CNN

The stakes for Democrats in their extraordinary public schism over whether President Joe Biden should withdraw from the 2024 presidential race extend far beyond the White House. A decisive loss at the top of the ticket could cost Democrats control of the US Senate for the remainder of this decade and cement Republican dominance of the Supreme Court for a generation.

So far, Democratic anxiety about the presidential race’s impact on the Senate has been muted because public polling has almost invariably shown their candidates still leading in the key states where Biden has fallen behind former President Donald Trump. But recent history raises deep questions about whether Democratic Senate candidates can continue to levitate as far above the presidential ticket as polls now show.