Cory Booker Thinks Dems ‘Still Have A Very Strong Pathway’ To Hold The Senate, Add Seats In Midterms

Democratic New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker said that Democrats still have a chance to hold the U.S. Senate.

Appearing on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday, Booker claimed that Democrats are “bucking” the historical trend in which a first-term president’s party usually loses in the midterm elections. Democrats have been pushing those talking points in recent days as Republicans are relying on public polling to advance an alternative narrative.

“The party in the White House usually loses during midterms but the reality is we still have a very strong pathway,” Booker said. “Not just to keeping the Senate but really picking up seats in… Pennsylvania and in places like Wisconsin and North Carolina. This election still is in the ballots. And the reality is we’re bucking what are usual trends.”

“I think that this is a tough election season,” Booker continued. “It’s a midterm election. But I still see a pathway for us to maintain control of the Senate.”

When asked how Democrats could win, Booker said it would happen if they showed up at the polls and vote. “It happens by voter turnout,” he said. “I mean, when I’m going around the country, I see a lot of enthusiasm, but at the end of the day, we’ve got to translate that to people getting out.”

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the same thing in an interview with the Associated Press last week. “It’s tight,” Schumer said. “I believe Democrats will hold the Senate and maybe even pick up seats.”

“I don’t want to give the illusion that these are all slam dunks,” he continued, but “[t]he fact that we’re in the ballpark and our Democratic candidates are defying the political environment is a testament to a few things.”

“[Voters] are seeing how extreme these Republican candidates are, and they don’t like it. And second, they’re seeing the Democrats are talking to them on issues they care about, and that we’ve accomplished a great deal on things.”

Democratic activists and legacy media have recently attacked public polling, especially surveys that favor Republicans. After the New York Times released a series of polls showing Democrats in the lead in key battleground Senate races, leftist media personalities blasted those that found Republicans leading in those races, calling them “cheap” and “partisan” while accusing them of trying to manufacture a red wave.

“If you get past those headlines and dig a little deeper, you would uncover an insidious and seemingly intentional campaign from Republican-backed polling firms to flood the zone and tip the balance of polling averages in favor of their candidates, to create a narrative that Republicans are surging and that a red wave is imminent and inevitable,” MSNBC host Joy Reid said in a monologue on her show “The ReidOut” Monday.

“Most of the polling over the last few weeks is coming from partisan outfits — usually Republican — or auto-dial firms,” New York Times pollster Nate Cohn claimed in an editorial touting his own polling. “These polls are cheap enough to flood the zone, and many of them were emboldened by the 2020 election, when their final results came close to the election results even as other pollsters struggled.”