SSP Daily Digest: 5/5 (Morning Edition)

  • FL-22: You stray, you pay. Marco Rubio strayed from the GOP reservation on Arizona’s new immigration law, and now ultra-rightist Allen West is attacking him for it. It will probably endear West even more to his base, but I note that the 22nd CD is 15% Hispanic (though undoubtedly some portion is Cuban).
  • PA-12 (PDF): Global Strategy Group (D) for Mark Critz (4/27-29, likely voters, mid-April in parens):
  • Mark Critz: 45 (41)

    Tim Burns: 37 (38)

    (MoE: ±4.9%)

  • RI-01: Former Providence city councilman David Segal is considering a run, and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee wants to back him. He would join former state Democratic Party Chairman William Lynch and current Providence Mayor David Cicilline in the race. Businessman Anthony Gemma says he is also “strongly considering” a bid.
  • VA-05: Virgil Goode, who briefly served in Congress as an independent (between his switch from the Democratic to the Republican Party) has abandoned the major parties once again. He says he’s joining the Constitution Party – though no word on whether he plans to run on that line for his old seat. However, Jeff Clark says he [Clark] has gathered enough signatures to qualify for the ballot as an independent – but will only run if state Sen. Robert Hurt is the GOP nominee. It seems like local conservatives hate Hurt as much as we hate Lieberman.
  • UT-02: Retired school teacher Claudia Wright is planning to challenge Rep. Jim Matheson at the 2nd CD Democratic convention this Saturday, and says she thinks she can get the 40% she needs to make it on to the primary ballot. Wright principally cites Matheson’s healthcare vote as the reason for her run. While we just saw last night that unhappy liberals in North Carolina were willing to vote for no-names against two other Dems who voted nay on HCR (Heath Shuler and Larry Kissell), the stakes are a lot higher in UT-02, where it’s hard to imagine any Dem other than Matheson holding this seat.
  • SSP Daily Digest: 5/4 (Afternoon Edition)

    NH-Sen: I’m still hazy on the backstory here, but it’s never a good sign when Politico is running big headlines titled “Fraud case complicates Ayotte bid.” New Hampshire’s Bureau of Securities Regulation director, Mark Connelly, just resigned his job to become a whistleblower, alleging a cover-up by the AG’s office and state banking commission in a fraud case where Financial Resources Mortgage Inc. defrauded New Hampshire investors out of at least $80 million. Connelly was pushing for charges against FRM as early as 2006; the AG in question, of course, was Kelly Ayotte, who resigned her post in mid-2009. Discovery in the matter may be complicated because all of Ayotte’s e-mail and calendars were wiped from her computer after she left the AG’s office.

    PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): It looks like Muhlenberg College (on behalf of the Morning Call) is actually going to be doing a daily tracker on the Democratic primary races in the next two weeks as we count down to May 18. Today they find an even narrower gap in the suddenly-closer Arlen Specter/Joe Sestak race: Specter leads Sestak 46-42. Dan Onorato’s numbers in the gubernatorial race aren’t quite as showy, but still dominant: he’s at 36, with Anthony Williams at 9, Joe Hoeffel at 8, and Jack Wagner at 8. Quinnipiac also has similar numbers out today: they also have Specter leading Sestak by only single digits, at 47-39 (down from 53-32 a month ago). In the governor’s race, Qpac finds Onorato at 36, Hoeffel at 9, Wagner at 8, and Williams at 8. The DSCC seems to be sensing some trouble here for their preferred candidate, and they’re dipping into their treasury to help Specter out: the DSCC chipped in for $300K in Specter’s last $407K TV ad buy. Sestak just kicked off TV advertising two weeks ago but is going all in, outspending Specter in the last two weeks, which obviously coincides with his late surge.

    AZ-Gov: That Behavior Research Center poll of AZ-Sen from a few weeks ago contained a Republican gubernatorial primary question as well. Their findings mirror the other most recent polls of the primary: vulnerable incumbent Jan Brewer strengthened her hand among GOP primary voters by signing Arizona’s immigration law into effect. She’s at 22, not a lock but well ahead of any opposition: Owen Buz Mills is at 13, Dean Martin is at 10, and John Munger is at 4. (If your calculator isn’t handy, that leaves 51% undecided.)

    NH-Gov (pdf): Univ. of New Hampshire is out with another look at New Hampshire’s gubernatorial race, where Democratic incumbent John Lynch is well in control but still facing a tougher race than the last few times. They find Lynch leads GOP challenger John Stephen 49-32, little changed from the February poll where Lynch led 50-30.

    WI-Gov: Ex-Rep. Mark Neumann is very much the underdog in the Republican primary in the gubernatorial race (as the DC and local establishments have both embraced Milwaukee Co. Executive Scott Walker instead). But he added a hard-right endorsement to his trophy cabinet today; he got the nod from Tom Coburn.

    GA-08: In a clear sign that state Rep. Austin Scott (who recently bailed out of a long-shot gubernatorial campaign) is the man to beat in the GOP primary in the 8th, Angela Hicks got out of the race, saying she didn’t want to hurt Scott’s chances. Local businesswoman Hicks seemed to be considered the frontrunner among the GOPers prior to Scott’s entry, more by virtue of being the least weak rather than the strongest.

    HI-01: Barack Obama recorded a robocall for Democratic voters in his hometown district. Despite reports that the White House is joining the DCCC is putting a finger on the scale in favor of Ed Case rather than Colleen Hanabusa in the screwy special election, Obama didn’t name names; he simply urged a vote for “a Democrat.”

    NH-02: The largely forgotten state Rep. John DeJoie, the third wheel in the Democratic primary to replace Paul Hodes, cut short his bid today. Despite generally being regarded as from the progressive side of the ledger, DeJoie threw his support to Katrina Swett. DeJoie’s departure, on the balance, may help Ann McLane Kuster, though, by not splitting the progressive vote.

    PA-12: I have no idea whether this is good strategy or not, but Mark Critz, hoping to replace former boss John Murtha, is clinging hard to Murtha’s legacy in his new TV ad, seeming to put a lot of faith in polling data showing Murtha still a very popular figure in the district. Critz blasts back at Tim Burns for his own TV spots focusing on Murtha’s ethical woes, telling Burns ungrammatically to stop attacking “someone not there to defend themselves.” Meanwhile, the fight’s on for Murtha’s money: $7K from Murtha’s PAC found its way into Democratic pockets (including $5K for Critz), but the bulk of Murtha’s leftover money is headed for a charitable foundation established by his widow.

    CA-St. Sen.: For fans of legislative special elections, it looks like the marquee event between now and November will be the fight for California’s SD-15, a Dem-leaning central coast district vacated by Republican now-Lt. Gov. Abel Maldonado. Republican Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee just got in the race, giving the GOP a solid contender to try and hold the seat as Dems try to push closer to the 2/3s mark in the Senate; he’ll face off against Democratic ex-Assemblyman John Laird in the June 22 election. (If neither candidate breaks 50%, there’ll be an Aug. 17 runoff.)

    Redistricting: Lots of redistricting-related action this week, going in two different directions. In Florida, the GOP-held legislature placed a redistricting measure on the November ballot that partially contradicts two citizen initiatives on the ballot that would prevent the legislature from drawing maps that favor one political party. The new proposal would still allow the legislature to take “communities of interest” into consideration when drawing maps. In Illinois, though, two attempts to change redistricting both failed, when the legislature couldn’t muster the votes to put it on the November ballot. Illinois’s arcane methods (which involve breaking ties by pulling a name out of a hat) will apparently still apply for the 2012 redistricting round.

    Deutschland: Our man in Cologne, SSPer micha.1976 has a hilarious and remarkable find from the streets of Germany. Remember the impeach-Obama Larouchie, Kesha Rogers, who won the Democratic nomination in TX-22? Her image is now being used on posters for a like-minded LaRouchie candidate in Germany! (J)

    SSP Daily Digest: 5/4 (Morning Edition)

    An all-House digest today – and it’s an hour earlier than usual! Remember, today is primary day in IN, NC & OH, so be sure to check out SSP’s handy election guide.

  • AL-07: Attorney Terri Sewell, who is probably the candidate ideologically closest to outgoing Rep. Artur Davis, is going up with a TV ad buy in Montgomery and Birmingham which will stay up through the primary (which is a month from now). No word on the size of the buy, though.
  • CT-02: Republicans are courting former television news anchor Janet Peckinpaugh to run against Rep. Joe Courtney, who has luckily skated by without much in the way of opposition this cycle. Peckinpaugh says she’s considering it. She was most recently seen shilling for a now-defunct mortgage company in deceptive, TV news-like ads, clearly trading on her reputation as a newsreader. The company, Lend America, shut down in December after it was placed under federal investigation.
  • FL-12: After screwing up the establishment’s efforts to clear the GOP primary field for ex-state Rep. Dennis Ross by jumping into the race, Polk County Comm’r Randy Wilkinson is bidding adieu to the Republican Party. Instead, he’s going to run as the Tea Party candidate (there’s an actual Tea Party in Florida, just like the Whigs). Wilkinson has raised very little money – his FEC reports are a mess, and he seems to like filing them in hand-written form, so he doesn’t even appear in their electronic database.
  • FL-21: What a bummer – zero Dems filed in the open 21st CD, which means that Mario Diaz-Balart will automatically inherit his brother Lincoln’s seat. I can’t really blame folks too much, though, as Florida has especially onerous ballot access requirements. If you don’t petition on, you have to pay a filing fee, which is an insane $10,000+.
  • HI-01: The DCCC threw down another $70K for negative ads against Charles Djou.
  • ID-01, OH-15: We mentioned the other day that GOPer Steve Stivers, busy with a rematch against Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy in OH-15, said he favors repealing the 17th amendment – the one which gives citizens the right to vote for their senators (rather than having them be appointed by state legislatures). Well, after taking a lot of much-deserved heat, he’s backed off that fantasy. But his would-be colleague, Vaughn Ward, is taking up the mantle. Ward, running against Rep. Walt Minnick in ID-01, offered a rationale worthy of Miss Teen South Carolina, saying “When you look at how come state’s rights have been so abrogated, it’s because of things like the 17th Amendment that has taken away those rights from our states.” Yuh huh. Exactly.
  • IL-08: Just click the link and read about the greatest political implosion of the entire cycle. (Thankfully, it’s the bad guys.) More here, here, and here.
  • KS-03: Along with Joe Garcia (see yesterday’s morning digest), the DCCC added another candidate to their Red to Blue list, Stephene Moore, who is the wife of retiring Rep. Dennis Moore.
  • MA-10: State Rep. Jeff Perry, running for Bill Delahunt’s open seat, scored an endorsement from ex-MA Gov. Mitt Romney. Perry, who was also previously endorsed by Sen. Scott Brown, has a primary against ex-state Treasurer Joe Malone. Malone has some baggage-related cooties, which probably explains Perry’s run of good fortune.
  • MD-01 (PDF): Public Opinion Strategies (R) for Americans for Prosperity (R) (4/25-26, likely voters, no trendlines):
  • Frank Kratovil (D-inc): 36

    Andy Harris (R): 39

    Richard Davis (L): 6

    Other: 1

    Undecided: 18

    (MoE: ±4.9%)

    Two things about this poll: First off, in contravention of appropriate practice, POS asked all kinds of axe-grindy issue questions (“Gov. O’Malley raised taxes by $1.3 billion”) before getting to the horserace question. This does damage to POS’s reputation as a supposedly respectable pollster. Secondly, the weird thing is that Harris switched pollsters – and his last survey, from the Tarrance Group back in November, had him up by a whopping 52-39. While it’s not a proper trendline, you gotta wonder – is Harris slipping? Or is he getting snowed by his various pollsters? (Update: D’oh! Our mistake — this poll was not done for Harris, but actually the right-wing consortium of douches known as the Americans for Prosperity.)

  • MI-01: Dem state Rep. Joel Sheltrown, who got into the race to replace Bart Stupak just a few weeks ago, is bowing out.
  • MI-09: Self-funder Gene Goodman is dropping out of the race to take on Rep. Gary Peters, despite having loaned his campaign $450K. That leaves ex-state Rep. Andrew “Rocky” Raczkowski and former Oakland County GOP Chair Paul Welday in the running, both of whom have had unimpressive fundraising – and in fact, Rocky is yet another victim (albeit a more minor one) of Base Connect.
  • Meanwhile, we missed a Welday internal poll from a couple of weeks ago (taken by Mitchell Research & Communications), which had Peters leading by just 44-43. The poll sampled just 300 LVs, though, and according to the Hotline, was in the field at two discontiguous times. Peters’ camp attacked the poll’s sample composition, but Steve Mitchell says he used the same methodology as he did in September of 2008, when (according to the article), ” he declared Peters was going to defeat Joe Knollenberg.” Is this hindsight proving to be 20/20? Mitchell’s poll from back then had the race tied.

  • NY-13: Global Strategy Group (D) for Mike McMahon (4/7-11, likely voters, no trendlines):
  • Mike McMahon (D-inc): 56

    Mike Allegretti (R): 24

    Undecided: 20

    Mike McMahon (D-inc): 56

    Mike Grimm (R): 23

    Undecided: 21

    (MoE: ±4.9%)

  • OH-09: Dem Rep. Marcy Kaptur, who is not really on anyone’s radar in terms of having a competitive race, is nonetheless facing a moneybags challenger. Former Food Town CEO Rich Iott just dumped $319,000 into his campaign. Kaptur has over a million on hand, and the 9th CD voted 62% for Obama and 58% for Kerry.
  • PA-12: Anzalone-Liszt (D) for the DCCC (4/27-29, likely voters, no trendlines):
  • Mark Critz (D): 43

    Tim Burns (R): 41

    (MoE: ±4.9%)

  • TN-08: A couple of disgusting low-lifes running for TN-08, Ron Kirkland and Randy Smith, had this delightful exchange at a candidate forum:
  • Kirkland, of Jackson, referred to his Army training during the Vietnam War and said: “I can tell you if there were any homosexuals in that group, they were taken care of in ways I can’t describe to you.”

    Smith, a chef from Mercer who served in the Navy during the Gulf War, said: “I definitely wouldn’t want to share a shower with a homosexual. We took care of that kind of stuff, just like (Kirkland) said.”

    These sick bastards have serious issues.

  • SD-AL: Heh – GOP state Rep. Kristi Noem has a biographical spot up on the air, talking about her return to her family farm after her father’s death. The only problem is that she shot the ad in Texas – which became apparent given that the backdrop (a grove of leafy green trees) is something you can’t really find in North South Dakota this time of year. Reminds me of when Bob Schaffer ran an ad pretending that Alaska’s Mount McKinley was actually Colorado’s famous Pikes Peak while running for CO-Sen in 2008.
  • SSP Daily Digest: 5/3 (Morning Edition)

  • AR-Sen: Former President and governor of Arkansas Bill Clinton cut two radio ads on behalf of Blanche Lincoln. One of them highlights Lincoln’s alleged support for Clinton’s economic agenda back in the 1990s – not an issue likely to resonate, especially in today’s economic climate.
  • FL-Sen: A Public Opinion Strategies poll for Charlie Crist, taken before he left the GOP primary, had him at 36, Marco Rubio at 28, and Kendrick Meek at 23. A McLaughlin & Associates poll (taken for “the Associated Industries of Florida,” also before the switcheroo) had Crist up as well, 33C-29R-15M. Meanwhile, The Buzz takes a look at which boldfaced names showed up to Crist’s first fundraiser following his political party reassignment surgery.
  • On the Dem side, zillionaire mortgage-shorting mogul Jeff Greene says he’ll “spend whatever it takes” to win his primary against Rep. Kendrick Meek. That must be music to Joe Trippi’s ears. Greene is unelectable but thanks to his monstrous bankroll, he can do a lot of harm to Democratic chances in this race. Trippi is aiding and abetting this bullshit, and will profit handsomely.

  • NY-Sen-B: Chris Dodd, in the midst of working on financial regulation reform, says he won’t attend a Wall Street-sponsored fundraiser on behalf of Kirsten Gillibrand in NYC tonight.
  • UT-Sen: A poignant poll for Bob Bennett: While Republican delegates to the state convention despise him (he’s in third place with just 16%), rank-and-file Republican voters like him much more (first place, 39%). In other states, the GOP would have cause for concern, since a convention process like this is clearly aimed at producing the most conservative candidate imaginable. But in Utah, it probably won’t matter. Though if Bennett gets toppled, I wonder if other nervous establishment officials might consider eliminating the convention and replacing it with an ordinary primary.
  • MI-Gov: Thank god: Geoffrey Feiger, Jack Kevorkian’s attorney and the Dems’ disastrous 1998 gubernatorial nominee, says he won’t run again. Now all we have to worry about is Andy Dillon.
  • HI-Gov, HI-01: Hawaii’s legislature unexpectedly passed a civil unions bill on the last day of the session, which now goes to Gov. Linda Lingle (she has until July 6th to decide whether to sign the bill into law or veto it). Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona (R), running to succeed Lingle, wants her to veto it. Ex-Rep. Neil Abercrombie is strongly in favor of the bill (and gay marriage), while his Democratic primary opponent, Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann, opposes gay marriage but hasn’t expressed an opinion on the current bill.
  • This may also have repercussions in the HI-01 race, where state Sen. President Colleen Hanabusa may have pushed the bill through in an attempt to repair relations with the LGBT community after the same bill got scuttled in January. Hanabusa says she doesn’t support gay marriage, though, while Democratic rival Ed Case does. Republican Charles Djou opposes the measure.

  • FL-05: Unsurprisingly, local Republicans are grumbling about Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite’s filing-deadline handoff to Sherriff Ted Richard Nugent, including state Sen. Mike Fasano, who apparently has had his eye on this seat for some time. You have to wonder if this is the kind of thing which will taint Nugent and make him vulnerable to a primary challenge next cycle. Also among the complainers, interestingly, is state Sen. Paula Dockery, whose current district overlaps with the 5th CD. Dockery’s gotten nowhere in her FL-Gov primary against AG Bill McCollum, so you have to wonder if she isn’t gnashing her teeth about a lost opportunity here.
  • FL-25: Joe Garcia’s candidacy is a rare bright spot for Dems in this otherwise putrid cycle. Now the DCCC, which lobbied heavily for him to get into the race, has given Garcia their official stamp of approval, adding him to their Red to Blue list once again.
  • GA-09: Dems never had a chance in the special election in this ruby red district, but you gotta figure it’s almost always better to actually have a Democrat on the ballot rather than not. We had a candidate here, pastor Mike Freeman, but he dropped out a couple of weeks ago. Now, though, he says he’s back in the race, but his website is offline.
  • IN-08: Democratic state Rep. Trent Van Haaften, running to fill Brad Ellsworth’s open seat, has been talking to local teabaggers to see if they might support him. Yeah, I’m in as much disbelief as you are. But, as is always the case, there’s a lot of hostility between the tea partiers and the establishment, and at least one ‘bagger says they want to “teach the machine a lesson.”
  • PA-12: Freedom’s Defense Fund, an arm of the incredibly dodgy Base Connect (formerly BMW Direct) has made a $20K “independent” expenditure on behalf of Bill Russell, who is challenging Tim Burns in the GOP primary. (Recall that there’s both a special election and a primary on the same day.) FDF is supposedly distinct from Base Connect, but given that they share the same office (according to TPM), the idea that their expenditures are actually “independent” is a real stretch.
  • More importantly, the NRCC just threw down another quarter million bucks on behalf of Burns, bringing their total spending on this race to over $725K. The DCCC has yet to respond to this latest blast.

  • DCCC: The DCCC is about to begin its biennial rite of splitting off its independent expenditure arm. Thanks to stupid federal laws against “co-ordination,” the DCCC staffers who make spending decisions about IEs can’t be in contact with the rest of the D-Trip, because those folks are in contact with individual campaigns. This is senseless. Anyhow, political director Robby Mook will head up the IE arm, and John Lapp (who once ran this shop himself) will serve as a “senior advisor.” Incumbent retention director Jennifer Pihlaja will replace Mook as PD of DCCC proper (and keep her current title).
  • PA-12: Dems Trailing in Special to Replace Murtha

    Research 2000 for Daily Kos (4/26-28, likely voters, no trendlines):

    Mark Critz (D): 40

    Tim Burns (R): 46

    Undecided: 14

    (MoE: ±4%)

    Things are looking tough for Democrats in the race to fill the late Jack Murtha’s House seat, with Research 2000 giving Republican Tim Burns his biggest lead yet. An earlier PPP poll showed him up three points, while interestingly, Burns’s own internal had him back one. Critz’s standing seems to be no fault of his own. He has similar favorables to Burns (44-33 vs. 46-40). The problem is simply that this is a bad district and a bad environment – a toxic combination.

    Pennsylvania’s 12th congressional district is a socially and culturally conservative place, the kind of area which has steadily been moving away from Democrats for quite some time. While much has been made of the fact that PA-12 was the only CD in the nation to flip from John Kerry to John McCain in 2008, that’s a pretty arbitrary metric. The real story is that it was one of just 35 CDs (out of 435) where Barack Obama got a smaller share of the vote than Kerry did. So while the nation as a whole was voting a whole lot more Democratic, PA-12 took a step in the other direction.

    And it shows in two other key poll numbers. Obama’s approval in the district is just 38-55. Just as troubling, only 34% of voters say they are more likely to vote for a candidate who supports healthcare reform, while 48% are more likely to pull the lever for someone who advocates repeal. This helps explain why Critz has said he would have voted against HCR, but with this kind of headwind, that may not make much of a difference.

    Both parties are seriously contesting this race – the DCCC has spent $472K so far, while the much less flush NRCC has matched them with $482K. Dems have also sent Joe Biden into the district to campaign for Critz. The election is a little over two weeks away (May 18), and undoubtedly it will be fought hard until the very end. But if Democrats’ streak winning special elections comes to an end, it may truly be a case of wrong place, wrong time.

    SSP Daily Digest: 4/26

    AZ-Sen, AZ-Gov: The signature by Gov. Jan Brewer (which may have helped her survive the GOP primary, but may also hurt her in the general) of Arizona’s new aggressive anti-immigrant law was the key motivating factor in a new Democratic candidate getting into the Senate race: civil rights activist Randy Parraz. He’ll face Rodney Glassman in the Democratic primary. (Why not the, y’know, Arizona Governor’s race instead? Apparently Glassman looks like easier primary opposition than AG Terry Goddard in the governor’s race… and at any rate, John McCain and J.D. Hayworth have both been beating the war drums on immigration.) And here’s an interesting take on the immigration law: ex-Rep. Tom Tancredo just came out in opposition to it, saying, “I do not want people here, there in Arizona, pulled over because you look like should be pulled over.” If even Tom Tancredo thinks you’re doing it wrong… you’re probably doing it wrong.

    CT-Sen: Linda McMahon’s campaign doesn’t seem to be doing anything illegal here, but there’s still no good way to spin this: the campaign has been offering students an extra $5 bounty (on top of a flat hourly rate) for every Republican registered during a Univ. of Connecticut voter registration drive. It’s a practice that the DOJ has frowned upon.

    IL-Sen: In the wake of the seizure of the Broadway Bank, Alexi Giannoulias wasted no time in getting an explanatory ad on the air, laying it out in easy-to-grasp points: one, he hadn’t worked there in years and when he left it was fine, two, the broader economy took the bank down, and three, speaking of that economic downturn, don’t vote for unemployment-benefits-denying Mark Kirk.

    MD-Sen: OK, maybe all those Barb Mikulski retirement rumors will finally go away. She just had her campaign’s official kickoff event on Friday. She has 24 times the cash of her likeliest Republican opponent, Queen Anne’s Co. Commissioner Eric Wargotz.

    NC-Sen: Elon University’s out with another poll; they still aren’t doing head-to-heads, but have some assorted other numbers that Richard Burr would probably rather not see. His approvals (among flat-out everybody, not even RVs) are 28/37 and 26% say he “deserves re-election” with 44% saying “time for a new person.”

    NV-Sen: A poll for the Nevada News Bureau performed by PMI finds Sue Lowden leading the pack in the GOP Senate primary, at 41. Danny Tarkanian is at 24, Sharron Angle is at 17, and “someone else” is at 18. The poll was taken on the 22nd, shortly after Lowden laid out her support for trading chickens in exchange for poultices and tinctures.

    NY-Sen-B: Long-time Rockland Co. Exec Scott Vanderhoef has decided not to pursue a run against Kirsten Gillibrand, after having spent a month in exploratory mode, saying the money’s just not there. Vanderhoef probably found he didn’t have the name rec outside of Rockland Co. to have an advantage against the odds and ends in the GOP primary, let alone in the general.

    UT-Sen: Another poll of GOP delegates for the convention in Utah isn’t as bad for Bob Bennett as the one leaked to Dave Weigel last week, but it still looks pretty bad for him. Mike Lee leads the way among first-choice votes at 31%, followed by Bennett at 22% (and then Tim Bridgewater at 17% and Cherilyn Eagar at 10%). 41% of delegates say they will “absolutely not” vote for Bennett, so even if Bennett picks up the other 59%, he still can’t nail down the nomination at the convention (as there’s a 60% threshold).

    WA-Sen: Everyone seemed a little taken by surprise by Friday’s SurveyUSA poll of the Washington Senate race, which has non-candidate (for now) Dino Rossi leading Patty Murray 52-42 (and leading the various no-name GOPers actively in the race by 2 or 3 points). Even the Rossi camp is downplaying it, saying that their internal polling places Murray in the lead – which is an odd strategy for someone who got gifted an outlying poll, unless either he’s trying to rope-a-dope Murray into complacency or privately cursing the results saying “aw crap, now I have to run for Senate.” One of the no-namers, motivational speaker Chris Widener, got out of the race on Friday, which may also portend a Rossi run (or just having taken a stark look at his own finances). Murray’s camp may have gotten advance warning of the SurveyUSA poll, as on Friday they leaked their own internal from Fairbank Maslin giving Murray a 49-41 lead over Rossi, very consistent with R2K’s recent poll.

    IL-Gov: Oh, goody. Scott Lee Cohen, having bailed out/gotten booted off the Democratic ticket as Lt. Governor nominee after his criminal record became news, still has a political issue that needs scratching. He’s announcing that he’s going to run an independent bid for Governor instead. Considering how thoroughly his dirty laundry has been aired, he seems likely to poll in the low single digits; I have no idea whether his candidacy (which now appeals mostly only to the steroid-addled pawnbroker demographic) is more harmful to Pat Quinn, Bill Brady, or just the world’s general sense of decency.

    MI-Gov: When I heard a few weeks ago that Geoffrey Fieger (the trial lawyer best known for defending Jack Kevorkian and second-best-known for his awful turn as 1998 Democratic gubernatorial nominee) was pondering another gubernatorial run, I laughed it off. The new EPIC-MRA poll makes it seem a bit more serious, though… which, in turn, if he won the primary, would pretty much foreclose any Democratic shot at winning the general. They only polled the Democratic primary and find, thanks to name rec within the Detroit metro area, Fieger is actually comfortably in the lead at 28%. Andy Dillon is at 20, Virg Bernero is at 13, Alma Wheeler Smith is at 8, other is at 2, and 29% are undecided. Fieger hasn’t moved much to act on his interest, though, and has only three weeks to collect the necessary 15,000 signatures to qualify.

    FL-24: Karen Diebel earned the backing of Tom Tancredo in the GOP primary in the 24th, focusing on (with Tancredo, what else?) in the immigration issue. It seems less of a pro-Diebel endorsement than more of a slap against her GOP opponent Craig Miller, though; in a 2006 Miami Herald op-ed, Miller (who was at that point chairman of the National Restaurant Association) came out pretty solidly on the “cheap labor” side of the Republican split on immigration.

    GA-12: Democrats looking for an upgrade from ex-state Sen. Regina Thomas (who raised $10K last quarter and has $4K CoH) for a primary challenge to recalcitrant Blue Dog John Barrow are going to have to keep looking. State Sen. Lester Jackson decided to take a pass, and will stay neutral in the Barrow/Thomas race. He’ll focus instead of supporting the Senate bid of Labor Comm. Michael Thurmond (another rumored, but no-longer, challenger to Barrow).

    LA-03: Bobby Jindal just appointed Scott Angelle, the state’s Sec. of Natural Resources, to the vacant position of Lt. Governor. Why is this filed under LA-03? Angelle was rumored to be one of the top contenders to run for the 3rd (although it was unclear whether he was going to do it as a Dem or a GOPer… Angelle was a Dem in the legislature, but appointed by GOP Gov. Jindal to his cabinet). With Angelle saying he’ll return to his job at Natural Resources after a permanent replacement is elected, that means that former state House speaker Hunt Downer is pretty well locked-in as the GOP nominee in the 3rd, and the Dems aren’t likely to get an upgrade from attorney Ravi Sangisetty, making this open seat a very likely GOP pickup. (H/t GOPVOTER.)

    NY-01: Randy Altschuler got the endorsement from the Suffolk County Conservative Party on Friday, which guarantees him a place on the ballot if he wants it. He’ll still need to overcome Chris Cox and George Demos in the competitive three-way moneybags duel in the GOP primary (where the county GOP recently switched its endorsement from Altschuler to Cox). It’s unclear whether he’d keep the Conservative line if he lost the GOP primary, as that would create a NY-23 type situation and pretty much assure Rep. Tim Bishop’s safety. (Unlike the patchwork of counties in the upstate districts, all of the 1st is within Suffolk.)

    NY-29: The GOP would really, really like to have a special election in the 29th, despite David Paterson’s apparent intention to play out the clock until November (and prevent a possible GOP pickup, given the difference in strength between the likely candidates). Several GOP party chairs within the district are preparing a lawsuit that would force a special election; the state GOP plans to assist.

    OH-02: Bad news for Jean Schmidt: although she got the Hamilton Co. GOP’s endorsement in the previous two elections, she’s going to have to proceed without it this year. They’re staying neutral as she faces several primary challengers, most notably Warren Co. Commissioner Mike Kilburn.

    PA-12: In battling independent expenditures in the 12th, the GOP went large, as the NRCC plunked down $235K on media buys. The DCCC also spent $16K on media buys.

    SC-04: The dean at Bob Jones University (the crown jewel in the buckle of the Bible Belt, in Greenville in the 4th), Robert Taylor, has announced he’s supporting Trey Gowdy in the GOP primary instead of incumbent Rep. Bob Inglis. The occasionally-moderate Inglis (more stylistically than in actual voting substance, though) faces at least three right-wing competitors in the primary, but could run into trouble if he doesn’t clear 50% and gets forced into a runoff with one of them.

    WV-01: There are dueling internal polls in the 1st, in the Democratic primary. State Sen. Mike Oliverio was first to release a poll, saying he led Rep. Alan Mollohan 41-33. (One caveat: Oliverio’s pollster is Orion Strategies, owned by Curtis Wilkerson, who also just happens to be Oliverio’s campaign manager.) Mollohan struck back with a poll from Frederick Polls giving him a 45-36 lead over Oliverio, with the primary fast approaching on May 11.

    MA-AG: Despite it now being widely known that Martha Coakley has a glass jaw (or what’s something more fragile than glass? what do they make those fake bottles out of that they use in bar fights in the movies?), she may actually get re-elected Attorney General without facing any GOP opposition whatsoever this fall. Of course, that may have something to do with the fact that the GOP’s entire bench in Massachusetts just got elected to the Senate.

    Pennsylvania: The Philadelphia Inquirer has an interesting look at the changes in registration in Pennsylvania over the last decade. The Democratic Party grew substantially in the state’s east, gaining 550,000 registrations up to 4.3 million voters. The GOP shrank by 103,000 registrations down to 3.1 million votes. The Dems lost 20,000 voters in the state’s southwest, though; in 2002, 27.8% of the state’s Dems were in the Pittsburgh area, but that’s down to 23.8%. Contrast that with the Philadelphia metro area: in its five counties, the number of Republicans dropped 13.5%, from a million to 873,000.

    Redistricting: Here’s the last redistricting resource you’ll ever need: a handy map showing congressional and legislative redistricting procedures for all 50 states. There’s also an accompanying document (pdf) which goes into remarkable detail about the various processes, and even contains an appendix of some of the ugliest current gerrymanders.

    PA-12: Critz Splits Two Polls with Burns; SSP Changes Rating to Tossup

    PPP (4/17-18, likely voters, no trendlines):

    Mark Critz (D): 41

    Tim Burns (R): 44

    Undecided: 15

    (MoE: ±2.8%)

    There’s a battle going on in the special election in the 12th, and that’s a battle between the district’s natural Democratic tendencies and its very high disapproval of Barack Obama. The sample is 55% Democratic, but at the same time, Obama clocks in with a 33/57 approval, and approval of HCR is an alarming 28/59 (so maybe not surprising Critz is running ads saying he’d have voted against it).

    If you’re wondering what’s up with that disparity, it mostly has to do with demographics. This is a historically Democratic district where Pittsburgh’s collar counties start to fade into the hills of Appalachia, a seat of traditional union strength among coal miners and steelworkers… but it’s also one of the most elderly districts in the nation (with the second highest percentage of seniors of any district outside Florida). Seniors have been the group most resistant to Obama (if Tea Party demographics are any indication), and in this district hard-hit by lost industry, there’s probably a lot more listening to Fox News than the voices at the union hall these days. Much has been made of how this was the only district in the nation to go from voting for Kerry in 2004 to McCain in 2008; it should also be pointed out that this was one of Hillary Clinton‘s strongest congressional districts anywhere in the primary, with most of the counties in the 12th going for her by at least 70%.

    That leaves Critz and Burns, both of whom are very blank slate-ish (people feel positively about both: Burns’ favorables are 45/26 and Critz’s favorables are 41/34). Critz may yet benefit from his connections to John Murtha — despite this district’s seeming turn to the right, Murtha is still held in high esteem in the district (55/33 posthumous approval rating, and by a 49/37 margin, voters want their next Rep. to “carry on” Murtha’s legacy). With a motivation gap in the Republicans’ favor (the PPP likely electorate went for McCain by 7%, instead of his 1% margin in 2008), Critz’s best hope is to tie himself to Murtha, rather than the national party, in order to motivate Democratic base voters to get out.

    McLaughlin (R) (4/15, likely voters, no trendlines):

    Mark Critz (D): 40

    Tim Burns (R): 39

    Undecided: 21

    (MoE: ±5.6%)

    Ordinarily, I’d trust PPP (and a MoE of 2.8%) over a Republican internal poll (and a MoE of 5.6%), and I guess I still have to, despite the GOP internal presenting a rosier scenario. The McLaughlin poll (on behalf of conservative group American Action Network, rather than the Burns campaign) points to the same underlying problem holding down Critz: they find Obama with a 31/68 approval rating.

    Taking these two polls into consideration, SSP is moving its rating of this race to “Tossup” from “Lean Democrat”.

    SSP Daily Digest: 4/16

    GA-Sen: Here’s some great news out of Georgia: we may actually score a late top-tier challenger in the Senate race. Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond, who’s held that office since 1998, has been considering promotion opportunities (including, reportedly, not just this but also a GA-12 primary challenge), and it looks like he’s likely to pull the trigger on a run against Johnny Isakson. Isakson has had soft approval ratings, but has benefited from lack of much of a challenge (R.J. Hadley is the only announced Dem). A recent R2K poll had Thurmond losing to Isakson 53-26, but maybe that poll gave some encouragement to Thurmond in that he might be able to ride the surging Roy Barnes’s coattails a bit (and maybe also give a boost to Barnes, by driving up African-American turnout).

    NV-Sen: Mason-Dixon, for the Las Vegas Review-Journal did another poll of the Nevada Senate, despite having issued one just a week ago. I’m not exactly sure why; perhaps they felt that, in the wake of Jon Scott Ashjian’s bad week (with revelations of the financial disaster in his personal life, as well as the kerfuffle about whether he even qualifies for the ballot), they needed to re-evalute. They also added another right-wing third-party candidate to the mix, Tim Fasano of the American Independent Party. Polling only on the Harry Reid/Sue Lowden matchup, they find not much has changed. Ashjian’s support has dropped, but that may have more to do with the addition of Fasano to the mix and the splitting of the hardcore no-RINOs crowd. They found Lowden 47, Reid 37, Fasano 3, and Ashjian 2. (Compared with last week’s 46-38, with 5 for Ashjian.) At least one thing is going right for Ashjian: he was just given the green light by a court to remain on the ballot for the Tea Party, despite the fact that he was still a registered Republican when he filed.

    NY-Sen: The search goes on for a challenger to Chuck Schumer, and the GOP may have a willing victim: George Maragos. You can’t fault Maragos for lack of ambition: he was just became Nassau County Comptroller at the start of the year, as part of the GOP’s comeback in Nassau in November, and he’s already looking to move up. Political consultant Jay Townsend has also floated his name for the race.

    WI-Sen: Beer baron (and former state Commerce Secretary) Dick Leinenkugel didn’t waste much time following Tommy Thompson’s rambling announcement of his non-candidacy; he issued a statement last night that sounds very candidate-ish, although the jist of it was to “stay tuned” over the next couple weeks.

    MN-Gov: Coleman endorses Rybak! No, relax, not Norm Coleman. Chris Coleman, mayor of St. Paul and an oft-rumored candidate himself last year, endorsed R.T. Rybak, mayor of the other Twin City (Minneapolis) for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.

    CA-11: Here’s a race to keep an eye on. David Harmer, who performed above expectations in the CA-10 special last year, is doing well in the next-door 11th also. He raised $380K last quarter, outpacing Democratic Rep. Jerry McNerney’s $286K.

    MN-06: Rep. Michele Bachmann rode the Crazy Train all the way to Moneyville, it looks like. She raised $810K in the first quarter, giving her $1.53 million CoH. If that number seems eerily familiar, it’s almost exactly what was reported by Alan Grayson, her lightning-rod bookend at the other end of Congress.

    MO-08: Sleeper candidate Tommy Sowers reported a nice cash haul ($295K for the quarter), and now it looks like he’s outraised incumbent GOP Rep. Jo Ann Emerson for the second straight quarter. She brought in only $223K.

    NC-08: One guy’s who’s lagging on the fundraising front — although it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, given the last four years of history — is Democratic freshman Rep. Larry Kissell (lauded, or notorious, depending on your perspective, for preferring to work on a shoestring budget). He raised only $72K for the quarter, giving him $326K CoH, as he was outpaced by self-funding GOP opponent Tim D’Annunzio.

    NV-03: Rep. Dina Titus may not be faring well in the polls against Joe Heck, but she’s whupping him in the cash department. Titus raised $254K last quarter and has $902K CoH, compared with $148K raised and $257K CoH for Heck.

    NY-24: There’s a less somewhere in here about keeping your base (you know, the ones holding the wallets) happy. Rep. Mike Arcuri’s fundraising wasn’t that impressive for a competitive race, as he raised $208K, leaving him with $493K CoH. He was outpaced by GOP rival Richard Hanna, who raised $358K (and reports the same amount as CoH).

    OH-15: Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy had a good quarter, raising $308K. It still wasn’t enough to top her GOP competition, Steve Stivers, though; he reported $367K for the quarter.

    PA-10: Here’s a loudly-touted GOP candidate who’s not living up to the hype yet. Ex-US Attorney Tom Marino’s first quarter was unimpressive, raising $111K and ending up with $74K CoH. Democratic incumbent Rep. Chris Carney sits on $665K CoH.

    PA-12: The DCCC is getting involved in a big way in the 12th, laying out $136K for ad time in the special election in the 12th. The ad is a negative ad against the GOP’s Tim Burns. Also, while he has a small cash edge over Dem Mark Critz right now, it’s fitting that, given his name, Mr. Burns is self-funding his campaign. Of the $325K raised by his campaign so far, $221K has come from his own pocket.

    VA-11: It looks like this is going to be a big money race all around. As the gear up for the GOP primary, Fairfax Co. Supervisor Pat Herrity and rich guy Keith Fimian are engaged in a tiresome spin battle about who has more money. Herrity raised $275K despite a late entry during the quarter and has $195K CoH, while Fimian raised $278K and has $609K CoH. Rep. Gerry Connolly can marshal his resources for the general; he bested them both, raising $446K and sitting on $1.04 million CoH.

    WV-01: Mike Oliverio, running in the Democratic primary, had a big quarter: he raised $240K and has as much cash on hand as Rep. Alan Mollohan.

    NY-AG: Former Rep. and NYC controller Elizabeth Holtzman looks poised for yet another comeback; she’s released an internal poll showing her with a big lead in the Democratic AG primary, which, while she’s not running yet, isn’t the usual action of someone who doesn’t plan to run. Her poll finds her at 29%, with Nassau Co. DA Kathleen Rice in second at 9%.

    DNC: Someone at the DNC seems to know what to do: they’re pledging to spend $50 million on cash and field operations for the 2010 midterm. They say there’s going to be a big emphasis on base turnout (youth, African-Americans and Latinos, first-time voters); in other words, they understand they need to rebuild the Obama coalition as much as possible to limit losses in November.

    SSP Daily Digest: 4/15 (Morning Edition)

  • CT-Sen: It looks like Dick Blumenthal, who hasn’t run a competitive race in 20 years, has a lot of rust to shed on the campaign trail. An NYT article paints an unflattering portrait of Blumenthal’s political skills, describing his long-winded and legalistic answers to simple questions, and a flop in a debate against an unknown primary opponent. (Please tell me why Blumenthal’s campaign team consented to a debate against Merrick Alpert in the first place?) None of this is making me feel very good.
  • KY-Sen: Heh – from the king of fuck-yous comes a final hurrah: Retiring Sen. Jim Bunning is endorsing weirdo Rand Paul in the Republican primary to succeed him, snubbing establishment pick Trey Grayson. Considering that Bunning was shoved aside very much against his will to make way for Grayson, this last knife-twist makes sense.
  • NY-Sen-B: Here’s one clear reason why Kirsten Gillibrand has scared off legions of opponents, including George Pataki: She raked in another $1.6 million in the first quarter, bringing her total raised since she became a senator to $8.8 million. No word on her cash-on-hand yet, though.
  • OH-Sen: Dem Lee Fisher’s Q1 haul doesn’t look too pretty – just $550K, and with only $1.8 million on hand, and his warchest will undoubtedly shrink heading into his primary with SoS Jennifer Brunner (Fisher just went up with an introductory TV ad). For her part, Brunner hasn’t released her numbers yet. (GOPer Rob Portman has $7.6 million on hand.)
  • FL-Gov: Yowza. Republican rich guy Rick Scott, who appeared on the gubernatorial scene out of nowhere just days ago, says he’ll spend $1.5 million of his own money on a statewide TV and radio ad buy this week. Is he trying to Meg Whitman his way into contention?
  • PA-12: The NRCC has spent another $50K on media on behalf of Tim Burns. The D-Trip hasn’t laid out any cash here yet.
  • TN-08: We noted in a previous digest that Rob Kirkland has been filing independent expenditures on behalf of his brother, Ron Kirkland, who is in the midst of a competitive GOP primary to replace retiring Rep. John Tanner. The two claim they are no longer communicating (if they did, they’d be violating the no-coordination rules required for IEs), but a local attorney (who is supporting another campaign, but won’t tell which) says he doesn’t buy it and has filed a complaint with the FEC.
  • WATN?: This is very good news: President Obama has nominated former Rep. Don Cazayoux to be U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Louisiana. Here’s hoping he is swiftly confirmed. Cazayoux is only 46, so this post would put him in great position to stage a return to electoral politics some day, if he so chooses.
  • SSP Daily Digest: 4/13 (Morning Edition)

  • CA-Sen: Barbara Boxer says she raised $2.4 million in Q1, with $8.7 mil on hand. GOPer Tom Campbell raised $1.6 mil. No word yet from the other Republicans.
  • NC-Sen: Cal Cunningham is launching his first TV ad, in introductory spot. Apparently the buy (so far) is just $45K. Separately, Cunningham told the AP that he doesn’t support the card check provisions of the Employee Free Choice Act, despite apparently telling a Teamsters official that he does. Still, the Teamsters are standing by their endorsement of Cunningham.
  • AL-07: Collingwood Research for Shelia Smoot (3/30-4/1, likely Democratic primary voters):
  • Shelia Smoot (D): 33

    Earl Hilliard Jr. (D): 28

    Terry Sewell (D): 12

    Martha Bozeman (D): 6

    Undecided/other: 20

    (MoE: 4%)

  • FL-24: Steak baron Craig Miller says he raised $340K in his first two months in his race to unseat Dem Rep. Suzanne Kosmas. There’s still a very competitive GOP primary to contend with, though.
  • MA-04: Surprise, surprise: Laura Ingraham is full of shit. The wingnut radio hostess tweeted some b.s. “rumor” that Barney Frank was going to retire. Frank did not hesitate to call Ingraham’s post a “lie.”
  • NY-14: Reshma Saujani raised $400K in Q1 in her bid to unseat Rep. Carolyn Maloney in the Democratic primary. Maloney, however, raised $475K and has $2 million on hand.
  • PA-12: Joe Biden, who is originally from Pennsylvania, will return to the state of his birth later this month to campaign for Dem Mark Critz in the upcoming PA-12 special election.
  • PA-17: Another Pennsylvania ballot challenge, this time against Dem Sheila Dow-Ford, has come undone in the courtroom. Dow-Ford is challenging Rep. Tim Holden in the primary.
  • DCCC: D-Trip Chair Chris Van Hollen was a busy man over the congressional recess. In addition to mucking up the HI-01 special election, he also campaigned for Reps. Leonard Boswell, Steve Kagen (twice), Mark Schauer and Gary Peters.
  • Polltopia: Voting is now open in PPP’s next pick-a-poll. I don’t think we’ve tried to freep these before, but come on, people – don’t you want to see a poll of PA-12?
  • WATN?: Former NM-01 Rep. Heather Wilson is being treated for thyroid cancer. We wish her a speedy recovery. Meanwhile, ex-Rep. Jim Saxton (NJ-03) has joined up with – you’ll never believe it – a DC lobbying firm. It never ends.
  • Babka: Did you know that Green’s babkas are so dense that airport x-ray scanners cannot see through them? Extra density = extra deliciousness – and, apparently, good insulation against high-frequency electromagnetic radiation. If only Lex Luthor had known!