Tag: AL-Gov

• NH-Sen, NH-Gov (pdf): As PPP’s Tom Jensen hinted yesterday, Kelly Ayotte may have lost some ground in the general election, but isn’t suffering in the GOP primary. Ayotte has a 53/23 favorable among GOPers, and they also say that by a 38/28 margin, a Sarah Palin endorsement makes it more likely that they’d vote for the endorsee. Ayotte is polling at 47%, with Bill Binnie at 14, Ovide Lamontagne at 8, Jim Bender at 6, and a handful of Some Dudes in low single-digits. (Lamontagne’s personal unpopularity seems to be keeping him from catching fire among the right wing; he’s at 23/31.) They also looked at the gubernatorial primary, where establishment frontrunner John Stephen hasn’t quite sealed the deal against teabagging businessman Jack Kimball and social conservative activist Karen Testerman. Stephen leads Kimball and Testerman 26-15-5.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: Quinnipiac offers up polls of the major races in New York state today, and, try as they may, they just can’t find anything interesting going on here, any more so than any other pollster. The main point of interest may be the GOP primaries; they find Rick Lazio leading Carl Paladino 39-23 in the gubernatorial primary, and Bruce Blakeman leading David Malpass 19-12 in the Senate primary (although Joe DioGuardi, who has submitted his petitions, really should be polled in that race too). In the general, they find Kirsten Gillibrand beating Blakeman 48-27 and Malpass 49-24. Andrew Cuomo defeats Lazio 56-26 and Paladino 55-25.

• WA-Sen: Having been on the receiving end of one of Fred Davis’s abstract-expressionist attack ads, Patty Murray’s out with her own first second TV spot of the election cycle, one that’s relentlessly job-o-centric and focuses on her close links to the region’s largest employer: Boeing. It’s a panorama of Boeing workers thanking her for saving their jobs.

• FL-Gov: Bill McCollum’s trailing in the polls of the GOP primary, but he got a boost from the Florida Chamber of Commerce, which is endorsing him. The Chamber also gave the cash-starved McCollum a $500K transfusion, although it went to McCollum-supporting 527 Florida First Initiative rather than directly to McCollum.

• GA-Gov: Nathan Deal got two presents, one good, one very bad. He got the endorsement for the runoff from fellow House member Jack Kingston, who had previously endorsed fellow Savannah resident Eric Johnson in the GOP primary. However, he also got news that a federal grand jury has issued subpoenas of Georgia’s Revenue Commissioner, in its investigation of whether Deal personally intervened with him to protect a state auto inspection program that was particularly beneficial to the Deal family’s auto salvage business. At least Deal isn’t lagging on the fundraising front; both he and rival Karen Handel have raised about $500K each in the week since the primary.

• MI-Gov: Rumors keep on resurfacing regarding Republican AG Mike Cox’s presence at an out-of-control mayoral mansion party hosted by now-disgraced former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, and they’re back in the news again, inconveniently timed for him with the primary next week. An eyewitness has just signed an affidavit placing the religious-right Cox at the stripper-laden party. Meanwhile, Rick Snyder, who’s actively trying to court Dems and indies to cross over to the GOP primary to vote for him, has rolled out an endorsement from a highly respected but long-ago GOP governor: William Milliken.

• MN-Gov: Alliance for a Better Minnesota is out with a new TV ad that’s hitting Republican nominee Tom Emmer on one of his weakest spots (of which it turns out he has many). It criticizes him for voting to weaken drunk driving laws, and oh, just happening to point out that Emmer himself has twice been convicted of drunk driving. (The Alliance name is a little oblique, probably intentionally so, but they’re a labor-backed 501(c)(4).)

• CO-04: Could Scott McInnis’s implosion and Tom Tancredo’s gubernatorial run actually help Democratic fortunes downballot, especially in the hotly-contested 4th? That’s what Politico is wondering, with a piece looking at how reduced GOP turnout and/or increased interest in Constitution Party candidate Doug Aden might ultimately benefit Democratic freshman Rep. Betsy Markey.

• NH-02: If there’s one competitive Democratic primary left where there’s a pretty clear ideological contrast, it’s in the 2nd. While Ann McLane Kuster is a netroots fave, Katrina Swett is on record as having supported the Bush-era tax cuts in 2002 (the decision of whether or not to extend said cuts is about to become an issue in Congress). Swett says she’s being misrepresented, to the extent that only supported the middle-class parts of the tax cuts, although she didn’t clarify whether or not she would have voted for the whole shebang.

• PA-06: Buried in a story about how Rep. Jim Gerlach has actually been giving money to the NRCC (to the tune of $44K just now, for a total of $100K all cycle) is news of an internal poll from a few weeks ago, which suggests he’s not in the sort of imminent danger that would require him to horde cash. He’s pointing to a Wilson Research poll from mid-July that gives him a 54-29 lead over Dem nominee Manan Trivedi.

• MI-Legislature: One state where we aren’t hurting for details on the state of the state legislatures, thanks to Michigan Liberal’s pbratt, is Michigan. He’s out with pre-primary filing fundraising databases for both the Senate (Republican-controlled, but one of our best offensive opportunities) and the House (reliably Democratic-controlled).

• Meta: I’ve always wondered, if this is such an anti-incumbent year, where the losing incumbents actually are. The Fix’s Aaron Blake is taking notice of the same thing, as we’re on track to have not really any more of an anti-incumbent year than 2008. With really only one more House member who seems on track to lose a primary (Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick), that puts us on track for 4 primary losses for both parties in the House… exactly the same number as 2008. Winning a primary, of course, takes loads of money, and the thing that sets the successful challengers (Mike Oliverio or Mo Brooks, or Joe Sestak at the Senate level) apart from the vast array of the rabble attacking from both left and right is $$. It is worth observing, though, that the average incumbent winning percentage seems to be down this year from last cycle, with many incumbents winning ugly, in the 60-70% range. We’d need to investigate how much that average percentage has changed since 2008, though, before declaring a trend to be underway.

• Rasmussen:

• AL-Gov: Ron Sparks (D) 35%, Robert Bentley (R) 55%

• IL-Sen: Alexi Giannoulias (D) 43%, Mark Kirk (R) 41%

• NV-Sen: Harry Reid (D-inc) 45%, Sharron Angle (R) 43%

• OR-Gov: John Kitzhaber (D) 44%, Chris Dudley (R) 47%

If you’d told me back in, say, January, that in late July Rasmussen would be finding Harry Reid winning and John Kitzhaber losing, I wouldn’t have even laughed at you, I would have just picked up the phone and called for assistance from men in white suits with big butterfly nets.

• Election results: Last night’s Georgia primary election went pretty much as expected. The main surprise was the collapse of John Oxendine in the GOP gubernatorial primary, who had the most money and led most polls, but his collapse was plainly foreseeable via polls over the last few weeks. He finished fourth, behind Karen Handel and Nathan Deal (who’ll advance to the runoff, where the Palin-backed Handel will attack Deal for being corrupt and the Gingrich-backed Deal will attack Handel for being a RINO), and Eric Johnson. Ex-Gov. Roy Barnes locked down the Democratic nomination without a runoff. Labor Comm. Michael Thurmond easily advanced to face GOP incumbent Johnny Isakson in the Senate race.

In the House races, Dems in two of the three potentially competitive races in Georgia know who their opponents will be: Mike Keown in GA-02 and Austin Scott in GA-08 won without runoffs. John Barrow — who beat back a challenge from the left from Regina Thomas in GA-12 (with a final score of 58-42, as Thomas’s Savannah stronghold reported late) — will need to wait for a runoff between Ray McKinney and Carl Smith. Hank Johnson in GA-04 escaped his three-way primary against Vernon Jones and Connie Stokes without a runoff, too. Finally, two dark-red seats will feature GOP runoffs: GA-09’s newly-elected Rep. Tom Graves will face off yet again against Lee Hawkins, who lost the special election, while the GA-07 race features a runoff between Rob Woodall and Jody Hice.

• AR-Sen, AR-Gov: That internal poll from Blanche Lincoln didn’t seem to do anything to stem the gusher of bad polls. One additional poll came out yesterday, from Ipsos on behalf of Reuters. It finds John Boozman leading Lincoln 54-35. On the plus side, it also looks at the Governor’s race and finds that the Zata|3 poll finding only a 9-point lead for incumbent Dem Mike Beebe may have been a bit pessimistic. They find Beebe leading Republican challenger Jim Keet 57-35, more consistent with other polling.

• IN-Sen: Brad Ellsworth is out with a new introductory TV ad in the Indiana Senate race. It focuses on his blue collar roots and his experience as Sheriff; there’s nary a mention of his time in Congress.

• LA-Sen: It turns out David Vitter may actually be a better family-values role model than his newly minted GOP primary opponent. Faulkner character State Rep. Noble Ellington says that Chet Traylor was “significantly involved” in his divorce from his ex-wife Peggy McDowell, who then married Traylor. Traylor is currently romantically involved with the estranged wife of one of his stepsons via McDowell. The two stepsons have also filed a lawsuit against Traylor, accusing him of hiding information about his financial assets, as part of their probate case concerning McDowell’s recent death without a will. (If someone wants to call me classist in the comments, please feel free, but I can’t help but notice that Traylor’s name is a homonym for a certain type of dwelling whose residents are stereotypically and often unfairly associated with such behavior.)

• WV-Sen, WV-Gov: As expected (at least as expected since late last night), Shelly Moore Capito announced this morning that she won’t run in the Senate special election in November, despite the nice Capito Carveout specifically designed by the legislature to facilitate her doing so. This leaves self-funding businessman John Raese the likely candidate. (In fact, he’d sounded likely to run in the primary with or without Capito, which may have been a major deterrent for Capito. She cited not wanting to run for two things at once, though, and the potential legal challenges to her doing so.) The primary is Aug. 28, so someone will need to fill the gap soon. West Virigina political analyst Hoppy Kercheval seemed to be the first to correctly diagnose the situation earlier yesterday, pointing out her risk-averse past.

There was one surprise, today, though: Joe Manchin drew a primary opponent, theoretically from the left. He was recently in the news for his staunch opposition to Mike Oliverio in WV-01; it’s former SoS and former Rep. Ken Hechler. Hechler, by the way, is 95 years old, older even than Robert Byrd was, so, well, take that for what it’s worth. Most of the speculation today instead seems to involve what happens with the Governorship. Succession laws aren’t very clear (and there’s no Lt. Gov.), but apparently State Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin will be acting Governor in the event of a Manchin move to the Senate. The bigger question is when the election to fill that job would occur: in a 2011 special election, or in 2012 when Manchin’s term would end anyway? Any discussion of GOP candidates for that begins and ends with Capito, but the Dem list is endless, ranging from temp Sen. Carte Goodwin to SoS Natalie Tennant, but almost certain to include state Treasurer John Perdue and state Sens. Jeff Kessler and Brooks McCabe.

• AL-Gov: Following the lead of Artur Davis on the Democratic side, Bradley Byrne finally got around to endorsing Robert Bentley, sticking his knife in his back a few more times along the way for good measure. His parting shot was that Bentley still needs to answer questions about his relationship with the teachers’ union, the Alabama Education Association.

• CO-Gov: OK, so it’s looking like if Scott McInnis does get kicked to the curb, no one is going to rally behind Dan Maes. His vaunted financial small-business acumen turned out to be a lot of inflated boasting, as newly-released tax returns reveal that his credit reporting business turns out to be a small operation and one that paid him earnings that put his family below the poverty line in 2005 and 2008. When asked how he made ends meet, he responded, “there are other ways to pay yourself than salary,” without further elaboration. Well, that’s true… are those ways legal, though?

• HI-Gov: After padding things out as long as he could, Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannemann finally resigned his day job today and launched his gubernatorial campaign in earnest. Hawaii has a “resign to run” law, so Hannemann wasn’t officially running until now, despite having been transparently campaigning for many months in the Dem primary against Neil Abercrombie.

• MA-Gov: Massachusetts Citizens for Life endorsed ex-Dem indie candidate Tim Cahill, rather than Republican Charlie Baker. Baker, from the moderate blue-blood side of the party, is pro-choice.

• NV-Gov (pdf): PPP’s Tom Jensen finds it ironic that somehow the Nevada GOP managed to pick the strongest possible Republican for the gubernatorial race and the weakest possible one for the Senate race. The telegenic and inoffensive Brian Sandoval is somehow managing to avoid having his GOP predecessor Jim Gibbons’ unpopularity (25/63) rub off on him (Sandoval is at 42/31). Sandoval leads Rory Reid (who’s at 34/48) by 52-38 in the general election.

• RI-Gov: Bill Clinton will be appearing in Rhode Island on behalf of Democratic candidate Frank Caprio, last man standing in the Dem primary, on July 29. Caprio backed Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary.

• WI-Gov: Fundraising numbers in the Wisconsin gubernatorial race are out. Democrat Tom Barrett raised $2.39 million in the period of January through June, while GOPers Scott Walker and Mark Neumann raised $2.59 million and $1.96 million respectively (although some of Neumann’s money seems to be out of his own pocket). In terms of CoH, it’s Barrett (with no primary opposition) with $2.89 million, Walker with $2.57 million, and Neumann with $1.05 million.

• IA-02: Marianette Miller-Meeks, the ophthalmologist who lost severely to David Loebsack in 2008, is back for a rematch, and seems to be in better shape this time (better, even, than Raul Labrador), if her own internal is to be believed. Her poll from Susquehanna Polling & Research gives Loebsack a 46-41 lead.

• NJ-03: The Courier-Post wonders aloud “who the heck is Peter DeStefano?” That’s because no one really seems to know. He’s the independent Tea Party candidate in the 3rd, who hasn’t done anything to promote himself and whose main claim to fame was polling in the double-digits in John Adler’s recent internal poll where he was dominating Jon Runyan. This led, naturally, to GOP claims that DeStefano was some sort of plant from the Adler camp. DeStefano denies that, but isn’t helping matters with his pattern of ducking publicity, not just among the teabagging rank and file but even with the Courier-Post too.

• PA-11: Naturally, it’s never a sign of strength for an incumbent to go negative on his challenger this early… but it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that Paul Kanjorski is in a heap of trouble in his rematch against Lou Barletta. But Kanjorski may feel he’s not only better served by localizing, not nationalizing his race, but also that he has a target-rich environment for hits on Barletta, given Barletta’s tenure as mayor of city of Hazleton, which has the highest unemployment in the state and whose local government is in danger of going into receivership.

• TX-06: I suppose this is an example of karma at work. Rep. Joe Barton’s campaign fund took a loss of $154K over the last three months because of hits to its investments… perhaps most significantly, because of losses at BP.

• RNC: It seems like Michael Steele can say all the dumb things he wants and keep his job (fo shizzle), but could financial mismanagement be the straw that breaks the camel’s back? The RNC has had to report new debts that were kept off the books by staffers loyal to Steele, and treasurer Randy Pullen (not a Steele ally) is going public alleging that the debts go much deeper than what was reported to the FEC, claiming that more than another $7 million in debt is out there. The dispute is likely to dominate matters at the RNC’s annual meeting in two weeks. This also leads to speculation that American Crossroads, the Karl Rove 527 operation that finally seemed to kick into high gear last month, will be the de facto main source for independent expenditures this year while the RNC sputters.

• House: Well, it looks like we’re stuck with 435 for the foreseeable future. A federal district court ruled against the plaintiffs in a lawsuit that claimed that only 435 seats was unconstitutional under 14th Amendment grounds, because of malapportionment between different states (i.e. Montana and Wyoming each getting one Rep., despite their population differences).

• Rasmussen:

• KY-Sen: Jack Conway (D) 41%, Rand Paul (R) 49%

• MN-Gov: Mark Dayton (D) 40%, Tom Emmer (R) 36%

• MN-Gov: Margaret Anderson Kelliher (D) 40%, Tom Emmer (R) 35%

• MN-Gov: Matt Entenza (D) 37%, Tom Emmer (R) 36%

• OH-Gov: Ted Strickland (D-inc): 43%, John Kasich (R) 48%

IL-Sen: Undoubtedly Alexi Giannoulias wishes this kind of thing happened every week: Barack Obama is coming to town for a fundraiser on August 5th.

PA-Sen: The Philly Inquirer has a good look at Pat Toomey’s attempted “moderate” makeover. He’s doing a fundraiser with Susan Collins, who was lambasted last year by the Club for Growth – Toomey’s old group – as “Comrade of the Month” for her stimulus vote. He’s also getting the support of a former Specter chief-of-staff (who “stayed loyal” to his old boss when he became a Dem), and perhaps most famously, came out in favor of Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation to the SCOTUS. The real question is, will this stick? Or will Joe Sestak be able to show Toomey for the ultra-conservative he really is?

WV-Sen: This is unexpected: The West Virginia legislature, called into a special session specifically for the purpose of amending the state’s elections laws, recessed yesterday without taking any action. Apparently, the two houses are still ironing out differences. (Remind me why we need bicameral state legislatures?) The Secretary of State’s office says that it thinks it has time to hold a special election this fall if a bill passes today, but that timetable may be in doubt if lawmakers tarry any longer. Gov. Joe Manchin could also rely on a state AG opinion and schedule a special even if the lege fails to act – but he might also do nothing, meaning Carte Goodwin could serve past November.

AL-Gov: Artur Davis is determined to be remembered as the Asshole of Alabama. Despite endorsing Ron Sparks in his concession speech, Artur Douchebag spewed a bunch of right-wang talking points about his former opponent – and also went out of his way to praise Republican candidate Robert Bentley. Ooh, ArturD2, I definitely see some phat lobbying jobs in your future – and maybe a seat on a deficit commission some day. Stay douchey!

MN-Gov: GOP nominee Tom Emmer really stepped in some serious shit when he suggested that the minimum wage should be revoked for waiters in Minnesota – and that he had heard of servers making over $100,000 a year. So to make reparations, he held… I guess, not a town hall but a dining hall hall with restaurant workers, who were mostly annoyed by his refusal to get specific. (Said one: “I didn’t know of him before this. I know him now. And I don’t like him.”) But it all came to an abrupt end when activist Nick Espinosa dumped a couple thousand pennies on Emmer’s table, barking “Here’s your tip!”

NY-01: Stay nasty, boys. Randy Altschuler is sending out mailers attacking rival Chris Cox for his support of Dede Scozzafava and Charlie Crist.

NY State Sen: You may remember Pedro Espada as the “Democrat” who spearheaded last year’s attempted coup by Republicans in the state Senate. In addition to being a scumbag under federal investigation, he’s also been targeted by the Working Families Party, who say that his defeat in the September primary is their “No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 priority.” To that end, they’ve been aiding Jose Gustavo River, a former aide to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. On top of that, Bill Samuels, a bigtime Dem donor, is pledging to spend $250K to boot Espada. Let’s hope it happens!

• Election Results: No big surprises last night in the Alabama runoffs. Robert Bentley, who’d had the edge in the one public poll shortly before the runoff, beat Bradley Byrne in the gubernatorial GOP runoff, 56-44; he and Ron Sparks are now promising each other a positive, issues-oriented race. (Assorted wonks are trying to figure out today if Bentley, friendly – or at least friendlier – with the AEA, was helped along by Democratic crossover votes… and the answer appears to be no, not really.) In the GOP runoff in AL-02, Mike Barber is sending his gathered armies back home after losing by a 60-40 margin to Martha Roby. In the Dem runoff in AL-07, Terri Sewell beat Shelia Smoot 55-45, and is almost certain to succeed Artur Davis. Finally, the closest race of the night was the GOP Agriculture Commissioner runoff, where Dale Peterson-powered John McMillan sent Dorman Grace back to his chicken farm, 52-48.

• AZ-Sen, AZ-Gov (pdf): A new Rocky Mountain poll from the Behavior Research Center finds [insert usual “good news” joke here]. John McCain leads J.D. Hayworth (seeming DOA after the free-grant-money thing) in the GOP primary 64-19, with 5 for someone named Jim Deakin. They also polled the now-irrelevant gubernatorial primary, finding Jan Brewer at 57, with 12 for Owen Buz Mills and 9 for Dean Martin (both of whom have dropped out since the poll’s completion). Matthew Jatte remains in the primary, but he polled at “less than 1%.”

• FL-Sen: Here’s some good news for Kendrick Meek, who seems to be counting on a last minute Democratic surge: Bill Clinton will be appearing on his behalf in August, to stump for him in August. Dem primary rival Jeff Greene has some less good news: he just lost his campaign manager Josh Morrow. (It’s unclear whether he fled, or was pushed.) The St. Petersburg Times has an interesting profile of Greene today, too, that delves below the headline-grabbing superficial weirdnesses.

• KS-Sen: Tancredo sez: get a brain, Moran! (No, I’m never going to get tired of that joke.) The loudmouthed ex-Rep., last seen torpedoing ally Ken Buck, today barged back into the Kansas GOP Senate primary and admitted he had gotten it all wrong. He withdrew his earlier backing for Rep. Jerry Moran and switched over to Rep. Todd Tiahrt instead, saying that Moran had “deceived him” on his apparently inadequate hatred for teh brown people. In other news, did you know there was actually a third guy running in the primary, and he wasn’t just Some Dude® but a former state Attorney General? Of course, he was AG from the years 1965 to 1969 Anno Domini, so you could be forgiven for not remembering Robert Londerholm. At any rate, Londerholm dropped out of the race today.

• LA-Sen: Bobby Jindal had previously hedged on his support for David Vitter, showing up at some fundraising events but never actually going so far as to say that he endorsed him. That’s going to be more of an issue now that Vitter has some serious primary opposition from Chet Traylor, and Jindal is doubling down on his neutrality, saying he’s not focused on the race. At least Vitter continues to have the NRSC in his corner.

• NC-Sen: SurveyUSA is out with another poll in NC-Sen, on behalf of WRAL. Richard Burr continues to have a lead over Elaine Marshall, currently at 46-36, with 6 to Libertarian Mike Beitler. Burr’s favorables are 28/27 (with 23 neutral and 22 no opinion), while Marshall is at 25/12 (with 28 neutral and 35 no opinion), so usual caveats at Marshall’s room to grow apply. Interestingly, SurveyUSA followed their WA-Sen lead and added a cellphone oversample, which in various permutations had little effect on the toplines.

• NV-Sen: No polling memo to link to, at least not yet, but Jon Ralston calls our attention to a new poll from Dem pollster Fairbanks Maslin on behalf of the Patriot Majority. If it’s a quasi-internal, you can probably guess where we’re going with this… it actually has Harry Reid in the lead, over Sharron Angle 44-40. Both Reid (45/52) and Angle (40/41) have net-negative favorables, though.

• FL-Gov: Rick Scott lost a court battle (though the war over the Millionaire’s Amendment is no doubt not over, though). A federal district court judge denied Scott’s request for an injunction against Florida’s campaign finance law, which would give a truckload of money to the near-broke Bill McCollum because of Scott’s aggressive self-funding.

• MI-Gov: There are two separate polls of the Michigan GOP gubernatorial primary floating around today. One is a public poll from Mitchell Research & Communications; it sees a flat-out three-way tie between Mike Cox, Peter Hoekstra, and Rick Snyder, each of them at 18, with Mike Bouchard at 9 and Tom George at 2. Not quite content with that, Bouchard rolled out an internal poll (from McLaughlin & Associates) which, in marked contrast with, well, every other poll, had Bouchard tied for the lead. His poll has him and Hoekstra at 19, with Cox at 16, Snyder at 12, and George at 3. Mitchell also has numbers from the Dem primary, where they find Andy Dillon leading Virg Bernero 35-15.

• RI-Gov: This seems out of the blue, although he had been lagging in fundraising and underperforming in the polls: Democratic AG Patrick Lynch will be dropping out of the gubernatorial primary, effective tomorrow. That leaves state Treasurer Frank Caprio as de facto Dem nominee, sparing him a primary battle with the more liberal Lynch. It’s the day before nominating papers are due, so maybe he’ll re-up for more AGing. The main question now seems to be positioning for the general election… maybe most notably whether independent ex-GOP ex-Sen. Lincoln Chafee finds himself running to the left of the generally moderate Caprio.

• WA-08: Via press release, we have fundraising numbers from Suzan DelBene, who’s raising strongly despite little netroots interest so far. She raised $378K last quarter, and is sitting on $1.04 million CoH. She’s raised $1.65 million over the cycle.

• Rasmussen:

• CA-Sen: Barbara Boxer (D-inc) 49%, Carly Fiorina (R) 42%

• MO-Sen: Robin Carnahan (D) 45%, Roy Blunt (R) 47%

• NH-Sen: Paul Hodes (D) 37%, Kelly Ayotte (R) 49%

• NH-Sen: Paul Hodes (D) 40%, Ovide Lamontagne (R) 43%

• NH-Sen: Paul Hodes (D) 38%, Bill Binnie (R) 49%

• NH-Sen: Paul Hodes (D) 39%, Jim Bender (R) 43%

• NV-Gov: Rory Reid (D) 36%, Brian Sandoval (R) 57%

Aside from a weird little special primary for the Dems in sleepy OH-03, all eyes tonight are on the runoffs in Alabama. Let’s check in on the three big-ticket items tonight (there’s also a Dem runoff in the AG’s race, and a sadly Dale Peterson-free Republican runoff in the Ag Commissioner’s race).

• AL-Gov (R): The GOP gubernatorial runoff between ex-state Sen. Bradley Byrne and state Rep. Robert Bentley is a convoluted one, as Byrne is simultaneously getting squeezed from the left and from the right, by Bentley in both cases. Bentley, who’s closely linked to Mike Huckabee’s camp, has the social conservative cred, and seems to have consolidated many former Tim James and Roy Moore voters, in opposition to the former Democrat and GOP-establishment-backed Byrne. Byrne, however, has been a tireless foe of the Alabama Education Association, who are much friendlier with Bentley. (As much as this is a duel between two guys trying to out-conservative each other, remember that these are the two comparatively reasonable guys in the field, with serious wackos Moore and James having fallen by the wayside). Both candidates have internal polls giving them the lead, but a sorta-public poll from Baselice gives Bentley the edge. The winner faces Democratic Ag Commissioner Ron Sparks.

• AL-02 (R): Gather your armies! Montgomery city councilwoman Martha Roby, the NRCC-crowned establishment favorite, just barely fell short of an outright primary victory last month, taking 49% to teabagging businessman Rick “The Barber” Barber’s 29%. Barber, who has lagged in the fundraising race against Roby, has attempted to gin up interest in his campaign through a series of increasingly absurd “viral” videos. Either candidate will face a tough general election fight against frosh Dem Rep. Bobby Bright, who’s leaving little room for his would-be opponent on his right flank. (J)

• AL-07 (D): Wall Street securities lawyer Terri Sewell squares off against Jefferson County Commissioner Shelia Smoot. Sewell led after the first round, with 37% of the vote to Smoot’s 29%. (Earl Hilliard, Jr. took 22% but hasn’t endorsed anyone in the runoff.) Sewell has swamped Smoot on the fundraising front, taking in some $1 million to Smoot’s $150,000 (thanks at least in part to her befuddling EMILY’s List endorsement), and has dominated the airwaves. The campaign has turned negative during the long runoff period, with Smoot accusing Sewell of accepting lots of out-of-state “Republican” money and calling her “Artur Davis in a dress.” Meanwhile, Sewell has suggested that Smoot double-dipped on a car allowance from JeffCo. No polls of the runoff have been released, so we’ll see whether Sewell’s money can carry the day for her, or whether Smoot has effectively tied her opponent to Davis (who performed very badly here – his home district – in the AL-Gov primary against Ron Sparks). (D)

If you have any predictions, please share them in the comments!

Polls close at 7 pm Central time (8 pm Eastern, 5 pm Pacific).

AK-Sen: It’s not every day you see an incumbent agreeing to debate a primary challenger, but Sen. Lisa Murkowski has done just that. She’ll meet Joe Miller for three debates in the middle of August, just before the primary on the 24th.

CT-Sen: This Politico story reminds me of that scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail where, amidst the Black Plague, the peasant exhorts everyone to “Bring out yer dead!” and dump them on his cart. One not-quite victim protests, “But I’m not dead yet!” So, too, the Rob Simmons campaign. A whole bunch of people – including Rob Simmons himself – plan on voting for Simmons in the August 10th primary. But it’s pretty clear that hope indeed seems to be the plan here, since Simmons still isn’t campaigning and seems to just be praying for an unlikely win. At least it’s a better system of governance than strange women lyin’ in ponds distributin’ swords.

FL-Sen: Charlie Crist is pulling the trigger on a special legislative session in which he’ll ask lawmakers to add a constitutional amendment to the November ballot which would allow voters to ban offshore drilling. The Miami Herald notes that Crist didn’t lay any groundwork for this special session with state House leaders, meaning he could potentially get negged here. But even that could redound to Crist’s benefit, as he’d be able to campaign against the legislature’s failure to give the people a voice on this pressing issue.

KY-Sen: It’s like John Galt forgot the fact that his motors still had to be delivered along public roads: Rand Paul is taking heat from local officials on account of his distaste for using federal money for drug treatment programs. Note that we aren’t talking about the “war on drugs” here, but money used to treat addicts – which Paul says should come from local sources. But the people who actually have to deal with the problem say that Paul doesn’t understand how important federal dollars are for these programs. Not really surprising, given Rand Paul Math:

When tax money flows to the nation’s capitol, half stays there, half is wasted and half of it goes to political cronyism, Paul said.

LA-Sen: David Vitter got a somewhat-prominent primary challenger at the very last minute: retired LA Supreme Court Judge Chet Traylor. There’s also at least one other Some Dude in the race. If for some reason Vitter can’t get 50% in the primary – which is not until August 28th – then he’d have to deal with a runoff on October 2nd, barely a month before the general. Also interestingly, Republican state Rep. Ernest Wooton qualified for the race, too – as an independent. This might be a rare bit of good news for Charlie Melancon. (H/t Darth Jeff.)

NV-Sen: At the state GOP convention, Sharron Angle expressed her support for the party’s platform – a wonderfully nutty document, as Jon Ralston points out, that touts its opposition to a “one-world government.” Angle was later seen leaving the convention on a black helicopter. Meanwhile, President Obama just did a fundraiser for Harry Reid late last week, which apparently raised $800K.

SC-Sen: Alvin Greene won’t face any charges regarding the $10,440 filing fee he paid to run for senate, or over whether he misrepresented his finances when he asked for a public defender after being charged with a crime (showing an obscene photo) last fall. It turns out that Greene really did pull together the scratch himself, mostly from his Army exit pay and a hefty tax refund. It’s not how I would have spent my last ten thousand bucks, but to each his own.

SD-Sen: With zero opponents on the ballot – not even a Some Dude independent – John Thune is shuttering his campaign team. While it’s always painful to see a Republican senate seat go completely uncontested like this, I wonder if this might not be for the best in terms of Stephanie Herseth Sandlin’s re-election chances. At the very least, it means that Thune won’t be out there stumping on the campaign trail – and won’t provide an attractive top-of-the-ticket draw in November. While it’s probably unprovable, I know a lot of folks here feel that Dick Lugar’s lack of an opponent probably helped us win three house races in Indiana in 2006, a sentiment I tend to share.

WI-Sen: Cute: Zillionaire teabagger Ron Johnson had previously criticized President Obama for pushing BP to set up a fund to pay out claims for damage their oil spill has caused. It turns out that Johnson owns at least $116,000 worth of BP stock. Johnson laughably tried to point out that Wisconsin’s public employee pension fund also invests in BP – and that Russ Feingold is a member of that fund (he was a state legislator before being elected to Congress). Srsly?

WV-Sen: It looks like that statement is no longer operative. On Friday, Gov. Joe Manchin told Politico’s Ben Smith that he would “declare his intentions about a Senate run Monday.” The next day, though, he informed Politico’s Jonathan Martin that he’s going to hold off until two things happen: first, he wants the state legislature (called back for a special session) to clarify the law on special election to replace Sen. Robert Byrd. Second, he wants to name an interim office-holder. Manchin also said that the special session will be held this Thursday at noon. (And in an odd aside, Manchin – who seems all but certain to run for Byrd’s seat – just became head of the National Governors Association.)

AL-Gov: This is probably too late to help much, but term-limited Gov. Bob Riley is endorsing former college chancellor Bradley Byrne in tomorrow’s runoff against state Rep. Robert Bentley. Still, Bentley seems to be in the better position. Despite being something of a dark horse in the first round, Bentley has apparently done a good job of consolidating conservatives, and internal polling has generally showed him in the lead.

AL-02: It’s not like we can love Bobby Bright – but we probably can credit him with running a good campaign. Republican Martha Roby is trying to paint herself as a champion against illegal immigration, but as Politico points out, in past battles on the subject, Bright took a harder line than Roby did. As Alex Isenstadt says, “It’s the newest iteration of a recurring challenge for Roby’s campaign: How do you run to the right of a Democrat who’s been squarely on the conservative end of his party since even before he was elected?” Roby still has a runoff fight tomorrow with Rick “The Barber” Barber.

CA-11: David Harmer, running against Dem Rep. Jerry McNerney, pulled in more than $400K last quarter.

FL-25: Marili Cancio, running against establishment favorite David Rivera in the GOP primary, accused him of “repeat domestic violence” on her Facebook page. There have been some rumors circulating about a potential story here (you can Google for more).

LA-02: State Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, who lost a runoff to then-Rep. Bill Jefferson in 2006, will not seek to challenge Rep. Joe Cao. This leaves state Reps. Cedric Richmond and Juan LaFonta as Cao’s most likely opponents. I’m actually a bit surprised that more big names didn’t get into the race, given how tempting a target Cao seems to be.

MI-13: The Detroit Free Press takes a look at the field challenging Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick in the Dem primary – and points out that Kilpatrick, who only took in 39% in the 2008 primary – doesn’t even have a website. The Freep thinks her two toughest challengers are state Sen. Hansen Clarke and businessman John Broad, while three other Some Dudes round out the field. No one has raised very much, and even Kilpatrick has only $300K on hand. But she may yet benefit from a split field for the second cycle in a row, much like Jean Schmidt.

NM-02: Handsome Harry Teague raised some $320K in Q2 and has $1.2 mil in the bank.

NY-14: Reshma Saujani is claiming that Carolyn Maloney agreed to a debate – but Maloney’s camp says no such thing ever happened. Given Maloney’s consistent stance of refusing to credit Saujani in any way, I have a very hard time believing anything Saujani’s team says about this. And meanwhile, the Washington Post has a pretty puffy profile of Saujani, which if nothing else confirms that she truly is the candidate of the banksters.

NY-18: Self-funding venture capitalist Paul Wasserman has dropped his bid to take on Rep. Nita Lowey in this suburban New York district. Westchester County Republicans are now instead backing 2008 nominee Jim Russell, who has a decidedly less-gaudy campaign warchest ($5,000).

Fundraising: A couple of memos – which were probably designed to be leaked – are now circulating which detail Democratic fears that they will be outspent by conservative interest groups this fall. What I don’t get is why every cycle, people always act like one side outspending the other is some kind of big surprise. New 527s come and go all the time, and it’s not like big Dem or GOP donors all of a sudden forget every January that, hey, there’s an election on! Maybe we should look into this newfangled 527 thing? This stuff is cyclical, and the fact that we’re getting our asses kicked in 2010 is not really news. But if memos like these spook a few rich Dems into opening their wallets, then okay.

Polltopia: Or more like poll dystopia. Media Matters has a distressing piece on McClatchy’s decision to stop polling altogether as part of a budget cutback. (They had previously done about a dozen polls a year with Ipsos.) The piece also details how many, many other news organizations, particularly local newspapers, have also pared down or eliminated their polling in recent years. I know there are far worse problems in the world, but as far as Swingnuts are concerned, this is very, very sad and unfortunate.

• 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%

• CO-Sen: Republican candidate Ken Buck has a couple pieces of good news today: one, he’s the recipient of $172K in independent expenditures from mysterious conservative group Americans for Job Security. And two, Jim DeMint‘s coming to town on July 8 to stump on Buck’s behalf

• NE-Sen: Ironically, on the same day that he was the deciding vote in the Senate’s failure to extend unemployment benefits, Ben Nelson announced that he won’t be making an appearance in the unemployment lines himself in 2012. He confirmed that he plans to run for re-election.

• SC-Sen: The profile of Lindsey Graham in the New York Times magazine is well worth a read. While it serves to make me like him a little more, I’ve gotta wonder if he’s even going to bother running (or at least running as a Republican) when he’s up again in 2014, considering it’s just going to tick off the teabaggers even more. He derides the Tea Partiers, saying they’ll be gone in a few years, “chortling” that Ronald Reagan would have a hard time getting elected as a Republican today… and also has a good laugh at the rumors about his sexual orientation, instead of, y’know, punching the interviewer in the nose or something unequivocally manly like that.

• WI-Sen, WI-Gov: PPP rolls out a last batch of numbers from their Wisconsin sample, looking at the Republican primaries in the Senate and gubernatorial races and seeing them as foregone conclusions. On the governor’s side, Milwaukee Co. Executive (and legendary 60’s crooner) Scott Walker leads ex-Rep. Mark Neumann 58-19, while in the Senate race, Ron Johnson leads Dave Westlake 49-11.

• WV-Sen: OK, so the rumor today is that things are still on for a 2012 special election to replace Robert Byrd, not a 2010 one as suggested yesterday. Gov. Joe Manchin and Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin are sending signals that they won’t call for a legislative special session to shift the election date to this year, despite the decision by SoS Natalie Tennant to have it in 2012.

• AL-Gov: Here’s one more politican trapped in the semantic quicksand that seems to be developing around the issue of stateside service during Vietnam. Alabama GOP runoff contestant Robert Bentley has drawn some heat for the words “Hospital commander” and “Vietnam War” appearing on-screen in one of his TV ads. Bentley was ranking medical doctor at Pope AFB (in North Carolina) during the Vietnam era, although he didn’t serve physically in Vietnam.

• FL-Gov: Now the supposed hero of 9/11 has RINO cooties, too? Rick Scott’s camp sent out press releases yesterday attacking opponent Bill McCollum for having supported “pro-abortion, pro-homosexual” Giuliani for President, back in those heady days of, say, 2007, when it was assumed that Giuliani was going to steamroller everyone else in the Florida primary.

• MD-Gov: Republican ex-Gov. Bob Ehrlich picked a running mate for his 2010 campaign, and, no, he’s not giving Michael Steele his old job back. He picked Mary Kane, who was the SoS under Ehrlich (an appointed position in Maryland). She’s from Montgomery County, suggesting he sees the route to 50%+1 through this increasingly-blue suburb.

• OR-Gov (pdf): Republican pollster Magellan is quickly becoming one of the most prolific purveyors of public polls, this time with a look at the gubernatorial race in Oregon. They join the consensus that this is a deadlocked race right now; they find Republican Chris Dudley leading Democrat John Kitzhaber by a paper-thin 41-40 margin. Dudley has 41-27 support among independents. They also offer an interesting breakdown by CD; it’s OR-04 that’s keeping Dudley in this, giving him a 44-38 edge, while predictably, Kitzhaber dominates in OR-01 and OR-03, Dudley sweeps OR-02, and they fight to a tie in OR-05.

• WY-Gov: OMG! Stop the presses! Veteran character actor and widely trusted commercial pitchman for products for old people (and Wyoming resident) Wilford Brimley has made an endorsement in the GOP gubernatorial primary. He’s backing state Auditor Rita Meyer. No word on whether he was won over by her pro-oatmeal stances.

• NJ-07: There’s an internal poll out from a Democrat? Not only that, but it’s from one who’s been totally off the radar, as national Dems seem to have ceded the 7th to freshman GOPer Leonard Lance. While the “informed ballot” numbers are the ones getting promoted (we at SSP think informed ballot questions are good… for us to poop on), there are legitimate toplines in there too, with Lance leading Ed Potosnak by a not-so-imposing 43-30. Lance also has a weak 31/46 re-elect number in the Garin Hart Yang poll.

• NM-02: Construction liens seem to be the common cold of political scandals, but Democratic freshman Harry Teague is in an uphill battle to retain his GOP-leaning seat and probably wouldn’t like any bad PR. He personally, and the four oil and gas industry companies he controls, are facing a civil lawsuit over failure to repay loans to purchase equipment.

• Ohio: PPP has some odds and ends left over from their Ohio sample. Two items are on the bad news side of the ledger, although only barely: a generic House ballot test for Ohio (where there are at least five competitive Democratic holds) has Republicans leading Democrats 44-43, and GOP ex-Sen. Mike DeWine is leading appointed Democratic AG Richard Cordray 44-41 in the Attorney General’s race. (Screw that; what about SoS race numbers?) The good news is that Sherrod Brown’s favorables have rebounded quite a bit since PPP’s last poll; he’s now at 38/38.

• NRCC: More expectations management from the NRCC? After previous pronouncements that John Boehner was looking to pick up 436 100 seats, now he’s sending out a fundraising e-mail that touts a 39-seat pickup as their target.

• RGA: Haley Barbour’s rolling around in a trough full of money today: the Republican Governors Association hauled in $19 million in the last fundraising quarter. Also suggesting that GOP fundraising is kicking into higher gear, American Crossroads, the Karl Rove venture that earned a whopping $200 in May, had a much better June: they raised $8.5 million.

• FL-Sen: As much as Charlie Crist seems to have benefited from his switch to an independent bid, he still has to deal with blowback from a lot of ticked-off Republicans. A group of GOPers, led by state Rep. Tom Grady, has filed a class action lawsuit against Crist to get back their contributions which they thought would be used to support a Republican. Meanwhile, with Crist running around looking gubernatorial amidst the oil spill crisis, and the media having lost interest with the Republican primary settled, Marco Rubio now finds himself in an unusual position (which may be reflected in recent polls): the guy who isn’t getting any attention.

• IL-Sen: Well, it took Mark Kirk a couple months to do what Richard Blumenthal took a few days to do, but he finally got around to apologizing today in a press conference for his various “careless” embellishments of his military and teaching records.

• KS-Sen: SurveyUSA (6/24-27, likely voters, 5/21-23 in parens):

Jerry Moran (R): 53 (52)

Todd Tiahrt (R): 33 (29)

Other: 5 (4)

Undecided: 9 (15)

(MoE: ±3.7%)

SurveyUSA also looks at the Democratic Senate primary (where little-known college professor Lisa Johnston is the surprise leader, at 24, followed by somewhat higher-profile candidates like former newspaper editor Charles Schollenberger at 16 and state Sen. David Haley at 11), and at the Republican gubernatorial primary (where I didn’t even know there was a contest anymore, but where Sam Brownback leads Joan Heffington 76-17).

• KY-Sen: With the primary resolved and with Rand Paul having gone into media-related hiding, his fundraising seems to have dwindled accordingly. He held another online moneybomb yesterday, which used to be his bread and butter, but the bomb was more of a dud this time: he banked only $90K by yesterday evening. That’s was off from the $400K generated by his largest one last August.

• NJ-Sen: A couple items of good news for Frank Lautenberg: first, he’s announced that, after having been treated for lymphoma, his cancer is now in remission. And today, he got Robert Byrd‘s gavel for the Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security.

• NV-Sen: Sharron Angle, in contrast to Rand Paul, is at least temporarily breaking her media silence tonight… and she’s doing it not exactly the friendliest environment either, going on local reporter Jon Ralston’s TV show. (Ralston is one of the best left of the dying breed of state-level political reporters; his Twitter feed is highly recommended.) Meanwhile, Nevada Dems are hitting Angle for her decidedly extreme position on abortion (legal under absolutely no circumstances), while the once-thought-ominous Karl Rove 527 American Crossroads is out with a new ad attacking Harry Reid over unemployment.

• WV-Sen: There’s quite a long list of potential temporary appointees developing in West Virginia, but ex-Gov. (and current College Board president) Gaston Caperton won’t be one of them; he took his name out of the running. In addion to former state party chair Nick Casey and current chair Larry Puccio, other names, all of whom are well-connected with Gov. Joe Manchin, bubbling up today include former Manchin counsel Carte Goodwin, businessman Perry Petropolis, former state Supreme Court justice Richard Neely, and first lady Gayle Manchin.

• AL-Gov: Robert Bentley is touting an internal poll from Dresner Wicker & Associates giving him a substantial lead over Bradley Byrne in the GOP runoff; Bentley leads 46-27, and has 59/9 favorables. Bentley has also pledged no negative ads from his camp, which may be a relief to many Alabamians (and which may have been the secret to Bentley’s surprise success in the primary, as he dodged the heavy crossfire between Byrne and Tim James).

• CA-Gov: There’s a clear difference in strategy in California’s governor’s race, with Jerry Brown (who needs to draw Meg Whitman out into the open) agreeing to ten debates and Whitman (who needs to hide behind her ads) agreeing to one. New ads run by Brown surrogates seem to be taking increasing aim at Whitman’s tendency to hide behind her large piles of money, too.

• RI-Gov, RI-01, RI-02: The Rhode Island Democratic party issued its endorsements yesterday, and the results weren’t good for the party’s former state chair (or his brother). Bill Lynch lost the RI-01 endorsement to Providence mayor David Cicilline, while AG Patrick Lynch lost the RI-Gov endorsement to state Treasurer Frank Caprio. In the 2nd, incumbent Jim Langevin got the endorsement over primary challenger state Rep. Betsy Dennigan.

• TX-Gov: The situation with the Texas Greens ballot line isn’t quite going away yet. A lower court decided last week to block them from the ballot because their petition drive was illegally funded with an in-kind corporate contribution (with roots tracing back to Rick Perry’s former chief of staff). The decision, however, was just appealed to the Texas Supreme Court (which, of course, is Republican-controlled and not averse to the occasionally nakedly political decision).

• ID-01: Here, maybe, is another instance of the Chamber of Commerce realizing that conservative Democrats do a better job of addressing big business’s needs for a functioning physical and educational infrastructure than do the group of anarchists who seem to have seized control of the GOP? The US Chamber of Commerce just gave freshman Dem Walt Minnick their endorsement.

• LA-02: Rep. Joe Cao has had to back down on a fundraising letter that strongly implies that the local Catholic diocese and Archbishop Gregory Aymond backed his candidacy. Cao apologized for taking Aymond’s praise for him out of context.

• MI-03: Well, at least we now know who to cheer against in the GOP primary to replace retiring Rep. Vern Ehlers. The Club for Growth announced yesterday that they’re backing state Rep. Justin Amash, meaning that Amash must have impressed the far-right group with his level of disdain for public spending. (JL)

• PA-07: Philly’s just a short Amtrak ride from Washington DC, and Joe Biden will be there July 19 to host a combined fundraiser for the DCCC and for the Dem candidate in the 7th, state Rep. Bryan Lentz.

• TX-17: Here’s an article that’s an interesting reminder of how all politics is, in the end, local, and how it can turn on stuff that’s a million miles away from inside-the-Beltway concerns. Politico looks at the race in the 17th, which is very much a Waco/Baylor (Chet Edwards) vs. College Station/Texas A&M (Bill Flores) contest, with the recent (now irrelevant, though) proposal to break apart the Big 12 a key flashpoint.

• WV-01: Old man yells at cloud? Initially, the idea of a legendary West Virginia Democratic politician setting up a PAC with the pure intent of stopping Democratic nominee Mike Oliverio from winning in November sounds like a game-changing impediment. From the backstory, though, it sounds like former SoS Ken Hechler may not have that much oomph behind his vendetta, which seems mostly motivated by Oliverio’s 2004 failed primary challenge to him in the SoS primary, where Oliverio’s entire argument seemed predicated on the fact that Hechler was 89. (If you do the math, that makes him 95 now. I guess the secret to longevity is to become a Democrat in West Virginia!)

• CA-Init: Don’t count on California making the switch to the Washington-style top-two primary just yet, despite the passage of Proposition 14 earlier this month. The major and minor parties are weighing legal challenges to it, and they’re watching with interest the latest round of litigation on the matter in Washington. (The US Supreme Court has already upheld a state’s authority to switch to a top-two primary, but there’s a new suit pending on new grounds.)

• AZ-Sen (pdf): Magellan is out with a poll of the Republican Senate primary, and finds (everybody say it with me now… 3… 2… 1…) good news! for John McCain! McCain leads J.D. Hayworth 52-29. The sample was taken on Tuesday, post-reveal of Hayworth’s Matthew Lesko-style free-money shilling.

• CO-Sen: Americans for Job Security, the mysterious conservative group who poured a lot of money into anti-Bill Halter ads in the Arkansas primary, have surfaced again, and this time they’re actually pro- somebody. They’re up with ads in Colorado pushing Weld Co. Ken Buck, who’s poised to knock off NRSC-touted Jane Norton in the GOP Senate primary.

• FL-Sen: An important-sounding behind-the-scenes Democrat has gotten on board the Charlie Crist campaign. Jeff Lieser, who was the finance director for Alex Sink’s successful 2006 CFO campaign, is going to be heading up Crist’s “Democratic fundraising efforts.”

• MO-Sen: Barack Obama will be doing a fundraiser with Robin Carnahan in Kansas City on July 8. Carnahan hid under a pile of coats when Obama was in Missouri last winter, so it’s good to see her changing her tune.

• AL-Gov: Robert Bentley, the state legislator who surprised many by squeaking into the GOP gubernatorial runoff, is picking up a key Tim James backer. Ex-Rep. Sonny Callahan, who represented AL-01 for decades, switched his backing to Bentley yesterday.

• AZ-Gov: The NRA really does seem to love its incumbents, as they’ve often been accused. The NRA weighed in to the GOP gubernatorial primary, endorsing appointed incumbent Jan Brewer. The only reason that’s a surprise is because her biggest rival is self-funding businessman Owen Buz Mills, who also happens to be on the NRA’s board of directors and who owns a shooting range.

• IA-Gov: Terry Branstad went with a relative unknown for his running mate, state Sen. Kim Reynolds, rather than one of the parade of recent losers whose names had been floated (Jeff Lamberti, Jim Gibbons, Rod Roberts). Perhaps most significantly, he didn’t pick GOP primary runner-up and social conservative extraordinaire Bob Vander Plaats, so now all eyes are on BVP to see whether he follows through with vague threats to run an independent candidacy. (While socially conservative personally, Reynolds isn’t known for running with the social conservative crowd.)

• MI-Gov: Virg Bernero is pretty universally considered the “labor” candidate in the Dem primary in the Michigan governor’s race, but rival Andy Dillon just got the backing of a big-time union: the statewide Teamsters. Bernero has the backing of the AFL-CIO (which, significantly for Michigan, includes the UAW); while they aren’t hitting the airwaves on Bernero’s behalf (at least not yet), they are gearing up for a large ground campaign.

• OR-Gov, OR-Sen: It looks like the Oregon gubernatorial race is going to be a close one (like New Mexico, this is shaping up to be a situation where what seemed like an easy race is turning into a battle because the outgoing Dem incumbent’s unpopularity is rubbing off on the expected successor). Local pollsters Davis, Hibbitts, and Midghall, on behalf of the Portland Tribune, find the race a dead heat, at a 41-41 tie between John Kitzhaber and Chris Dudley (with 6 going to minor party candidates). Tim Hibbitts is the go-to pollster in Oregon; the upside, I suppose, is that it’s good for Dems to realize now they’re going to need to fight this one hard, rather than realizing it in October after months of complacency. While the Gov. numbers here are closely in line with Rasmussen, the Senate numbers certainly aren’t: they find Ron Wyden leading Jim Huffman by a much more comfortable margin of 50-32.

• TX-Gov: Bill White got a big endorsement from Bill Clinton (although there’s no word yet if Clinton will stump in Texas on White’s behalf, which would be huge). Former Houston mayor White was also a Dept. of Energy official in the Clinton administration.

• LA-02: You might recall some sketchily-sourced information from a few days ago that a couple Democrats were considering launching independent bids in the 2nd, where a high-profile spoiler may be the only hope for another term for GOP freshman Rep. Joe Cao. Well, it seems like there’s some truth to the story, inasmuch as the person most likely to be affected by that, state Rep. Cedric Richmond (the likeliest Dem nominee here), is calling attention to the situation now. He’s accusing Republicans of a “South Carolina-style political ploy by convincing black candidates to run as independents.”

• MI-07: Although ex-Rep. Tim Walberg has the social conservative cred by the bushelful, he didn’t get an endorsement from Catholic Families for America. They instead backed his GOP primary rival, Brian Rooney. The Rooney backing makes sense, though, when you recall that Rooney is an attorney for the Thomas More Law Center, the Michigan-based nonprofit that’s a frequent filer of amicus briefs and bills itself as “Christianity’s answer to the ACLU.” The Center was founded by Domino’s Pizza baron Tom Monaghan, whose other attempts to mix ultra-conservative Catholicism and the law have included Ave Maria School of Law.

• WATN?: I had absolutely no idea that retiring Rep. Henry Brown was actually interested in demoting himself instead of leaving the political game altogether, but it turns out that, rather than take up golf or shuffleboard like a normal 74-year-old, he decided to run for the Board of Supervisors in Berkeley County (in Charleston’s suburbs). Here’s where it gets really pathetic… he didn’t even win that race. He got 44% of the vote on Tuesday in the GOP runoff (although in his sort-of defense, he was running against an incumbent).

• History: Here’s a very interesting article from Larry Sabato’s henchman Rhodes Cook, on why 2010 won’t be 1994. His gradation of “blue,” “purple,” and “red” districts is a little reductive, but it’s a nice look at how Democrats have somewhat less exposure in general this year. And if you’re looking for some amusing trivia, Univ. of Minnesota’s Smart Politics has a captivating look at which states have the most (South Carolina) and the fewest (Alaska by #, Idaho by %) governors who were born in-state.