Garin-Hart-Yang for David Boswell (8/23-25, likely voters):
David Boswell (D): 41
Brett Guthrie (R): 33
(MoE: ±4.9%)
This is a real opportunity, no doubt. An earlier poll this summer from SurveyUSA showed Boswell, a longtime state Senator, leading Guthrie by three points for this open seat. While Kentucky’s 2nd has a PVI of R+12.9, it’s an ancestrally Democratic seat and Boswell has a good deal of name recognition from his long stint in Kentucky politics, including serving a term as the state’s Agriculture Commissioner.
However, if Boswell hopes to win this one, he’s gonna need to bundle some money together, and fast. When we last checked in with the Bos at the end of June, he had only $45K in the bank (compared to Guthrie’s $661K). Former Senate candidate (and richie rich) Greg Fischer has stepped forward in recent weeks to help money find Boswell, and other Kentucky Dems were pushing this race hard in Denver. However, Boswell needs to crank it up in order to seize this opportunity.
The guy is well-known and liked and this could be his race to lose. WHY does he seem to have no interest in running a real campaign? I really hope he gets his act together.
Boswell is extremely well known in the district. KY-02 is a lot like MS-01 in the sense that before it elected a GOP true believer in 1994, it was represented by a yellow dog Democrat (William Natcher) for decades. While the district is around R+13, there are probably some yellow dogs left in eastern Kentucky.
Let the record show that the wise sage Stu Rothernberg said in passing in a column that Boswell had no chance of winning. (Though, I actually think Rothernberg is smart, he is unquestionably overly-smug about races he knows little about besides the conventional wisdom).
what Boswell’s fundraising has looked like SINCE Q2 ended? He couldn’t raise money during the legislative session which went pretty late into the year this year and then he had to spend most of his money on his primary which I think was in June. Perhaps he’s picked it up since then?