Republican Senate candidates take the spotlight at Milwaukee convention

(CNN) — The excitement at the Republican National Convention isn’t just about Donald Trump and his new running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance – it also extends to Senate candidates who the party believes can help deliver the former president a GOP majority on Capitol Hill.

While Democrats in competitive Senate races have largely been overperforming President Joe Biden in polling so far this year, Republicans are hopeful that that movement in favor of Trump at the top of the ticket will close those gaps and potentially expand this year’s playing field. That’s reflected in the roster of candidates speaking Tuesday night, which includes Hung Cao, the GOP Senate nominee in Virginia, a state Biden won by 10 points in 2020.

Besides Virginia – which New York Times/Siena College polling out this week showed to be a margin-of-error presidential race – Republicans are also eyeing the Senate race in New Mexico, a state Biden carried by 11 points.

Montana Sen. Steve Daines, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, specifically touted New Mexico GOP nominee Nella Domenici, the daughter of the late Sen. Pete Domenici, at a CNN-Politico Grill event in Milwaukee on Monday. Polling conducted by the NRSC and Domenici’s campaign last month showed her in a margin-of-error race with Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich.

Democrats, however, don’t see trouble signs for their incumbents in those states. “While Democrats are taking nothing for granted, New Mexico and Virginia have elected Democrats to the US Senate for over a decade and will do so again this cycle,” said a national Democrat working on Senate races.

Republicans need to pick up just one or two seats to flip the Senate, depending on who wins the White House. And with Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin retiring from deep-red West Virginia, they’re likely to get at least one of those. The top three seats on CNN’s ranking of the Senate seats most likely to flip have consistently been in states Trump twice won comfortably, followed by presidential battlegrounds.

Maryland, which backed Biden by more than 30 points, joined the list of GOP targets after former two-term Gov. Larry Hogan entered the race. But the popular Republican, who has made clear he isn’t supporting Trump despite having the former president’s support, will unsurprisingly not be onstage Tuesday night.

Election observers don’t see improving numbers for Trump drastically changing a map that already favored his party.

“It expands the map for Republicans at the very margin of the battlefield. But the status quo was already a pretty expansive list of opportunities for Republicans,” Jacob Rubashkin, deputy editor of Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales, told CNN, arguing that New Mexico is a more realistic takeover opportunity for Senate Republicans than Virginia.

Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez’s conviction Tuesday in his federal corruption trial – and his colleagues’ calls for him to step down – has put a fresh spotlight on New Jersey, where Democratic Rep. Andy Kim has a strong path to election in a state that backed Biden by 16 points in 2020. There’s still the possibility Menendez could run as an independent and split the Democratic vote, but Rubashkin doesn’t think that’s a big threat to Democrats.

“The reality was that (Menendez) was so unpopular in the state by the time the verdict came down that any support he would have gotten would not have complicated Andy Kim’s path in a major way,” he said.

While the Senate landscape unquestionably benefits Republicans, some of the most vulnerable Senate Democratic incumbents have leaned on strong brands in their states and fundraising advantages to create separation from Biden. Republicans recruited a large crop of wealthy candidates, many of them businessmen, to run this year. But that hasn’t yet closed Democrats’ fundraising edge, and it’s fueled Democratic attacks on the Republican candidate’s business ties and out-of-state connections.

Daines argued on Monday that polling from this spring and early summer won’t reflect what happens in November, suggesting that lower-propensity voters who support Trump will turn out this year in a way they did not during the 2022 midterms. Daines said the NRSC halted its polling on Saturday after the assassination attempt on Trump to let things “cool off a bit.” And there’s been limited public polling – especially of Senate races – since last month’s presidential debate.

Since the debate, some GOP Senate candidates have run ads questioning Biden’s mental fitness for office, trying to pressure Democratic incumbents into answering whether he’s fit to serve. But Daines said this week that the president’s policies, rather than his acuity, should be the focus.

“I don’t think we need to talk about President Biden’s mental acuity,” Daines told Politico’s Rachael Bade during the CNN-Politico Grill interview, reflecting the shift in Republican messaging that was largely seen onstage Monday during night one of the RNC.

Candidates onstage Tuesday night will include those in the GOP’s top targeted races. West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice, a former Democrat, is almost certain to flip the strong Trump state. In Montana, businessman Tim Sheehy is taking on Sen. Jon Tester, the most vulnerable Senate incumbent running for reelection. Ohio businessman Bernie Moreno, whom Democrats boosted in the GOP primary because they thought he’d be the weakest challenger, is trying to unseat Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, a progressive populist who has so far been able to defy the reddening of his home state.

Candidates running in key battlegrounds will also be on hand. Army veteran Sam Brown is taking on first-term Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen in Nevada – a state where demographics are moving away from Democrats.

Another veteran, Pennsylvania’s Dave McCormick, who ran unsuccessfully for the GOP Senate nod in 2022, is taking on Democratic Sen. Bob Casey. In Michigan’s open Senate race, national Republicans and Trump are backing former House Intelligence Chairman Mike Rogers to take on Rep. Elissa Slotkin, the likely Democratic nominee after next month’s primaries.

And in the convention’s home state of Wisconsin, Republicans have rallied around businessman Eric Hovde to take on Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin.

In Arizona’s open Senate race, Kari Lake is all but certain to win next month’s GOP primary, but her refusal to accept her 2022 gubernatorial loss and her repetition of Trump’s 2020 election lies has given some Republicans pause. She’ll be facing Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego in a state Biden flipped in 2020 but that looks unlikely to go blue again this year.

Tuesday’s speakers also include Indiana Rep. Jim Banks, who’s seeking an open seat in a solidly red state, and Florida Sen. Rick Scott, who is one of Democrats’ few targets this year but running in a red-trending state. Scott, who’s making a bid to succeed Mitch McConnell as Senate GOP leader, is expected to face former Democratic Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell.

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