Many have been wondering if and when the party committees would dive into the special election to replace Kirsten Gillibrand in the House. Well, the wait appears to be over, as the DCCC has just purchased a block of TV ad time set to start tomorrow. From Roll Call:
According to knowledgeable sources, the buy is scheduled to start on Friday and continue through March 31, the date of the special election. Specific details about the size of the DCCC’s buy are not yet known. The committee previously was on the air with a radio ad.
On Tuesday, the National Republican Congressional Committee went on the air with about 1,200 gross ratings points of television ads on broadcast and cable in the Albany media market, which covers the majority of the district.
In the battle of managing expectations, both committees have something at stake here. Democrats obviously would like to retain this seat (though its loss would hardly hinder the ability of the super-sized Democratic caucus to push through legislation in the House). For the NRCC, this seat is pretty close to a must-win; they’ve started off the race with the advantages of having a relatively clean recruit with high name recognition in an ancestrally Republican district, while Democrats have had to start from scratch with venture capitalist Scott Murphy — his Wall Street ties already being the subject of Republican attack ads. If Tedisco loses this one, the NRCC will have no excuses.
I’ll be sick at my stomach if she doesn’t even bother spending a little of that political capital campaigning for Murphy or cutting him a TV ad.
until we see an intensive ground game IE effort… and so far its butkis.