An NBC North Dakota News poll shows incumbent Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND) down by 10 points to her Republican opponent, Rep. Kevin Cramer.
Cramer is up 51-41. 8% of those polled remain undecided.
The majority of the respondents named the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh as their main issue.
Rob Port at SayAnythingBlog.com shared his analysis:
The survey was conducted by Strategic Research Associates, an organization I’ve never heard of before. The folks at FiveThirtyEight.com don’t have them graded, either, so I’m not sure how much stock to put into this particular survey.Though, to be fair, I’m not sure how much stock to put in any survey at this point in the cycle. I suspect the reality of the Senate race is that it’s close (certainly much closer than a 10 point Cramer lead), and opinions among the undecided are very fluid. Things could break either way, very quickly.Remember that in 2012, when Heitkamp was first elected to the Senate, there was polling out weeks before election day showing her Republican opponent with a 10 point lead. She went on to win the race.Still, the fact that Cramer has consistently led every single public poll in this race going back to February makes me think it’s his race to lose at this point.
The Cook Political Report still has North Dakota has a toss-up, but this is a red state. Heitkamp is the only Democratic to win in the state in the last eight years, but that victory came with less than one percentage point. Plus, President Donald Trump won the state with 63% of the vote and 123,036 more votes than failed Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
The news about Kavanaugh doesn’t shock me because a Fox News poll in September made in known that those in North Dakota want Kavanaugh. The poll found that “[O]ne in three voters who say they could change their mind before November say they would be less likely to vote for Heitkamp if she opposes Kavanaugh, while 21 percent would be more likely.”
Judicial Crisis Network has spent $400,000 on ads to encourage Heitkamp and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) to confirm Kavanaugh. Like Heitkamp, Manchin represents a conservative state that chose Trump over Hillary by a large amount and wants Kavanaugh confirmed.
Here is the group’s ad for Manchin:
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