“Republicans are trying to boost their early-voting efforts after lagging behind Democrats in the past two election cycles, spending unprecedented sums at the state level and launching a national campaign to get GOP voters to cast ballots before Election Day,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“With early voting beginning Friday in three states, the GOP’s efforts have the potential to affect the outcome of close races. Campaigns that bank early votes can then spend their resources chasing supporters with less reliable voting histories, who may need a push to the polls.”

“The Kansas Supreme Court issued a decision laden with political intrigue Thursday that overruled the state’s top elections officer and declared Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Chad Taylor could pull himself from the November ballot,” the Topeka Capital Journal reports.

“In the middle of a wild campaign for the seat held by three-term Republican Sen. Pat Roberts, the high court’s opinion thwarted the decision of Secretary of State Kris Kobach to prohibit Taylor’s exit from race.”

Rick Hasen: “The big unanswered question is what happens to the other statute which appears to require Democrats to replace a withdrawn candidate on the ballot.”

A new Rasmussen survey in Georgia finds David Perdue (R) leading Michelle Nunn (D) by five points in the U.S. Senate race, 46% to 41%.

American Interest: “The most interesting finding of a recent NYT poll on voter preferences before the midterms: The Democrats have lost their edge with women. Though the NYT write-up of the poll doesn’t mention the change, it shows up in the accompanying graph. When asked “If the 2014 election for United States House of Representatives seats were being held today, would you vote for the Republican candidate or the Democratic candidate in your district?” women favor Democrats over Republicans by one point only, 43 to 42 percent.”

First Read: “It’s really hard to get a handle on this year’s race because the likely-voter modeling is so divergent, even among good pollsters with good reputations. It’s ironic: In the past two weeks, we’ve seen a tremendous amount of polling, and it’s created more uncertainty that anything else.”

“That said, this year should be a reminder as to why to be leery of any political handicapping site only using released polls as their basis for prediction. These aggregation and regression analysis sites are trying to find accuracy with incredibly inaccurate data. That’s not exactly scientific.”

Kyle Kondik: “There are all sorts of reasons why you shouldn’t, unless in the next seven weeks one side or the other — probably the Republicans — starts opening up a clear lead in enough races to give them a clear majority. If neither side does, control of the Senate could remain up in the air — for a while.”

Karl Rove: “The president’s job approval numbers are lousy, no Democrat in a competitive Senate race polls regularly above 50%, GOP enthusiasm is high, and independents are trending Republican. The midterm environment is terrible for Democrats–yet each passing day provides evidence as to why a GOP Senate majority is still in doubt.”

A new Quinnipiac poll in Colorado finds Cory Gardner (R) leading Sen. Mark Udall (D) by eight points in the U.S. Senate race among likely voters, 48% to 40%.