SSP Daily Digest: 1/11

Redistricting Contest: A reminder – if you haven’t sent in your .DRF.XML file to Jeff, please do so ASAP – jeffmd [at] swingstateproject [dot] com. Please be sure to include your SSP username and a link to your diary. Thanks! (D)

AR-Sen: Alleged United States Senator Blanche Lincoln is whinging that actually doing her job in December cost her $300,000 in fundraising receipts. This is probably her way of saying her numbers will be lighter than expected this quarter. Why on earth would you go public with this, though? This is not exactly the kind of message you want to communicate to the public – or your opponents. (D)

CA-Sen: A lot of Republicans seemed dismayed by Carla Fiorina’s suggestions a few months ago that she wasn’t going to be dipping into her personal money in order to fund her Senate bid – I mean, that was the whole point of her running, wasn’t it? At any rate, she’s just reversed course, with her latest finance report, which reveals that she loaned her campaign $2.5 million. Having burned through most of her outside donations, that leaves her with $2.7 million on hand.

FL-Sen, FL-Gov: Charlie Crist’s message discipline seems to be gotten completely unglued, as he searches for the just-right pitch that’s moderate enough and yet conservative enough. Today, he’s acknowledging support for the stimulus package and “being nice” to Barack Obama, and not apologizing for either one. Meanwhile, there’s still that persistent rumor out there involving Crist bailing on the Senate race and going back to another term as Governor. That’s not happening if GOP AG Bill McCollum has anything to say about it; he says he won’t stand down for Crist.

MA-Sen: Everyone’s still milling around waiting for that rumored close Boston Herald poll, but in the meantime, a new Democratic internal poll floated to the surface this morning, and it seems to give some credence to that Boston Globe/UNH poll that gave a solid 15-point margin to Democratic AG Martha Coakley. The internal, conducted by Mark Mellman’s firm, gives Coakley a 50-36 lead over Republican state Sen. Scott Brown, with Libertarian candidate Joe Kennedy (no relation to the Kennedy clan) pulling in a surprisingly-high 6 (which may be coming out of Brown’s share). If Brown has internals showing the race a dead heat like he claims, now would be the time for him to lay them on the table. Also today comes word that Barack Obama has no plans to campaign for Coakley, although I don’t know whether to interpret that as a sign of Democratic confidence, or of Obama not wanting to risk political capital on something that’s less than a slam dunk.

ND-Sen: Gov. John Hoeven had said he needed a few weeks to get some stuff out of the way before saying anything official about the Senate race, but it looks like the stuff was more easily cleared away than anticipated: he’s now expected to announce his candidacy at an appearance at a GOP district convention in Bismarck tonight.  

NY-Sen-B: Republican Rep. Peter King announced, for something like the third or fourth time, that he is no longer considering running for the Senate, and instead will run for another term in NY-03. Stay tuned for next month, when King will at some point remember that he hasn’t been on cable news for a while and will reveal that he’s considering a run for the Senate. Meanwhile, the political establishment is continuing to take seriously the possibility of a Harold Ford Jr. primary challenge to Kirsten Gillibrand, going all the way up to the White House, which today confirmed that it will back Gillibrand over Ford. Ford, meanwhile, is doing some serious remodeling of his image to better comport with New York codes: he’s now done a complete 180 on gay marriage, which he’s now for, and on abortion, where he claims that when he said he was pro-life, it was to “take back” the term from its right-wing appropriators. Finally, the Republicans will have to look elsewhere than ex-Rep. Susan Molinari for their nominee; after a brief flirtation, Molinari (who’s making big money consulting and probably doesn’t want the pay cut) just declined.

UT-Sen: This should come as no surprise, but the NRSC, tasked with defending incumbents, confirmed that it’s supporting Bob Bennett in his re-election bid against several right-wing primary challengers. The Club for Growth has painted a bullseye on Bennett’s back, although they haven’t settled on which challenger to support.

CO-Gov: Denver mayor John Hickenlooper hasn’t leaped as quickly into the Governor’s race (following the withdrawal of Bill Ritter and demurral of Ken Salazar) as many had expected; he’s saying he’ll make a decision within the next five days, so stay tuned. Former House speaker Andrew Romanoff, currently an invisible presence in the Senate primary, has also been consulting with Democratic officials about getting in, although it sounds like he’d do so only if Hickenlooper didn’t. Another rumor getting bandied about: Romanoff joining forces and running as Hickenlooper’s Lt. Gov. candidate; at any rate, it sounds like Romanoff is looking for an exit from the Senate race. Hickenlooper’s decision may get helped along by a certain Barack Obama, who apparently called Hickenlooper to encourage him to get into the race (Hickenlooper says that doesn’t change his decision, though).

KS-Gov: Kansas Democrats are getting way, way down the totem pole as they look for a gubernatorial candidate, with Tom Wiggans’ recent withdrawal. Board of Regents chair Jill Docking, whose name frequently appears as Democrats’ Plan B in a variety of races, said she won’t run, and now the fickle finger seems to be pointing at Lawrence-area state Sen. Marci Francisco. (H/t Campaign Diaries.)

MA-Gov: The Boston Globe/UNH poll of the Senate race also asked about 2010’s gubernatorial race, and it’s more confirmation for the apparent trend that Dem incumbent Deval Patrick seems bolstered by the presence of state Treasurer Tim Cahill’s independent bid (despite Patrick’s 39/50 favorables and Cahill’s 39/15). Rather than Cahill dominating the middle, as he may have expected, instead he just winds up splitting the anti-Patrick vote, leaving the race’s GOPers a distant third. A Patrick/Cahill/Charlie Baker ballot plays out 30-23-19, while Patrick/Cahill/Christy Mihos is a similar 32-23-19.

CA-11: The GOP hasn’t quite found a top-tier candidate to take on Democratic Rep. Jerry McNerney, the only Golden State Dem who’s even remotely vulnerable. But they might get something of an upgrade with the newly-announced candidacy of David Harmer, the Republican attorney who acquitted himself fairly well in the special election last year in much bluer CA-10. He can bring residual name rec and fundraising connections to the race, and one of the race’s lesser lights, former San Jose city councilor Larry Pegram, is already moving to get out of the race. Still, Harmer doesn’t live in the district, and he exposes himself to the same carpetbagging charges he brought to his race against John Garamendi in the 10th.

CA-19: Kevin McCarthy looks a little flaky after this whole incident: it was reported last Friday that the Bakersfield-area Republican was sticking with his earlier endorsement of state Sen. Jeff Denham in the 19th while admitting a bit of a man-crush on ex-Rep. Richard Pombo. But now the Fresno Bee is reporting that McCarthy has gone all the way, spurned Denham, and is now endorsing Pombo.

HI-01: The local political establishment weighed in heavily on the side of state Sen. Colleen Hanabusa in the upcoming special election to replace resigning Rep. Neil Abercrombie. The decision of Sen. Daniel Akaka to endorse Hanabusa over his nemesis Ed Case should be no surprise, but this was accompanied by endorsements from the state’s other Senator, Daniel Inouye, and a variety of labor leaders as well. Case does have one endorsement which he’s touting in ads, though, from ex-Governor Ben Cayetano.

NY-23: Doug Hoffman won’t have the GOP primary field to himself in the 23rd after all. He’ll face a fight with a fellow conservative, albeit more of a team player: Assemblyman Will Barclay, who passed on a run in the special election in the 23rd, says he’s begun exploring the general election race.

OK-02: Rep. Dan Boren can always be counted on to say something douchey, and today’s no exception. He tells the Tulsa World (in an article titled “Boren: Democrats May Lose Congress”) that Dems are likely to lose seats in Congress, and that’s good news for Oklahoma and especially for him personally. “”In the 112th (Congress), I probably will have the most influence I have ever had, no matter who has the majority,” he says.

TN-08: It remains to be seen how much of an impact this will have on the race to succeed retiring Dem Rep. John Tanner, but the Republican primary just shrunk by one: computer consultant Donn Janes has announced that he’s going to run instead as a Tea Party-aligned independent. (J)

Mayors: That Rahm Emanuel-running-for-Chicago-mayor thing seemed to last a whole couple days. Emanuel yesterday praised Richard Daley and backed him for another term starting in 2011.

Florida: For all the general black clouds hanging over the Democrats regarding 2010, there’s always a lot of nuts-and-bolts numbers that somehow still look favorable, such as party committee fundraising and registration numbers. In Florida, both are actually advantage Team Blue, as the state Democratic party is sitting on $2.6 million cash on hand, $1 million more than state Republicans. Democrats have also built up their registration advantage over Republicans in Florida, to a margin of more than 800,000.

Tea Partiers: TPM has an interesting look at the civil war growing within the Tea Party movement, a microcosm of the larger civil war within the Republican party. Front and center today is the big teabaggers’ convention in Nashville (with Sarah Palin as keynoter), which is too expensive for many of the teabagging rank and file to attend, leading some to question whether there’s a usurpation of the movement by the Republicans’ Beltway professional class. Meanwhile, Think Progress has some new additions to its ongoing compendium of teabagger primary challenges to establishment GOPers.

SSP Daily Digest: 10/26

AR-Sen: Another day, another random conservative guy running for the Senate in Arkansas. Today, it’s the turn for Stanley Reed, the former president of the Arkansas Farm Bureau and former president of the University of Arkansas board of trustees, who says he’s considering the race for the Republican nod. (H/t CongressDaily.)

FL-Sen: The Police Benevolent Association, friendly with Charlie Crist from his law-and-order days as Attorney General, commissioned a poll via McLaughlin & Associates that paints a slightly rosier picture of Crist’s race against Marco Rubio than we’ve seen from several other pollsters last week. They find Crist up against Rubio 53-29, with a 67% approval.

IA-Sen: It looks like Christie Vilsack (the former Iowa first lady, and political heavyweight in her own right) won’t be challenging Chuck Grassley after all. She’d sounded receptive to the idea in the last few weeks, but today she’s telling the Des Moines Register that she won’t run. Lawyer and former gubernatorial candidate Roxanne Conlin had sounded close to running last week, so the ball’s in Conlin’s court now.

LA-Sen: Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne is the only prominent Republican left who hasn’t ruled out a challenge to David Vitter in the Republican primary, and, although he hasn’t taken any steps, he’s still not shutting the door on it. Last week on a radio show he confirmed that he hasn’t ruled it out. While a primary between the two hasn’t been polled since March (with Vitter leading 43-32), a recent poll had Dardenne overperforming Vitter against Charlie Melancon in the general.

MA-Sen: A poll of the Democratic primary, from Western New England College Polling Institute, in the special election in Massachusetts finds that AG Martha Coakley is still in the driver’s seat, but that some of her competitors are gaining ground as they get better-known. Coakley is at 37, with Boston Celtics co-owner Stephen Pagliuca at 14 (that’s what spending all that money on ads will get you), Rep. Michael Capuano at 13, and City Year founder Alan Khazei at 4. The general election is shaping up to be a non-event, as Coakley beats Republican state Sen. Scott Brown 58-32 and Capuano beats him 49-33.

WI-Sen: Russ Feingold finally has a noteworthy challenger: Terrence Wall, a Madison-area real estate developer who seems to have lots of money, although he’s never been elected before and it’s not clear what poltical skills he brings to the table. Wall is a frequent GOP donor, although he’s also given money to his local Dem, Rep. Tammy Baldwin.

MI-Gov: Rasmussen took a look at the Michigan governor’s race, but without a clear sense of who the nominees will be, they just did a generic ballot test. Generic R leads Generic D by only a point, 37-36 — suggesting that Lt. Gov. John Cherry, who hasn’t polled well in general election matchups, is underperforming Generic D. Democratic Governor Jennifer Granholm’s approval is 40/60.

NJ-Gov: Suffolk University takes its first poll of the New Jersey governor’s race, and while it would be nice to say this was the new reality, it’s probably more likely an outlier: Jon Corzine leads Chris Christie 42-33, with Chris Daggett pulling in 7. Suffolk did an interesting experiment: they listed all 12 minor candidates, and they ate a bit into Daggett’s numbers, pulling in a cumulative 3%. Corzine also has surprisingly high favorables, at 45/46, with Christie at 34/46. Monmouth, however, explains what might have happened with this sample (apparently a simple mistake that out-of-state pollsters often make): Suffolk weighted party ID by registration, but because of NJ’s semi-open primary system, many unaffiliateds are actually partisan and should be polled as such.

Meanwhile, with most polls still pointing to a tossup, Barack Obama is back for one more rally with Corzine next weekend. Chris Christie can ill-afford one more scandal in the news, but that seems to be happening anyway, as stories about his seemingly politically-motivated hiring of the son of Christie patron and mentor Herbert Stern as an assistant US Attorney, despite Stern Jr.’s mediocre interviews.

NY-Gov: This is the kind of courtesy call you don’t really want — the kind that says “I’m taking the job you want.” According to the NY Post’s Fred Dicker (so add salt according to taste), Andrew Cuomo contacted Rudy Giuliani through intermediaries to let him know that he will, in no uncertain terms, be running for Governor.

CA-11: One more Republican sounds like he’s ready to join the strangely crowded field to go up against Rep. Jerry McNerney next year. Former San Jose city councilor Larry Pegram says he’ll move into the district to take on McNerney — but it seems like he may want to do a little research before getting too committed, as he claimed that McNerney is weak because he was just swept in as part of the “Obama wave.” (McNerney, of course, was first elected in 2006.)

FL-19: The special election in the 19th is shaping up to be pretty uneventful: over the weekend, not only did outgoing Rep. Robert Wexler endorse state Sen. Peter Ted Deutch to take over for him, but so too did everyone else representing the Gold Coast: Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Ron Klein, and Alcee Hastings.

MI-02: A whole lot of Dutch-American conservative Republicans are jostling to take over from Rep. Peter Hoekstra in the solidly-red 2nd, and one of the field’s heavy hitters made his entry official: state Sen. Wayne Kuipers. He faces former state Rep. Bill Huizenga, former NFL player Jay Riemersma, and businessman Bill Cooper.

NY-23 (pdf): There have been rumors of private polls out there given a small lead to third-party Conservative candidate Doug Hoffman in the 23rd, and now his sponsors at the Club for Growth have openly released one. Basswood Research finds Hoffman in the lead with 31, with Democrat Bill Owens at 27 and Republican Dede Scozzafava lagging at 20, with 22 undecided (although with a huge 6% MoE, anything could be happening). That must have something to do with the DCCC’s new strategy; their new negative ad is going after Hoffman, rather than Scozzafava. Also, Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty finally got off the fence and decided to throw his lot in with the movement: he endorsed Hoffman.

NY-24: The New York Times, in a broader piece on GOP targeting of New York House Democrats, has an interesting tidbit we hadn’t seen before: the GOP is trying to coax Michael Richard Hanna, the businessman who performed surprisingly well against Rep. Mike Arcuri last year, into a rematch.

KY-St. Sen.: We’re moving one step closer to another vacant seat and special election in Kentucky’s Senate (which is controlled 21-17 by Republicans right now). Republican Dan Kelly was nominated for a state circuit court position, and he just needs Gov. Steve Beshear’s approval to get the job. Competitors are already lining up for the special, including Republican state Rep. Jimmy Higdon and Democratic former state Rep. Jodie Haydon. (In case you were wondering if Kentucky, which votes for statewide offices in odd-numbered years, is having legislative elections next week, the answer is no; state legislators are still elected in even-numbered years.)

VA-St. House: One more good piece in the diaries breaking down the individual races in Virginia’s House of Delegates into Tossup, Lean, and Likely, thanks to our Johnny Longtorso. One particularly interesting race is the 51st District in exurban Prince William County, where Republican Rich Anderson, challenging Dem incumbent Paul Nichols in a very competitive race, may face criminal charges for giving out Nichols’ Social Security number on a mailer to over 15,000 area residents.

ME-Init: Another poll from Pan Atlantic SMS of Question 1 in Maine on gay marriage. They find 42 yes and 53 no (with “no” being a vote in favor of continuing gay marriage), not much changed from their September poll (43-52) but the most optimistic numbers we’ve seen yet here.

Mayors: In New York City, Quinnipiac finds incumbent Michael Bloomberg (the $85 million man) with a sizable edge against Democratic comptroller William Thompson, leading 53-35 with a lead in every borough. (Not much change from 52-36 a month ago.) In what looks to be the first poll of the Atlanta mayoral race, SurveyUSA finds city councilor Mary Norwood with a big lead, although not quite enough to avoid a runoff with the 2nd place finisher. Norwood is at 46%, followed by state Sen. Kasim Reed at 26% and city councilor Lisa Borders at 17%. Norwood leads 6:1 among whites, independents, and Republicans; Reed leads among African-Americans. Also worth a read is a piece from our own diaries about major (and minor) mayoral races from elections09, which gets into the weeds on some tight races not on anybody’s national radar screen (with Vancouver, WA and Stamford, CT as particularly interesting examples).