Tag: Jon Barela

Research & Polling Inc. for the Albuquerque Journal (9/27-29, likely voters, 8/23-27 in parentheses):

Diane Denish (D): 42 (39)

Susana Martinez (R): 49 (45)

Undecided: 9 (16)

(MoE: ±3%)

House numbers:

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 48 (47)

Jon Barela (R): 41 (41)

Undecided: 11 (12)

Harry Teague (D-inc): 45 (45)

Steve Pearce (R): 46 (42)

Undecided: 9 (13)

(MoE: ±5%)

Here’s another state where things are staying pretty consistent over the last month. Over the course of September, Susana Martinez’s lead over Diane Denish has remained at 7, as they’ve both made gains from undecided, but Martinez is getting dangerously close to 50. (The basic story of this election is: what sounds better on your resume, “district attorney” or “Bill Richardson’s #2?”)

Likewise, things barely budged in the 1st, where Martin Heinrich added one point to his already decent-but-not-decisive lead. (It’s looking more and more like that SurveyUSA poll that gave a lead to Jon Barela a few months ago was quite the outlier.) The needle moved only a little more in the 2nd, where the polls have shown a true tossup… but the movement was enough to drop Dem incumbent Harry Teague from a surprising 3-point lead to a 1-point deficit (exactly where he was in a PPP poll a few weeks ago, too).

Fundraising: Today is the last day of the fundraising quarter, so now is a good time to donate to any Dems you like out there. Decisions on whom to help will be made in the final weeks of the election season based in part on who shows fundraising strength in this final quarter.

AK-Sen: It’s not small – no no no. Republican Joe Miller has failed to file a personal finance disclosure with the Senate, something any candidate who raises or spends more than $5,000 is required to do within 30 days by law. Miller’s been out of compliance with the law since at least April. The penalty? Up to $50,000. Politico caught up with Miller at a fancy DC fundraiser, but he refused to answer any questions about the issue.

Meanwhile, Dem Scott McAdams sends out a fundraising ask via email in response to word that the Tea Party Express will be pouring resources into the state to finish the job they started. McAdams reminds us of something we’ve been saying all along: “In some Alaskan towns it costs only $30 to run a radio ad and $200 for a TV spot.” So if you still have some spare change to give, he still needs your help – and it will indeed make a difference, no matter how much you can afford to give.

PA-Sen, PA-07, PA-08: VoteVets is launching a half-million dollar canvassing effort on behalf of Joe Sestak, who of course is one of them. They’ll also be helping out another pair of veterans, Bryan Lentz and Patrick Murphy.

FL-Gov: Man, dejected gubernatorial loser Bill McCollum is serving up the cat fud personally, on a fucking silver platter. Rick Scott’s been hitting Alex Sink on the airwaves over her alleged mismanagement of the state’s investments while serving as Chief Financial Officer. But at a recent public meeting of the board of trustees of Florida’s pension funds, McCollum made sure to repeatedly question a top administrator about the soundness of the funds – and was assured they were. It’s like he’s fact-checking and doing p.r. for Sink all at once! Someone hire this guy!

NY-Gov: Here’s something that’s no surprise: Carl Paladino was awarded the Conservative Party’s ballot line. Here’s something else that’s no surprise: He’s a motherfucking spazz who can’t control his temper – even around reporters, even on camera. The video is fuzzy and the sound quality poor, but watch Paladino get into it with conservative New York Post political columnist Fred Dicker. The most amusing thing is that Paladino seems to think Dicker, who, uh, as I said, works for the Post, is a Cuomo plant.

AL-05: This parsing almost reaches Clintonian levels: Dem Steve Raby has been hammering Mo Brooks for opposing earmarks, thanks to some teabagger pledge that Brooks signed. This is not a popular position in Alabama, and Brooks had his name removed from the group’s website – but claimed he was only opposing pork, not earmarks. Someone buy this poor fucker a thesaurus, stat!

AZ-05: Harry Mitchell’s got a poll out from Bennett, Petts & Normington, showing him up 43-40 over David Schweikert.

LA-03: In the very last primary of the year, coming up this Saturday, a survey by a robopollster called ElectPoll shows Jeff Landry crushing fellow Republican Hunt Downer, 66-34. Can’t say I’m too surprised, given that Landry missed avoiding a runoff by less than 200 votes. I doubt Downer made the right choice by continuing the fight. Meanwhile, Ravi Sangisetty becomes the latest anti-Pelosi Dem, saying he wouldn’t vote to keep her as Speaker of the House. Somehow I doubt he’ll have the chance to vote on that issue one way or another.

NM-01: So classic – another anti-government spending Republican who has embraced government spending for himself. It’s really no different than the teabaggers who declare “Hands off my Medicare!” Anyhow, Jon Barela is the latest offender. His film production company has received cash assistance from taxpayers thanks to a special New Mexico rebate program designed to encourage movie-making in the state.

NY-20: Always gotta be careful not to read too much into stories about staff departures, but this is awfully late in the game to be losing your campaign manager – which just happened to Republican Chris Gibson. One red flag: That they didn’t have someone lined up to replace Patrick Ziegler, who was supposedly recruited by the RNC to help with broader election efforts in the Hudson Valley. Another: Ziegler had almost no political experience and apparently was overwhelmed by the job. And finally: Ziegler himself has sought the GOP nomination, but dropped out of the race in March. A week later, he was hired by none other than Gibson. So perhaps this was not quite a match made in heaven in the first place.

OH-18: SEIU is sending out a mailer attacking Dem Zack Space, who flip-flopped and voted against healthcare reform in the end. No word on how much they’re spending, though it seems to me that this fight really should have happened during the primaries. I mean, would they really prefer Bob Gibbs?

PA-06: A nice get for Manan Trivedi: He secured the endorsement of the Sierra Club, one of those groups which likes to back “moderate” Republicans to bolster their supposed bi-partisan cred. While they haven’t backed Jim Gerlach in recent years, they haven’t supported his opponents, either, so it’s good to see them take the right side this time.

VA-02: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, typically friend to Republicans the world over, endorsed Democrat Glenn Nye. Somehow I don’t think it’ll stop the attacks that he’s a libruhl who votes with Nancy Pelosi 743% of the time.

NRSC: Aaron Blake says Tom Coburn’s going to give $1 million to the NRSC.

NRCC: Meanwhile, John Boehner just gave $1 million more to the NRCC, and supposedly succeeded in getting $4 million more in pledges from his buddies.

NRA: We are most definitively done with the NRA whip count, which got boring long ago. If you really want to keep checking up on it, keep this link handy.

SSP TV:

• AR-02: Dem Joyce Elliott touts her non-DC background as a teacher, and links herself to still-popular Gov. Mike Beebe
• NC-02: Renee Ellmers accuses Bob Etheridge of cutting half a trillion from Medicare to pay for “Obamacare”
• NM-02: Harry Teague attacks Steve Pearce for being pro-shipping-jobs-to-India
• SC-02: Rob Miller’s campaign asks people how they know Rep. Joe Wilson has “gone Washington,” but apparently folks need the help of a poster to answer

AK-Sen: On the topic of Lisa Murkowski’s declaration that she’s “still in this game” and her outreach efforts to a polite but seemingly unenthused Alaska Libertarian Party, The Mudflats sums up the situation pretty well:

   * She’s not technically in the race right now

   * She’s not out of the race

   * She’s not a quitter

   * She is who she is

   * She will likely not run as a Libertarian

   * She will likely not run as a write-in

   * She doesn’t know what she’s doing

NH-Sen: Businessman Bill Binnie is throwing down another $500K of his own money, with the GOP primary just a week in the way. Though ex-AG Kelly Ayotte leads in what little polling there’s been, I think this race is still up for grabs.

NV-Sen: The LVRJ has a detailed profile on Sharron Angle’s tumultuous years in the state Assembly, where votes in the 42-member body were often “41 to Angle.”

CO-Gov: Some Colorado Republicans are suing to try to knock Tom Tancredo off the ballot, saying his candidacy violates the American Constitution Party’s bylaws. Even if they’re right, I wonder if they have standing.

FL-08: Alan Grayson claims he raised half a million bucks in August, and says he has more than a million on hand, despite prepaying for a bunch of television advertising.

FL-24: GOPer Sandy Adams (and the NRCC, apparently) are touting a Public Opinion Strategies internal which has her leading Rep. Suzanne Kosmas 49-37.

HI-01: Colleen Hanabusa outraised Rep. Charles Djou in the pre-primary fundraising period, $330K to $206K. But Djou has slightly more cash on hand, $428K to $404K.

NY-14: Some Democrat she is. When asked by a reporter if she would vote for her opponent – not even endorse, just vote – in the general if she lost the primary, Reshma Saujani said she “didn’t know” whether she would pull the lever for Rep. Carolyn Maloney. I’ve been adamantly opposed to Saujani’s candidacy since I first learned about her, and with good reason. But this may be the most disgusting thing she’s said so far. How can I possibly trust the Democratic bona fides of someone who can’t even say if she’ll vote Democrat in her own district? And no, her campaign’s belated attempt to claim she’ll “vote a straight ticket” does not assuage me in the least. When the cameras were rolling and the pressure was on, Saujani admitted she wasn’t a team player. We don’t need people like her in Congress.

Turnout (PDF): According to data compiled by the Center for the Study of the American Electorate, the “average percentage of eligible citizens who voted in the primaries of each major political party” shows more a greater share of Republicans voting in primaries this year than Dems for the first time since 1930. Of course, 1930 was a pretty good year for Dems… but the trendlines are not inspiring.

SSP TV:

GA-Sen: GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson, not a guy you traditionally think of as being endangered (if you’ve ever even heard of him) touts his conservative record

NH-Sen: Paul Hodes compares Washington to… a hot dog eating contest

NV-Sen: Harry Reid continues to produce some of the best negative ads of the cycle

OH-Sen: We mentioned this ad in yesterday’s digest, wherein Lee Fisher sez: “Congressman Rob Portman knows how to grow the economy… in China!” Our update is that a GOPer says the buy is for $1.4 million and that the ad is running in Columbus and northern OH

FL-Gov: Alex Sink responds to Rick Scott’s attack ads, which she says are all about Obama, not Florida

CA-11: Jerry McNerney’s first ad, touting his support for veterans’ causes (I like that he has an actual veteran do the talking – much better than the usual candidate bragging or hackneyed voiceover)

CA-45: Dem Steve Pougnet is on the air with his first ad, kicking off a reported $100K/week TV & radio ad blitz from now through election day

CO-04: Betsy Markey has an anti-spending spot

NM-01: Republican Jon Barela has an ad complaining about the debt

NM-02: Harry Teague is up with his first ad of the cycle, a surprisingly authentic 60-second spot that’s worth watching

NM-02: Meanwhile, Americans for Job Security hits Teague over his vote for cap-and-trade (a “one-week” buy)

NY-02: If Steve Israel is worried enough to go up on the air….

VA-02: Glenn Nye touts his work to keep an aircraft carrier at Hampton Roads

Research & Polling for the Albuquerque Journal (8/23-27):

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 47

Jon Barela (R): 41

Undecided: 12

(MoE: ±5%)

The good news is: Heinrich is in the lead, unlike his performance in that nasty SUSA poll from a month ago. The bad news is that this is a real race, and one that Democrats cannot afford to take for granted. After pasting the extremely hyped Bernalillo County Sheriff Darren White by 11 points in 2008, few thought that Heinrich would be in trouble this cycle against a lesser-known foe. But you can’t ignore the numbers — this is what some would call “striking distance”.

Barela beats Heinrich among independents by 51-45 and takes 33% of the Hispanic vote. Unlike SurveyUSA, though, the unimaginatively-named Research & Polling finds Heinrich up on Barela by 20 points among 18-to-34 year-olds. If you recall, SUSA had Barela running ahead by three points among that demographic.

Meanwhile, we also have some pretty amazing NM-02 numbers:

Harry Teague (D-inc): 45

Steve Pearce (R): 42

Undecided: 13

(MoE: ±5%)

I say “amazing” because the general vibes I’ve been getting from from this race haven’t been particularly strong for Teague. Teague trailed Pearce by two points in a PPP poll back in February, but the national (and local) mood has not improved since then. Teague did release an internal poll claiming a one-point lead on Pearce back in April (up from a 10-point Pearce lead a year ago), but we haven’t seen any additional polls until now.

Perhaps one factor moving the numbers for Teague is the $325K ad buy against Pearce by the Defenders of Wildlife. (The New Mexico Independent has their latest ad, if you’d like to watch it.) The fact that Teague is apparently hanging in there while so many frosh Dems are struggling to tread water is pretty remarkable.

SurveyUSA (7/22-25, likely voters, no trend lines):

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 45

Jon Barela (R): 51

Undecided: 4

(MoE: ±4.2%)

There’s been a lot of chatter today about this explosive new SUSA poll showing frosh Democrat Martin Heinrich trailing his Republican challenger, former Albuquerque Hispanic Chamber of Commerce leader Jon Barela. Let’s slice this sucker open and take a look at the innards.

SurveyUSA polled this contest once before in 2008 and several times in 2006 — culminating in an early November poll showing a razor-thin lead for Democrat Patsy Madrid. Let’s take a look at three demographic yardsticks from each poll, starting with its sample composition of 18-34 year-olds, a particularly controversial age bracket for SUSA this cycle:

	Nov-06	Aug-08	Jul-10
Vote Share	24%	20%	16%
Dem Margin	8%	37%	-3%

Next up, Hispanic voters:

	Nov-06	Aug-08	Jul-10
Vote Share	37%	24%	27%
Dem Margin	16%	23%	13%

And, finally, party affiliation:

	Nov-06	Aug-08	Jul-10
Democratic	46%	47%	45%
Republican	39%	36%	39%
Independent	13%	16%	16%

Nothing particularly dramatic outside of Heinrich’s supposed collapse among younger voters. I’m inclined to believe this is a real race (though I’m not yet convinced that Heinrich is actually down).

In response, Heinrich’s campaign released an internal poll of their own. Greenberg Quinlan Rosner (7/8-13, likely voters, 4/28-5/2 in parens):

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 53 (55)

Jon Barela (R): 41 (38)

(MoE: ±4.4%)

At the very least, this race is getting closer — which isn’t good news for anyone.

CA-Sen: Moose lady endorses sheep lady. Is chicken lady next?

KY-Sen: With the primary less than two weeks away, Jack Conway’s throwing in another $300K of his own money.

OH-Sen: Gov. Ted Strickland thinks that Jennifer Brunner might be getting ready to endorse Lee Fisher after all. If she wants to have a future in Democratic politics, she has to do this. If she fails to come through, this will be the kind of thing people remember forever.

CO-Gov: A challenging name for challenging times: Businessman Joe Gschwendtner is joining the GOP gubernatorial field, and he says he’ll seed his campaign with $100K of his own scrilla.

OH-Gov: Dems keep making John Kasich feel the pain over his refusal to make public all of his tax returns. Now, a couple of state legislators are proposing a bill which would require all political candidates to disclose their returns as a condition of running for office. Kasich, you’ll recall, briefly displayed a summary of his 2008 returns to reporters (who weren’t allowed to photocopy it); he made $1.1 million for doing mostly nothing, including helping to drive Lehman Brothers into the ground.

CA-19, CA-20: Two stones, one bird: It looks like two GOP congressional hopefuls in neighboring districts broke federal election laws by taking a flight on a private corporate jet with none other than Karl Rove. That could turn out to be one expensive ride for State Sen. Jeff Denham of Atwater (CA-19) and cherry farmer Andy Vidak (CA-20).

DE-AL: Wilson Research Strategies did a poll of the GOP primary for developer Glen Urquhart, who is facing off against possibly rich businesswoman Michele Rollins. (I’ve heard she may have only inherited an income interest from her late – and exceedingly wealthy – husband’s estate.) The poll showed Rollins leading 27-11 (with 60%) undecided.

FL-02: This is a little unexpected: Blue Dog Allen Boyd is running ads against his absurdly underfunded primary opponent, state Sen. Al Lawson. (Boyd has 29 times the cash that Lawson does.) Once again, though (say it with me), no word on the size of the buy.

FL-11: A fridge too far? NRCC honcho Pete Sessions is holding a fundraiser later this month in Tampa for one Mike Prendergast. Yeah, I ain’t never heard o’ him neither, but I guess he did raised about $100K in Q1, and incumbent Kathy Castor only has about $350K on hand. Still, this was a 66% Obama/58% Kerry district.

GA-09: In these dark-red districts, the most you can hope for is some hot wingnut-on-wingnut violence – and it looks like we’re finally seeing some. The Club for Growth is running ads targeting ex-state Sen. Lee Hawkins, alleging (what else?) that he’s not conservative enough and wouldn’t sign a pledge to repeal healthcare reform. Hawkins fired back with a press release, charging that the CFG supports illegal immigration and that their favored candidate, ex-state Rep. Tom Graves, is their stooge.

IL-08: Local Republican leaders met with the already-imploded Joe Walsh to see what the eff was going on with his campaign… and they’ve decided to stick with him. While running into the Melissa Bean buzzsaw might not be that enticing (even in a cycle like this), several other candidates ran against Walsh in the primary, so a replacement ought to be possible. (Read here if you need background on the Walshsplosion.)

MO-06: Local businessman Clint Hylton will run as a Democrat against GOP Rep. Sam Graves. Graves obliterated one of our most highly-touted recruits last cycle, former Kansas City mayor Kay Barnes.

NM-01: Greenberg Quinlan Rosner (D) for Martin Heinrich (4/28-5/2, likely voters, no trendlines):

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 55

Jon Barela (R): 38

(MoE: ±4.4%)

Heinrich leads among Hispanics 68-24, who make up 35% of this sample. These are very nice numbers. Heinrich has over $1 million cash-on-hand, while Barela has under $400K.

MA-09: SEIU political director Mac D’Alessandro submitted 5,000 signatures as part of his nominating papers, but still needs an additional 2,000 by June 1 to qualify for the ballot. He’s aiming to take on Rep. Stephen Lynch, who earned lifetime douchebag status by infamously switching from “yes” to “no” on the healthcare reform bill.

OH-18: 2008 loser Fred Dailey trails establishment fave Bob Gibbs by 164 votes after Tuesday’s GOP primary, but there are still ballots left to be counted. In fact, provisionals and absentees, as long as they were postmarked on time, will still be accepted up until ten days after the election. No one knows how many ballots are outstanding, though. If the final margin is less than one half of one percent, there will be an automatic recount. Still, the odds have to be against Dailey – though a prolonged fight is probably good for Rep. Zack Space.

PA-06: While NARAL doesn’t usually endorse in primaries, their former president, Kate Michelman, is backing Manan Trivedi over Doug Pike. Pike, in the past, has written columns that suggested he has wobbly views on reproductive choice. Other pieces of his have made very questionable remarks about women – click the link if you want the exact quotes. Pike says he “apologizes” for these columns, about the 99th time he’s had to apologize for something on this campaign.

PA-12: Public Opinion Strategies (R) Tim Burns (5/4-5, likely voters, 3/15 in parens):

Mark Critz (D): 41 (41)

Tim Burns (R): 43 (45)

Undecided: 14 (13)

(MoE: ±4.9%)

IL-Sen: In DC celebrating Greek Independence Day, Alexi Giannoulias also met with White House political advisors David Axelrod and Patrick Gaspard. No real word on what was discussed.

PA-Sen: Ouch – check out this blistering broadside directed at Joe Sestak from PA Democratic Chair T.J. Rooney. Rooney blasted Sestak in a sternly-worded letter for not paying his campaign workers the minimum wage and encouraged him to make a concerted effort to vote more often on the House floor. (JL)

TX-Sen: Will she resign or won’t she? The Politico catches up with GOP Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, still fresh from her massively underwhelming performance in the Texas gubernatorial primary, and reports that she “has nothing to say, and I won’t for a while” regarding her future plans. Senate Republicans, apparently, are taking her silence as a sign that a resignation is not actually in the cards, despite KBH’s repeated promises in the past year that she would definitely be leaving the Senate regardless of the primary result. (JL)

CO-Gov: Teasing teaser Tom “The Teaser” Jensen teases us with this tease:

Well we’ll have Colorado Governor numbers out [today] and here’s a little preview – John Hickenlooper’s net favorability is 36 points better than Bill Ritter’s net approval. As you can imagine that makes Hickenlooper just a little more competitive in the horse race.

AL-05: It’s the party switch which keeps on backfiring. Unlike a lot of other, uh, Republicans, Parker Griffith accepted a bunch of money from Charlie Rangel, which he was in a hurry to give back. The problem is that Rangel donated in 2008 – and Griffith recently told angry ex-supporters (to whom he had promised refunds) that he couldn’t return their money from the previous cycle since it had already been spent.

GA-07: Ralph Reed says he’ll announce his plans today, but according to Roll Call, GOP bigs think he’s going to pass on a run. Reed’s previous run for office did not go particularly well – he got crushed in the 2006 Republican primary for GA Lt. Gov., losing 56-44.

LA-03: Lawyer Jeff Landry joined the GOP field to replace Rep. Charlie Melancon yesterday, but CQ thinks that there are bigger names still in the offing: House Speaker Hunt Downer and Scott Angelle, “a Democrat who was named by Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal in late 2007 to serve as Louisiana’s secretary of the Department of Natural Resources.” Dems are also holding out hope for a more prominent candidate, such as state Rep. Fred Mills (who might decide after the legislative session ends on June 21) or former Rep. Chris John.

MI-01: Teacher and former Charlevoix County commissioner Connie Saltonstall plans to challenge Bart Stupak in the Democratic primary, specifically citing Stupak’s infamous anti-choice amendment and threats to vote against healthcare reform if he doesn’t get his way. Saltonstall lost a race against incumbent GOP state Rep. Kevin Elsenheimer in 2008, 61-37.

NM-01: NRCC Chair Pete Sessions will campaign in Albuquerque with fellow GOPer Jon Barela, who is hoping to unseat frosh Dem Martin Heinrich.

NY-13: Here’s a nice score for frosh Dem Rep. Mike McMahon. Richmond County Borough President James Molinaro, an elected Republican who came up with the Conservative Party, has endorsed McMahon for another term in the House. Molinaro endorsed McMahon in 2008, but that was against the detested specimen that was Bob Straniere, who seemed to turn off just about every member of the Republican and Conservative Staten Island hierarchy. (JL)

NY-29: David Paterson says that he’s going to call the special election “as soon as possible,” and that he doesn’t think the seat will be left vacant for the rest of the year.

House: Some chair shuffling as 69-year-old Rep. Norm Dicks, the second most-senior member of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, takes over the reins in the wake of John Murtha’s passing, as expected. This mondo committee post potentially means tons more campaign donations will head Dicks’ way, giving him a chance to shower that wealth on others.

WATN?: Ex-Rep. Eric Massa is now under investigation “for allegations that he groped multiple male staffers working in his office.” Also yesterday, Glenn Beck apologized at the end of his Massa interview, saying: “America, I’m going to shoot straight to you. I think I’ve wasted your time.”

Public Policy Polling (2/18-20, registered voters):

Martin Heinrich (D-inc): 45

Jon Barela (R): 36

Undecided: 19

Harry Teague (D-inc): 41

Steve Pearce (R): 43

Undecided: 16

Ben Lujan (D-inc): 40

Adam Kokesh (R): 32

Undecided: 28

Ben Lujan (D-inc): 42

Tom Mullins (R): 36

Undecided: 22

(MoE: ±4.9%)

PPP’s NM-Gov sample comes with an added bonus: results for each of the Land of Enchantment’s three House races. The big ticket item here is NM-02, where Rep. Harry Teague is considered one of the most vulnerable Democratic incumbents going into November. That’s not so much because of the district’s lean (it’s R+6 and has a Hispanic plurality — Walt Minnick and Bobby Bright would kill for R+6) but because Teague is facing off against ex-Rep. Steve Pearce, who held the district for a number of years until his ill-fated 2008 Senate run, and is still well-thought-of here (as seen by his 43/31 favorables). While I’d certainly prefer to see Teague leading, all things considered, the 43-41 lead for Pearce feels not-that-bad. Like Tom Perriello in VA-05, Teague seems to have been already written off as a casualty by mainstream media pundits, not only having won a superficially-fluky victory in a reddish district but also having voted for cap-and-trade instead of cowering with the Blue Dogs. And yet (just like Perriello) PPP finds him in a dead heat.

The race in the 1st — between freshman Rep. Martin Heinrich and Jon Barela, the former head of Albuquerque’s Hispanic Chamber of Commerce — is one that, even before this poll, I’d have classified as “Likely D,” given the district’s lean (D+5) and Heinrich’s convincing 2008 victory. The Republicans will have to make a serious dent in the currently “Likely D” seats in order to retake the majority, but it’s looking like NM-01 isn’t on track to be one of those seats where they do.

In fact, the Republicans actually come a little closer in the 3rd, which is the state’s traditionally most Democratic-friendly district at D+7 (although this was briefly held by a Republican in the 1990s after a surprisingly strong Green Party performance in a special election). Part of the problem may lie with its Rep, Ben Lujan (the only one of the three to sport negative approvals, at 31/40 — Teague, by comparison, is at 41/36), but I suspect the 3rd is also a very difficult district to poll. It’s a rural, impoverished district where a sizable number of the Democratic base voters may not speak English or have landlines, which may give more weight to the district’s Republicans clustered around Farmington.

RaceTracker Wiki: NM-01 | NM-02 | NM-03

• FL-Sen: Here’s a pretty serious repudiation of Charlie Crist by the GOP party faithful. At a county party straw poll in Pasco County (Tampa exurbs, one county removed from Crist’s Pinellas County home), Marco Rubio beat Crist 73 to 9. Luckily for Crist, the primary electorate includes a much broader sample than the party’s diehard activist base who actually show up for meetings… but this shows just how badly things are for him with the base.

• IL-Sen: Bad news for AG Lisa Madigan, whose list of demands for a Senate race include an Obama endorsement, a cleared field, and no brown M&Ms at the catering table: Barack Obama announced that he wouldn’t be endorsing anyone in the Senate race. Good news for Roland Burris, on the other hand: a state prosecutor has decided that Burris won’t face perjury charges over his vague statements to the state legislature about his appointment to the Senate by disgraced former governor Rod Blagojevich.

• KY-Sen: SoS Trey Grayson has decided to start fundraising like a madman in the coming weeks, scheduling eight more events before the end of the fundraising quarter in June. Grayson opened his exploratory committee on May 6, so he has had only half-a-quarter in which to try to top Jim Bunning.

• MN-Sen: The FEC released two draft opinions that, if enacted by the full commission, will prevent Norm Coleman from tapping his campaign funds for his legal defense fees associated with his FBI investigation. (This doesn’t affect the costs of paying for the recount, which are paid in part by the Coleman Minnesota Recount Committee instead.)

• CA-Gov: Has anyone noticed that LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who everyone assumes is running for Governor, hasn’t taken any steps toward running for Governor? The folks at Calitics have noticed, and the fact that Villaraigosa (whose popularity in LA seems to be faltering) just took over the 2nd VP role for the US Conference of Mayors (which puts him on track to become the organization’s president in 2011) is another tea leaf that he won’t run. If he doesn’t run, that just leaves an all-Bay Area clash between old (Jerry Brown) and new (Gavin Newsom) for the Dem nod.

• MN-Gov: GOP state Rep. Paul Kohls from Minneapolis’s western exurbs has announced his candidacy for the Minnesota governor’s race. He joins former GOP state Rep. Bill Haas as official candidates, but at least a dozen more people seem intent on entering the race.

• FL-15: Rep. Bill Posey got nothing but scorn when he aligned himself with the most tinfoil elements of the GOP in introducing his birther legislation, but he’s just ratcheting up the crazy. Posey picked up four more co-sponsors (Culberson, Carter, Neugebauer, and Campbell). Also, while being interviewed on WorldNetDaily’s radio show about the bill, Posey outright accused Barack Obama of hiding something and, for good measure, tried launching a feud with Rachel Maddow.

• NM-01: Jon Barela, a former vice-chair of the New Mexico GOP and former head of the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce, officially announced his candidacy against Rep. Martin Heinrich. He did so with the endorsement of 2008 candidate Sheriff Darren White. While it’s now a D+5 district, it’s almost half Latino, so Barela could make some noise if he gets some traction in the Latino community.

• OH-08: Speaker Minority leader John Boehner got a break: his would-be primary challenger, iconoclastic Butler County Sheriff Richard Jones, has opted not to get in the race. This frees Boehner up to spend more of summer of 2010 fundraising for other House candidates, or at least working on his tan.

• VA-05: Very little has been happening in VA-05 while everyone waits to see whether ex-Rep. Virgil Goode will try to get his old job back from Rep. Tom Perriello in this GOP-leaning district in rural Virginia. One GOPer isn’t waiting, though: Cordel Faulk is publicly considering the race. Faulk hasn’t held office, but he has an interesting job; he’s the spokesman for Charlottesville-based professor and pundit Larry Sabato.

• NY-St. Senate: With the New York State Senate collapsed into a 31-31 tie, turncoat Dem (and, for now, Senate president and thus acting Lt. Gov.) Pedro Espada Jr. has come up with a rather novel legal theory in the absence of any constitutional clarification: he gets two votes, one ordinary vote as Senator and one tie-breaker vote as LG. Of course, nobody else seems to think this, and other theories are popping up as to who might get a tie-breaking vote (Former LG and current Gov. David Paterson? Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver?) if the Senators can’t figure out how to break the deadlock themselves. Meanwhile, a likely primary challenger to Espada has already popped up: Haile Rivera, an activist and ally of city councilor Eric Gioia who had previously been planning his own city council run this year.

• MO-Sen: Rep. Roy Blunt got some unwelcome news yesterday: he and his wife owe $6,820 in back taxes on their three-bedroom home in Georgetown, Washington D.C. assessed at $1.62 million. (The problem seems to be an improperly declared homestead exemption.) True to Republican form, the Blunt camp is blaming the government (more specifically, the D.C. government, for bungling the update of their homestead status).

• NV-Sen: The Nevada GOP may be closer to landing a credible candidate to go against Harry Reid. State Senator Mark Amodei of Carson City (who’s term-limited out in 2010) was unusually vocal on the senate floor in the session’s closing weeks. When pressed in a recent interview, he said that if Rep. Dean Heller didn’t run against Reid (which seems unlikely; Heller, if he moves up, is usually mentioned as a primary challenger to toxic Gov. Jim Gibbons), then he’d “consider” running.

• NY-Sen-B: Rep. Carolyn McCarthy endorsed Mayor-for-Life Michael Bloomberg for another term at the helm of New York City. As Daily Kos’s Steve wisely points out, this may be an indicator she’s not looking to run in the Dem primary; if she’s going to do so, she’d have to run to Kirsten Gillibrand’s left, but that would be a difficult case to make having just endorsed a Republican-turned-Independent for one of the state’s biggest jobs.

• AL-Gov: State Treasurer Kay Ivey announced that she’s joining the crowded field of GOP candidates for Governor (including college chancellor Bradley Byrne, who also announced this week, as the moderate option, and ex-judge Roy Moore as the nuclear option). Ivey, however, may suffer a bit from her role in the state’s messed-up prepaid college tuition plan.

• IA-Gov: State Rep. Chris Rants has been traveling the state gauging support for a run at the GOP gubernatorial nomination. Rants, from Sioux City in the state’s conservative west, served as majority leader and then speaker, but was replaced in leadership after the GOP lost the majority in 2006. Fellow Sioux City resident Bob Vander Plaats (the 2006 Lt. Gov. nominee) is expected to announce his candidacy soon as well.

• MN-Gov: Tim Pawlenty has deferred his decision on whether or not to run for re-election to a third term until later this summer. The decision may turn on who’s more pissed at him after he decides whether or not to certify Al Franken — the nationwide GOP base, or Minnesotans.

• OR-Gov: Former Gov. John Kitzhaber seems to be moving closer to a return to Salem, meeting with some of the state’s insiders about steps toward a comeback. Ex-SoS Bill Bradbury, who’s already in the running (and won’t stand down if Kitzhaber gets in), confirms that Kitzhaber is “looking very seriously” at the race. Kitzhaber seems to be looking forward to a “do-over” now that there’s a firmly Democratic legislature; he spent most of his two terms in the 90s playing defense against a GOP-held legislature.

• RI-Gov: Two of Rhode Island’s key Democrats are taking steps to run for the open Governor’s seat: AG Patrick Lynch and Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts. Roberts is staffing up with top-tier campaign staff, while Lynch said that he has “every intention” of running for Governor during a radio interview. (Treasurer Frank Caprio is also mentioned as a likely candidate and is sitting on the most cash, but hasn’t done anything visible yet.) A Brown Univ. poll just released tested their approvals; Lynch was at 47/39 and Caprio at 41/24, while Roberts was in worse shape at 22/36. (A poll from March is the only test of the Dem primary so far, with Caprio leading with 30%, compared with 17 for Lynch, 12 for Roberts, and 13 for Providence mayor David Cicilline, who won’t be running.)

• FL-02: State Senate Minority Leader Al Lawson has been attempting to primary Rep. Allen Boyd from the left, but party power brokers are encouraging him to switch over to the race for state CFO, being vacated by Alex Sink. With Senate President Jeff Atwater already running for CFO for the GOP, this would pit the parties’ two Senate leaders against each other.

• IN-05: In this R+17 district, the primary’s where it’s at, and there’s a whole herd of Republicans chasing Rep. Dan Burton, perceived more as vulnerable more for his age and indifference than any ideological reason. State Rep. Mike Murphy just got into the race. He joins former state Rep. and former state party chair Luke Messer, John McGoff (who narrowly lost the 2006 primary against Burton), and Brose McVey (who ran against Julia Carson in IN-07 in 2002).

• NM-01: It’s looking there’ll be a contested GOP primary to see who gets flattened by freshman Rep. Martin Heinrich in this now D+5 district. Former state party vice-chair and former Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce president Jon Barela is about to form an exploratory committee. (Given this district’s 45% Latino population, Barela may be a stronger candidate for the general than funeral home director Kevin Daniels.)

• PA-06: Here’s a good tea leaf that Rep. Jim Gerlach is making behind-the-scenes notifications that he’s indeed bailing on his rapidly-bluening district. State Rep. Curt Schroder from rural Chester County (not to be confused with Oregon’s Kurt Schrader), always considered to be the next GOPer to have dibs on this seat, has organized a campaign committee. Dems have journalist Doug Pike running in this race, but someone with more firepower may jump in once Gerlach makes it official.

• PA-07: For a few hours there last night, it looked like we were facing real problems in PA-07, a D+3 seat with a good Republican bench that will open up if Rep. Joe Sestak follows through on his threatened primary challenge to Arlen Specter. Former E.D. Pa. US Attorney (and before that, Delaware County DA) Pat Meehan was reported to be mulling a switch from the Governor’s race, where he’s probably lagging AG Tom Corbett in the primary (no polls have been taken, so who knows?), over to PA-07, giving the GOP a top-tier recruit. However, Meehan acted quickly to tamp that down and reaffirm he’s running for Gov. TPM points to another potential GOPer, Steven Welch, founder of local pharma company Mitos Technologies; on the Dem side, as most everyone here knows, state Rep. Bryan Lentz is heir apparent.