Voters in four states Tuesday will choose candidates for the fall elections in contests that will do much to determine whether the GOP maintains its razor-thin edge in the Senate.

Contests include a raucous Senate primary fight in West Virginia, a bitter intraparty feud for nomination to the Senate in Indiana, and a race to replace outgoing Ohio Gov. John Kasich.

Here is a look at the major action Tuesday and the stakes:

State: West Virginia
Key race: Republican Senate primary
The stakes: The marquee matchup here is the Republican primary, which will determine the right to challenge Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin. Few incumbent Democrats offer a juicier target for the GOP than Manchin, who — despite his conservative rhetoric and somewhat moderate voting record — faces steep headwinds in a state that backed President Donald Trump by 42 percentage points in 2016. But party insiders fear they will blow their chance if voters pick Don Blankenship, a wealthy mine owner convicted of crimes related to safety violations, which led to an accident that killed 29 people.

If a criminal record were not enough of a drag, Blankenship has gained national attention over the past couple of weeks for running what some regard as a racially tinged campaign. This has included attacks on the Taiwanese ancestry of the in-laws of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

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Aside from the personal nature of the attacks against him, the race must give McConnell flashbacks to 2010, when he saw promising hopes of recapturing control of the upper chamber flame out amid candidates who won GOP Senate primaries that year though they were not ready for prime time.

Trump waded into the race early Monday with a tweet raising the specter of Roy Moore, an Alabama Republican with a boatload of liabilities. Moore won the GOP primary in a special election for the Senate last year, only to become the first Republican Senate candidate to lose to a Democrat in the Heart of Dixie since 1992.

“To the great people of West Virginia we have, together, a really great chance to keep making a big difference,” he tweeted. “Problem is, Don Blankenship, currently running for Senate, can’t win the General Election in your State … No way! Remember Alabama. Vote Rep. Jenkins or A.G. Morrisey!”

That was a reference to the two mainstream Republicans vying for the nomination, state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins.

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Polls generally have put Blankenship in third place, but his campaign on Monday released an internal survey suggesting he has a 17-point lead.

State: Indiana
Key race: GOP Senate primary
The stakes: Incumbent Joe Donnelly is another beatable Democrat in a state that voted heavily for Trump in 2016. This race lacks the kind of polarizing figure that Blankenship presents in West Virginia, but the contest has been plenty heated.

Mostly, a pair of Republican congressmen — Todd Rokita and Luke Messer — have vied for which one is more supportive of the president and his agenda. While they have trained their fire on one another, businessman Mike Braun has been able to float above them. He has led the two most recent polls.

Rokita and Messer have spent more than $5.6 million, mainly pummeling each other.

Braun, who resigned his seat in the Indiana state House of Representatives to concentrate on the campaign, has outspent them both at $4.45 million — much of it coming from loans he has made to the campaign from his personal wealth.

Belatedly, Braun’s opponents are waking up to the threat, seizing on a CNN report over the weekend that he has voted in many Democratic primaries over the years, and that files at the Republican National Committee (RNC) listed him as a “hard Democrat” — meaning that he was not a voter considered persuadable for Republican campaigns.

Braun has dismissed the notion, insisting that he has always been a Republican but sometimes voted in Democratic primaries in his solidly blue county to have the greatest impact on local races, while always voting Republican in general elections.

One impact of the competitive Republican primary is that Donnelly has been able to sock away funds for the fall. Campaign finance records show he has nearly $6.2 million in the bank.

State: Ohio
Key races: Democratic gubernatorial primary, Republican Senate primary
The stakes: Few Republicans have been a more persistent thorn in Trump’s side than Kasich, who refused to concede long after Trump beat him in the 2016 presidential primaries — and refused even to attend the Republican National Convention, even though it took place in his state. While Kasich has toyed with running again in 2020, Ohio pols have been busy trying to succeed him.

The Democrats have the competitive primary, featuring Richard Cordray, a former state attorney general who also ran the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which President Barack Obama and the Democratic Congress created in 2010 following the Great Recession of 2008.

Cordray’s main opponent is ultra-liberal former representative and Cleveland Mayor Dennis Kucinich. Kucinich was known as “Dennis the Menace” in the early years of his career due to his being only 31 years old when inaugurated and his confrontational style of us vs. them populism.

Regardless of who wins — and polls suggest Cordray is the favorite — Democrats are virtually guaranteed to get a hard-Left standard-bearer in November.

The likely GOP opponent is former Sen. Mike DeWine, who now serves as state attorney general. If he faces Cordray in November, it would be a rematch of their 2010 contest for attorney general, which DeWine won.

DeWine has led early hypothetical match-ups against both Cordray and Kucinich.

For the Senate, Rep. Jim Renacci has led a crowded GOP primary field, although surveys consistently show a majority of voters undecided. The winner gets the right to face incumbent Democrat Sherrod Brown, whom most analysts consider the favorite in the fall.

State: North Carolina
Key races: Three Democratic primaries for congressional seats
The stakes: With no Senate or gubernatorial races on the ballot this year, attention in the Tar Heel State shifts down ballot to a trio of suburban congressional districts that Democrats hope to capture in the fall. Republicans will be favored in all three, but all three GOP incumbents could be vulnerable in a changing state if a blue wave emerges nationally.

The 13th Congressional District probably offers Democrats their best shot at unseating a Republican in North Carolina.

Trump won the suburban district between Charlotte and Greensboro by more than 9 points, but this is incumbent Republican Ted Budd’s first term, and his fundraising has been lackluster.

The favorite in the Democratic primary, former immigration lawyer Kathy Manning, has outraised him and has nearly twice as much money in the bank.

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In the 2nd Congressional District, former state Rep. Linda Coleman faces technology entrepreneur Ken Romley in a district that takes in the Raleigh suburbs. The Republican incumbent, George Holding, has been in office since 2013 but has represented his current district only since last year, following his defeat of fellow Republican Rep. Renee Ellmers after the courts ordered a redistricting.

Trump won the district by about 9 points.

In the 9th District, incumbent Republican Rep. Robert Pittenger has a pair of primary opponents, including a rematch from 2016 against Mark Harris, former president of the North Carolina Baptist Convention. If Pittenger can hold them off, he will face the winner of a Democratic primary featuring Marine Corps veteran and solar energy entrepreneur Dan McCready and 2016 candidate Christian Cano.

Trump won the Charlotte-area district by 11.6 points in 2016.

PoliZette senior writer Brendan Kirby can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter.