• CO-Sen: Both Jane Norton and Ken Buck found something else to do when Michael Steele showed up in town yesterday, eager to take his off the hook, technically avant-garde message to Colorado’s urban-suburban hip-hop settings. Seems like Steele has a bad case of the cooties in the wake of his Afghanistan comments. Buck instead went to hang with the decidedly non-hip-hop Tom Tancredo at a rally yesterday instead, where Tancredo called Barack Obama the “greatest threat to the United States today.” Buck subsequently had to distance himself from Tancredo’s comments via conference call… I’m wondering if Buck would have rather appeared with Michael Steele after all.
• NV-Sen: Sharron Angle rolled out her campaign’s first ad; perhaps wisely, she isn’t in it at all, other than a voiceover doing the required disclaimer at the end. Instead, it’s just a narration-free black-and-white montage of the economic woe that, of course, Harry Reid caused. Which completely contradicts her own message that she’s touted in public appearances, which is that it’s not a Senator’s job to create jobs, and that it was in fact a bad thing for Harry Reid to intervene to save 22,000 jobs at a local construction project. To top all that off, Angle said Wednesday that Reid’s attempts to fight back on the jobs issue were an attempt to “hit the girl.” (UPDATE: Jon Ralston uncovers that Angle’s ad buy was for a whopping total of $5K. Add this one to the growing pile of bullshit ad buys aimed at getting free media.)
• OH-Sen: Lee Fisher’s fundraising numbers are out. The good news is: he finally had a seven-digit quarter, pulling in at least $1 million last quarter and giving him “more than” $1 million CoH. The bad news is: that’s less than half what Rob Portman raised last quarter, and it’s a more than 8:1 CoH advantage for Portman.
• AL-Gov: Two different polls are out in the Republican runoff in Alabama, and they paint very different pictures. One is from GOP pollster Baselice, working on behalf of a group called Public Strategy Associates. They give Robert Bentley a 53-33 lead over Bradley Byrne. The other is an internal from the Byrne camp; they’re claiming a four-point lead, although without any details about topline numbers or even the pollster. They’re also claiming that Byrne has gained 7 points in the last week while Bentley has lost 7, presumably because of Byrne’s attacks on Bentley’s friendliness with the Alabama Education Association, the teachers’ union that has particularly had it in for Byrne. Byrne also rolled out endorsements from two of Alabama’s sitting House members, Spencer Bachus and Jo Bonner.
• CA-Gov: Seems like Jerry Brown took a look at the internals at the latest Field Poll and realized he’d better do something about his standing among Latino voters. He held a press conference yesterday with 14 Latino leaders, criticizing the sincerity of Meg Whitman’s softening of her immigration stance since the GOP primary. Xavier Becerra pointed out that “Jerry Brown broke bread with Cesar Chavez. His opponent breaks bread with Pete Wilson.” (Wilson, of course, was the driving force behind Prop 187 last decade.)
• CO-Gov: Dan Maes, the insurgent candidate in the GOP primary, is pretty much out of gas. He raised all of $33K last quarter, with $23K CoH. That cash on hand is somewhat less than the $27K fine he’s going to have to pay for various campaign finance violations he’s committed.
• GA-Gov: SurveyUSA has more polls of the fast-approaching gubernatorial primaries. They find John Oxendine at 32 and Karen Handel at 23, meaning they’re likely to advance to a GOP runoff. Nathan Deal and Eric Johnson are lagging at 12, with Ray McBerry at 5. On the Democratic side, Roy Barnes is at 56, which would let him avoid a runoff against Thurbert Baker (who’s at 18). Dubose Porter and David Poythress languish at 6 and 5, respectively. (SUSA also has Dem Senate and downballot numbers, if you click the link.) PPP (pdf) is also out with a poll, although this is one of their rare internals that makes it to the public view; it’s on behalf of J.C. Cole, a Thurbert Baker backer. They find Barnes just under the runoff mark: 49 Barnes, 19 Baker, 4 Porter, and 3 Poythress.
• MA-Gov: The money race in Massachusetts is a pretty close three-way race, although Tim Cahill, corresponding with his slide in the polls, has also lost his financial edge. GOPer Charlie Baker has the most cash on hand with $2.97 million, with Cahill at $2.95 million. Dem incumbent Deval Patrick has the least, $2.37 million, but seems to be expecting some help from the state Dem party, which has a big CoH edge over the state GOP.
• NE-Gov: The Nebraska governor’s race is turning into a bit of Democratic debacle, as the departure of Mark Lakers has left Dems looking high and low for someone willing to take his place at this late date. Ben Nelson says someone’s likely to emerge before the July 23-25 state convention, although he didn’t volunteer any particular names.
• TN-Gov: Knoxville mayor (and oil baron) Bill Haslam seems on track to be Tennessee’s next governor, according to a poll for local TV affiliate WSMV. (The poll was conducted by Crawford, Johnson, and Northcott, a firm I’ve never heard of.) The free-spending Haslam leads the GOP primary in the open seat race at 32, with Rep. Zach Wamp at 21 and Lt. Governor Ron Ramsey at 11. Haslam also performs the best against Mike McWherter, the only Dem left in the hunt. Haslam wins 60-34, while Wamp wins 59-35 and Ramsey wins 51-41.
• FL-22: Allen West continues to post gaudy fundraising numbers; he says he raised $1.4 million in the last quarter, likely to be the biggest total for any Republican House challenger. West, of course, is a client of BaseConnect, and a lot of that money gets churned through for direct-mail expenses, but he is steadily expanded his cash on hand, claiming to be up to $2.2 million. Rep. Ron Klein had $2.6 million CoH at the end of the previous quarter in March.
• GA-08: Here’s a fundraising success for a late entrant for the GOP: state Rep. Austin Scott, who bailed out of the gubernatorial primary to run an uphill fight against Democratic incumbent Rep. Jim Marshall, outraised Marshall last quarter. Scott raised $251K last quarter (including $56K of his own money), leaving him with $213K CoH. Marshall raised $165K, but has $981K in his war chest.
• MI-03: In case there was any doubt who the DeVos family (the power behind the Republican throne in western Michigan) was backing, they made it explicit today. Dick DeVos announced his support for state Rep. Justin Amash in the GOP primary to succeed retiring Vern Ehlers.
• MN-01: One more surprise GOP fundraising score to report: state Rep. Randy Demmer had a good quarter, pulling in $303K, leaving him with $251K. Democratic Rep. Tim Walz hasn’t released numbers, but had $856K CoH banked last quarter.
• NY-23: Scozzafava endorses Bill Owens! No, it’s not quite what you think. It’s Tom Scozzafava (apparently absolutely no relation to special election opponent-turned-endorser Dede Scozzafava), the Supervisor of the town of Moriah. Owens also got some probably more significant good news on Tuesday: Don Kasprzak, the Republican mayor of Plattsburgh, offered some public praise of Owens and, while stopping short of endorsing him, said that he couldn’t vote for either Doug Hoffman or Matt Doheny.
• OH-12: With Rep. Pat Tiberi having dropped an internal poll yesterday showing him dominating Democratic challenger Paula Brooks, today it was Brooks’ turn. She offered up an internal poll from Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, which also showed her losing, but by a much smaller margin. The poll sees the race at 48-36 in favor of Tiberi, with 10% going to Libertarian candidate Travis Irvine.
• CA-Init (pdf): The Field Poll also provided numbers for four initiatives that are likely to be on the ballot in November. Like several other pollsters, they see a close race for Prop 19, which proposes to legalize marijuana: it’s failing 44-48. Perhaps the most significant race, though, is Prop 25, which would solve the Sacramento gridlock by allowing passage of a budget by a mere majority vote; support for Prop 25 is very broad, at 65-20, with even Republicans favoring passage. Voters don’t support Prop 23, a utilities-funded push to overturn the state’s greenhouse gases emissions law; it’s failing 36-48. Finally, there’s 42-32 support for Prop 18, a bond to pay for water supply improvements.
• Fundraising: A couple more fundraising tidbits from the Fix: Democratic GA-Gov candidate Roy Barnes raised $1.3 million last quarter, while GOPer Nathan Deal raised $570K. And in NH-Sen, Bill Binnie reported raising $550K, but bear in mind he can write himself checks as need be.
• Rasmussen:
• IL-Gov: Pat Quinn (D-inc) 40%, Bill Brady (R) 43%
• SD-AL: Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-inc) 44%, Kristi Noem (R) 49%
The fact that Fisher is still leading Portman right now (however slightly) suggests to me that Fisher will have enough money to compete ultimately.
That said, Fisher will need to do better with fundraising to make sure he doesn’t get swamped by Portman’s stash.
http://www.nola.com/politics/i…
State Rep. Ernest Wooton (who I’ve never heard of before today) is the guy. His district includes parts of Jefferson, Plaquemines and St. Charles Parishes, so hopefully he can take a few votes from Vitter’s base. I’ll likely be volunteering for Melancon when I get back to Tulane, so I’ll keep an eye out for any Wooton-ness in NOLA (though I doubt he’ll be much of a presence).
Oh brother, that oughta backfire on Angle.
But I’m beginning to wonder if she’s actually one of the most gaffe-prone candidates ever, or if there’s some weird calculation behind this. Sort of inoculation against future more critical gaffes in the fall since they’ll seem less-noteworthy and less news-worthy.
I posted this late into the previous thread. I sent this to Dr. Kerwin Swint, a former political science professor of mine who wrote the book on negative campaigns. He’s reaction: “Wow!”
For those of us who still like to see what he’s polling, even if we take it with a grain of salt, it makes it much more digestable.
Kazprsak is probably the most prominent R Mayor in the district. Per http://www.observer.com/2009/p… , he was the first district Rs to endorse Hoffman over Scozzafava.
Good sign for Owens that Kazprsak has seen the light.
be getting some good media coverage about Vitter, though they are still going softly about it. Nobody seems to have much respect for him, but they’ll vote to keep Democrats from gaining power. Melancon is probably getting crushed where he is unknown; I have no doubt he’s probably winning his congressional district where he is immensely personally popular since his work in the aftermath of Katrina, and in New Orleans; he just needs to gain a better toehold in Arcadia, and northwest Louisiana, as well as the Baton Rouge upper central Louisiana area.
He should be hitting on Katrina and Rita down in South Louisiana; call Vitter what he’s been, which is an ineffective Senator, a far-right backbencher who hasn’t gotten money or support for the state like it’s other members have.
Then he just has to hope 45% of the vote will be enough with legitimate third party candidates taking the “I don’t like Vitter but I don’t want to vote for a Democrat” voters.
So the loon of Sharrontology bought a whole 5k worth of ads. I am out of touch with the market so I have no idea of what that means. How many late night off-hours commercials will it take to eat that up? How many prime time ads would 5k buy? If anyone knows let me know. I live out in the sticks, I am so far away that the I have to drive five miles to see the “bright lights” of town, in my case it means Winnemucca.
http://www.bluestemprairie.com/
The $130k debt Demmer has is a loan he gave himself for his 2008 run. There has been some speculation that part of the reason Demmer ran again this year was so he could raise enough money to pay himself back for his 2008 loan.
why Rasmussen keeps polling ND-AL and SD-AL over and over again? Both states have non-competitive Senate races, so it doesn’t make sense to keep polling these districts obsessively. SD-Gov might be (very) mildly interesting, but it’s still weird to be spending money polling these states.
Is it possible that someone keeps paying Rasmussen to poll these districts? I don’t really want to speculate, but it seems so strange to me. I know that both Herseth Sandlin and Pomeroy are vulnerable, but there are so many other interesting races out there.
Democrats scrounged up candidates for LA-01 and LA-06, but it looks like LA-05 and LA-07 will go without a Democratic candidate. A bunch of independents filed, but it appears that Tommie Vassel will spare Democrats a headache in LA-02. Also, I think the Dems panicked when they realized they didn’t have a candidate for the Lt. Governor election in October, so four of them filed. There are also challengers to Vitter and Cao in their respective primaries.
Senate: Nick Accardo (R), Chet Traylor (R), Neeson Chauvin (D), Randall Todd Hayes (L), William McShan (Reform!), Skip Galan (I), Milton Gordon (I), Tommy LaFargue (I), Ernest Wooton (I)
LA-01: Myron Katz (D), Arden Wells (I)
LA-02: Norman Paul Billiot (R), Eugene Green (D), Gary Johnson (D), Ron Austin (I), Jack Radosta (I)
LA-03: Kristian Magar (R)
LA-06: Merritt McDonald (D)
Lt. Governor: Ken Burkhalter (D), Jim Crowley (D), Caroline Fayard (D), Butch Gautreaux (D)
as former Supreme Court Justice Chet Traylor just announced he was challenging him the primary. Traylor is fairly well-connected in North Louisiana business circles and Republican circles, and is already lambasting Vitter for some of his improprieties as well as running a teabagger campaign to Vitter’s right, (yes it is possible). Traylor is famous of course for upholding Louisiana’s anti-sodomy law. It looks Vitter, reeling now from the full-fledged media pick up, (it was even in the Monroe News-Star today, and that paper is a conservative rag), and Melancon attacks are really helping get his name out htere, (along with his work on BP),will now have to spend significant resources and time attacking someone other than Obama and Melancon and the Democrats. And waiting in the wings for dissatisfied Republicans is Ernest Wooten, running as an independent.
I’m starting to see a path to win this if Melancon had a good fundraising quarter. Still unlikely, but I think Rasmussen might be overstating the Republican lean a bit.
without half of the major Republicans in the state, epic fail:
Not to mention Reno Mayor Bob Cashell, (who has endorsed Reid, very strongly, which will help in the crucial Washoe swing area where Cashell is highly respected by moderates of both parties and independents), and former Republican Governor Kenny Guinn, a wildly popular moderate who of course was derided as a RINO by conservative critics like Angle.
Oh, and she accused Reid “Of waterboarding the economy”. Could even GOPVOTER support this woman? I mean I can hardly think of a more abrasive personality and far-right collection of views and strange religious positions. I mean she is Helen Chenoweth all over again but the thing is Nevada is not fricking Idaho and she’s gonna get her butt handed to her by Reid, even in this environment.
And, from the looks of it, at least for now, no races whatsoever have really moved up or down, rankings-wise, over the past month. The only June projection I’d be tempted to mull over was my Rob Portman prediction.
I can’t think of a better slogan to win California’s Latino votes than:
Jerry Brown broke bread with Cesar Chavez. His opponent breaks bread with Pete Wilson.
Boom. Done. Run that phrase repeatedly on Spanish-language radio and TV (get Becerra to say it again in Spanish, perhaps?) and Brown’s numbers will surge again among Latinos.