Money isn’t enough to smooth the path for Republican candidates hoping to retake the Senate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Frustrated by the seemingly endless cash flowing to Democrats, Republicans aiming to retake the Senate have rallied around candidates with plenty of their own money.

The goal is to neutralize Democrats’ roughly 2-to-1 financial advantage, among the few bright spots for a party defending twice as many Senate seats as Republicans this year. But it also risks elevating untested candidates who might not be prepared for the scrutiny often associated with fiercely contested Senate campaigns.

In Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, GOP Senate candidates are being pressed on whether they live in the state. In Montana, the party’s Senate candidate recently admitted lying about the circumstances of a gunshot wound he sustained. And in Ohio, the Republican contender pitched himself as financially independent but now may be turning to donors for help repaying loans he made to his campaign.

“One of the challenges they face, as opposed to established politicians, is that established politicians have already gone through the process,” said David Winston, a Republican pollster and senior adviser to House Republicans.

The GOP needs to gain only two seats to win Senate control, and the party’s top Democratic targets have vulnerabilities of their own that run counter to their carefully curated images as advocates for the working class. Those liabilities include Montana Sen. Jon Tester’s ties to defense industry lobbyists; Sherrod Brown, of Ohio, repeatedly failing to pay property taxes on time; and Pennsylvania’s Bob Casey spending more than $500,000 in campaign cash at his sister’s printing business.

But for Republicans, the dynamic is sensitive because they’ve been here before.

Since the rise of the tea party movement more than