PPP-IA: Braley +1

[Ryan in Iowa]

The IA absentee request trend is not really encouraging though.

The Dem-lead is down to 2.7%, while the final margin in 2010 was D+5.7% ...

The GOP has taken a completely different stance on early voting this year (to their credit), so there is no way the dems will finish with an outsized lead. However, the GOP they are targeting Republicans, which are highly likely to vote anyways on election day.

The Dems made a huge effort to target casual dems/independents early, and it may be the difference at the end.

[Ryan in Iowa]

Stupendous news! An extremist nutjob like Ernst has no business being a US Senator.

Is it possible that Braley is improving because of early voting? In other words, Dems are getting a lot of people out to vote who would normally be shut out of the LV screen, but you can't say someone who already voted isn't a likely voter.

It probably is helping , but it depends on the poll. Early voting definitely helped Braley on the Selzer poll, which used too tough of a likely voter model 2 months away from the election.

Honestly, the biggest problem from Ernst is that as the light shines on her more, her views for Iowa are problematic at getting to 50+%.

She would not be in this race if it wasn't for Braley's early mistakes, however, to his credit he has preformed well in the debates. The problem with that is very few watch the debates.

[Ryan in Iowa]

My bet was always that IA's light blue tint would assert itself, so can't say I'm surprised.

It's only light blue in Presidential elections, but I guess that's all this board ever uses when saying "red state" or "blue state."  Iowa has a Republican governor, Republican senate, Republican house, a Republican Senator (soon to be two, possibly) and their House delegation is every divided.

This is actually incorrect.