Tag: Carolyn Maloney

AR-Sen: Americans for Job Security, a shadowy group deservedly under fire for racist ads attacking Bill Halter, has now followed suit with an equally if not more disgusting mailer (click to see for yourself).

FL-Sen: So Charlie Crist’s gone and hired himself an interim campaign manager… who just happens to be his sister. It’s not surprising that Charlie’s having trouble finding staff. Dems are loyal to Kendrick Meek and will risk getting blackballed by the DSCC if they work against him. And the Republicans – you can bet they will fucking fry anyone who crosses them. Crist is definitely going to wind up with some slim pickins’, though if the Jeff Greene thing doesn’t work out, I’m sure Joe Trippi will be available.

NC-Sen: Former Rep. Eva Clayton, the first woman elected to Congress in North Carolina and a prominent backer of third-place finisher Ken Lewis, gave her endorsement to Elaine Marshall. Will Lewis himself follow suit?

AL-Gov: Is Artur Davis’s plan to win the war causing him to lose the battle? Ron Sparks just picked up the endorsement of two historically black political groups in Birmingham, which seem to have established a mutual shunning society with Davis thanks in large part to his vote against healthcare reform. Even if Davis does win the primary, will he kill the enthusiasm of black voters for the general?

CT-Gov: The Democratic state convention is the same weekend as the GOP meetup (see CT-04 item below). My understanding is that Dan Malloy has the nomination locked up, but Ned Lamont and his millions are only hoping to score the 15% they need to avoid petitioning to get on the ballot.

SC-Gov: Moose Lady in the Palmetto State today, endorsing Mark Sanford protégé Nikki Haley.

ME-Gov: Heh – it’s a poll, of sorts. Portland-based Critical Insights asked 600 likely voters if they could name any of the gubernatorial candidates, I assume by pure recall. Republican Les Otten was best-known, with 30% naming him, while Peter Mills was at 16%. Among Dems, Libby Mitchell scored 16% and Steve Rowe 11%. Everyone else was in single digits.

CT-04: Some Dude Will Gregory is bailing on the race, following Rob Russo, who quit a couple of weeks ago. Russo endorsed state Sen. Dan Debicella, but Gregory isn’t backing anybody. The GOP will gather next weekend (May 21st) for its convention, where a simple majority gets you the party’s endorsement, which Debicella is expected to pick up easily. However, 15% gets you on the primary ballot, and failing that, so will 2,000 signatures. The other three Republican hopefuls are all more or less saying they plan to fight on regardless of what happens at the convention.

DE-AL: This is either some unbelievable oppo or the product of an amazingly lucky Google search: A letter to the editor in a Jamaican newspaper written by businesswoman/heiress Michele Rollins has somehow surfaced, and it’s given developer Glen Urquhart a fat opening. In the letter, Rollins advocates that Jamaica – which she refers to as “our” country – develop itself as an international banking center (aka offshore tax evasion haven) to rival the Cayman Islands. Not only does this raise the weirdest dual-loyalties question I’ve ever seen, but given that Delaware is a big banking center, it’s causing Rollins extra grief. Also of note: The DE GOP will hold its convention this Saturday. Candidates need 60% to get the party’s endorsement (which is expected to go to Rollins), but it’s non-binding, and both Republicans plan to fight on to the September primary no matter what happens.

FL-08: Former state Sen. Dan Webster, like so many of his brethren, also seems ensnared in the burgeoning Republican Party of Florida Amex scandal. He spent $9K over a two-year period, pretty much entirely at restaurants, and isn’t apologizing for it. That’s a lot of pizza.

FL-25: Joe Garcia is hammering state Rep. David Rivera for a “political stunt” which cost taxpayers several hundred thousand dollars. Rivera supported a law which required travel agencies arranging flights to Cuba to post six-figure bonds. The agencies successfully fought the law in court and were also awarded their legal costs, which amounted to $365K. This is a clever hit, and it also shows that Garcia isn’t afraid to challenge anti-Castro fanaticism.

HI-01: AFSCME funneled $100K back in April to a group called Workers for a Better Hawaii, which has since spent about $75K on radios ads against Charles Djou and Ed Case. Perhaps the scariest thing is that the NRCC hasn’t spent a dime on this race (thought the RNC transferred some $94K to the Hawaii GOP back in March).

ID-01: Remember back in 1997, when George Lucas re-released Star Wars? Yeah, he shoulda stopped there. GOP candidate Vaughn Ward shouldn’t have even bothered with the re-release: He tried to re-trot-out an endorsement from the American Conservative Union in order to bolster his wingnut bonafides… but he put out a press release about this all the way back in November. That is sad. Even sadder is the Bill Sali-esque excuse making from Ward’s campaign manager, who – when called on it – claimed, “I just got a new Mac and I’m still trying to figure it out.” Oh god.

IN-08: I like it: The D-Trip is already going up on the air with an ad bashing Republican Larry Buchson on a tried-and-true theme: social security privatization. No word on the size of the buy, though apparently it will go up for a week in Evansville, which is not a costly market.

MA-05: So Niki Tsongas demurred on whether or not she’d want Barack Obama to campaign with her. While Scott Brown did win this district 56-43, I’m really not sure Tsongas wants to be playing cringe politics. However, the NYT – which seems to think she’s in real trouble – cutely points out that her best-funded GOP challenger has not raised “as much” as Tsongas has. The truth: Tsongas $863K, Jonathan Golnik $177K. P.S. I note that Rep. Brian Higgins (NY-27) was eager to get a photo op with Obama yesterday.

NY-14: Hah – Reshma Saujani almost does something I might approve of, except I don’t. She’s berating Carolyn Maloney for not supporting President Obama and the DCCC because she didn’t raise money for last night’s fundraiser (see item below). Ordinarily at SSP, we’re the loudest when it comes to demanding incumbents support their party committees – but this is ridiculous bullshit. The D-Trip always goes easy when incumbents face serious races, whether primaries or generals. But in any event, Maloney points out that she has in fact raised over a quarter mil for the DCCC this cycle. I guess Saujani has a lot of credibility when it comes to supporting the D-Trip and Obama, though: She’s donated $0 lifetime to the DCCC and was a big Clinton backer.

PA-12: SEIU just dropped a cool $200K on TV ads to go after Tim Burns. Let’s just hope those recent polls are right…. Meanwhile, Scott Brown is coming to campaign for Burns, while Sen. Bob Casey will be doing the same for Mark Critz.

DCCC: Barack Obama was in NYC last night, doing a fundraiser for the D-Trip at the St. Regis hotel. He raked in $1.3 million (tickets started at $15K a pop).

KY-Sen: Wendell Ford, the Democrat who held this seat before retiring Sen. Jim Bunning, endorsed AG Jack Conway. Conway is running a TV ad touting the endorsement, but no word (sigh) on the size of the buy. Meanwhile, Rand Paul is sticking both thumbs in the eye of the Kentucky GOP establishment: He says he’s not sure if he’ll support Mitch McConnell as Republican Senate leader. Given that McConnell has done everything in his power to flush Paul down the toilet, this isn’t so shocking, but it is extra-juicy.

NY-Sen-B, NY-14: The Working Families Party endorsed both Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Rep. Carolyn Maloney. NY-14 wannabe Reshma Saujani whinged about the “establishment endorsing the incumbent,” which is pretty rich, given that she herself signed a letter last summer asking Maloney not to challenge Gillibrand. Not too surprising, though, given that Saujani claimed last week she hasn’t “issue-tested or poll-tested” – even though she conducted a $50,000 focus group earlier this Spring.

MI-Gov, MI-12: Troy businessman David Kniffen’s gubernatorial signature drive fell short, so he’s decided instead to run against Rep. Sandy Levin in this D+12 district.

CA-36: Blue America PAC has thrown down a $13K independent expenditure on behalf of Marcy Winograd, who is challenging Dem Rep. Jane Harman in the primary.

FL-22: After attacking Marco Rubio for going ever-so-slightly wobbly on Arizona’s new immigration law, Allen West has now turned his fire on Jeb Bush. Even if this guy somehow wins, he’s going to have a hard time staying on anyone’s good side.

HI-01: Another one of those polls with too many significant digits: An outfit I hadn’t previously heard of, Aloha Vote (which is a subsidiary of a Mass. consulting shop called Merriman River Group), has Charles Djou at “39.5”, with Colleen Hanabusa and Ed Case at “25.5” apiece. Half of the sample had already voted, and among that group, Djou was at 45%.

IA-01: Some Dude Mike LaCoste is dropping out of the GOP primary less than a month before election day. A couple of Republicans remain in the race against Rep. Bruce Braley, but really, the GOP has wound up with stems and seeds here.

NC-08: Three Republicans who failed to make the runoff in the race to challenge Rep. Larry Kissell – Hal Jordan, Lou Huddleston, and Darrell Day – all endorsed rival Harold Johnson today, over crackpot freakazoid Tim D’Annunzio. What’s more, Johnson is in DC today and tomorrow to meet with NRCC chief Pete Sessions and other key GOP honchos. Dems just have to hope that D’Annunzio, who’s already plowed a million of his own into his campaign, keeps spending like an RNC official at a bondage club.

NY-01: A nice score for Rep. Tim Bishop: Bill Clinton is doing a $1000-a-head fundraiser for him in NYC on June 2nd.

NY-13: Though he’s repeatedly denied his interest, GOP ex-Rep. Vito Fossella – best known for a drunken driving arrest and fathering a child with a woman other than his wife – is supposedly interested in making a comeback attempt. In other words, he’s got perfect Republican values. Fossella would have to make a decision by next month, when nominating petitions must be circulated.

PA-12: Crikey – another quarter mil on paid media from the NRCC on this race. You can see the new TV ad, which hits Pelosi, here.

WI-07: It looks like Dems are quickly rallying around state Sen. Julie Lassa to fill retiring Rep. Dave Obey’s considerable shoes. Lassa has held office since 1998, first as a state representative, then as a state senator since 2003. She would not have to give up her current office to run for Obey’s seat. Meanwhile, Wausau attorney Christine Bremer says she won’t run, while state Rep. Donna Siedel sounds like she’s still considering it (albeit tepidly).

• Election results: Yesterday’s big event was the special election in FL-19, the first real electoral test after the passage of HCR. The allegedly massive opposition to healthcare reform on the part of the district’s many seniors never really materialized. Democratic state Sen. Ted Deutch beat Republican Ed Lynch 62-35, with very little falloff from Obama’s 65-34 performance in 2008. (Contrast that with John Garamendi’s so-so 53-43 performance in November’s CA-10 special election, a similarly 65-33 district in 2008.)

I should also pause to offer a little credit to Texas’s Republicans, who voted for the less crazy candidates in the Board of Education and Supreme Court runoffs, and in a bigger surprise to me, for the Hispanic-surnamed candidates in the TX-17 and TX-23 runoffs (which, based on incumbent Victor Carrillo’s trouncing in the Railroad Commissioner primary, seemed unlikely to happen). The NRCC has to be pleased to see the wealthier and less wingnutty Bill Flores and Quico Canseco emerge. Rep. Chet Edwards, however, is one guy who knows how to stand and fight, and he wasted no time hitting Flores hard and defining him as a carpetbagger in big oil’s pocket.

One other leftover issue from last night: two races in California, as expected, are headed to runoffs. In Republican-held SD-12, Republican Assemblyman Bill Emmerson will face off against Democrat Justin Blake (the GOPers combined got more than 60% of the vote, so this is a likely hold), while in safely-Democratic AD-43, Democratic lawyer Mike Gatto will face off with Republican Sunder Ramani to replace now-LA city councilor Paul Krekorian. Gatto seemed to shoot the gap in this heavily Armenian-American district after the two Armenian candidates, Chahe Keuroghelian and Nayiri Nahabedian, nuked each other.

• AR-Sen: Bill Halter’s primary campaign gained more momentum, as he picked up an endorsement from the Alliance for Retired Americans, pleased with his time as a Social Security Administration official. One group that really isn’t getting on board with Halter, though, is the Berry family; first outgoing Rep. Marion Berry dissed Halter, and now his son, Mitch, is head of a group, Arkansans for Common Sense, that’s running ads attacking Halter on the Social Security front. (Are there any Arkansans who are actually against common sense?)

• CO-Sen: Looks like GOP establishment candidate Jane Norton sees the handwriting on the wall and is taking a page from Democrat Michael Bennet’s book: not able to rely on getting on the ballot via activist-dominated convention (where teabagger-fueled Ken Buck seems likely to triumph), she’s making plans to qualify by finding 1,500 signatures in each of the state’s seven congressional districts. Speaking of Bennet, he’s still the fundraising kingpin in this race; he just announced he raised $1.4 million last quarter, well ahead of Norton’s $816K.

• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist may have sounded Shermanesque last week in his determination not to switch to an Independent bid for Governor, but apparently now there’s increasing moves within his inner circle to move in that direction. Unnamed advisors are floating the idea to the WSJ today.

• IN-Sen: Dan Coats seems to be having more trouble making the transition from the free-wheelin’ world of high-stakes lobbying back to the humdrum electoral politics world, where you actually have to follow the rules and stuff. He’s 10 days overdue on filing his finance disclosure reports with the FEC. One note that the Beltway press seemed to miss though: his main GOP primary opponent, ex-Rep. John Hostettler hasn’t made his filing yet either. (Of course, fundraising was never Hostettler’s strong suit. Or even his weak suit.)

• NC-Sen (pdf): PPP issued its latest installment in polls of the Senate general election in its home state. Maybe the biggest surprise is that incumbent Republican Richard Burr’s approvals are just continuing to fall; he’s currently at 32/41 (while likeliest opponent Elaine Marshall is in positive territory at 19/11). Also encouraging, I suppose, is that the actual human Democrats are starting to draw even with Generic D (while previous polls have had Generic D far outpacing them), showing they’re getting better-defined. Burr leads Generic D 43-38, while he leads Marshall 43-37, and leads both Cal Cunningham and Kenneth Lewis 43-35.

• NY-Sen-B: With ex-Gov. George Pataki’s phantom interest in this race finally having been dispelled, Swing State Project is removing this race from its “Races to Watch” list.

• PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): One more poll in the rapidly-becoming-overpolled Pennsylvania Senate race, this time from Republican pollster Susequehanna. They use an LV model, and find Pat Toomey with a 48-38 lead over Arlen Specter. Of more immediate consequence, they find Specter leading Joe Sestak 42-28 in the Dem primary. They also polled both primaries in the gubernatorial race, finding Dan Onorato seeming to break away from the ill-defined pack among the Dems. Onorato is at 32, followed by Joe Hoeffel at 13, Jack Wagner at 6, and Anthony Williams at 4. Tom Corbett beats down Sam Rohrer on the GOP side, 50-7. After marshaling his resources, Specter is finally starting to open fire; he’s up with his first TV ad of the cycle starting today.

• WI-Sen: The only thing that’s sure is that Tommy Thompson likes to see his name in the press. There’s been a lot of conflicting reporting about Tommy Thompson today, with many outlets running with the story that he’s decided against running for Senate (that all traces back to one leak to a local TV station, although it sounds like Politico got some confirmation from an anonymous GOP source). Other outlets are emphasizing that Thompson’s spokesperson says that Thompson hasn’t made a final decision, though. Either way, Thompson will be announcing his plans at a Tea Party rally tomorrow in Madison, so our pain will be ended tomorrow one way or the other.

• MA-Gov: Here’s more evidence for my expectation that Dem-turned-indie Tim Cahill will be running to the right (or at least to the incoherent-angry-working-class-Catholic-guy-position) of the Republican in the Massachusetts gubernatorial race this year. He’s appearing at today’s Tea Party rally on Boston Common today, the same one with Sarah Palin that Scott Brown ditched (although MA-10 candidate Joe Malone and GOP gubernatorial underdog Christy Mihos will be there). Likely GOP gubernatorial nominee Charlie Baker (from the party’s old-school moderate WASP tradition) decided against attending, probably out of fears that he might get jostled by some ruffian and spill some of his gin and tonic on his white Bermuda shorts.

• MN-Gov: Two blasts from the past in the Minnesota gubernatorial race. Walter Mondale weighed in in favor of Democratic state House speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher, while a guy I’ve never heard of named Al Quie, who claims to have been governor from 1979 to 1983, endorsed Republican Marty Seifert.

• NE-Gov: Via press release, the campaign for Democratic candidate Mark Lakers let us know that he took in $314K, impressive considering his late entry to the campaign.

• AL-07: State Rep. Earl Hilliard Jr. got an endorsement from the United Steelworkers, a union that seems to still have a lot of clout in Birmingham, once a major steel town.

• AZ-03: Now here’s some news I didn’t expect: the fundraising champ in the 3rd isn’t one of the many state legislators running here, but rather attorney (and vice-presidential progeny) Ben Quayle. He pulled in $550K in the first quarter, thanks no doubt to family connections. There are a couple other self-funders in the race too, but the elected officials seem to be lagging: case in point, well-known ex-state Sen. Pamela Gorman, who raised only $37K and ends with $23K CoH.

• FL-24: Rep. Suzanne Kosmas announced a haul of $260K for the first quarter. That’s less than the $340K reported by her likely GOP opponent, steakhouse mogul Craig Miller (although a slab of his money was apparently carved out of his own personal funds); Kosmas has a big CoH advantage, though, sitting on more than $1 million.

• GA-07: Retiring Republican Rep. John Linder didn’t look far to endorse a replacement for him: he gave his nod to his former chief of staff, Rob Woodall.

• HI-01: Sen. Dan Inouye just transferred $100K of his money to the DCCC, despite appearances that they’re actively backing Ed Case, rather than Colleen Hanabusa, who has the support of Inouye (and pretty much everyone else in the local Democratic establishment). Inouye has apparently been working behind the scenes, including reaching out to Nancy Pelosi, to get the DCCC to dial back their Case support, so maybe the cash infusion will give him a little more leverage. (Inouye is sitting on $3.2 million and faces little if any opposition this year.)

• IN-03: Nice fundraising numbers from Democrat Tom Hayhurst, who ran a surprisingly close race against Rep. Mark Souder in 2006 and is back for another try. Hayhurst has racked up $234K CoH, more than Souder ($99K in the first quarter).

• IN-05: Politico has a look at Rep. Dan Burton’s difficult primary in the 5th, in Indianapolis’s dark-red suburbs. While Burton may actually be safer this year compared with 2008 (since he has four opponents instead of just one), the article traces the roots of the local GOP’s discontent with him, and also shows the magnitude of his collapse in support: only 2 of the 11 local party organizations are supporting Burton this time.

• MO-08: Another Dem in a dark-red seat who keeps impressing everybody with his tenacity is Tommy Sowers. The veteran and college instructor, who’s challenging Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, raised $295K in the first quarter and is now sitting on $675K CoH.

• NM-02: Ex-Rep. Steve Pearce can write himself his own checks if he needs to, but he may not need to at this rate. Pearce raised $277K in the first quarter, and now sits on $708K. Democratic Rep. Harry Teague hasn’t reported yet, but in the duel of wealthy oil guys, he can self-fund too if need be.

• NY-14: With Democratic primary challenger Reshma Saujani having some success on the financial front, Rep. Carolyn Maloney got some top-tier help from Barack Obama, who endorsed her and sent out a fundraising appeal on her behalf.

• PA-11: If this doesn’t wake up Rep. Paul Kanjorski from his nap, I don’t know what will. Three-time Republican opponent Lou Barletta raised $300K in the first quarter. An important caveat: there was no mention of cash on hand, which is telling because Barletta was still saddled with a lot of debt from his 2008 campaign when he decided to run again. (UPDATE: Barletta’s CoH is now $205K.)

• PA-17: Republican state Sen. David Argall raised a tolerable but not-too-impressive $125K in the first quarter. He’ll need more than that to battle Rep. Tim Holden, who, if nothing else, has great survival skills (he had the worst district of any freshman who survived 1994, and then survived a 2002 gerrymander designed to rub him out). In fact, he’ll need more than that just for his primary; heretofore unknown GOP opponent ex-Marine Frank Ryan raised $70K in the first quarter.

• Redistricting: Maryland beat out New York to be the first state in the nation to enact legislation that will, in terms of redistricting, treat prisoners as residents of their last known address, rather than where they’re incarcerated (and thus move the center of gravity back toward the cities from the countryside). Also, on the redistricting front, if there’s one group of people who are the target audience for a whole movie about redistricting (Gerrymandering), it’s the crowd at SSP. The film’s director has a diary up, touting its release in two weeks at the Tribeca Film Festival.

CA-Sen: Barbara Boxer says she raised $2.4 million in Q1, with $8.7 mil on hand. GOPer Tom Campbell raised $1.6 mil. No word yet from the other Republicans.

NC-Sen: Cal Cunningham is launching his first TV ad, in introductory spot. Apparently the buy (so far) is just $45K. Separately, Cunningham told the AP that he doesn’t support the card check provisions of the Employee Free Choice Act, despite apparently telling a Teamsters official that he does. Still, the Teamsters are standing by their endorsement of Cunningham.

AL-07: Collingwood Research for Shelia Smoot (3/30-4/1, likely Democratic primary voters):

Shelia Smoot (D): 33

Earl Hilliard Jr. (D): 28

Terry Sewell (D): 12

Martha Bozeman (D): 6

Undecided/other: 20

(MoE: 4%)

FL-24: Steak baron Craig Miller says he raised $340K in his first two months in his race to unseat Dem Rep. Suzanne Kosmas. There’s still a very competitive GOP primary to contend with, though.

MA-04: Surprise, surprise: Laura Ingraham is full of shit. The wingnut radio hostess tweeted some b.s. “rumor” that Barney Frank was going to retire. Frank did not hesitate to call Ingraham’s post a “lie.”

NY-14: Reshma Saujani raised $400K in Q1 in her bid to unseat Rep. Carolyn Maloney in the Democratic primary. Maloney, however, raised $475K and has $2 million on hand.

PA-12: Joe Biden, who is originally from Pennsylvania, will return to the state of his birth later this month to campaign for Dem Mark Critz in the upcoming PA-12 special election.

PA-17: Another Pennsylvania ballot challenge, this time against Dem Sheila Dow-Ford, has come undone in the courtroom. Dow-Ford is challenging Rep. Tim Holden in the primary.

DCCC: D-Trip Chair Chris Van Hollen was a busy man over the congressional recess. In addition to mucking up the HI-01 special election, he also campaigned for Reps. Leonard Boswell, Steve Kagen (twice), Mark Schauer and Gary Peters.

Polltopia: Voting is now open in PPP’s next pick-a-poll. I don’t think we’ve tried to freep these before, but come on, people – don’t you want to see a poll of PA-12?

WATN?: Former NM-01 Rep. Heather Wilson is being treated for thyroid cancer. We wish her a speedy recovery. Meanwhile, ex-Rep. Jim Saxton (NJ-03) has joined up with – you’ll never believe it – a DC lobbying firm. It never ends.

Babka: Did you know that Green’s babkas are so dense that airport x-ray scanners cannot see through them? Extra density = extra deliciousness – and, apparently, good insulation against high-frequency electromagnetic radiation. If only Lex Luthor had known!

CA-Sen: No one does weird-ass like Carly Fiorina, who has another web video out that hails from the land of the bizarre.

CO-Sen: Seventh CD Rep. Ed Perlmutter has endorsed Sen. Michael Bennet over Andrew Romanoff in the Dem primary.

FL-Sen: It looks like Marco Rubio is finally starting to come in for some serious scrutiny. The St. Pete Times has a lengthy examination of the corporate money that has flowed Rubio’s way, and the irregularities which have riddled his campaign finance reports.

IL-Sen: Alexi Giannoulias says he’s going to return all campaign contributions from, as Politico puts it, “accused bank fraudster Nick Giannis and his family.”

IN-Sen: Ah, this is good. Dan Coats is trying to run as hard as he can against the bailout… but back in 2008, he was lobbying the government on behalf of a hedge fund which owned 80% of Chrysler – a huge recipient of bailout funds. (He didn’t do a very good job, it seems, considering that the fund, Cerberus, has its equity stake wiped out.) As Texas Dem astutely noted the moment Coats rumors started flying, “Usually retired senators get rich in some unseemly way that makes them unelectable in the future.” Sure looks like the case here.

NY-Sen-B: I hope all those Democrats who supported Mike Bloomberg over the years are happy: The NYT has an in-depth look at Bloombo’s hostility to Kirsten Gillibrand, and all the candidates he has tried to push into running against her. The latest is his own girlfriend, Diana Taylor. The Times fails to find any rational reason for why His Bloominess has chugged so much haterade, but devtob points out that they ignored a key item: Bloombo was a big backer of Caroline Kennedy, who of course was snubbed in favor of Gillibrand.

RI-Sen: Don’t look to retiring Dem Rep. Patrick Kennedy to share any of his spoils with the DCCC. Calling his decision not to seek another term in the House more of a “sabbatical” than a retirement, Kennedy says he plans to transfer his $500K campaign purse into an interest-bearing account, just in case he should need it for a Senate campaign someday. This is total bullshit. (Thanks to SSPer Andrew for this one.) (JL)

ID-Gov: Dem Keith Allred has made it official. Allred, a former Harvard professor, had spent five years running a non-partisan “citizens group” called The Common Interest which he left to pursue a gubernatorial run.

MI-Gov: Virg Bernero locked down another big union endorsement: the AFL-CIO took a vote, and it was “overwhelming” (their words) in Bernero’s favor. The United Auto Workers union, itself a member of the AFL-CIO, had already gotten behind Bernero, but now the entire umbrella organization (which also includes AFSCME, IBEW and AFT) is doing so. Bernero’s been running exactly the sort of populist campaign his supporters would have hoped, lately proposing that Michigan establish a state-run bank, modeled after the Bank of North Dakota.

NM-Gov: Doña Ana County District Attorney Susana Martinez won the support of 47% of the delegates at the state GOP convention this past weekend, while former NM Republican Party chair Allen Weh pulled in 26%. Pete Domenici, Jr. took less than 5%, but still plans to file petitions to get on the ballot. Because Martinez and Weh got over 20%, they only have to file half as many signatures, but as Heath Haussamen points out, no candidate who hasn’t scored 20% at the convention has ever come back to win the nomination.

OH-Gov: A voluminous auditor’s report on the demise of Lehman Brothers was published last week, documenting all of the company’s shady financial practices which led to its doom. Why does this matter to the Ohio governor’s race? John Kasich was a managing partner at Lehman for several years, right up until the bitter end in 2008. Ted Strickland is putting some pointed questions to Kasich, whose response so far has been extremely feeble.

FL-08: Sarah Palin’s gotten mixed up in the race to take on Rep. Alan Grayson, firing some broadsides at the Democrat during a recent trip to Orlando. Grayson did not let this challenge go unanswered.

KY-03: Tacked on to a Louisville mayoral poll, SUSA included a sort of unusually-worded question about Dem Rep. John Yarmuth’s re-elects. They asked voters if they would vote for or against Yarmuth “no matter who else is on the ballot,” with a not sure “until I know who else is on the ballot” option. Yarmuth scored 27-23-48. It still seems that Yarmuth’s only challenger so far is a dude who owns a bunch of Pizza Huts.

NY-14: EMILY’s List has finally done something right: They’re endorsing Rep. Carolyn Maloney, a longtime advocate for women’s issues, in her primary fight against Some Dude Reshma Saujani.

NY-23: After months of sounding pretty serious about a bid, state Assemblyman Will Barclay has decided to pass on a race against Dem Rep. Bill Owens. Barclay’s exit greatly improves the chances of Club For Growth nutter Doug Hoffman in the GOP primary, where his main rival now appears to be investment banker Matt Doheny, who lost the special election nomination to Dede Scozzafava last fall. (JL)

OK-05: The Republican primary to succeed Mary Fallin in the House just gets bigger and bigger. State Rep. Shane Jett is now the sixth candidate in a field that includes state Rep. Mike Thompson, former state Rep. Kevin Calvey, and Some Other Dudes. (JL)

IL-Lt. Gov: The 38 members of the IL Dem central committee will hold interviews with prospective candidates around the state next week and then pick a replacement Lt. Gov. nominee on March 27.

FL-Sen: Insider Advantage, polling on behalf of the Florida Times Union, confirms what PPP sees in the GOP primary. They have Marco Rubio eviscerating Charlie Crist, 60-26. Charlie Crist better figure out his exit strategy in a hurry, or else he’ll have a lot more time to spend on back waxes come September.

KY-Sen: Some Dude Bill Johnson said he’s bailing on the GOP primary to succeed Jim Bunning, saying his internal polling looked cruddy. He’d spent a few hundred grand of his own money, but yeah, I never heard of him either. He does have a perfect Some Dude name – according to the SSP tags, there’s another Bill Johnson running in Ohio this cycle, and still another running in Alabama!

NV-Sen: How is this man still in office? The New York Times reports:”Previously undisclosed e-mail messages turned over to the F.B.I. and Senate ethics investigators provide new evidence about Senator John Ensign’s efforts to steer lobbying work to the embittered husband of his former mistress….”

CO-Gov: In an apparent bid to out-nut his party-mate Jane Norton when it comes to outlandishly conservative proposals on the “restructuring” of basic governance, Scott McInnis was caught on tape at a recent Tea Party candidate forum suggesting that the state Department of Education be looked at as a possible target for elimination. (JL)

GA-Gov: Georgia Dems are pressing the House Ethics Committee to wrap up its investigation of Rep. Nathan Deal, who is slated to resign from the House at the end of the month. If they don’t finish by then, there’s a good chance they’ll just drop the investigation – something, in fact, they just did with regard to Eric Massa.

HI-Gov: This is interesting. We noted the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s endorsement of Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hanneman in the Dem primary yesterday, but we didn’t look at their rationale. One of their reasons ought to appeal to progressives: Hanneman, like the ILWU and Sens. Dan Akaka and Dan Inouye, has backed Colleen Hanabusa over Ed Case for the HI-01 May special election. Rival Neil Abercrombie has stayed neutral, which looks like a big mistake, given how powerful the ILWU is in Hawaii.

NY-Gov: Trying to forestall attempts to find a better candidate (or shove him from the race), Rick Lazio rolled out a bunch of endorsements from a bunch of Republicans who are all retired these days: former Gov. George Pataki and former Reps. Amo Houghton, Sherwood Boehlert, and George Wortley. I had to look up Wortley – he hasn’t served since 1989.

MI-07: Look out, John Kasich! Tim Walberg says “I was Tea Party before there was a Tea party.” He also says he lost in 2008 “because McCain was not a true conservative and people were tired of moderates.”

NY-14: With Democratic majorities at risk and progressive power in Congress at a troubling ebb, too many powerful New Yorkers seem only too happy to back an unabashed pro-bankster neophyte challenging a liberal female incumbent. I’m talking about Reshma Saujani, who’s running on a platform of kissing Wall Street’s ass (“If you go to Texas, you’ll never hear a Congressional member speak poorly of the oil industry”) against Rep. Carolyn Maloney. Oh, but don’t worry – Saujani’s got all the important things covered. At a recent women’s fundraiser, one of her supporters assured the crowd, “But it gets better, look how fashionable she is. She’ll definitely be the best dressed person in Congress.”

NY-29: Former Rep. Randy Kuhl has decided he won’t try to win his old seat back. Instead, he’s endorsing ex-Corning Mayor Tom Reed. Incidentally, Kuhl must have had the worst oppo team ever when he was actually running for office, no?

SC-02: Ugh – Dem Rob Miller, who raked in a couple mil he never otherwise would have seen after Rep. Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” outburst, is making some unforced errors. He kicked a TV reporter and camera crew out of a speech to a local Democratic club, and then tried to later claim he had done no such thing. Unfortunately, contemporaneous emails contradicted Miller’s claims. I really hope that Miller’s elevation to Red to Blue status means he’s going to get some professional campaign assistance, and that he’s not just being fleeced for his Brewster’s millions.

Redistricting: I love this diary – possumtracker takes us on a magical mystery tour of some of the most extreme possible majority-minority districts, in places you probably never thought such districts could exist. Let’s hope actual map-drawers (or the DoJ) don’t take too many cues, though, since these kinds of districts would likely kill many neighboring Democratic seats.

Robocalls: The Republican Attorney General of Indiana, Greg Zoeller, chastised the NRCC yesterday for its use of robocalls introduced by a live operator. Zoeller says that, while legal, the NRCC’s tactics violate the spirit of a tri-partisan treaty signed between the state’s Democratic, Republican and Libertarian parties banning the use of robocalls in the state. Zoeller asked the NRCC to suspend its use of robocalling in the state. Typical for the NRCC, they told Zoeller to go twist. (JL)

• AZ-Sen: Ex-Rep. J.D. Hayworth has made it pretty clear already that he’s taking on John McCain in the Republican Senate primary, and now he’s made it official when he’s going to make it official. The launch date for his campaign: Feb. 15.

• CT-Sen, CT-02: Ex-Rep. Rob Simmons did a whole lot of bobbing and weaving when an interviewer yesterday kept pressing him on the issue of whether he’d consider dropping down to run for his old House seat again (although a spokesperson followed up afterwards, saying he will not running for anything else, “period”). The idea has to be tempting to Simmons, though, who just watched his Senate dreams vaporize with Democratic AG Richard Blumenthal’s entry, and who may by enviously eyeing efforts by some of the other 2006 victims (like Mike Fitzpatrick) to turn back the clock.

• KS-Sen: There’s still six months to go before their Republican Senate primary, but time’s running out for Rep. Todd Tiahrt to make a move against fellow Rep. Jerry Moran. Moran leads this month’s SurveyUSA poll 40-33 (two months ago Tiahrt pulled within 3, but that’s the closest he’s been). Moran is currently up 38-23 in the state’s northeast, which will be the decisive region (as they each have their respective districts already locked down).

• NV-Sen: File this under “it’s bad news even if you have to be out there repeatedly saying this,” but Harry Reid again denied (this time to Las Vegas political reporter Jon Ralston) that he’d drop out of his fizzling Senate race to make way for a different candidate. On the GOP side, one potential opponent, Sue Lowden, is up with her first TV spot, a soft-focus biographical ad. Taking note of these developments, no doubt, are Dick Durbin and Charles Schumer; insiders are observing that the two of them are both busy doling out campaign cash to their colleagues in order to build loyalties for what looks like the fight to be the next majority leader.

• NY-Sen-B: In case you missed it, last night’s point-by-point dismantling of Harold Ford Jr. by Stephen Colbert is a must-see. It clearly wasn’t the coming-out gala that Ford had envisioned.

• UT-Sen: The establishment is riding to the rescue for Bob Bennett, who could be threatened in this year’s primary if the teabagging rabble somehow coalesced behind one of his many opponents. The NRSC just handed $43K to Bennett’s campaign (an important sign to other institutional contributors), and Newt Gingrich is headlining a big-bucks fundraiser for Bennett.

• CA-Gov: Republican pollster McLaughlin & Associates (apparently not working on behalf of any of the candidates) released a poll of the Republican gubernatorial primary, finding zillionairess Meg Whitman leading zillionaire Steve Poizner, 39-12. Apparently they were in the field when Tom Campbell bailed out, as they also offer up a three-way head-to-head, which was 31 Whitman, 17 Campbell, 5 Poizner.  

• CT-Gov: A couple comings and goings in Connecticut today: as expected, Danbury mayor Mark Boughton got in the Republican field. On the Democratic side, state Sen. Gary LeBeau, who’d been polling in the low single digits, dropped out. In a moment of unusual honesty for a politician, LeBeau said, “The state has no idea who Gary LeBeau is.”

• OR-Gov: This is a bit of a surprise, but in the wake of Al Gore’s endorsement, it’s certainly an indication that ex-SoS Bill Bradbury (something of an underdog in the Democratic primary against ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber) has some powerful friends back in DC. Howard Dean will appear at several fundraisers for Bradbury in Oregon next week.

• FL-08: Here’s another surprise: brash 20-something real estate developer Armando Gutierrez dropped out of the GOP field in the 8th, despite having attracted a lot of favorable buzz and even picked up a few endorsements from members of Florida’s House delegation. The national party never warmed up to him, though, seemingly put off by his line-crashing, and he may have finally gotten the message, between the NRCC’s preferred pick, businessman Bruce O’Donoghue, officially filing yesterday, and the endorsement by neighboring Rep. Cliff Stearns of yet another Republican in the crowded field, state Rep. Kurt Kelly.

• FL-19: In all the madness over the Illinois primaries today, it’s been almost universally forgotten that the primary in the safely-blue 19th to replace resigned Rep. Robert Wexler is also today. It’s hardly worth a look, though, as state Sen. Ted Deutch pretty much has it locked down, having raised many times more money than anyone else and nailed down the establishment endorsements. Former Broward Co. Commissioner Ben Graber is the only other candidate of note.

• IN-04: Despite the advantages that his statewide profile brings him, SoS Todd Rokita won’t have the GOP field to replace retiring Rep. Steve Buyer to himself. He’ll have to face state Sen. Brandt Hershman too. Hershman has one key advantage himself: he works as an aide to Buyer, and has Buyer’s backing.

• NV-03: Here’s some good news for ex-state Sen. Joe Heck: he just got $10K to go toward his campaign against vulnerable Dem freshman Rep. Dina Titus. The bad news is: that $10K came from the PAC of John Ensign, who just won’t stop trying to make himself useful to Nevada’s other Republicans despite the fact that he’s about as popular as shingles right now. But then Heck got some more good news: he won’t face a seriously contested primary, as self-funding businessman Rob Lauer dropped his teabaggish challenge to Heck to run for SoS instead.

• NY-13: A lot of people are asking who Michael Grimm is, after he banked over $300K last quarter to go up against Democratic Rep. Michael McMahon. He’s a former FBI agent, who apparently has a lot of friends in high places… in places outside of his district. Only $3,500 of that amount came from within the actual district, and $2,000 of that was from Staten Island Republican guru Guy Molinari.

• NY-14: Live by the primary challenge, die by the primary challenge. Rep. Carolyn Maloney now faces one of her own, a well-funded challenge from the apparent right from 30-something attorney Reshma Saujani, who has previously raised serious dollars within the Indian-American community for other Democratic candidates. Saujani, believe it or not, is running on an unashamedly pro-Wall Street platform (although this is maybe the one district in the country where that might still work).

• PA-06: Two more prominent local Democrats who had endorsed Doug Pike when he was the only game in town have switched their endorsements to Manan Trivedi instead. Significantly, they’re both in Berks County (which is also where Trivedi is from, and which is where Dems have tended to run the weakest in the district in the past): Reading mayor Tom McMahon and Berks Co. Commissioner Kevin Barnhardt.

• TN-01: Would you believe that there’s a Republican who lost in one of the wave elections who isn’t running for something this year? However, before you get too excited, it’s ex-Rep. David Davis, who’d been mulling a third matchup against Rep. Phil Roe, who knocked him off in a GOP primary in this super-red district in eastern Tennessee. The not-insane Roe may be the best we can hope for in this district, especially compared with Davis, who’d been making outreach to the local teabaggers in preparation for another run.

• WV-03: A credible challenger to Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall sneaked under the rope at the filing deadline: former state Supreme Court justice Elliott Maynard. Maynard was, until recently, a Democrat, but switched parties pushed along largely by his perception of Democrats’ anti-coal environmental policies (and no doubt also influenced by West Virginia’s reddish turn over the last decade).

• OH-SoS: This was painless and easy: not only did a more progressive alternative to conservative state Rep. Jennifer Garrison get into the Secretary of State race – Franklin Co. Court Clerk Maryellen O’Shaughnessy – but she won’t even face a contested primary. Getting the message that her establishment support was practically nil, Garrison got out of the race. Meanwhile, on the Republican side, the GOP establishment seems to have settled the trouble it was having finding a replacement Auditor candidate after Mary Taylor ditched the job to run for Lt. Governor. They got Delaware Co. Prosecutor Kevin Yost to switch over from the AG’s race, where he was facing ex-Sen. Mike DeWine in a primary. That caused a lot of consternation among the state’s right-wingers, though – they were looking forward to Yost picking off the unacceptably moderate (and generally underwhelming) DeWine in the primary. Both the SoS and Auditor positions are key from a redistricting perspective, as along with the Governor they control the state’s legislative redistricting process.

• Republicans: If you haven’t checked out the details of Research 2000’s in-depth poll of the state of what Republicans believe today, please do. Although I’m not really still sure what to do with all this knowledge… except maybe acknowledge that you can’t negotiate with such irrational actors.

• Redistricting: CQ’s Josh Kurtz takes an interesting look at redistricting in California over the decades, as seen through the prism of a new book that covers the many ups and downs of legendary California Rep. Philip Burton. Will it be an incumbent protection map or an aggressive push, and how will the state’s fast-growing Latino population be accommodated?

A weirdly Senate-free version of the Digest…

• IL-Gov: State Rep. Jack Franks, a Democrat from exurban McHenry County, was a loud and frequent Rod Blagojevich critic, and he was considering parlaying that into a run in the Illinois governor’s primary against incumbent Pat Quinn. Franks just decided against it, though. (He does sound like he’s going for higher office in 2012, including a possible run against Rep. Don Manzullo in IL-16, a low-profile wingnut who’s gotten a free pass for almost two decades in a district that just went for Obama.) Meanwhile, Pat Quinn got another key union endorsement, from UNITE HERE’s Local 1 (giving him pretty much the big union trifecta, having already gotten the SEIU and Teamsters).

• MI-Gov: I can honestly say I didn’t see this coming; businessman Rick Snyder, who’s been polling in the low single digits in the GOP gubernatorial primary in Michigan, won a straw poll this weekend at a confab of party insiders on Mackinac Island. Snyder (who looks like he’s positioning himself as the ‘moderate’ in the race) got 31%, while AG Mike Cox and Oakland Co. Sheriff Mike Bouchard each got 24%.

• MN-Gov: Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor just moved its statewide convention from June to late April. This change appears to be due in part to the expected shift in Minnesota’s primary from September to August (or earlier), thanks to a new federal law regarding the date by which absentee ballots for the general election must be mailed. The new convention date probably makes life a bit harder for candidates who are currently members of the state legislature, since the legislative session doesn’t end until May 17th, 2010. (D)

• OR-Gov: Up-and-coming Clackamas County Chairwoman Lynn Peterson was the subject of some gubernatorial speculation a few weeks ago, but now she’s declared that she won’t be running for the Democratic gubernatorial nod next year (despite her Facebook page saying otherwise).

• PA-Gov: AG Tom Corbett got another high-profile (if somewhat stale) endorsement in the GOP gubernatorial contest: Dick Thornburgh, Pennsylvania’s former governor and US Attorney General.

• IN-02: GOP St. Rep. Jackie Wolarski (who has earned the sobriquet “Wacky Jackie” for her right-wing views) turned down the NRCC’s entreaties for a run against Rep. Joe Donnelly in 2008, leaving them with the woeful Luke Puckett. However, she’s sounding more interested about a run in the R+2 2nd for 2010.

• NV-03: Back to the drawing board for the NRCC in Nevada: their touted recruit John Guedry, a deep-pocketed banker who announced his bid last month against freshman Rep. Dina Titus, withdrew from the race over the weekend, citing family concerns. They may turn to former Clark County GOP chair Brian Scroggins instead, who had considered the race. Former state Sen. Joe Heck could be another replacement, but he says he’s staying put in the GOP gubernatorial primary.

• NY-14: Our condolences to Rep. Carolyn Maloney and her family; her husband, Clifton Maloney, died while on a climbing expedition in the Himalayas, having just summitted the world’s sixth-highest peak.

• NY-23: More trouble for moderate GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava on her right flank: the Club for Growth has endorsed her Conservative opponent, Doug Hoffman (although they’d certainly telegraphed their intents, having released a poll showing him making it a 3-way race). Also, Hoffman got another boost among the social conservative set, via an endorsement from Fred Thompson (of 2008 presidential nap race fame). Democrat Bill Owens isn’t wasting any time; he’s up with his second TV spot of the campaign already.

• TN-03: Robin Smith, the leading GOP candidate to replace Zach Wamp, is claiming that Barack Obama personally called her “everything from racist to terrorist to extremist”. Smith, who served as chair of the Tennessee GOP during the last cycle, gained some previous notoriety for taking a hard run at Michelle Obama. The Smith campaign has yet to issue a retraction. (J)

• WV-01: Rep. Alan Mollohan, long-serving Democrat in northern West Virginia, has easily dispatched GOP opposition in his R+9 district over the decades. In 2010, it looks like he’ll face off against state Senate minority whip Clark Barnes. One glitch: although Barnes grew up in the 1st, his Randolph County residence and almost all of his Senate district are in the 2nd.

• Census: Sen. Robert Bennett of Utah — feeling the heat from the right in his primary — is introducing legislation to require the Census to ask a citizenship status question for purposes of apportionment. Such a bill is unlikely to gain any traction in a Democratic-controlled Congress.

• AR-Sen (pdf): Here is a very weird set of numbers out of Arkansas, courtesy of a poll from somebody called Talk Business Quarterly. Blanche Lincoln has a 49% job approval rating, with 40% disapproval — no surprises, about what I’d expect. But on the re-elect question, the results are 27/60! (There’s some polling sleight of hand going on here, though; the question is phrased “would you vote to re-elect Blanche Lincoln as your U.S. Senator no matter who ran against her?” Well, I dunno… is Jesus going to run against her?) Also, in Arkansas, Republican wealthy guy/gaffe-prone crackpot Curtis Coleman has apparently gotten his shots and visa and can now go safely campaign in southeast Arkansas, as he officially launched his campaign today.

• CT-Sen: Chris Dodd underwent successful surgery for prostate cancer yesterday and is resting comfortably. He’ll be back to full activity in a few weeks, probably just in time for the end of recess.

• IA-Sen: Democrats nailed down a candidate to go against Chuck Grassley, although he’ll be hard-pressed to make a dent in the well-funded and inexplicably well-liked Grassley. Tom Fiegen, a former state Senator and bankruptcy attorney, will announce his candidacy on Friday. Another Dem, Iowa Democratic Veterans Caucus chair Bob Krause, is already exploring the race.

• NV-Sen: Here’s a telling little tidbit from an interview with Rep. Dean Heller, suggesting that he may have just as much of a non-aggression pact with Harry Reid as does John Ensign (or else he just lives in perpetual fear of Reid). When asked if it was best for Nevada if Reid were defeated, Heller’s response was a 14-second pause, followed by “Um. My position is that I’m going to support the Republican candidate. If we have a viable Republican candidate, that is going to be my position. So I think that speaks for itself.”

• NH-Sen: Kelly Ayotte made her public debut yesterday (although she maintains she’s not a candidate yet, despite having filed her candidacy papers), and shed a little more light on her hitherto-unknown positions on, well, everything. She seems to be running on mostly a law-and-order image, but she did reveal that she’s anti-abortion rights and anti-gay marriage.

• NY-Sen-B: With Carolyn Maloney now out of the picture, Bronx-based Rep. Eliot Engel endorsed Kirsten Gillibrand today for re-election. That brings to 12 (out of 26) Dem members of the New York House delegation who’ve endorsed her.

• HI-Gov: Rep. Neil Abercrombie, who’s running for Hawaii governor, ran into a sticky wicket: he won’t be able to transfer the $900K in his federal fund to his state fund, according to Hawaii’s Campaign Spending Commission. This puts him behind, in the fundraising game, both Republican candidate Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona and possible Dem primary opponent Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannemann, although he’s well-connected and should be able to catch up with some effort.

• NJ-Gov: In a revelation that should surprise no one, it turns out that Karl Rove discussed with Chris Christie the possibility of running for New Jersey Governor while Christie was serving in the ostensibly non-partisan position of U.S. Attorney.

• SC-Gov: Democrats may be sensing an opening in the South Carolina governor’s race after l’affaire Sanford, as yet another Dem jumped into the scrum: Dwight Drake, an attorney and lobbyist who hasn’t been elected before but is a prominent behind-the-scenes Democrat in Columbia.

• UT-Gov: Gary Herbert was sworn in as Utah’s Governor yesterday, replacing new Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman. Although Herbert is universally viewed as conservative, he rankled some conservatives by throwing a bone to the state party’s moderate wing by picking state Sen. Greg Bell to be Lt. Governor. He now has nine months to prepare for the GOP nominating convention for the 2010 special election, where possible candidates he may face include state Senators John Valentine and Steve Urquhart, state House speaker David Clark, and law professor Kirk Jowers. With Rep. Jim Matheson declining a run, the Dems’ next best bet is Salt Lake County mayor Peter Corroon.

• VA-Gov: Rasmussen takes its monthly look at the Virginia Governor’s race. Republican Bob McDonnell leads Democrat Creigh Deeds, 49-41, when leaners are pushed; the 8-point gap mirrors the R2K poll from last week, but is a drop from the 3-point gap in the July Rasmussen poll. Voters still like both of them; McDonnell’s favorables are 53/30, while Deeds’ are 48/39.

• GA-02: Rep. Sanford Bishop has an honest-to-gosh state Rep. opposing him this time, instead of the usual token Republican opposition: Mike Keown. Bishop should face little difficulty in this black-majority district he’s held since 1992, though. (H/t TheUnknown285.)

• NY-01: Speaking of Bishops, Rep. Tim Bishop also drew a bigger challenger than he’s used to, in the form of wealthy businessman Randy Altschuler, whom the NRCC had been trying to lure into the race. It remains to be seen if Altschuler, who’s never run for office before, has any political chops; the NRCC may have been loudly touting him more for his fundraising abilities, as he was a big McCain bundler and can open up his own wallet as well if need be. At any rate, it at least puts this D+0 district onto the map for 2010.

• NY-St. Sen.: It’s amazing what being in the majority can do for you: New York State Senate Democrats are now way in the lead in the fundraising, compared with the once-dominant Republicans. Dems have raised $6.9 million so far this year, compared with $2.5 million for the GOP, driven largely by shifts by unions who previously felt the need to play ball with the Republicans in order to avoid getting shut out of the discussion. The GOP still retains a cash-on-hand edge, though.

• FL-Sen: As the angling for a one-and-a-half-year fill-in for Mel Martinez’s Senate seat continues, there’s already been one prominent “no thanks,” from Jeb Bush (not that anyone would expect Charlie Crist to pick him, as there’s been a lot of Crist/Bush friction and Crist wouldn’t want to risk having a placeholder overshadow him). Meanwhile, a likelier pick, 70-year-old former Republican Rep. Clay Shaw (a Gold Coast moderate who served in the House from 1980 to his 2006 defeat) shot his hand up and said “pick me pick me!”

• IL-Sen: Chicago Urban League president (and former Rod Blagojevich spokeperson) Cheryle Jackson made her entry into the Democratic senatorial primary field official yesterday. However, the Illinois SEIU chapter, one of the state’s major unions, came out with an Alexi Giannoulias endorsement today, which, given their resources, moves him closer to having a lock on the nod. I’m wondering if they’re announcing in response to Jackson… or to Roland Burris, who keeps popping his head back up.

• KS-Sen: Not much change in the GOP Senate primary in Kansas since we last looked. SurveyUSA finds that Rep. Jerry Moran has a 38-32 lead over Rep. Todd Tiahrt, propelled along by a 78-13 edge in the state’s western portion. Moran led by 2 in June and 4 in April.

• NY-Sen-B, NY-16: It didn’t register much, at a time when all speculation focused on Rep. Carolyn Maloney, but several months ago Rep. Jose Serrano said he would consider a primary run against Kirsten Gillibrand. Yesterday he made clear that he wouldn’t get in the race (although he still didn’t sound very enthused about Gillibrand), which means that none of her former House colleagues are left planning a primary challenge.

• MN-Gov: Add one more second-tier Republican to the huge pile of prospects for the open Minnesota governor’s race: state Senator Mike Jungbauer, a religious rightist from exurban Anoka County, formally kicked off his campaign. He does already have one important endorsement in his corner; he was “called by God” to run.

• NJ-Gov: Today’s Quinnipiac poll has a slightly better showing for Jon Corzine, in line with last week’s R2K poll, though it’s far from time to start talking “comeback.” He cuts the lead to 9 points, 51-42, in a two-way poll of likely voters, down from 53-41 in July. More importantly, Corzine trails Chris Christie 46-40 in a three-way that includes independent Chris Daggett (who’s up to 7%). Campaign Diaries observes that the centrist Daggett (a former EPA regional administrator) is probably absorbing a lot of protest votes, keeping Democrats and moderate indies who hate Corzine from going over to Christie. If Corzine wins, he’ll owe Daggett a big ol’ “thank you.”

• NY-Gov The NYT reports on growing discomfort by various downballot electeds on the prospect of having David Paterson at the top of the ticket. Both Reps. Michael McMahon and Dan Maffei worry about the effect of Paterson’s low approvals spilling over into their own races. Not to worry: although it’s buried deep in the story, the Times says that powerful local Dems are pushing Paterson to stand down and make way for Andrew Cuomo — and that local bigwigs have been tugging at White House sleeves, hoping they’ll find a nice appointed position for Paterson soon.

• CA-10: The John Garamendi camp released an internal poll from Tulchin Research giving Garamendi a sizable edge in the upcoming special election: Garamendi is at 31, Mark DeSaulnier is at 21, Joan Buchanan is at 17, Anthony Woods is at 9, and Republican David Harmer is at 5. There’s a wrinkle with this poll, though (one that didn’t elude the DeSaulnier campaign): it’s a poll only of Democratic and decline-to-state voters, but the primary election is an all-party primary with one pool of votes (although under California law, the top Democrat and Republican will advance, not simply the top 2). In response to our inquiry, the Tulchin crew said that polling Republicans as well just wasn’t cost-effective, especially since there are six Republicans running and therefore there isn’t likely to be much party-line crossing.

In other CA-10 news, Garamendi got another bit of good news: he got the endorsement of both Bill Clinton and Al Gore (he was a deputy Secretary of Interior for part of the Clinton administration). However, a SurveyUSA that only tested favorables for the CA-10 candidates didn’t have good news for much of anyone: Garamendi is at 30/34, DeSaulnier is at 22/23, and Buchanan is at 16/25. Only up-and-comer Woods is in positive (if generally unknown) territory, at 14/13.

• CT-04: With presumptive GOP nominee state Senate minority leader John McKinney staying out, not one but two other GOPers got in the race against Democratic freshman Rep. Jim Himes. One was the party’s likely #2 choice, state Senator Dan Debicella; the other is Rob Merkle, a political novice but the wealthy owner of a financial services recruitment firm.

• PA-06: Maybe journalist Doug Pike won’t have the Dem primary to himself after all, now that Rep. Jim Gerlach is committed to the gubernatorial race. Bob Roggio, the little-known businessman who almost beat Gerlach in 2008, said he hasn’t “ruled it out.” Also, while there doesn’t seem to be anything tangible, there are indications that state Sen. Andy Dinniman, the Dems’ highest-profile elected official in the pivotal Chester County portion of the district, is “increasingly rumored to be seriously considering” the race.