Tag: SSP 2010 Senate Race Ratings

Mason-Dixon for Las Vegas Review-Journal (7/12-14, likely voters, 6/1-3 in parens):

Harry Reid (D-inc): 44 (41)

Sharron Angle (R): 37 (44)

Other: 4 (3)

None of these: 5 (4)

Undecided: 10 (8)

(MoE: 4%)

I’d thought the Patriot Majority poll from a few days ago (that gave Harry Reid a 4-point lead) was a little optimistic, but along comes Mason-Dixon (on behalf of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, which Jon Ralston has described as “an anti-Harry Reid PAC”) with an even bigger lead in their first poll since the resolution of the GOP primary.

As in Kentucky, this looks like a race where the most conservative primary option got insufficient pre-primary scrutiny in the media, and then got hammered with it afterwards. Add in a big disparity in the effectiveness of advertising and general messaging right now — Reid touting his ability to save jobs for Nevada, and Angle, um, criticizing Reid for saving jobs while saying that job creation’s not a Senator’s job — and there’s a definite shift in momentum here. No doubt someone will point out that the incumbent is still way below 50%, but I have a feeling Harry Reid is OK with that… because this is going to be an election where “None of these” scores extremely well.

Worth noting: nobody but Rasmussen has seen an Angle lead since the GOP primary wrapped up. Here’s the state of the race in graphic form, courtesy of Pollster.com:

We’d had a pretty clear sense that this race was headed back to “Tossup” (from “Lean Republican”) as soon as Sharron Angle won the primary, but with today’s poll we can’t justify holding back any longer.

It’s been clear for a few days now that Dino Rossi was ready to run for Senate, and, as expected, today was the official launch day:

In a five-minute video posted to his web site, www.dinorossi.com, Rossi reaches out to voters upset with the direction the country is headed, citing rising unemployment, plummeting housing values, “wasteful” stimulus plans and “massive new debt as far as the eye can see.”

In language straight out of Ronald Reagan’s playbook, Rossi says “America’s best days” lie ahead if we “unleash the power of the people” and restore government to its “proper, more limited role….”

Rossi says he’d start by “replacing the Pelosi-Reid health care bill with something that will actually reduce costs and increase access,” though he gave no specifics.

Before facing off against Patty Murray, though, Rossi needs to survive the state’s top-two primary. State Sen. Don Benton was considered the more-or-less establishment frontrunner before Rossi’s entry; he’s a friend of Rossi and is likely to share the same pool of votes and donors, so he may be ready to bail out. Rossi’s bigger problem is likelier to be Clint Didier, who has been explicitly courting the Tea Party vote (which doesn’t have much goodwill left for Rossi… and whom Rossi doesn’t seem too interested in, as he spent last Friday hinting about his plans not with them but rather in front of the Mainstream Republicans of Washington) and who has a freshly-minted Sarah Palin endorsement.

With many polls giving Murray a lead in the single digits over Rossi, Swing State Project is moving this race to “Lean Democratic” from our list of Races to Watch.  

• Election results: Yesterday’s big event was the special election in FL-19, the first real electoral test after the passage of HCR. The allegedly massive opposition to healthcare reform on the part of the district’s many seniors never really materialized. Democratic state Sen. Ted Deutch beat Republican Ed Lynch 62-35, with very little falloff from Obama’s 65-34 performance in 2008. (Contrast that with John Garamendi’s so-so 53-43 performance in November’s CA-10 special election, a similarly 65-33 district in 2008.)

I should also pause to offer a little credit to Texas’s Republicans, who voted for the less crazy candidates in the Board of Education and Supreme Court runoffs, and in a bigger surprise to me, for the Hispanic-surnamed candidates in the TX-17 and TX-23 runoffs (which, based on incumbent Victor Carrillo’s trouncing in the Railroad Commissioner primary, seemed unlikely to happen). The NRCC has to be pleased to see the wealthier and less wingnutty Bill Flores and Quico Canseco emerge. Rep. Chet Edwards, however, is one guy who knows how to stand and fight, and he wasted no time hitting Flores hard and defining him as a carpetbagger in big oil’s pocket.

One other leftover issue from last night: two races in California, as expected, are headed to runoffs. In Republican-held SD-12, Republican Assemblyman Bill Emmerson will face off against Democrat Justin Blake (the GOPers combined got more than 60% of the vote, so this is a likely hold), while in safely-Democratic AD-43, Democratic lawyer Mike Gatto will face off with Republican Sunder Ramani to replace now-LA city councilor Paul Krekorian. Gatto seemed to shoot the gap in this heavily Armenian-American district after the two Armenian candidates, Chahe Keuroghelian and Nayiri Nahabedian, nuked each other.

• AR-Sen: Bill Halter’s primary campaign gained more momentum, as he picked up an endorsement from the Alliance for Retired Americans, pleased with his time as a Social Security Administration official. One group that really isn’t getting on board with Halter, though, is the Berry family; first outgoing Rep. Marion Berry dissed Halter, and now his son, Mitch, is head of a group, Arkansans for Common Sense, that’s running ads attacking Halter on the Social Security front. (Are there any Arkansans who are actually against common sense?)

• CO-Sen: Looks like GOP establishment candidate Jane Norton sees the handwriting on the wall and is taking a page from Democrat Michael Bennet’s book: not able to rely on getting on the ballot via activist-dominated convention (where teabagger-fueled Ken Buck seems likely to triumph), she’s making plans to qualify by finding 1,500 signatures in each of the state’s seven congressional districts. Speaking of Bennet, he’s still the fundraising kingpin in this race; he just announced he raised $1.4 million last quarter, well ahead of Norton’s $816K.

• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist may have sounded Shermanesque last week in his determination not to switch to an Independent bid for Governor, but apparently now there’s increasing moves within his inner circle to move in that direction. Unnamed advisors are floating the idea to the WSJ today.

• IN-Sen: Dan Coats seems to be having more trouble making the transition from the free-wheelin’ world of high-stakes lobbying back to the humdrum electoral politics world, where you actually have to follow the rules and stuff. He’s 10 days overdue on filing his finance disclosure reports with the FEC. One note that the Beltway press seemed to miss though: his main GOP primary opponent, ex-Rep. John Hostettler hasn’t made his filing yet either. (Of course, fundraising was never Hostettler’s strong suit. Or even his weak suit.)

• NC-Sen (pdf): PPP issued its latest installment in polls of the Senate general election in its home state. Maybe the biggest surprise is that incumbent Republican Richard Burr’s approvals are just continuing to fall; he’s currently at 32/41 (while likeliest opponent Elaine Marshall is in positive territory at 19/11). Also encouraging, I suppose, is that the actual human Democrats are starting to draw even with Generic D (while previous polls have had Generic D far outpacing them), showing they’re getting better-defined. Burr leads Generic D 43-38, while he leads Marshall 43-37, and leads both Cal Cunningham and Kenneth Lewis 43-35.

• NY-Sen-B: With ex-Gov. George Pataki’s phantom interest in this race finally having been dispelled, Swing State Project is removing this race from its “Races to Watch” list.

• PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): One more poll in the rapidly-becoming-overpolled Pennsylvania Senate race, this time from Republican pollster Susequehanna. They use an LV model, and find Pat Toomey with a 48-38 lead over Arlen Specter. Of more immediate consequence, they find Specter leading Joe Sestak 42-28 in the Dem primary. They also polled both primaries in the gubernatorial race, finding Dan Onorato seeming to break away from the ill-defined pack among the Dems. Onorato is at 32, followed by Joe Hoeffel at 13, Jack Wagner at 6, and Anthony Williams at 4. Tom Corbett beats down Sam Rohrer on the GOP side, 50-7. After marshaling his resources, Specter is finally starting to open fire; he’s up with his first TV ad of the cycle starting today.

• WI-Sen: The only thing that’s sure is that Tommy Thompson likes to see his name in the press. There’s been a lot of conflicting reporting about Tommy Thompson today, with many outlets running with the story that he’s decided against running for Senate (that all traces back to one leak to a local TV station, although it sounds like Politico got some confirmation from an anonymous GOP source). Other outlets are emphasizing that Thompson’s spokesperson says that Thompson hasn’t made a final decision, though. Either way, Thompson will be announcing his plans at a Tea Party rally tomorrow in Madison, so our pain will be ended tomorrow one way or the other.

• MA-Gov: Here’s more evidence for my expectation that Dem-turned-indie Tim Cahill will be running to the right (or at least to the incoherent-angry-working-class-Catholic-guy-position) of the Republican in the Massachusetts gubernatorial race this year. He’s appearing at today’s Tea Party rally on Boston Common today, the same one with Sarah Palin that Scott Brown ditched (although MA-10 candidate Joe Malone and GOP gubernatorial underdog Christy Mihos will be there). Likely GOP gubernatorial nominee Charlie Baker (from the party’s old-school moderate WASP tradition) decided against attending, probably out of fears that he might get jostled by some ruffian and spill some of his gin and tonic on his white Bermuda shorts.

• MN-Gov: Two blasts from the past in the Minnesota gubernatorial race. Walter Mondale weighed in in favor of Democratic state House speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, while a guy I’ve never heard of named Al Quie, who claims to have been governor from 1979 to 1983, endorsed Republican Marty Seifert.

• NE-Gov: Via press release, the campaign for Democratic candidate Mark Lakers let us know that he took in $314K, impressive considering his late entry to the campaign.

• AL-07: State Rep. Earl Hilliard Jr. got an endorsement from the United Steelworkers, a union that seems to still have a lot of clout in Birmingham, once a major steel town.

• AZ-03: Now here’s some news I didn’t expect: the fundraising champ in the 3rd isn’t one of the many state legislators running here, but rather attorney (and vice-presidential progeny) Ben Quayle. He pulled in $550K in the first quarter, thanks no doubt to family connections. There are a couple other self-funders in the race too, but the elected officials seem to be lagging: case in point, well-known ex-state Sen. Pamela Gorman, who raised only $37K and ends with $23K CoH.

• FL-24: Rep. Suzanne Kosmas announced a haul of $260K for the first quarter. That’s less than the $340K reported by her likely GOP opponent, steakhouse mogul Craig Miller (although a slab of his money was apparently carved out of his own personal funds); Kosmas has a big CoH advantage, though, sitting on more than $1 million.

• GA-07: Retiring Republican Rep. John Linder didn’t look far to endorse a replacement for him: he gave his nod to his former chief of staff, Rob Woodall.

• HI-01: Sen. Dan Inouye just transferred $100K of his money to the DCCC, despite appearances that they’re actively backing Ed Case, rather than Colleen Hanabusa, who has the support of Inouye (and pretty much everyone else in the local Democratic establishment). Inouye has apparently been working behind the scenes, including reaching out to Nancy Pelosi, to get the DCCC to dial back their Case support, so maybe the cash infusion will give him a little more leverage. (Inouye is sitting on $3.2 million and faces little if any opposition this year.)

• IN-03: Nice fundraising numbers from Democrat Tom Hayhurst, who ran a surprisingly close race against Rep. Mark Souder in 2006 and is back for another try. Hayhurst has racked up $234K CoH, more than Souder ($99K in the first quarter).

• IN-05: Politico has a look at Rep. Dan Burton’s difficult primary in the 5th, in Indianapolis’s dark-red suburbs. While Burton may actually be safer this year compared with 2008 (since he has four opponents instead of just one), the article traces the roots of the local GOP’s discontent with him, and also shows the magnitude of his collapse in support: only 2 of the 11 local party organizations are supporting Burton this time.

• MO-08: Another Dem in a dark-red seat who keeps impressing everybody with his tenacity is Tommy Sowers. The veteran and college instructor, who’s challenging Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, raised $295K in the first quarter and is now sitting on $675K CoH.

• NM-02: Ex-Rep. Steve Pearce can write himself his own checks if he needs to, but he may not need to at this rate. Pearce raised $277K in the first quarter, and now sits on $708K. Democratic Rep. Harry Teague hasn’t reported yet, but in the duel of wealthy oil guys, he can self-fund too if need be.

• NY-14: With Democratic primary challenger Reshma Saujani having some success on the financial front, Rep. Carolyn Maloney got some top-tier help from Barack Obama, who endorsed her and sent out a fundraising appeal on her behalf.

• PA-11: If this doesn’t wake up Rep. Paul Kanjorski from his nap, I don’t know what will. Three-time Republican opponent Lou Barletta raised $300K in the first quarter. An important caveat: there was no mention of cash on hand, which is telling because Barletta was still saddled with a lot of debt from his 2008 campaign when he decided to run again. (UPDATE: Barletta’s CoH is now $205K.)

• PA-17: Republican state Sen. David Argall raised a tolerable but not-too-impressive $125K in the first quarter. He’ll need more than that to battle Rep. Tim Holden, who, if nothing else, has great survival skills (he had the worst district of any freshman who survived 1994, and then survived a 2002 gerrymander designed to rub him out). In fact, he’ll need more than that just for his primary; heretofore unknown GOP opponent ex-Marine Frank Ryan raised $70K in the first quarter.

• Redistricting: Maryland beat out New York to be the first state in the nation to enact legislation that will, in terms of redistricting, treat prisoners as residents of their last known address, rather than where they’re incarcerated (and thus move the center of gravity back toward the cities from the countryside). Also, on the redistricting front, if there’s one group of people who are the target audience for a whole movie about redistricting (Gerrymandering), it’s the crowd at SSP. The film’s director has a diary up, touting its release in two weeks at the Tribeca Film Festival.

The daily digest is so hunormous today that we had to CHOP IT IN HALF!

AR-Sen: Chris Cillizza’s incredibly annoying Mr. Rogers wallpaper tweets that Bill Halter raised $2 million in his first month on the trail.

AZ-Sen: This Roll Call piece has some interesting tidbits about the nascent Democratic (yes, Democratic) primary in the Arizona senate race. Tucson city councilman Rodney Glassman is all but running, and he has some personal wealth due to his family’s farming business. He also has the backing of Rep. Raul Grijalva (Glassman was once a Grijalva aide). Some other Dems, however, are talking up the potential candidacy of Nan Stockholm Walden, who is also wealthy and is a well-connected Democratic donor. The knock on Glassman is that he’s young and inexperienced; the knock on Walden is that she was a registered lobbyist for several years. Glassman says he’ll run no matter what Walden decides, and I think a primary here could actually be helpful if it stays clean.

On the GOP side of things, John McCain says he raised $2.2 million in the first quarter and has $4.5m on hand. Primary opponent J.D. Hayworth, meanwhile, seems like he hasn’t been doing quite so hot on the money front.

CA-Sen: A whiff of extra-special dumb: Carly Fiorina sent around an email to supporters describing Passover as a time to “break bread.” Of course, the one thing that Jews don’t eat on Passover is… bread. Trying to wiggle their way out of this one, a staffer tells TWI: “We meant all bread, leavened and unleavened, and matzo is just unleavened bread so that’s what we meant by that.” That still doesn’t work.

CT-Sen: GOP hopeful Linda McMahon is taking heat from opponent and ex-Rep. Rob Simmons for her $10,000 donation to the DCCC in 2006. Not only should this make McMahon suspect to Republicans, argues Simmons, but he seems to be tying that donation to the fact that he himself lost in 2006, perhaps nudged out the door by McMahon’s very own cash. (Considering Simmons came up just 83 votes short, he may have a point.)

FL-Sen: The joke is that when the New York Times finally gets to writing about a hitherto underground phenomenon (steampunk, miracle fruit, etc.), that’s the moment it becomes mainstream and therefore loses its cool. Marco Rubio’s “NYT moment” happened months ago, so anyone endorsing him at this late stage is about as cool as your mom using Facebook. Welcome to the club, Sen. Tom Coburn. Meanwhile, Charlie Crist’s old buddy, former FL GOP chair Jim Greer, is under criminal investigation for some sort of self-dealing.

KY-Sen: I think this is where Paulists probably part ways from teabaggers: Rand Paul thinks the government “shouldn’t be involved” in requiring people to wear seat belts. Not really sure ultra-libertarian whackness like this plays too well in most quarters. Please, please let this guy win the GOP primary. Incidentally, Paul says he’s raised $600K in the last quarter (lower than I would have thought), but also says he’s spent almost all of it. Apparently, though, he’s pre-paid for “the next six weeks of activity” (until the primary), perhaps locking in lower rates on things like TV ads.

MO-Sen: One last odd-n-end from PPP’s MO-Sen poll: Roy Blunt is under 50% against his unknown GOP primary challenger, Chuck Purgason – he leads 48-18. Purgason’s favorables are just 7-9 (not a typo), so obviously there’s a chunk of Republicans out there who just hate Blunt.

NC-Sen: Former Charlotte Mayor Harvey Gantt will endorse attorney Ken Lewis, who is seeking the Dem senate nomination. Gantt himself ran for the Senate twice, losing two close races to the unthinkably odious Jesse Helms. Meanwhile, GOP Sen. Richard Burr says he’s raised $1.4 million in the first quarter and is sitting on a $5.3 mil warchest. No word yet on any of the Dems.

TX-Sen: It looks we will have Kay Bailey Hutchison to kick around some more – for at least the next two years. She announced yesterday that she’ll serve out the remainder of her term, which ends in 2012. I wouldn’t be surprised if she subsequently changed her mind (at least, after this November), but for now, that means TX-Sen comes off our “Races to Watch” list.

WI-Sen: Richie rich Terrence Wall says he’ll stay in the GOP primary even if ex-Gov. Tommy Thompson gets in. Wall had kind words for Thompson, and also thanked him for drawing Democratic fire, but it sounds like Wall wants to present himself as the “true conservative” option.

CA-Gov: Meg Whitman is the latest moron-American to jump onto the “healthcare reform is unconstitutional” bandwagon, agreeing wholeheartedly with a supporter who asked at a campaign event if she would “force your attorney general to file suit” against the legislation. (Of course, CA’s governor can do no such thing.) I really can’t wait until these idiots get punked out of court.

PA-Gov: Some fundraising numbers from some of the big players in Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race – click the link for details. One of them, Dan Onorato, is up on the air with his first TV ads. No exact word on the size of the buy, but supposedly the ads are in “heavy rotation around the state,” which could cost $1 million.

The Swing State Project is changing its ratings on two Senate and two gubernatorial races. Our writeups for all of these are below. You can find our complete ratings here: Sen | Gov.

Senate races:

IN-Sen (Open): Safe D to Tossup

SSP was reluctant to change its rating on this race when Dan Coats announced, in part because he started off hedging about his intentions, and in part because the DSCC landed so many solid hits on him in such a short time, we could plausibly believe he might reconsider his decision to un-retire. Now, of course, we’re waiting for the dust to settle from Evan Bayh’s collossal retirement announcement. Dems have a good shot at retaining this seat, especially if they nominate someone like Rep. Brad Ellsworth. But until we know more about who either party’s nominees will be, the future is too hazy to rate this race as anything other than a Tossup. (D)

WA-Sen (Murray): Safe D to RTW

Optimistic Republicans seem to be reading a lot into Dino Rossi’s three words regarding this race: “Never say never.” (While ignoring the statement from the same article that he has “no plans to run for any office at this point.”) The two-time gubernatorial loser has disassembled the campaign apparatus he had in place between 2004 and 2008, and returned to the private sector – but who knows. With enough encouragement from the NRSC, and from folks like Rasmussen (who gave him a 2-point lead against Patty Murray), he might feel motivated to give it one last shot. Murray is a more likable and better-funded figure than Chris Gregoire (who beat Rossi twice), but with the possibility of a Rossi (or Rep. Dave Reichert, although that’s unlikely too) entry, we’ll need to keep one eye on this race. (C)

Gubernatorial races:

IA-Gov (Culver): Tossup to Lean R

Man, it’s hard out there for a gov. Chet Culver was looking pretty good for much of last year, especially since he faced a mostly third-tier crowd of wannabes. But along came former Gov. Terry Branstad looking for his old job back, which drastically changed the equation. Branstad’s long and somewhat rocky tenure doesn’t seem to have hurt him, but all-too-familiar economic woes seem to be pounding Culver, along with so many other incumbent governors. The polls have been especially unkind to him. If it were just Rasmussen showing him down big, we’d be slower on the trigger. But respected pollster Selzer & Co. has now pegged Culver at twenty points behind in two consecutive surveys. That’s brutal, deep hole, which makes this race Lean R. (D)

TX-Gov (Perry): Likely R to Lean R

Despite a national headwind that can only be described as atrocious, Democrats appear to have their best shot at winning back the Governor’s mansion in Texas in over a decade. A series of new polls have placed incumbent Gov. Rick Perry in the precarious position of facing a possible run-off after the state’s March 2nd primary. A run-off would tack on another five weeks to the primary process and would drain the GOP of even more resources. Meanwhile, former Houston Mayor Bill White has been raising money at a prodigious clip and trails Perry by only mid-single digits in many recent polls. There’s no question that Republicans still hold a clear edge in a state as red as this, but White has pushed this race into a more competitive stratum. (J)

AR-Sen (Lincoln): Tossup to Lean R

Rep. John Boozman officially entered the Arkansas Senate race this weekend. While he had telegraphed this for weeks, his official entry means that there’s finally a top-tier candidate for the Republicans. This race was a tossup even with a grab-bag of state legislators and self-funders, thanks to the Democratic brand’s decay in Arkansas and Blanche Lincoln’s play-it-down-the-middle-and-appeal-to-nobody approach. Two polls this week gave Boozman a lead over Lincoln in the 20-point ballpark, though, indicating that a stronger Republican probably pushes this one out of Lincoln’s grasp.

Boozman will still have to fight his way out of the crowded GOP primary — state Sen. Gilbert Baker and businessman Curtis Coleman aren’t getting out of the way (although some of the lesser opposition, like Tom Cox and Buddy Rogers, have bailed out), and Boozman’s long House tenure may be a liability in an anti-incumbent, anti-establishment year. His base in the state’s dark-red northwest will probably see him through the primary, though.

IL-Gov (Quinn): Likely D to Tossup

It’s a bit of a surprise that Pat Quinn survived the primary election, as the primary campaign revealed he had something of a glass jaw, and the last few polls of the race showed him with terrible approval ratings and getting edged by challenger Dan Hynes. It’s never a good sign to have a bloody, depleted victor staggering out of a barely-won primary, and his problems are compounded by general anti-incumbent fervor and bad economic conditions in the Rust Belt, which is enough for us to move this race all the way up to Tossup.

Still, there are a few things that Quinn has in his favor: he has an extremely long period (nine months) to rehabilitate himself, while the Republicans won’t even have a nominee for a while, and most likely it’ll be Bill Brady — while Illinois throughout the 80s and 90s was happy to elect moderate, suburban Republicans to statewide office, it remains to be seen whether a socially conservative downstate resident can get over the hump. Finally, the Scott Lee Cohen sideshow quickly and suitably resolved itself this weekend, leaving the state party to pick a more appealing running mate… although, after some initial lukewarm interest, Hynes has now taken his name out of consideration for a unity ticket.

You can find our complete ratings here: Sen | Gov.

RaceTracker Wiki: AR-Sen | IL-Gov

Field Poll (pdf) (1/5-17, likely voters, 9/18-10/6 in parentheses):

Tom Campbell (R): 30 (NA)

Carly Fiorina (R): 25 (21)

Chuck DeVore (R): 6 (20)

Undecided: 39 (59)

(MoE: ±7.1%)

Barbara Boxer (D-inc): 48 (NA)

Tom Campbell (R): 38 (NA)

Undecided: 14 (NA)

Barbara Boxer (D-inc): 50 (49)

Carly Fiorina (R): 35 (35)

Undecided: 15 (16)

Barbara Boxer (D-inc): 51 (50)

Chuck DeVore (R): 34 (33)

Undecided: 15 (17)

(MoE: ±3.3%)

The Field Poll (it’s become kind of cliched to refer to them as the “gold standard” for California pollsters, but their reputation precedes them) checks in on the California Senate race for the first time since September, with one big change: the switchover of ex-Rep. Tom Campbell from the Governor’s race to the Senate race. It looks like Campbell knew what he was doing, getting out of the GOP governor’s field where he was financially outgunned (as seen today, where it’s barely newsworthy that Meg Whitman just fronted herself another $20 million), and immediately moving into the lead in the GOP field.

Campbell had released an internal poll last week that showed him leading Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore 31-15-12, suggesting that he was eating equally into Fiorina and DeVore supporters. But the Field poll suggests that this is almost coming entirely out of DeVore’s share — initially strange since there’s a sharp contrast between Campbell’s Silicon Valley moderatism and DeVore’s O.C. conservatism. But it makes sense when you think that much of DeVore’s support was coming from the seemingly ascendant libertarian side of the party (and that social conservatives have been unusually quiet lately), and many of them are likely to embrace the socially liberal but fiscally hawkish Campbell.

As for the general, Field sees little movement in the last four months in the Boxer/Fiorina and Boxer/DeVore matchups, suggesting that Barbara Boxer hasn’t seemed to sustain much personal damage from the withering of the Democratic brand. As I’d feared, though, the amiable and well-known Campbell polls noticeably better against Boxer than the others — at ten points, not enough to start hitting the panic button, but indicating that this race will need to be carefully monitored. (Rasmussen recently showed this a closer tace than that, but, well, what else is new.) Taking into account Campbell’s apparent likelihood of winning the primary and the overall national environment, that’s enough for us to move this race back onto the board at “Likely Democratic.”

RaceTracker Wiki: CA-Sen

• MA-Sen: With last night’s Suffolk poll, there really can’t be any doubt any more that the Massachusetts Senate race qualifies as a “Toss Up,” so we’re changing our rating to reflect that. There’s still room for skepticism on whether Scott Brown can in fact pull it out, given not only the difficulty of pinning down a likely voter universe in a rapidly-fluctuating special election, but also the Democrats’ structural advantages on the ground in the Bay State. (The Democrats have the advantage of labor and local machines long-skilled at rousting out voters and getting them to the polls, while it’s questionable whether the Republicans have, given their long neglect of the state, any ground troops to deploy here, or even up-to-date, refined voter databases.) Nevertheless, given what can actually be quantified, right now the polls balance out to more or less a tie, and that’s how we have to treat the race.

The breaking news du jour is that Barack Obama has finally agreed to head up to Massachusetts and stump for Martha Coakley on Sunday. Also, the Coakley campaign is rolling out a second ad for the weekend, to go with their ad showcasing the Vicki Kennedy endorsement; they’re also running a populist-themed ad on Wall Street regulation (specifically, the rather narrow issue of the proposed bonus tax on banks). The ad deluge is being bolstered a League of Conservation Voters ad buy for $350K; on the third-party front, that’s being countered by a pro-Brown ad buy for $500K from Americans for Job Security.

• CA-Sen: Yesterday I was musing about whether ex-Rep. Tom Campbell’s entry into the GOP Senate primary hurt Carly Fiorina or Chuck DeVore more, and we already seem to have an answer. The Campbell camp is touting an internal poll showing them with a sizable lead over both Fiorina and DeVore in the primary: Campbell is at 31, with Fiorina at 15 and DeVore at 12. The few polls of the primary so far have shown Fiorina and DeVore deadlocked in the 20s, so maybe it’s safe to say that Campbell hurts them each equally.

• FL-Sen: Which of these is not like the other? There’s a new multi-candidate GOP fundraising PAC called the U.S. Senate Victory Committee, which benefits seven different Republicans: Kelly Ayotte, Roy Blunt, Jane Norton, Rob Portman, Rob Simmons, Pat Toomey… and Marco Rubio? Six establishment candidates, and one insurgent. Or is Rubio the new establishment?

• PPP (pdf): PPP looks all the way to 2012 as part of their wide-ranging Nevada survey, and finds that John Ensign may weather his whole giving-a-patronage-job-to-the-cuckolded-husband-of-his-mistress thing, if he runs again. Ensign trails Las Vegas mayor (but probable 2010 gubernatorial candidate) only Oscar Goodman 43-41, but leads Rep. Shelly Berkley 49-40 and SoS Ross Miller 47-36. Of course, Berkley and Miller aren’t that well-known yet and would presumably gain ground in an active 2012 race, but again, more food for thought on the idea that Republicans really don’t get the vapors over sex scandals after all, so long as they’re perpetrated by Republicans.

• MN-Gov: The St. Paul Pioneer Press is out with a poll of Minnesota voters (by a pollster I’ve never heard of, Decision Resources Ltd.). The poll seemed most focused on the question of whether there should be public funding of the new Vikings stadium, but it did throw in (almost as an afterthought) something we haven’t seen before: general election head-to-heads in the Governor’s race. The numbers are pretty encouraging for the Democrats: ex-Sen. Mark Dayton leads ex-Sen. Norm Coleman 41-31, and state Rep. Marty Seifert (who, assuming Coleman doesn’t get in, is the likeliest GOP nominee) 41-25. State House speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher beats Coleman 33-31, and Pat Anderson (who dropped out of the race this week) 33-23. There weren’t any numbers for Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak, another strong contender for the Dem nod. And yes, if you’re wondering, this does take into account the potential spoiler role of Minnesota’s Independence Party; IP candidates account for 11 to 13 percent of the vote in each of these trial heats. (H/t alphaaqua.)

• NH-Gov: One other gubernatorial poll has good news for Democrats, and it even comes from Rasmussen. They find incumbent Gov. John Lynch in safe position with 58/38 approvals and, against his no-name opponents, leading social conservative activist Karen Testerman 53-30 and businessman Jack Kimball 51-32.

• OH-Gov: Who knew that John Kasich had the power to transcend the boundaries of space and time? In an effort to court the GOP’s restive base, Kasich said “I think I was in the Tea Party before there was a Tea Party.”

• WY-Gov: One more big-name Republican (by Wyoming’s small standards) is getting into the gubernatorial race, banking on the assumption that incumbent Dem Dave Freudenthal won’t jump through the legal hoops necessary to run for a third term. Auditor Rita Meyer is getting into the race, where potential GOP primary rivals include former US Attorney Matt Mead and state House speaker Colin Simpson.

• AL-05: Rep. Parker Griffith is showing his true colors. The party-switcher has been turning away requests for refunds of contributions that don’t meet the requirements buried in the fine print: he says he can’t refund donations for the 2008 cycle, only the 2010 cycle, because the 2008 contributions were spent long ago.

• AR-02: Rep. Vic Snyder is in pretty dire shape, if a new poll from SurveyUSA is to be believed: he trails Republican candidate and former US Attorney Tim Griffin by a 56-39 margin. You may want to take this poll with a grain of salt, as it was paid for by Firedoglake, who seem to have an axe to grind in the health care reform debate, and the Snyder numbers seem to be less the main point than engaging in strangely-right-wing-sounding message-testing. The good news is that, even after a variety of anti-HCR arguments have been offered (and Nate Silver does a fine job of picking apart the survey), Snyder doesn’t fare much worse (at 58-35); the bad news, though, is that the 56-39 topline question was asked before any of the litany of anti-HCR talking points, suggesting that, HCR or no, we have a major problem in Arkansas.

• AZ-03: Despite Jon Hulburd’s surprising cash haul, he may have bigger company in the Democratic primary to replace recently-retired Republican Rep. John Shadegg. Phoenix mayor Phil Gordon is the subject of speculation; he had briefly considered a 2008 run against Shadegg before ruling it out, saying his post-mayoral future would be in the private sector, but all eyes are on what he does now. (Gordon lives slightly outside the district’s boundaries.) On the GOP side, there’s no clear frontrunner at all. State Rep. Sam Crump has already said he’s running. Possible other candidates include state Treasurer Dean Martin (who would have to drop down from the gubernatorial bid he just launched this week), state Sens. Pamela Gorman and Jim Waring, Phoenix city councilor Peggy Neely, former ASU football star Andrew Walter, and, in a shocker, the co-founder of Taser International Inc., Tom Smith. Former state House speaker Jim Weiers has taken himself out of the running.

• NC-11: Businessman Jeff Miller has reversed course and will run against Democratic Blue Dog Rep. Heath Shuler in the 11th. Miller had been recruited to run, but decided against it; he’ll have to face a primary against Hendersonville mayor Greg Newman, who got in after Miller initially declined.

• OH-15: The Ohio GOP is still searching for an Auditor candidate after Mary Taylor decided to run for Lt. Governor instead of re-election. Former state Sen. Steve Stivers has been asked to run for Auditor, but made clear he’ll be staying in the race in the 15th (where he might actually have better odds, considering how close he came to Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy last time).

Public Policy Polling (1/11-12, registered voters, no trend lines):

Harry Reid (D-inc): 42

Danny Tarkanian (R): 50

Undecided: 8

Harry Reid (D-inc): 41

Sue Lowden (R): 51

Undecided: 8

Shelly Berkley (D): 39

Danny Tarkanian (R): 47

Undecided: 14

Shelly Berkley (D): 38

Sue Lowden (R): 46

Undecided: 17

Oscar Goodman (D): 41

Danny Tarkanian (R): 41

Undecided: 18

Oscar Goodman (D): 42

Sue Lowden (R): 40

Undecided: 18

Ross Miller (D): 34

Danny Tarkanian (R): 45

Undecided: 22

Ross Miller (D): 34

Sue Lowden (R): 44

Undecided: 23

(MoE: ±3.6%)

Pretty ugly stuff, all around. For the Harry Reid match-ups, PPP is basically on the same page as Rasmussen and Mason-Dixon. We’ve thought long and hard about this decision, but the choice, in the end, is unavoidable: this race is no longer a tossup. Much like Chris Dodd, Reid has been spending a significant amount of money on his re-election already, and he has no positive results to show for it. Voters know Harry Reid, and they just don’t like him: his job performance rating is at a disastrous 36-58.

In our conversations with DC Democrats, they have always stressed that Harry Reid has one big advantage over his Republican opponents: he’ll have an enormous amount of money at his disposal to nuke his competition. While it’s true that Reid will have all the resources he needs (and then some), money won’t buy him love, and the usual “But the Republicans are worse!” argument (while also true) will be more likely to fall on deaf ears in races like this one where Reid is vulnerable to voter ire over Senatorial process. I also expect that, once the GOP primary is settled out, enough resources will flow to the Republican nominee so that he or she will be able to make their case against Reid. This race started off bad, and the trend is only getting worse — gaffes like Reid’s leaked “Negro” comment the other day only serve as exclamation points on how much difficulty the Majority Leader is facing. SSP is moving our rating of this race from Tossup to Lean Republican.

Also disturbing is the fact that Reid’s would-be Democratic successors, 1st CD Rep. Shelly Berkley, Secretary of State Ross Miller, and Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman (who is actually now an Independent, but whatever), are also in tough races against Lowden and Tarkanian.

At this point, though, I would have to take any of the above options over Reid. The silver lining here is that Berkley and Miller are, amazingly enough, somehow just as (or more!) unknown than Lowden and Tarkanian. Berkley and Miller are met with 46% and 66% “Not Sure” opinion ratings, respectively, while Lowden gets 49% and Tarkanian 43%. On the flip side, a Reid retirement could also lead to the candidacy of 2nd CD Rep. Dean Heller, who could prove to be the most formidable opponent the GOP could run.

RaceTracker Wiki: NV-Sen

Research 2000 for Daily Kos (1/11-13, likely voters, no trendlines):

Heidi Heitkamp (D): 34

John Hoeven (R): 55

Undecided: 11

Ed Schultz (D): 32

John Hoeven (R): 56

Undecided: 12

Jasper Schneider (D): 32

John Hoeven (R): 56

Undecided: 12

(MoE: ±4%)

Earl Pomeroy (D-inc): 46

Kevin Cramer (R): 24

Undecided: 30

Earl Pomeroy (D-inc): 47

Duane Sand (R): 22

Undecided: 31

(MoE: ±4%)

Republican Gov. John Hoeven seems to have an even clearer path to the Senate than he did against Byron Dorgan, now that it’s an open seat. He posts 20-point-plus leads against all of his opposition, including the likeliest Democrat to get the nod: former AG and 2000 gubernatorial candidate Heidi Heitkamp. We’re looking at a strongly Republican likely electorate here (with Barack Obama at 41/54 approval, and the Republican Party faring much better as a party than the Democrats (although still in crappy position, too): 39/53 for the GOP vs. 25/61 for the Dems). That means that performance is pretty much equal for all Dems, whether they’re well-known (Ed Schultz) or up-and-coming but unknown (North Dakota Rural Development Director Jasper Schneider). With that in mind, Swing State Project is moving this race to “Likely Republican.”

Hoeven may still be in for a bumpy ride, though, thanks to the same thing facing fellow level-headed midwestern Governor (and ‘stache wearer) Terry Branstad: bubbling-over anger on the teabagging right and mistrust of his establishment, insufficiently tax-averse ways. While the Tea Partiers don’t seem to have a particular primary opponent in mind, they’re adamant that Hoeven won’t be getting a free pass through the primary.

Democratic at-large Rep. Earl Pomeroy seems to have had the right idea in staying where he is, rather than going for the promotion. He’s looking fairly secure against the GOP opposition (although below the symbolic 50% mark), leading Public Service Commissioner Kevin Cramer (a statewide official, but one who’s lost twice to Pomeroy previously, and just announced today that he’s going back for a third try) and his 2008 opponent (and current Senate candidate, although he might want to drop down to get out of Hoeven’s way) Duane Sand by similar 20-point-plus margins. Insurance salesman Paul Schaffner is also in the GOP primary, and state Rep. Rick Berg and Fargo city commissioner Dave Piepkorn are also weighing the race.

RaceTracker Wiki: ND-Sen | ND-AL