Sabato’s Crystal Ball, an independent election handicapper, predicts that the GOP will win control of the Senate with 51 seats. This prediction comes before Tuesday’s midterm elections.

On Monday, the University of Virginia’s Department of Politics published an updated prediction. It noted that the Senate races of Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania are still “jump balls”. However, the handicapper changed its rating in Pennsylvania to “leans Republican” while shifting the Nevada Senate race from “leans Democratic” to “leans Republican”.

These ratings highlight the importance of Nevada, Georgia, and Pennsylvania in the race to control the Senate in the coming year.

According to polls, Pennsylvania’s Lt. Governor. John Fetterman (D), is tied with Republican Mehmet O, while Sen. Raphael Warnock holds a slight advantage over GOP nominee Herschel Wade in Georgia.

“Basically, we think that the environment is not favorable to Democrats holding the Senate. Could they? They could.

“But, we believe the Republicans could and should win, despite the challenges of this cycle,” the report said. According to the report, we have enough seats for them to control 51 of their magic numbers.

After Jon Ralston, a Nevada Independent journalist, predicted that Cortez Masto would win, the election handicapper stated it was shifting its Nevada prediction to favor incumbent Senator Catherine Cortez Masto.

It added, “It’s also worth noting that Nevada is one of the most bluest core Senate battlegrounds.”

The Crystal Ball of Sabato also predicts that the GOP will easily win the majority in the House. This is despite the GOP gaining 24 seats. It also changed its rating for four state gubernatorial election from a “toss up” to a “lean Republican.”

According to the report, factors like anger at the conservative Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade as well as the unpopularity and popularity of Trump may help reduce Democratic losses.

“To the extent that these factors matter, we think they end up imposing some limits on the size GOP gains this year,” Sabato’s Crystal Ball wrote. “That’s reflected by our projections which we believe represent a good, but not necessarily great night of Republicans,” Sabato’s Crystal Ball wrote.