U.S. Sen. Susan Collins’s reelection is nearly as certain as death and taxes, according to the Washington Post’s Election Lab predictions released on Thursday.
According to WaPo, Collins has a greater than 99 percent chance of defeating her challenger, Democrat Shenna Bellows.
Here’s what WaPo says about their Election Lab: “Like most forecasting models, Election Lab uses the past to predict the future. To predict House and Senate elections in 2014, we draw on the elections from 1980-2012. We first look at how well key factors were related to outcomes in those past elections. Then, we gather information about those same factors for 2014. Assuming that these factors will be related to election outcomes in 2014 in the same way they were from 1980 to 2012, we can make a prediction about who will win each race.” (You can read more about their methodology here.)
According to the Election Lab analysis, the GOP has an 82 percent chance of taking control of the Senate and a 99 percent chance of retaining control of the House.
Well, if this pans out we will continue to have two Democrats in the Senate from Maine.