DE-Sen: Defeat From the Jaws of Victory; SSP Moves to Lean D

Public Policy Polling (9/11-12, likely voters, 8/7-8 in parentheses):

Chris Coons (D): 50 (44)

Christine O’Donnell (R): 34 (37)

Undecided: 16 (19)

Chris Coons (D): 35 (35)

Mike Castle (R): 45 (48)

Undecided: 20 (17)

(MoE: ±3.2%)

The loud rumbling sound you’re hearing is the implosion of Republican chances in the Delaware Senate race, previously one of their gimmees that were the foundation for big overall Senate gains. As you can see, Democratic New Castle Co. Executive Chris Coons was well on track to lose to Mike Castle (although by a narrower margin than others polls have seen)… but the state’s remaining Republican electorate saw fit to nominate Christine O’Donnell last night, giving Coons a pretty clear shot at the win.

How bad a fit for the Delaware general electorate is O’Donnell? Let’s look at some of the underlying details: Castle’s favorables are 44/40, while O’Donnell’s are 29/50. 45% thought Mike Castle was “just right,” while 31% said “too liberal” and 15% “too conservative.” On other hand, Christine O’Donnell is 40% “too conservative,” with only 35% “just right” and 9% “too liberal.” By a 59-26 margin Castle was seen “fit to hold public office;” by a 49-31 margin O’Donnell is not. 18% say a Sarah Palin endorsement would make it more likely for them to vote for a candidate, while 52% say less likely. 15% say they’re members of the Tea Party, 71% are not. All in all, a pretty serious indication that the Delaware Republican Party, shrunken by the defection of many moderates to the Dems as in many other northeastern states, has been distilled to irrational purism in its purest essence.

UPDATE: Swing State Project is moving this race to Lean Democratic (from Lean Republican). While this poll might be more suggestive of “Likely D,” we don’t want to underestimate the power of a particularly revved-up Republican base in an open-seat race, even in a blue state like Delaware.

103 thoughts on “DE-Sen: Defeat From the Jaws of Victory; SSP Moves to Lean D”

  1. Like they tried with Maes, but given the level of pushback today, Rush is even attacking Rove for his remarks last night on Hannity, I think she’s sticking around.  

  2. Krashaauer tweets this afternoon that DE-Sen(R), back-to-back:

    If nothing else, the #DESEN results should end the WH/DNC-fueled myth that the GOP and Tea Party are one and the same.

    The danger for Dems is that they’ve been misreading the Tea Party movement all along, and aren’t prepared for a backlash in November as well.

    Oh, sigh.  Delaware proves the GOP and tea party ARE one and the same.  The GOP is whoever they put on the ballot for November.  Every time a teabagger wins, that’s a merger of the two.  That that’s happened so much, and the polling that shows the teabaggers are all right-wing Fox News lovers, underscores that these people are just part of the Republican base.

    And Democrats aren’t misreading anything, Josh is.  The teabaggers are just a loud part of the GOP base, nothing more.  They’ve been voting for Republicans for years, it’s just now they’re a little louder since their party has its back to the wall and they’re pissed off at Democrats because they hate us and they’re pissed off at their own establishment for not being far right enough when in power and then losing elections to boot.  Swing voters have turned against us, too, but they’re coming from an entirely different place psychologically than teabaggers.  For them, it’s low national morale; as Bill Clinton put it, they don’t feel like they’re winning.  Josh doesn’t get that, he thinks swing voters equal teabaggers.

    It’s really become part of political journalists’ DNA that no matter what happens, it’s bad for Democrats and good for Republicans.

  5. I admit it, me and my buddy took a victory shot last night when O’Donnell won because, obviously, it’ll lead to Senator Coons. But as I think about it, I’m not sure how great of a thing this is that she won.

    O’Donnell’s victory emboldens the loud, racist, and ignorant faction of the Republican Party. It’s sad. Why? Because it undoubtedly drags the party further(!) to the right. When they’re so far right, a couple of them will slip by and win their races–think Joe Miller and Marco Rubio. A lot of these guys will be on Sunday talk spewing out hateful and deceitful talking points; remember, if a senator says it, it’s GOT to be true! I think a lot of people will start to believe what they say, no matter how ignorant and untruthful it is.

    I love the fact that we’ll get a Senator Coons. Good for him. He stuck his neck out and took a chance in an uphill battle. He deserves the seat. Yet, a Castle-Coons debate would have been a productive one for our country: a sane, respectful conservative vs. a centrist Democrat would have contributed infinitely more than a Coons vs. TAKE OUT COUNTRY BACK discourse. Further, a Tea Party-infested party will make the Democrats more conservative, as they will try to scoop up disenfranchised Republicans.

    In the long term, who knows what it’ll happen. I’m happy about last night, don’t get my wrong. But I think we have to be careful in rooting for all tea party candidates; some of them will win!

  6. 1. End the myth that far right-wing Republicans cannot win Senate primaries in the northeast. It is very clear that conservative Republicans have taken over the party almost everywhere, and their preferences will be even stronger in closed primary states.

    2. Put a halt on all the attacks against PPP. Once again, PPP has come out well, although of course they are prone to showing an outlier just like every other pollster once in a while.

  9. C’mon.  Half the Republican voters are as discouraged right now as they can possibly be.  She has no path to victory short of a plague killing everyone with an IQ over 90.

  10. Clifford Case a liberal four-term senator

    .

    Case sought a fifth Senate term in 1978, but lost the Republican primary to Jeffrey Bell, an anti-tax conservative. Bell went on to lose the general election to Bill Bradley. No Republican has been elected to represent New Jersey in the Senate since Case’s last victory in 1972.

  13. Come on, guys. I’ve been Mr. Optimism for the GOP this cycle, and even I’m willing to say that Coons’ term in the Senate starts on Jan. 3rd, 2011. This one’s essentially over.

  17. Fox news thinks the Key to an O’Donnell victory in November is for her to run on a platform of “Throw the Bums out”

    But don’t you folks realize this is an open seat? there is no one to throw out

  19. http://politicalticker.blogs.c…

    http://voices.washingtonpost.c…

    Michael Steele:

    Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele told CNN Wednesday that he has instructed his staff to devote resources and money to help Christine O’Donnell in Delaware.

    Specifically, Steele said that he has emphasized to the RNC’s finance staff the need to help set up fundraisers to help stock O’Donnell’s campaign war chest. O’Donnell, with the help of Tea Party activists, defeated establishment favorite Mike Castle Tuesday in the Republican Senate primary.

    Steele has reached out to O’Donnell, and as of early Wednesday afternoon had not yet connected with her.

    Mike Pence:

    “I categorically reject that Christine O’Donnell cannot win in Delaware. This is a whole new world, we elected a Republican member of the Senate from Massachusetts.”

    (O’Donnell is NOT Scott Brown, you dolt.)

    Rove:

    “I’m for the Republican, but I got to tell you, we were looking at eight to nine seats in the Senate. We are now looking at seven to eight in my opinion. This is not a race we’re going to be able to win.”

    Mitt(ens) Romney:

    “Now is the time for Republicans to rally behind their nominee, Christine O’Donnell,” Romney said. “She ran an impressive campaign. I believe it is important we support her so we can win back the U.S. Senate this fall.”

    What can I say, the GOP is officially cowed by the teanuts.

  20. http://politicalticker.blogs.c…

    In Delaware’s Senate race, the upset on the Republican side of the ticket has been a boon for the Democrat. A campaign aide tells CNN Democratic Senate nominee Chris Coons raised $40-50,000 online in the two to three hours after word broke that the Tea Party-backed Republican Christine O’Donnell would be his challenger.

    The campaign also expects plenty of help from the White House. According to the aide, Vice President Biden called Coons last night and they expect the Vice President, whose seat Coons is trying to win, to campaign for him just as he did during the primary. Aides say President Obama also has an open invitation.

  21. Rand Paul won the Kentucky primary, and I thought to myself “Wow, they picked the craziest possible candidate to run for anything.”  And then Sharon Angle happened.  Then Dan Maes.  Then Joe Miller.  Now comes the icing on the cake.

    That said (and we all know this here) don’t just crown Chris Coons senator.  Does he have a huge advantage?  Of course.  Is he probably going to win by a comfortable margin?  I think so.  But he’s got to go out and campaign for it every day between now and early November.  Especially in this environment, don’t just assume voters anywhere are going to write O’Donnell off as crazy.

    I actually feel bad for Mike Castle.  He and Bob Inglis and Lisa Murkowski and Bob Bennett are all good people, who are somewhere near the center of the constituents they represent, and have been dumped to unqualified, and in some cases, mentally unbalanced right wing challengers.

    Finally, this race shows the absolute necessity of having good candidates on the Dem line in all races, because you never know what’s going to happen.  The little bit I’ve read about Chris Coons, I’m pretty impressed.

  24. (First off, for now, I have this race pegged as Likely Dem.)

    Democrat – 44%

    GOP – 35%

    Independent – 21%

    Coons – 83/15/53 = 53%

    O’Donnell – 17/85/47 = 47%

    That’s probably the most GOP-friendly model that’s not implausible. Internals-wise, O’Donnell sweeps the 10% of Democrats who are self-described “conservatives,” and siphons off about a fifth of moderate Dems. She’s bound to have trouble among the Republicans, though – in ’08, 24% of them voted for Biden and 18% for Obama. She needs to hope the disgruntled Castle supporters just stay home – they’re more prone to vote Coons over her. Among Indies, she also has a steep climb. They went almost 2-to-1 for Obama and narrowly backed Kerry in ’04 too. Let’s pretend O’Donnell runs as competent a campaign as Bush ’04 and garners the same 47%.

    Even in this perfect storm, she can’t pull within 5.

  26. If Chris Coons and John Carney win the Senate and House races in Delaware in November, it will be the first time since 1899 that Democrats have held the Governorship, the two U. S. Senate seats, and the U. S. House seat.  Yes, that’s 1899!

  27. am really pumped about Chris Coons. I was just on his website and was heavily impressed. I think he has the possibility to be a long term incumbent and he is SO progressive. It’s odd, I remember reading that he was moderate to conservative but that’s not what his website says. That is even his tagline on his website, “a progressive voice for Delaware”. He supports marriage equality, HCR, pretty much everything. He looks like your average Joe and I can not think of many more deserving. Most people here said this was the sleeper race of the cycle but no one really said it with conviction. I am sooooo happy to see him as the Senator-elect from DE. Thanks Sarah!  

  28. It’s an intelligent move to only move this to ‘Lean’ instead of ‘Likely’, since reality is so different from that poll.  The poll shows the Democrat ahead by 16 points, but that was taken in the middle of a huge, possibly multi-million dollar, ad buy by the Castle folks doing savage personal attacks on O’Donnell.  It was about a month and a half or so ago when a poll came out showing her ahead of the Democrat.  Then the attacks came, and she went down in the polls, but now that the primary is over, and the brutal attack ads from her own party have stopped, the polls will likely tighten again quickly.  I believe O’Donnell is going to win, and I think the best evidence of that is the incredible financial support she received today from folks across America, in a backlash to the treatment she received from the GOP Establishment.  The only thing better in 2010 than running against the Democratic Establishment in Washington, is running against the Establishment of both Parties, and that’s what O’Donnell is doing, and that’s why she’s going to win in November.  

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