Even after the tumultuous Summer of Trump, Republicans still insist that he won’t doom their hopes of retaining control of Capitol Hill.

Returning to Washington after their long August recess, Republican lawmakers are cautiously optimistic that GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump can remain disciplined enough over the next two months to keep them from getting blown out — and give them a fighting chance to hold the Senate and protect their sizable House majority.


“If he can hold it together for eight weeks this thing’s going to be very close. I think he’s beginning to realize the big picture,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who opposes Trump's candidacy. “Most of our guys are running ahead of Trump in these competitive states. The narrower the gap the better. And [Hillary Clinton’s] just had a series of political body blows.”

"He seems to have his own style, his own plan, and people respond to it," Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) said. "And we're seeing that more [media] focus now is ... being put on Hillary Clinton. The stories are not good."

Of course, this late in the presidential contest, there’s little congressional Republicans can do other than hope Trump avoids any further campaign debacles over the next two months. Failing that, their only option is to abandon Trump altogether — which for most Republicans is not a viable option.

But chances of sweeping Senate and House Republican losses increased sharply in August after Trump’s muddled immigration policy pronouncements — not to mention his clash with a Gold Star family in July. Still, recent national polls suggest that Trump’s slightly more disciplined approach to campaigning and focus on Hillary Clinton has helped close the gap — a trend that could likewise buoy House and Senate GOP candidates facing down-ballot headwinds created by Trump’s overall unpopularity.

“We’ve seen improvement in his campaign and there’s still a number of months left. If he continues going in that direction, it could come out very positive,” said House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

Many Republicans privately say Trump's recent campaign strategy probably won't translate to a presidential win, but it will aid their battles for Senate and House control. House Rules Chairman Pete Sessions (R-Texas), for example, said anytime the Republican nominee does better, Hill Republicans benefit from it too. And he hopes that Trump’s plan in the coming weeks to layout his policy vision showing how he would govern will likewise help the party: “I’m on the ballot, too,” he joked.

Many congressional Republicans have managed to run ahead of Trump in individual state races, so GOP officials merely want him to stay close enough to Clinton to allow them a shot at winning reelection.

Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) trails Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan by 1 point while Trump lags Clinton by 9, Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) is less than a point behind Katie McGinty while Clinton leads by nearly 7 points and Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) is outrunning Trump by 10 points with a healthy lead over former Gov. Ted Strickland, according to RealClearPolitics polling averages. But if Trump were to sink further in the polls, all that could change.

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), a key Trump booster, dialed up Trump’s campaign in August to plead with them to “get him off the primary kicks” after the Republican convention, when Trump tangled with the parents of Humayun Khan, an American soldier killed in Iraq, and drew widespread condemnation. Apparently satisfied, Hatch now says Trump’s even “got a good chance to win it.”

“I did call. And almost immediately he stopped the attacks and so forth,” Hatch said. “They were fun during the primary … and he’s been pretty serious since. I think he’s done a pretty good job.”

Even with Trump’s sinking poll numbers showing some signs of improvement, Trump has still shown a penchant for vague policy pronouncements and internecine battles: In the past 48 hours he attacked Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) as “weak,” stoked unfounded rumors over Clinton’s health and refused to rule out some legal status for undocumented immigrants — after previously taking a hard line on the matter.

Flake said despite his colleagues’ sunny view of Trump, nothing has changed.

“I don’t want to prolong this anymore. I just want him to run a good campaign. I want Republicans to win but I want them to deserve to win, too,” Flake said in an interview. “So, I’ve had issues with the way he’s campaigned.”

Indeed, for Trump to offer real election-year stability, he needs to continue building a more traditional campaign — and long-term discipline has been in short supply over the past four months.

"I still hear things that I don't agree with, but recognizing that he is the nominee of our party, recognizing what's at stake, I'm supporting him," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Tuesday. "I'm just as interested in what's happening in places like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Illinois and New Hampshire, and I'm just hoping that as the gap decreases between Clinton and Trump, that it also lightens the burden on our Senate candidates."

While Democrats have far more paths to the majority, if Trump stays somewhat close to Clinton in competitive states then at least Republicans have a credible route to keeping the Senate. Republicans are defending 24 states to Democrats’ 10, and Democrats are strongly favored to claw back three seats right now (they need four and the presidency to take back the majority).

But things could turn dramatically worse for Republicans if the bottom falls out of Trump’s campaign over the next month in places like North Carolina. Clinton has a small edge now in the Tarheel State, which has suddenly made incumbent GOP Sen. Richard Burr vulnerable and a potential target for Senate Democrats, particularly if Trump can’t recover.

Burr said he’s blazing his own path to separate himself from the ups and downs of the presidential race.

"He's had an effect on everybody's race from the standpoint of understanding what type of an election year this is. It's a weird one,” Burr told reporters. "I plan to win regardless of how Donald Trump finishes."