The unexpected retirement of West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin last month added fuel to the hopes that Republicans can reclaim the U.S. Senate in 2024.

It should be a slam dunk with a favorable Senate map and a deeply unpopular Democrat president. Of the 34 regularly scheduled elections in 2024, Democrats are defending twice as many seats as Republicans — 20 to 11. That gives Republicans twice as many potential pickups. There will also be three seats up that are currently held by independents who caucus with Democrats. So count those as Democrats, meaning three more seats they need to defend.

Right now, Democrats hold a 51-49 majority. Manchin is not running again because West Virginia has become one of the reddest states in the union, going for Trump over Biden by 39 points. That seat will flip with almost any Republican, but with popular Republican Gov. Jim Justice leading the primary, the Democrats will be lucky to find a sacrificial lamb. The Cook Political Report has put it as “solid Republican” with Manchin stepping down.

Of the 11 Senate seats that Republicans are defending this year, Cook has nine of them as “solid Republican” and two, Texas and Florida, as “likely Republican.” That is an unusually strong defensive position, and given the pickup of West Virginia, which ties the Senate, Republicans can train most of their funding and resources on some of the vulnerable 23 Democrats. And here, the field is ripe for harvest.

Fifteen of the Senate seats are solid or likely for Democrats. Four states — Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — only “lean” Democrat. While three states — Arizona, Montana, and Ohio — are considered “toss-ups.”

Before we take a peek in some detail at these states, a caveat: Several of these have Democrat secretaries of state and have shown no inclination to back away from their horrific, illegal, unconstitutional 2020 election changes. And we have no idea what Covid-like schemes are being hatched to further the disruption of legitimate democracy. Not a conspiracy. We all saw 2020.

With that said, we take a look at these states beyond the polling (everyone remembers the deep disappointment of 2022 from errant polls). Here are the three toss-up states.

And here are the four states only leaning Democrat:

Of course Republicans could totally mess this up. There is precedent. But to be fair, when fighting the entirety of corporate media, all of social media except X, the corrupt apparatus in many states, pop culture knuckleheads such as Taylor Swift with knucklehead lemming followers, less money than Democrats and the rest of the movers of culture and information, Republicans need to be nearly perfect to ever win.

Related: Dumb and Drunker — Team Biden Wants Hillary's Help

Final caveat: The unknown effect of Trump winning the nomination and being in prison (a realistic possibility) on down-ballot races. And we won’t know that until we know that.