Senate Democrats' secret weapon? Donald Trump

WASHINGTON — Democrats trying to regain control of the Senate in November say they have a powerful new weapon: Donald Trump.

Montana Sen. Jon Tester, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, says having Trump at the top of the ticket is putting even such senior Republicans as Arizona's John McCain and Iowa's Chuck Grassley at risk of losing their seats. He derided as doomed efforts by some GOP contenders to keep their distance from the party's presumptive presidential nominee.

"Donald Trump for the last year-plus has said things and done things that have been totally inappropriate, and he's gotten away with it, yet the folks here in the Senate have endorsed him almost en bloc," Tester told Capital Download on Thursday. "I just think when you do that kind of stuff, knowing full well what you've got, it speaks to who you are as a candidate."

He dismissed efforts by some Republicans to spotlight their differences with Trump while still saying they will vote for their party's nominee.

"The people who stand up and said, 'He said this thing about a judge that I didn't like but I'm still going to vote for him, I still endorse him' — that's as good as standing for all the principles that he stands for, in my opinion," Tester told USA TODAY's weekly video newsmaker series. "He's their guy, and he's a known commodity, yet they still endorse him; they still stand up for the policies he stands up for."

That is an argument Republicans are likely to hear in Democratic attack ads this fall tying them to Trump's most provocative declarations.

The Montana senator with a distinctive buzz cut just might be the luckiest pol in America this year. He chairs the Democrats' Senate campaign arm in a year that already had a favorable landscape: Republicans have 24 Senate seats up in November, Democrats just 10. Democrats already were hopeful they would be able to gain the ground necessary to reclaim control two years after Republicans gained it.

That would require a net gain of four seats if Democrats hold the White House — because the vice president would break a 50-50 tie — or five seats if Republicans win the presidency. A half-dozen of the Republican seats are in such swing states as Florida, Illinois, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

"I feel very good about chances in November," Tester said. "Very good."

He did express concern about the prospect that conservative donors, including the Koch brothers network, will divert to Senate contests money they typically would have contributed to the presidential race. "The money is the problem," he said.

Tester credits the Democrats' bright prospects to the quality of the candidates recruited to challenge Republican senators — but he adds that Trump's presence on the ballot "is going to help our candidates."

Even McCain, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, and Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, are in trouble, Tester says. Trump's inflammatory rhetoric about Mexican immigrants is creating problems with Arizona's rising Latino population for McCain, who faces Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick. And Tester says Grassley could lose to Democrat Patty Judge not only because he's supporting Trump but also because he's denying Merrick Garland, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, a hearing before his panel.

"That's not Iowa; that's not Iowa values," Tester said. "He's made his bed there."