2014 midterms

Polls: Close Senate races in Iowa, North Carolina

The campaigns remain tight for a pair of Democratic-held Senate seats, according to a new pair of surveys from CNN.

In Iowa, where Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin is retiring, Republican state Sen. Joni Ernst has 49 percent support, to Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley's 47 percent. Notably, each candidate has the same personal ratings in this poll: 49 percent favorable, to 47 percent unfavorable — though one can guess that the two sets of respondents might be almost mirror-image opposites of one another, viewing one candidate positively and the other negatively.

In North Carolina, Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan has 48 percent support, against Republican state House Speaker Thom Tillis with 46 percent, plus 4 percent for Libertarian candidate Sean Haugh. Hagan's personal rating is 49 percent favorable, to 48 percent unfavorable — while Tillis is in worse shape, with only 43 percent favorable, to 50 percent unfavorable.

Both surveys of likely voters were conducted from Oct. 27 to 30, and have margins of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.