Tag: allen boyd

• CT-Sen: Linda McMahon is in Washington DC this week to meet with Republican bigwigs about her bid for the Senate in Connecticut, meeting with Mitch McConnell, Jon Kyl, Orrin Hatch, and the knuckle-draggers at FreedomWorks. McMahon’s visit is accompanied, however, by stories in The Hill and Politico that focus on professional wrestling’s dangerous conditions, and lack of health insurance or union representation — and are replete with quotes from former wrestlers decrying McMahon and her company.

• KS-Sen: The previous few rounds of polling for Rep. Todd Tiahrt in the Kansas GOP Senate primary haven’t looked so hot, but the newest offering from SurveyUSA finds him back in the thick of things. Rep. Jerry Moran now leads Tiahrt 37-34, compared with a 43-27 gap in early October. Crosstabs suggest Tiahrt has pulled back into a tie in Kansas’s northeast (the Kansas City suburbs) — with Moran dominating the rural west and Tiahrt dominating the Wichita area, the KC suburbs are the decisive region.

• OR-Gov: State Republican leaders are still casting their nets about, despite former NBA player Chris Dudley bringing a lot of money to the table. With some troubled that Dudley “has not delivered any ideas at all” (and with their best-known candidate, Bill Sizemore, having gotten arraigned for tax evasion yesterday) many have now set their sights on state House minority leader Bruce Hanna, a conservative from the state’s rural southwest; Hanna says he’s “listening with interest” to their entreaties.

In the you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up department, Jerry Wilson, founder of exercise machine maker Soloflex, was originally going to run for Governor under the banner of Oregon’s Naderite Progressive Party, but somewhere along the way decided it would be better to run for one of the major party noms so he’d have a better chance, and inexplicably decided to run for a Republican. Wilson just found out that he  missed the deadline by several months to change his party registration to be able to do so (he’s a Democrat), so now he’s decided to run as a Democrat. (The pro-marijuana Wilson might want to, y’know, lay off it a little while he’s trying to put together a political campaign.) Also on the Dem side, the state’s AFL-CIO announced that it won’t be endorsing in the race until at least March, which has to be seen as a victory of sorts for ex-SoS Bill Bradbury in that they don’t view ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber as having the nomination locked down and are waiting to see how things shake out.

• TX-Gov: With heavyweight Houston mayor Bill White having settled into the Democratic field in the Governor’s race, the remaining candidates are assessing their options. Kinky Friedman was expected to drop out today, but announced that he’ll take at least a few more days to meet with supporters, and with White and Farouk Shami, before pulling the plug. (Shami was a big donor to Friedman last time.) The independently wealthy Shami sounds like he’s staying in, although he’s now suffering the usual fate of celebrity business candidates: the revelation of his paltry voting record (including no vote in the 2008 general, and no votes in any Democratic primary elections, with at least one in a Republican primary instead). And on the GOP side, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, faced with the realization that the Senate election may not be happening any time soon, just filed for re-election to another term as LG.

• FL-02: That was fast. (And not very good message discipline, either.) After confirming yesterday that he was considering a move over to Florida’s statewide CFO race, Democratic state Sen. Al Lawson backtracked today and said he’s sticking with his longshot primary challenge to Rep. Allen Boyd instead.

• ID-01: An intramural fight is breaking out among Idaho Republican legislators, as state Rep. Raul Labrador seeks the Republican nomination to take on Rep. Walt Minnick next year. State Sen. Mike Jorgenson is demanding Labrador drop out, attacking him for his work as a — gasp — immigration lawyer; the two have previously clashed over immigration policy in the legislature, including Jorgenson’s proposal to bar illegal immigrants from receiving state benefits. There’s no clue given where Labrador’s opponent, Vaughn Ward, stands on immigration issues, but it’s interesting to see the same cheap-labor/close-the-borders fissures opening up here that erupted in, say, the UT-03 primary last year.

• IL-14: One more dropout in the GOP field in the 14th, as young Mark Vargas, a former Defense Dept. employee in Iraq, got out of the race. Unlike other recent dropout Bill Purcell, though, Vargas endorsed Ethan Hastert on his way out the door. Jeff Danklefsen is the only minor player left on the playing field between Hastert and state Sen. Randy Hultgren.

• NJ-03: The 5’9″ John Adler is certainly vulnerable to wedgies and wet willies from the 6’7″ Jon Runyan, but now he’s vulnerable to the dreaded Rear Admiral as well. Maurice “Mo” Hill, a Toms River Township Councilor, dentist, and retired Navy rear admiral, says he’ll likely run in the GOP primary against Runyan, despite local party leaders’ hopes to avoid a contested primary like the one that sank their hopes last year. Hill says he’ll move forward if he gets the backing of his local Ocean County party, regardless of how the other counties’ organizations go.

• PA-06: Chester County Recorder of Deeds Ryan Costello bailed out on his run in the GOP field in the 6th, finding all the oxygen in the race gobbled up by self-funding moderate Steven Welch and well-known conservative state Rep. Curt Schroder. Schroder, meanwhile, nailed down the endorsements of two more Republican legislators in the area: Berks County state Sen. Mike Folmer and newly-elected state Montgomery County Sen. Bob Mensch.

• SC-01: Another Republican is getting into the primary against vulnerable Rep. Henry Brown in the Charleston-area 1st (joining “Tumpy” Campbell): attorney, Navy vet, and former Mt. Pleasant city councilor Mark Fava. Could this have the effect of splitting the anti-Brown vote, though? On the Dem side, restauranteur Robert “Bob” Dobbs was joined several weeks ago by commercial pilot and Air Force vet Robert Burton.

• TN-08: State Sen. Roy Herron isn’t getting a completely free shot in his primary to replace retiring Rep. John Tanner in rural western Tennessee: he’ll face off against 34-year-old Luther Mercer II, an educator and son of a Madison County Commissioner. Meanwhile, eager to generate more Tanners, the GOP has unveiled its target list of aging House Democrats in red districts to push to retire (mostly just via press release attacks for now — perhaps there will also be a sustained attempt to blanket their offices with brochures for oceanfront Florida condominiums as well). Recall, though, that Tanner said the prospect of a good fight was the one thing that was potentially keeping him from retiring, suggesting this has the potential to backfire in some cases.

• Mayors: Lt. Governor Mitch Landrieu had said this summer that he wouldn’t seek to become the next mayor of New Orleans. When most other big-names like city council president Arnie Fielkow and state Rep. Karen Carter Peterson subsequently declined, Landrieu apparently sensed a mayoralty for the taking. Now he’s apparently changed his mind, and says he’ll launch a mayoral campaign next week. (Landrieu narrowly lost the mayor’s race to Ray Nagin in 2006.)

• WATN?: 80-year-old former New York state Sen. majority leader Joe Bruno, who turned Albany into his personal fiefdom for decades, just got convicted of two felony corruption charges. And former Rep. Chip Pickering, one of the C Street House residents who bailed from a promising career after an embarrassing affair, is staying classy. He was last seen getting into a physical altercation at his young son’s soccer game — with an opposing team’s soccer coach already wearing a neck brace.  

Mega-Blue Dog Allen Boyd may have a much easier route to re-election:

Florida state Sen. Al Lawson has confirmed to the St. Petersburg Times that he is considering switching from challenging Rep. Allen Boyd (D-Fla.) to the state chief financial officer race.

Democrats have struggled to find someone to run for outgoing CFO Alex Sink’s (D) post while she runs for governor. And Lawson has found it difficult to raise the money needed to run a primary against an incumbent congressman.

This comes as a bit of a surprise, as Lawson had posted an internal poll a few weeks ago giving him a 35-31 lead over Boyd, suggesting he was engaged with the race and had incentive to stay in it. (The Democratic electorate in the 2nd is substantially African-American, giving Lawson an advantage there.) As The Hill notes, though, Lawson is at a terrible financial disadvantage ($78,000, versus Boyd’s $1.7 million), and that gives Lawson — who’s termed out of the state Senate and looking for somewhere to move up — an incentive to switch over to a race where he’d be running with establishment backing instead of against it.

So: bad news for those hoping to replace a Blue Dog with a (somewhat) Better Dem… although if Lawson won the primary, he might have had a rough time of it in the general in this R+6 9 district. On the other hand, good news for Dems trying to make a full court press for all the statewide offices in Florida, with current CFO Alex Sink at the top of the ticket.

RaceTracker Wiki: FL-02

• MA-Sen: Rep. Michael Capuano picked up several more endorsements in the special election primary to succeed Ted Kennedy, although the clock is ticking loudly on trying to make up that last bit of ground against AG Martha Coakley. He got the endorsement of the Boston Herald (Boston’s smaller daily) and also fellow Rep. Ed Markey, who had seemed a likely candidate initially.

• NJ-Sen: With a Republican moving into Drumthwacket (sorry, I just like saying “Drumthwacket”) for four years and Sen. Frank Lautenberg not getting any younger (at 85), Democratic Assembly whip John McKeon has introduced legislation that would change the way that Senate vacancies are filled in New Jersey. Under current law, a governor can opt either to make a temporary appointment or call a special election. The proposed law, however, would require the governor to appoint a replacement within 30 days and it would need to be someone from the same political party as the departed officeholder. The temporary appointment would continue until the next general election.

• IA-Gov: His entry to the race provoked a lot of interest back when the rest of the field was just assorted wingnuts, but with the entry of ex-Gov. Terry Branstad, there wasn’t much room for young businsessman Christian Fong. He suspended his campaign today.

• MI-Gov: Lansing mayor Virg Bernero has been on some people’s wish list for a gubernatorial candidate, in light of the rather underwhelming Democratic field in Michigan. It sounds like Bernero has been hearing those calls (and noticing the polls showing Lt. Gov. John Cherry not only badly losing the general but not even summoning up much interest in the Dem primary), as now he says that he’s switching from “very unlikely” to “seriously considering” a race in the last few weeks.

• OR-Gov: This is the kind of thing that can put a big crimp in your newly-launched gubernatorial campaign. Initiative kingpin (and 1998 gubernatorial loser) Bill Sizemore just got charged with tax evasion for failure to file state tax returns for the previous three years. Although the state has known about this failure for more than a year, the timing may have more to do with the recent expiration of Sizemore’s amnesty period to file rather than his announcement last week of his intention to run for governor again.

• PA-Gov: Allegheny Co. Executive Dan Onorato isn’t well-known outside the Pittsburgh area, so he’s been focusing his early efforts on the Philadelphia area. He’s gotten a boost with endorsements from several prominent Democratic legislators in Montgomery and Chester Counties: state Sens. Daylin Leach and Andy Dinniman, and just yesterday, state Rep. Michael Gerber.

• CA-03: The once-crowded Democratic field in the 3rd, to go up against vulnerable GOP Rep. Dan Lungren, has gotten whittled down to one. Bill Slaton, an executive with Sacramento’s municipal public utility, dropped out and endorsed Ami Bera. With Elk Grove city councilor Gary Davis also having dropped out a few months ago, Bera has a clear shot; Bera, the former Sacramento County Chief Medical Officer, has been going gangbusters on the fundraising front, sitting on $586K (more than Lungren has). Slaton had loaned himself $300K but hadn’t seemed to make much progress beyond that.

• FL-10, FL-12: Two Democratic challengers who have favorable circumstances (an aging incumbent who’s barely fundraising in the 10th, an open seat in the 12th) but haven’t gotten far at fundraising yet are getting a boost on the money front. Iowa Rep. Bruce Braley is hosting a Tampa fundraiser for state Sen. Charlie Justice, while Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Allen Boyd are hosting a DC fundraiser for Polk Co. Elections Supervisor Lori Edwards (although perception-wise, it’s probably not good that it’s being held in a lobbyist’s office).

• MN-01: Another Republican challenger showed up to take on sophomore Rep. Tim Walz in Minnesota’s rural 1st. Unlike former state Rep. Allen Quist (who was at his peak in the 90s), Randy Demmer is a current state Rep.

• NH-02: State Rep. John DeJoie, who’s been expected to run, made official that he’s getting into the open seat race for the 2nd on the Democratic side. DeJoie has been a firefighter in Concord for 14 years; he joins attorney Ann McLane Kuster and may also be joined by Katrina Swett.

• NJ-03: Jon Runyan might want to be spending the next few months working on his message discipline instead of playing for the Chargers. Runyan, shortly after announcing that he’d be running against freshman Democratic Rep. John Adler after the football season, turned around and told San Diego reporters that he hadn’t committed to the race yet and was exploring his options. Runyan’s spokesperson then corrected Runyan, saying he’s definitely in the race, and bafflingly said that the latter comment was made “in jest.”

• PA-06: The Republican field in the open seat race in the 6th just keeps growing; the fifth entrant is Patrick Sellers, a former Republican committeeman. Sellers is apparently a Paulist, and made his announcement at a Philadelphia “End the Fed” rally. He joins state Rep. Curt Schroder, pharma exec Steven Welch, Chester Co. Recorder of Deeds Ryan Costello, and long-ago state Revenue Secretary Howard Cohen.

• PA-19: It’s not clear yet whether Rep. Todd Platts is even going to get chosen as head of the GAO, but Republicans are already lining up to take over his dark-red seat if he does. Roll Call lists a bunch of ’em, starting with state Rep. Scott Perry, who’s already making his interest public. Eyes are also on one of Platts’ 2000 primary opponents, York County Commissioner Chris Reilly. The article also lists a slew of other possible state legislators and county officials.

• NH-St. Sen.: Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty really, really wants to do lots of favors for the good people of New Hampshire, and he’s starting by hosting a fundraising event for Republicans in its state Senate, who are currently down 14-10 in that chamber. Interestingly, ex-Rep. Jeb Bradley (who downshifted to the state Senate) is on the host committee and a key recipient of the help, which may lead to the question of whether he’s looking for leverage for trying something bigger again in the future.

• KY-St. Sen.: Here’s a positive tea leaf as we head into the home stretch on the special election in the Bardstown-based SD-14 next week (one of the two seats strategically excised of its Republican occupants by Democratic governor Steve Beshear): Democratic former state Rep. Jodie Haydon has raised more than four times the funds as Republican state Rep. Jimmy Higdon ($546K for Haydon, including in-kind contributions from the state Dems, vs. $131K for Higdon). Much of Haydon’s money is coming from the horse industry, which has fallen squarely behind the Dems in recent months as state Democrats seek to allow video slots at horsetracks (something Higdon and most local GOPers oppose). A Dem pickup here would cut the GOP advantage in the state Senate to 19-18 (with one GOP-leaning indie).

• VA-St. Sen.: The special election to fill two vacant, formerly GOP-held state Senate seats has been set for Jan. 12. The race to take over the heavily Republican SD-8 in Virginia Beach (vacated by new Virginia Beach Sheriff Ken Stolle) doesn’t look to be very interesting; only two Republicans have signed up for it so far. Dems may have a shot at a pickup in the swingy SD-37 in Fairfax County, vacated by new AG Ken Cuccinelli. Democratic state Del. David Marsden has confirmed that he’ll run for the promotion. Dems have a narrow 21-19 edge in the Senate, which they’d like to pad in case incoming Gov. Bob McDonnell attempts any Beshear-style poaching.

• Mayors: The Atlanta mayoral runoff is tonight, between white city councilor Mary Norwood and African-American former state Sen. Kasim Reed. (The one public poll of the race gave Reed a small edge.) Norwood’s final ad, and the final debate, point to how the runoff has gotten racially fraught as it comes to a close. There are also four legislative runoff elections scattered around Georgia tonight, although two are Dem/Dem and one is GOP/GOP. The remaining one, in HD-141 in Milledgeville, is between independent Rusty Kidd and Democrat Darrell Black.

• Redistricting: Dave’s Redistricting App is starting to add partisan political data (the 2008 presidential election results). First up is Maryland. Give it a whirl, and leave your feedback in Dave’s diary. (D)

Redistricting fans may also want to head over to CQ today, where long pieces by both Bob Benenson and Greg Giroux give an overview of where the fireworks will be in the coming few years.

• CA-Sen: Rasmussen piggybacked another California Senate poll on their gubernatorial poll from yesterday. Despite finding some gains for Meg Whitman yesterday, they don’t see any improvement for Carly Fiorina or Chuck DeVore. Barbara Boxer leads Fiorina 46-37 (it was 49-39 in September) and DeVore 46-36 (previously 46-37).

• DE-Sen: Mike Castle’s fundraising was weak earlier this year (in fact, that was why most people figured he wasn’t going to run for Senate), but now Republican Senators are moving to quickly fill up his coffers. Four Senators gave large contributions, the largest being $10,000 from Thad Cochran. Castle had $853K in his last report.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-Gov: The shortest possible explanation in New York is that nobody still has the faintest clue what Rudy Giuliani is up to. Food for thought, though, comes from the new Marist poll (pdf). They find Giuliani beating Democratic incumbent Kirsten Gillibrand 54-40. They also found Giuliani with the upper hand in a potential (if extremely unlikely) primary against ex-Gov. George Pataki; Giuliani demolishes him, 71-24. (For some reason, Marist didn’t poll Gillibrand/Pataki, but Rasmussen just did, finding Gillibrand beating Pataki 45-42. Rasmussen didn’t poll Gillibrand/Giuliani, though.)

Marist (pdf) also has gubernatorial numbers, which don’t offer any surprises beyond the sheerly absurd dimensions of David Paterson’s unpopularity. Paterson has a 20/76 approval, and a 30/63 verdict on whether people want him to run for re-election. Paterson loses the primary to Andrew Cuomo, 72-21, although he ties Rick Lazio in the general, 44-44. Cuomo makes short work of Lazio, 69-24. They also have Giuliani numbers (which are looking obsolete now): Rudy annihilates Lazio in the primary, 84-13, and beats Paterson 60-35, but loses to Cuomo, 53-43.

• CA-Gov: Republican Ex-Rep. Tom Campbell announces that he’s passed the $1 million cumulative mark in fundraising for the gubernatorial race, which indicates he’s at least getting some traction as people notice he’s polling well. In most states, that would be pretty impressive. In California, where you have to reach more than 30 million sets of eyeballs and where $1 million is Meg Whitman’s budget just for ivory backscratchers, though, it’s kind of a drop in the bucket.

• OR-Gov: As quickly as he appeared, he went away; former Hewlett-Packard VP Steve Shields pulled the plug on his brief Democratic gubernatorial campaign, not having had much luck on the fundraising front. Meanwhile, SoS Bill Bradbury got a big boost in his uphill climb against ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber. Bradbury’s environmentalist bona fides earned him an endorsement from Al Gore. (Also a likely factor: a long-running behind-the-scenes feud between Kitz and Gore.)

• TX-Gov: Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchison are both out with TV ads as they enter the stretch run toward their March gubernatorial primary. Perry attacks Washington (and by extension, KBH, who works there), while KBH is more intent on explaining that she’s keeping her Senate job to fight against Democratic health care proposals.

• CO-07: Going from being a music promoter to a Representative is a strange career leap, but that’s what Jimmy Lakey is fixing to do. The Colorado Republican has opened an exploratory committee to go up against Democratic Rep. Ed Perlmutter, although he’ll need to get past Aurora city councilor Ryan Frazier (who dropped down from the Senate race) first.

• FL-02: Al Lawson, the African-American state Senator who’s challenging Blue Dog Rep. Allen Boyd in a Democratic primary, is out with an internal poll via The Research Group that actually gives Lawson the lead: 35-31. Boyd was a vote against health care reform and the stimulus, which may provide him some cover in the general in this now R+9 district, but probably hurts him in the primary, where African-Americans make up a sizable portion of the Democratic electorate.

• IA-03: The appearance yesterday of well-known wrasslin’ coach Jim Gibbons was no deterrent to state Sen. Brad Zaun, setting up an epic smackdown in the GOP primary. Zaun, formerly the mayor of Des Moines suburb Urbandale, had made clear his interest in the race before Gibbons surfaced; he’ll formally launch his campaign in early December.

• IL-10: State Rep. Beth Coulson, probably the only Republican in the field in the 10th with the name rec and moderate profile needed to overcome the 10th’s Democratic lean, is meeting with RNC head Michael Steele today to discuss her campaign — the same Steele who has warned moderates that, in the wake of NY-23, he’s gunning for them. She’s loudly touting the meeting in the press, although it’s unclear whether she’s trying to make clear she’s a GOP team player, or that she’s trying to play up her moderate reputation by standing up to Steele.

• MD-01: If there’s one freshman Democrat who’s looking endangered coming into 2010, it’s Frank Kratovil, who barely won in a dark-red district thanks in large measure to a lousy opponent (Andy Harris) and an Obama downdraft. The Harris camp is now out with an internal poll via the Tarrance Group that quantifies that, giving that same lousy opponent a 52-39 edge over Kratovil, despite Kratovil’s 43/30 favorables.

• MN-01: Former state Rep. Allen Quist followed through on his plans to challenge Rep. Tim Walz in the rural 1st District. Quist has been out of the limelight for a while, but was a darling of the religious right in the 1990s; his wife is Michele Bachmann’s district director.

• NY-23: Appropriately enough, given that Fort Drum is the largest employer in his district, Bill Owens was given a seat on the Armed Services Committee, taking former Rep. Ellen Tauscher’s spot. Owens himself is a former Air Force captain, and his predecessor, Army Secretary John McHugh, had been the top-ranking Republican on the committee. (D)

Also in the 23rd, it’s all over but the shouting of the wronged wingnuts. The Watertown Times reports that Owens leads Hoffman by 3,105 with 3,072 absente ballots left to count. Also worth noting is the increasingly hostile tone of the Watertown Times (maybe the district’s largest newspaper) to Hoffman and his post-electoral antics, which bodes ill for getting a fair shake out of them if he runs again.

• NRCC: There’s a very important addendum to yesterday’s story about the NRCC’s big TV spot ad buy to go against Vic Snyder, John Spratt, and Earl Pomeroy. The total of the ad buy was $6,300, including only 35 gross rating points in the Charlotte market (2,000 GRPs are considered “saturation-level”), and the ads are running only on Fox News. In other words, the cash-strapped NRCC isn’t paying for anybody to actually see the ads — they’re just a foot in the door to get media coverage of the ads.

• Redistricting: The DLCC’s blog has an interesting look at the redistricting conundrums in Louisiana, where the loss of a House seat and a Katrina-remodeled population loom large. Dems ostensibly control the legislature but also face a Republican gubernatorial veto (although Dems control the tiebreaking Supreme Court, too).

• MO-Sen: Rep. Roy Blunt got some unwelcome news yesterday: he and his wife owe $6,820 in back taxes on their three-bedroom home in Georgetown, Washington D.C. assessed at $1.62 million. (The problem seems to be an improperly declared homestead exemption.) True to Republican form, the Blunt camp is blaming the government (more specifically, the D.C. government, for bungling the update of their homestead status).

• NV-Sen: The Nevada GOP may be closer to landing a credible candidate to go against Harry Reid. State Senator Mark Amodei of Carson City (who’s term-limited out in 2010) was unusually vocal on the senate floor in the session’s closing weeks. When pressed in a recent interview, he said that if Rep. Dean Heller didn’t run against Reid (which seems unlikely; Heller, if he moves up, is usually mentioned as a primary challenger to toxic Gov. Jim Gibbons), then he’d “consider” running.

• NY-Sen-B: Rep. Carolyn McCarthy endorsed Mayor-for-Life Michael Bloomberg for another term at the helm of New York City. As Daily Kos’s Steve wisely points out, this may be an indicator she’s not looking to run in the Dem primary; if she’s going to do so, she’d have to run to Kirsten Gillibrand’s left, but that would be a difficult case to make having just endorsed a Republican-turned-Independent for one of the state’s biggest jobs.

• AL-Gov: State Treasurer Kay Ivey announced that she’s joining the crowded field of GOP candidates for Governor (including college chancellor Bradley Byrne, who also announced this week, as the moderate option, and ex-judge Roy Moore as the nuclear option). Ivey, however, may suffer a bit from her role in the state’s messed-up prepaid college tuition plan.

• IA-Gov: State Rep. Chris Rants has been traveling the state gauging support for a run at the GOP gubernatorial nomination. Rants, from Sioux City in the state’s conservative west, served as majority leader and then speaker, but was replaced in leadership after the GOP lost the majority in 2006. Fellow Sioux City resident Bob Vander Plaats (the 2006 Lt. Gov. nominee) is expected to announce his candidacy soon as well.

• MN-Gov: Tim Pawlenty has deferred his decision on whether or not to run for re-election to a third term until later this summer. The decision may turn on who’s more pissed at him after he decides whether or not to certify Al Franken — the nationwide GOP base, or Minnesotans.

• OR-Gov: Former Gov. John Kitzhaber seems to be moving closer to a return to Salem, meeting with some of the state’s insiders about steps toward a comeback. Ex-SoS Bill Bradbury, who’s already in the running (and won’t stand down if Kitzhaber gets in), confirms that Kitzhaber is “looking very seriously” at the race. Kitzhaber seems to be looking forward to a “do-over” now that there’s a firmly Democratic legislature; he spent most of his two terms in the 90s playing defense against a GOP-held legislature.

• RI-Gov: Two of Rhode Island’s key Democrats are taking steps to run for the open Governor’s seat: AG Patrick Lynch and Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts. Roberts is staffing up with top-tier campaign staff, while Lynch said that he has “every intention” of running for Governor during a radio interview. (Treasurer Frank Caprio is also mentioned as a likely candidate and is sitting on the most cash, but hasn’t done anything visible yet.) A Brown Univ. poll just released tested their approvals; Lynch was at 47/39 and Caprio at 41/24, while Roberts was in worse shape at 22/36. (A poll from March is the only test of the Dem primary so far, with Caprio leading with 30%, compared with 17 for Lynch, 12 for Roberts, and 13 for Providence mayor David Cicilline, who won’t be running.)

• FL-02: State Senate Minority Leader Al Lawson has been attempting to primary Rep. Allen Boyd from the left, but party power brokers are encouraging him to switch over to the race for state CFO, being vacated by Alex Sink. With Senate President Jeff Atwater already running for CFO for the GOP, this would pit the parties’ two Senate leaders against each other.

• IN-05: In this R+17 district, the primary’s where it’s at, and there’s a whole herd of Republicans chasing Rep. Dan Burton, perceived more as vulnerable more for his age and indifference than any ideological reason. State Rep. Mike Murphy just got into the race. He joins former state Rep. and former state party chair Luke Messer, John McGoff (who narrowly lost the 2006 primary against Burton), and Brose McVey (who ran against Julia Carson in IN-07 in 2002).

• NM-01: It’s looking there’ll be a contested GOP primary to see who gets flattened by freshman Rep. Martin Heinrich in this now D+5 district. Former state party vice-chair and former Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of Commerce president Jon Barela is about to form an exploratory committee. (Given this district’s 45% Latino population, Barela may be a stronger candidate for the general than funeral home director Kevin Daniels.)

• PA-06: Here’s a good tea leaf that Rep. Jim Gerlach is making behind-the-scenes notifications that he’s indeed bailing on his rapidly-bluening district. State Rep. Curt Schroder from rural Chester County (not to be confused with Oregon’s Kurt Schrader), always considered to be the next GOPer to have dibs on this seat, has organized a campaign committee. Dems have journalist Doug Pike running in this race, but someone with more firepower may jump in once Gerlach makes it official.

• PA-07: For a few hours there last night, it looked like we were facing real problems in PA-07, a D+3 seat with a good Republican bench that will open up if Rep. Joe Sestak follows through on his threatened primary challenge to Arlen Specter. Former E.D. Pa. US Attorney (and before that, Delaware County DA) Pat Meehan was reported to be mulling a switch from the Governor’s race, where he’s probably lagging AG Tom Corbett in the primary (no polls have been taken, so who knows?), over to PA-07, giving the GOP a top-tier recruit. However, Meehan acted quickly to tamp that down and reaffirm he’s running for Gov. TPM points to another potential GOPer, Steven Welch, founder of local pharma company Mitos Technologies; on the Dem side, as most everyone here knows, state Rep. Bryan Lentz is heir apparent.

• MN-Sen: After the court-ordered opening of the 351 previously rejected absentee ballots, Al Franken’s lead just grew to 312 votes (up from 225 votes after the hand recount). Although the Minnesota Supreme Court still has to rule on some miscellaneous issues (the possibility of some double-counts), these questions affect fewer than 300 ballots, meaning that it is now mathematically impossible for Norm Coleman to prevail.

• RI-Gov: After backing off and saying he wouldn’t decide anything until May, it seems like Lincoln Chafee has turned around again and has officially formed his exploratory committee. He will be “putting together a plan that will lay the groundwork for an Independent campaign for governor in 2010.”

• PA-Sen: Arlen Specter has come out firing against Pat Toomey’s likely primary challenge… and he’s already shooting blanks. He had to pull down and revise his attack ad for a factual error. He had accused Toomey of having traded credit default swaps while a Wall Street trader in the 80s (turns out CDSs hadn’t been invented yet at that point). Trying a new tack on today’s Morning Joe, Specter said that Toomey is too conservative to win statewide, accusing him of being “to the right of Rick Santorum.”

• AR-Sen: Looks like Wal-Mart may have sent Blanche Lincoln a cheap Chinese-made horse head for her bed. Lincoln, who supported the Employee Free Choice Act last time it came up, has announced she won’t be supporting it this time around, at least “in its current form.” Even if Franken gets seated and Specter flip-flops again, this probably defers EFCA until after 2010 (unless it passes in a gutted form).

• NV-Sen: John Ensign is making his first speaking appearance in Iowa later this spring. Signs of a presidential run? Possible, considering the paltry lot the GOP has on tap so far. This is of SSP interest primarily because Ensign is up for re-election in 2012 and would leave behind an open seat in this newly blue seat in order to run.

• IL-Sen: Big first-quarter haul for Treasurer (and Friend of Barack) Alexi Giannoulias, the only announced candidate for IL-Sen so far. He pulled in $1.1 million, none of which was from corporate PACs.

• FL-Sen: When asked for his assessment of Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s job performance, Democratic Senate candidate Kendrick Meek dodged the question, telling the St. Petersburg Times that “I haven’t yet reviewed his work”. Sharp answer! (J)

• FL-Gov: Hey, pallie – you better watch it! Charles Bronson says he’s going to run for governor of Florida if Charles Crist runs for the Senate. And you thought Charles Bronson was dead! Wrong again, pallie! (D)

• FL-02: State senator Al Lawson, who’s primarying Allen Boyd from the left, seems like he won’t be pulling punches in going after Boyd. Lawson (who’s said a few Blue Doggish things of his own in the past) says “From my perspective, a Blue Dog is just a closet Republican,” and is “committed to being a true Democrat.”

• LA-Legislature: There were three special elections in Louisiana legislative races over the weekend (a Democratic senate seat in Opelousas, a Democratic house seat in New Orleans, and a GOP house seat in Baton Rouge suburbs). Despite the GOP contesting all three seats, Democrats held the line in their two open seats (including one to replace Don Cravins, who’s moved to Washington). The candidates in both runoffs will be Democrats, meaning Dems will hold their 4-seat edge in the senate and 1-seat edge in the house.  

• IL-05: It’s special election day in the dark, dark blue 5th. Cook County Commissioner Mike Quigley faces off against GOP activist (and Minutewoman) Rosanna Pulido and a Green party candidate. In a big surprise, SSP will not be liveblogging the results.

Here’s the full write up on each race. 

OK, I know we just came off of 2008, and there were a lot of competitive races nationally, as well as in Florida. But, 10 is just a big number. I mean we’ve only got 25 seats in the House, so 10 of them being competitive is a huge deal. Don’t get too excited though, they aren’t all possible D pickups.

2nd (Tallahassee, etc.): Congressman Allen Boyd, a Blue Dog, is being primary challenged by Al Lawson, term-out state Senate leader. Lawson, no true progressive, will run to the Left of Boyd. My prediction: the challenge never really materializes, and Boyd keeps his seat.



8th (Orlando, etc.): Grayson beat Keller here in 2008. Since winning, Grayson has shown his true colors as an ‘aggressive’ progressive. Nothing wrong with that in my book, but will his voters find him out of sync with them? I think it’s less of a question about Grayson but more about who the Rs can put up against him.



10th (St. Petersburg, etc.) Will Bill Young ever retire?



12th  (Lakeland, etc.) Adam Putnam is vacating to run for Ag Commissioner. Dennis Ross, former state Senator, is the defacto Republican nominee; Lori Edwards, Polk county Supervisor of Elections, is the prominent D in the race. Definitely will be a race to watch.



13th (Sarasota, etc.) What is Vern Buchanan doing? He’s talking about a Senate race; perhaps because the Ds will never let him just have the district. If he vacates, watch for a strong race in a tight district.



16th (Palm Beach County, etc.) Southern Political Report ranks this one. I’m not so sure it’s competitive. Tom Rooney will win again, but he will be challenged by a strong D. Just not sure the D will ever be able to take off.



17th (Miami, etc.) Who will replace K-Meek? Whoever wins this primary will be the new Rep.



22nd (Fort Lauderdale, etc.) This is another, ‘What will person X do?’ race. Ron Klein may get into the Senate race. Even if he doesn’t, he will never go unchallenged in this swingy district. But, if he runs for reelection, Klein should sail to victory again.



24th (Orlando, etc.) Kosmas, who just took her seat in January, will face a strong, but yet to be determined, Republican. Feeney had questionable morals, which inevitably led to his downfall. The national Rs will look to the 24th to run a strong campaign and reclaim the district.



25th (Miami, etc.): The 3 Miami area Ds who ran in 2008 never took off in their races like the national party expected. But, expect to see strong races again down in the Miami area. In the 25th, Joe Garcia will likely again challenge Mario Diaz Balart, but just ask Christine Jennings what happens to second time candidates.

So those are my thoughts. What are yours?  

Rep. Allen Boyd announced today that he won’t be running for the open Senate seat in Florida in 2010. While Boyd (fairly conservative even by Blue Dog standards) might have been a decent prospect in the general, he may not have been enthused about his prospects for making it out of the primary, where two more liberal Miami-area politicians, Rep. Kendrick Meek and State Sen. Dan Gelber, are already jockeying for position. As a bonus, this means not having to defend an open seat in the Republican-leaning FL-02 in the Panhandle.

On the Republican side of the ledger, Attorney General (and Clinton impeachment manager and two-time Senate loser) Bill McCollum also bowed out today. While he was the front-runner in the GOP field according to last week’s Quinnipiac poll, that may have been based more on name recognition as a frequent statewide candidate (and certainly not on likeability).

Politico reports that it’s still full speed ahead for two other GOPers: former State House Speaker Marco Rubio and Rep. Connie Mack IV, although neither one has formally announced anything. On the Dem side, one other name cropped up yesterday, that hadn’t been mentioned before: Tampa mayor Pam Iorio publicly expressed her interest in the race. She could make things interesting, as the I-4 Corridor becomes more of a locus of Democratic strength in Florida while Meek and Gelber divide the Miami-area vote.

Quinnipiac (1/14-19, registered voters):

Alex Sink (D): 15

Kendrick Meek (D): 13

Ron Klein (D): 9

Allen Boyd (D): 8

Dan Gelber (D): 1

Don’t know: 54

(MoE: ±4.7%)

Bill McCollum (R): 22

Connie Mack IV (R): 21

Vern Buchanan (R): 10

Marco Rubio (R): 6

Allan Bense (R): 2

Don’t know: 39

(MoE: ±4.3%)

If the primary elections for the Florida senate race were held today, “Don’t know” would sweep both nominations in a landslide. At this point, this is a name recognition test, and Floridians seem to have no idea who these candidates are. At any rate, there seems to be something of a hierarchy here: statewide officials (Sink, McCollum) fare best, then U.S. Representatives, with state legislative leaders down in no man’s land.

On the Dem side, Kendrick Meek has the edge among current candidates. But assuming that he comes in with fairly high name rec from being in the state’s largest media market, and that he’s probably already consolidated the state’s African-American vote, he may not have as much room to grow as the other candidates.

Unfortunately, this poll has a major wrinkle; it was in the field when Alex Sink announced that she wasn’t going to be a Senate candidate, so presumably some respondents were operating under the assumption that Sink was a likely candidate while others knew that she wouldn’t be. In fact, the only head-to-head Quinnipiac tried out involved Sink as the Dem nominee (McCollum 36, Sink 35, with 29 don’t know). Here’s hoping they try again soon with some other permutations.

Cross posted at draftalex.com.

It’s pretty obvious that people are hoping that Alex Sink tosses her hat in the ring or higher office. The question we hope she’s facing right now is which one: Senate or Guvna?

There are perhaps a few too many calls for Alex Sink to be our Senate nominee.  This morning, Blast Off! even called for her to run for Senate and forget about the governor’s mansion.

At Draft Alex Sink for Governor the bias is pretty obvious. But, think for a second about why running for Senate wouldn’t be as good as a move.

First, just in terms of personality and experience, Alex is perfectly suited to be governor. She’s been an executive- and that’s what a governor theoretically does (just don’t look to Charlie for an example). Dan Gelber, Bob Wexler, Allen Boyd- these men are legislators- damn good ones, if I may. Their skills and interests fit the profile of a Senator more than Alex’s do.

There is a crowded bench already. Alex would have to compete with the likes of Dan Gelber and Chris Korge, maybe Allen Boyd, or even Bob Wexler. Those are some serious players, who could all represent the state well and some will run if she gets in or not. Alex could win the primary and the general, but why go for Senate to when the bench is already so deep, so good.

Winning the senate seat back is going to be tougher than we imagine. Sure, it looks a lot easier than beating Charlie does, but we’re two years out from the election- things change. Charlie should start to look more like a do-nothing, and Mel Martinez might decide to gracefully bow out, leaving the Republicans to nominate someone who could give us more of a challenge. In short, get excited about another Democratic senator, but don’t bet money on it just yet.

While there’s a crowded bench for Senate, there is literally no bench for governor- outside Alex Sink. If Democrats want to stop losing the state, then we can’t cede races like the 2010 gubernatorial. We need to not only nominate a candidate, but we need to nominate a good one. Right now, no other Democrat is really dipping the proverbial toe in the water- no one, not even Rod Smith.

And, there’s my peace.