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By Joe Edwards
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Polling leaders have not always prevailed in the nation’s most competitive U.S. Senate races, raising questions about how much weight to place on this year’s narrow margins.
Republicans led RealClearPolitics’ final polling averages in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania—the four Senate contests The Cook Political Report rated as toss-ups in 2022—yet Democrats ultimately won all four seats.
How Previous Toss-Ups Played Out
In Nevada, Republican Adam Laxalt led Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto by 3.4 percentage points in aggregator RealClearPolitics’ final average of polls, but Masto went on to win by a narrow 0.9 points.
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In Pennsylvania, RealClearPolitics’ final poll average showed Republican Mehmet Oz marginally ahead of Democrat John Fetterman, 47.2 to 46.8, though Fetterman won by almost 5 points, 51.2 to 46.3.
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Senate races in Arizona and Georgia were also rated toss-ups by Cook that year. In both, the Democratic candidate won despite being narrowly behind in RealClearPolitics’ final polling average.
Whether that pattern could recur is now a question in Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Ohio and Texas—the seven Senate races Cook rates as toss-ups in 2026. Several are separated by narrow margins in RealClearPolitics’ polling averages.
The margin looks especially narrow in Iowa, where Republican Ashley Hinson leads Democrat Josh Turek by less than half a percentage point, according to RealClearPolitics’ average.
Alaska is considered another particularly tight race, with Democrat Mary Peltola 1.4 points ahead of Republican incumbent Daniel Sullivan.
Texas also looks to be closely divided. Democrat James Talarico leads RealClearPolitics’ polling average in the Lone Star State by 2.5 points over Ken Paxton.
RealClearPolitics’ polling averages put the Democratic candidate ahead in Kansas (by 3.6 points), Maine (3.3), Michigan (5.3) and Ohio (2.8).
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Why Narrow Polling Leads Require Caution
Joshua Dyck, a political science professor and director of the Center for Public Opinion at the University of Massachusetts Lowell, cautioned against drawing firm conclusions from narrow polling leads.
“People are often too eager to make predictions from close polls rather than to conclude the obvious, that the election is close and within the margin of error,” Dyck told Newsweek.
He described polls as snapshots rather than votes, adding that their underlying data can still provide useful information about a race.
Dyck added that toss-up results often move in the same direction because elections are influenced by the same national political environment.
“A late break, especially in a nationalized political environment, will tend to fall in the same direction,” he said.
Mike Traugott, a professor emeritus of political science at the University of Michigan, does not expect the 2022 scenario to be repeated this year.
“The outcome in 2022 was unusual,” he told Newsweek. Pollsters have been working over several election cycles to correct “systematic partisan biases” in their estimates, he added, and their improved performance makes him less likely to expect the same pattern this year.
The pattern did not repeat across the board two years later. In 2024, the candidate leading RealClearPolitics’ final polling average won three of the four Senate races Cook rated as toss-ups: Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin. Pennsylvania was the exception.
Cook’s review of its final pre-election ratings also found that toss-up Senate races often break heavily toward one party rather than producing an even split. Democrats won eight of the 10 contests rated as toss-ups in 2012, while Republicans captured eight of nine in 2014. The election analyzer said the closest races in a given election tend to move disproportionately in one party’s direction.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Daniel Orton and Dave Siminoff.
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