These days, many of us in the blogosphere are turning our attention to the coattail effect in this year’s election. I’ll leave all the presidential speculation to every other blog out there, but I wanted to open up the floor to discuss the effect of gubernatorial and senatorial candidates on congressional and state-legislature races. Who hurts? Who helps? I can’t help but speculate that some down-ballot candidates in Minnesota are waiting with bated breath to see how much of a liability Al Franken turns out to be. And I definitely foresee Mark Warner helping down-ticket Dems in Virginia win new seats in the U.S. House and in state and local offices. Got any other observations and insights? I yield the floor!
35 thoughts on “Coattails, Coattails.”
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Jeanne Shaheen and Tom Udall should definitely have coattails in their respective races — hopefull that helps us hold our seats in NH (though its gonna take a lot to hold onto Shea-Porter) and to pick-up an additional seat in NM (and hold onto Udall’s).
If Barack is the nominee — this should help cement Bean’s hold on her district — as well as help Foster and Halvorson pick up those seats open seats.
including Rasmussen today so he seems to be doing ok for now.
IL-06, 10, 11, 14, 18…how many of those districts would Obama help Democrats capture? (That is, if we don’t take IL-14 in the special election).
do we think Levin will have any coattails to help push Gary Peters over the 50 + 1 mark? I know we came close in 2006…
Bradley is running — and she refuses to raise any money. It’s pretty pathetic — and stupid. Her only hope is Shaheen and the presidential nominee pulling her over the finish line.
she was able to fly under the radar and take advantage of an unexpecting incumbent. now the nrcc (though cash-strapped) views this as one of their best shots at picking off a dem incumbent — and bradley has the capability to raise millions if he needs it.
she had a great ground operation in 2006 — but she is going to need more than just that to win re-election when the Republicans are coming after her hard. without money, she can’t counter the millions Bradley, the nrcc, and Republican 527s are planning to spend attacking her…
she also has a reputation of being a bit of a nut — which isn’t going to help get he re-elected either. think sekula-gibbs after she won the special to replace delay — its that bad.
has come primarily from labor, leadership pacs, and contributions directly from members. look at her reports. i’m guaranteeing you that 90% of her money has come from those three groups — or from funds the dccc has solicited on her behalf.
and $500k is far from where she should be at at this point — less than 9 months from Election Day. her district is almost completely in the Boston media market — and $500k is probably less than 25% of her projected media buy.
I haven’t heard much about her popularity in NH-01 or he competition. Is Bradley trying to get his seat back?
no matter what. And I expect a destructive GOP primary in the NM-Sen race, which will hurt them in the general.
Warner will be helpful in the Congressional races, but not too much so. There are only 2 potentially competitive CDs in Va, Va-10 and Va-11. Va-11 should be a solid pickup with Tom Davis retiring and Frank Wolf is potentially vulnerable, but Judy Feder, his likely opponent, lost by 16 points in 2006 despite the DCCC getting in and providing help. Unfortunately, the rest of the CDs are pretty well gerrymandered and VA holds its state and local elections in off year. We just had an election in 2007 and the next state and local races are in 2009. Warner has GREAT coattails in Va (He helped Tim Kaine win in 2005 and was big in Dems taking back the State Senate in 2007), but unfortunately we won’t get much benefit from him being on the ballot this year.
. . . but not by much. I’m thrilled that he has been able to catch up to Coleman, but I fully expect the GOP slime machine to throw everything they’ve got at him from now until November. The question is, how much of it will stick . . . and what does that do to Congressional and statehouse candidates?
Obviously, all tickets are unique, but an Obama ticket does some especially unique things to the turnout model. Seniors are hostile to him, youth are crazy about him, and the black vote, the male vote, the Hispanic vote all need adjusting from their normal forecasts.
For one, Obama is an excellent reason to consider re-recruiting for GA-Sen. We should not give Chambliss a pass if Obama is the nominee.
The case for Sessions and Graham is weaker, but still exists.
Obama helps Musgrove a LOT. Musgrove lost because of weak relations with the African-American community, and correspondingly weak turnout in his reelection bid.
North Carolina also needs to be revisited. I don’t think Hagen is trying to win, and I don’t know that Neal can win (as much as that pains me to say), but this race should get a stronger challenger given the new circumstances.
Lastly, Kansas. There’s at least a 25% chance that Sebelius is the VP. We need to challenge Pat Roberts.
Kentucky is a disaster but it appears the die is cast here.
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As far as existing candidates, I’d say Obama helps Landrieu and Mark Udall quite a bit. He helps Franken and Begich and Noriega also. I don’t think he changes the dynamics for Tom Udall, Shaheen, Warner, Merkley, Allen terribly much, although a turnout boost in OR and ME could be a big deal for the last two.
Bottom line, over the last two months the picture has changed for a lot of these races. And in at least a couple (Georgia and North Carolina for sure, KS AL and SC maybe), the change is so profound that it warrants a totally fresh look at recruitment. I hope it happens. Especially because Schumer may be so focused on rear-guard actions in defense of Clinton that he doesn’t see the opportunity in front of him until it’s too late.
. . . should be nationwide, not just in Illinois. Regarding those specific congressional races . . . do you think Dick Durbin has some coattails of his own that will help in those districts? He is certainly more popular than Blagojevich, who was the top Dem on the ticket in ’06. Could that tip the balance?