Poll: Democrats lead in two key Senate races


Democrats are leading in two Senate races where they could flip a seat from red to blue, a new CNN poll finds.
Arizona Rep. Kyrsten Sinema and former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen are both Democrats trying to fill vacant seats where current Republican senators are retiring. Sinema leads her opponent, Arizona Rep. Martha McSally (R), by 7 points among likely voters in the race to replace retiring Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake (R). Bredesen, meanwhile, has a 5-point lead over Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) for the rights to outgoing Sen. Bob Corker's (R-Tenn.) seat, the poll finds.
About 1 in 6 voters in either state say there's a chance they'll change their mind before Nov. 6, per CNN. A previous Fox News poll showed Bredesen, who served as Tennessee's governor from 2003 to 2011, trailing Blackburn by 3 points.
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Still, Arizona and Tennessee are two of four states where Democrats are considered to have a strong chance at flipping a Senate seat, per CNN. The other two are Texas, where Republican Sen. Ted Cruz is fighting off a strong challenge from Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas), and Nevada, where Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen is battling vulnerable Sen. Dean Heller (R).
CNN polled 1,001 adults in Arizona and 1,000 adults in Tennessee. Both surveys were done over the phone from Sept. 11-15. The Arizona results have a margin of error of 3.8 points, while the Tennessee margin of error is 3.6 points. Read more about the poll's findings at CNN.
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Marianne is The Week’s Social Media Editor. She is a native Tennessean and recent graduate of Ohio University, where she studied journalism and political science. Marianne has previously written for The Daily Beast, The Crime Report, and The Moroccan Times.
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