Tag: Dede Scozzafava

Five weeks from election day and Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava (R) leads Bill Owens (D) by seven points with Doug Hoffman (C) trailing in the first independent poll of the special election to replace Army Secretary John McHugh in the House of Representatives for New York’s 23rd District.

The topline numbers from the Siena College Research Institute (LV, 9/27-29, MoE 3.9%) are:

Scozzafava 35%

Owens 28%

Hoffman 16%

http://www.siena.edu/uploadedf…

“This is a wide open race. One in five voters is currently undecided. Add to that the fact that one-third of Scozzafava’s current supporters and one-quarter of Owens’s current supporters say they are not very certain of their choice and that they very well may change their minds between now and Election Day.”

I think it fair to say this is a total tossup, particulary with the better known Scozzafava having such a small lead. I will update with more thoughts when I’ve poured over some of the internals.

UPDATE

Looking at the 2008 presidential race in the district we find Obama won Clinton, Essex, Franklin, Madison, Oswego and St. Lawrence counties. McCain carried Fulton, Hamilton, Jefferson, Lewis and Oneida.

The three-way makes it difficult to extrapolate but Scozzafava leads big in the West (which is where her Assembly district is located) matching McCain in Jefferson and Lewis counties but also in St. Lawrence where Obama won big.

On the contrary Owens leads in some of the central counties she represents and which McCain won, namely Madison, Oneiga and Oswego.

The good news is they are tied in places Obama won big – Clinton, Essex and Franklin. As andgarden mentions in the comments Obama is popular in the district so if people there get to know Owens and like what they hear I think there is a good chance he can take this one.

On the flipside McCain did well in Fulton and Hamilton so Owens is overperforming there though I suspect that has more to do with Hoffman taking conservative votes.

UPDATE 2

Favorables are interesting. Scozzafava clocks in at 33-20-47, favorable, unfavorable, no opinion. Hopefully Hoffman’s kamikaze act helps make people form a negative opinion.

Owens is at 23-12-64 so significantly more room to grow. Hoffman at 16-13-71.

Top issues, economy and health care, unsuprisingly, and the candidates are split.

McHugh’s endorsement would be key according to the numbers but if Obama comes out for Owens is it at all likely he will oppose his new boss? Interesting.

• NH-Sen: Joe Biden will be on duty to help Paul Hodes (who hasn’t set the world on fire with his fundraising so far) at a DC fundraiser on Oct. 5.

• SC-Sen: Democrats appear to have a candidate with some financial heft to take on Sen. Jim DeMint next year. The Indigo Journal writes that Rock Hill attorney Chad McGowan recently told local Democrats that he’ll be running full-time for the Senate nomination beginning in early October. (J)

• CA-Gov: Looks like the period of meditation on the Governor’s race that Jerry Brown promised us didn’t take very long: he’s opening his exploratory committee today. Meanwhile, Meg Whitman managed to poach another member of the Steve Poizner camp; former state GOP chair and former Assembly minority leader Bob Naylor dropped his Poizner endorsement and switched to Whitman.

• NJ-Gov: Yet another pollster sees the same story developing in New Jersey (this time it’s Quinnipiac). The race is tightening to within the margin of error, but it’s not because Jon Corzine is getting much better (he’s still not breaking 40); instead, Chris Christie is slowly deflating, while moderate independent Chris Daggett gains. Today’s poll has Christie up 43-39-12, a definite improvement over last month’s 47-37-9.

• VA-Gov: Creigh Deeds is finally playing one of his aces in the hole: Sen. Mark Warner, who generally polls as by far the most popular political figure in the state, cut an ad for Deeds and will be campaiging for him on weekends. Deeds also got an endorsement which, superficially, seems like a big coup, but isn’t, really: former GOP governor Linwood Holton. (The moderate Holton is father-in-law to Tim Kaine and endorsed Barack Obama in 2008.)

• NH-02: It looks like ex-Rep. Charlie Bass is getting off the fence and moving closer to an effort to reclaim his old seat, which he lost to Paul Hodes in 2006 but will be an open seat in 2010. He’ll be opening his exploratory committee tomorrow. (Although — maybe this is a possible sign of ambivalence — he says he’s opening the committee because he needs somewhere by quarter’s end to put all the unsolicited checks he’s received lately, or else he’ll have to return them.) He’ll probably still face a primary against the more conservative 2008 candidate, Jennifer Horn, assuming he runs.

• NY-23: As expected, Gov. Paterson has set Nov. 3rd for the NY-23 special election, the same day as other elections in the state (such as the NYC mayoral race), and of course the gubernatorial races in NJ and VA. GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava also got an endorsement that falls into the “as expected” category: from the Main Street Partnership, the ideological caucus for the dwindling ranks of moderate House Republicans.

• PA-04, 08: Two sophomore Democrats in Pennsylvania both got Republican challengers. In the Pittsburgh suburbs’ R+6 4th, Keith Rothfus, a Republican lawyer and former Dept. of Homeland Security official, will challenge Rep. Jason Altmire. (Apparently the NRCC’s top recruit, state House minority whip Mike Turzai, has been balking so far.) Meanwhile, in the less challenging 8th in the Philly burbs, computer consultant Jeffrey Schott is slated to run against Rep. Patrick Murphy.

• CA-Sen: Politics Magazine takes a look at how the blowback from the launch of iCarly Fiorina’s new website continues from all ends of the political spectrum, including a nice dig from SSP’s own Ben Schaffer. As California’s right-wingers sputter, there were also rumors circulating at the state’s recent Republican convention that radio talk-show host Larry Elder — the conservatives’ preferred candidate, and someone who expressed interest in the race — got boxed out by the NRSC, who told him not to run.

• IN-Sen: 33-year-old state Sen. Marlin Stutzman launched his long-shot bid against Evan Bayh with some help from Rep. Mark Souder, who introduced Stutzman at his kickoff rally. The race already has some fourth-tier figures in it: businessmen Richard Behney and Don Bates. Grant County Commissioner Mark Bardsley, former state Rep. Dan Dumezich, and self-funding popcorn magnate Will Weaver are also considering the race.

• NH-Sen: Kelly Ayotte is taking this whole not-saying-anything-about-her-positions thing to an illogical extreme, refusing to say for whom she voted for Governor in 2006 and 2008. Primary opponents Ovide Lamontagne and Sean Mahoney were quick to announce that they voted for Jim Coburn and Joe Kenney — i.e. the guys who ran against Ayotte’s ex-boss, Democratic Gov. John Lynch.

• NY-Sen-B: Ed Cox, having secured his role as New York state GOP chair despite a push from Rudy Giuliani to install one of his own lieutenants in the role, is now trying to make nice with Giuliani, encouraging him to run for the Senate seat currently held by Kirsten Gillibrand instead of for Governor. Giuliani hasn’t been returning Cox’s calls, and insists via spokespersons that it’s Governor or nothing.

• AZ-01: Former state Senate majority leader Rusty Bowers has filed to form an exploratory committee to run against freshman Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick in the mostly-rural 1st. He’s been out of the legislature since 2001 and has been a lobbyist for the Arizona Rock Products Association since then.

• IL-07: Rep. Danny Davis, who previously seemed poised to bail out of his west Chicago seat and run for Cook County Board President, now seems to be dialing that back. Davis says he has the signatures collected to run for Board President “should [he] choose to do so.” He may be having some second thoughts now that he has a key seat on Ways and Means and also because the expected field-clearing for him in the Board race didn’t happen. With Illinois’s super-early February primary, he has until mid-November to  make up his mind. Alderwoman Sharon Dixon says she’s running in the primary in the 7th regardless of what Davis does, though; however, some other likely contenders, like state Rep. LaShawn Ford and state Sen. Rickey Hendon are in a holding pattern to see what Davis does.

• IL-14: The field to take on Rep. Bill Foster in the Chicago suburbs just keeps growing, with the addition of GOP state Sen. Randy Hultgren. His best-known opponent in the now five-way primary is lawyer Ethan Hastert.

• MI-11: Natalie Mosher is a fundraising consultant who’s the only person with a hat in the ring for the Dems to go up against Rep. Thad McCotter. She’s telling supporters via e-mail that she’s “very close” to being named to the DCCC’s Red to Blue program — although that seems to be news to the DCCC, who say that R2B decisions won’t be made for some time and they are still talking to other possible candidates.

• NV-03: Yesterday we reported that former state Sen. Joe Heck was content to stay in the GOP gubernatorial primary, rather than switching over to the NV-03 slot vacated by John Guedry’s withdrawal. However, since then, Heck has signaled more interest, saying he hasn’t ruled it out and is discussing it with his family. Heck could turn out to be a step up from the inexperienced Guedry (remember that Rep. Dina Titus was a replacement candidate as well in 2008, who turned out in the end to be a better bet).

• NY-13: Here’s a strange rumor: disgraced ex-Rep. Vito Fossella has been making public rounds, leading to speculation that he’s considering a comeback (although there’s no sense whether he’d try again for the 13th, or elsewhere).

• NY-23: The Watertown Daily Times has some juicy dirt on Conservative candidate Doug Hoffman, who apparently pledged his support to GOP candidate Dede Scozzafava shortly after he was passed over by the party in favor of her… and then shortly thereafter reached out to the Conservatives and got their nod. His defense is that he didn’t know just how “liberal” Scozzafava really was, despite that having been a main bone of contention even before her selection.

• NYC: With the primary runoff elections set for tonight, SurveyUSA has a final poll of the two races at issue: Public Advocate and Comptroller. For Public Advocate, city councilor Bill DeBlasio leads ex-PA Mark Green 49-42 (although DeBlasio narrowly won the primary, Green led every poll prior to it). And for Comptroller, Eric John Liu leads David Yassky 48-40 (both are city councilors). (Discussion of tonight’s main event is underway in Pan‘s diary.) Meanwhile, it looks like Barack Obama won’t be expending any political capital on the New York mayor’s race, unless it becomes clear William Thompson is closing the gap on Michael Bloomberg.

• NY-St. Sen.: The Erie County, NY DA’s office is the latest to join a bipartisan chorus calling for an investigation into the shady campaign finance practices of political consultant Steve Pigeon. As you may recall, Pigeon was the mastermind behind billionaire Tom Golisano’s attempted coup in the New York State Senate earlier this year. Pigeon is also buddy-buddy with Republican-turned-Dem Sen. Arlen Specter, and gets a $150,000 sinecure (completely above-board, I’m sure) as counsel to now-legendary scumbag Pedro Espada, Jr. (D)

• PA-St. Sen.: One other race to keep an eye on tonight, in addition to the NYC races: a state Senate election in the Philly suburbs. It’s a seat vacated by a Republican (who left to take a job with the Chamber of Commerce); Republican state Rep. Bob Mensch is considered to have the edge to hold the seat over Lansdale councilor Anne Scheuring (picked after better-known Dems took a pass), although Dems have spent considerably on the race. The district (the 24th) takes a bite out of the corners of four counties that went convincingly for Obama (Bucks, Montgomery, Lehigh, and Northampton) but it’s exurban turf and has a Republican registration advantage — which is exactly the kind of district that has bedeviled PA Dems at the legislative level but that the Dems need to pick up if they’re ever going to take over the state Senate. The GOP currently holds a 29-20 edge, plus this one vacancy.

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.

Basswood Research for the Club For Growth (9/17, likely voters):

Bill Owens (D): 17

Dede Scozzafava (R): 20

Doug Hoffman (C): 17

Undecided: 45

(MoE: ±5.7%)

The Club For Growth seems ready and eager to jump into the fray in upstate New York after releasing this poll showing their homeboy Doug Hoffman in spitting distance of Scozzfava. The results are even more optimistic for Hoffman than those of Hoffman’s own polling (which had Scozzafava ahead by 30-19, with 20% going to Democrat Bill Owens). Both polls, with their fat MoEs (and in this case, a single-day sample), appear to have been done on the cheap, though. The fact that the Club For Growth appears to be ready to throw down must be music to the DCCC’s ears here.

Both party committees are up on the air with ads, but the NRCC has made the bigger investment: $120K vs. the DCCC’s $55K. But Team Blue is getting an assist from Hoffman, who’s up on the air with a new ad hammering Scozzafava from the right. Both the DCCC’s and Hoffman’s spots are available here:

RaceTracker: NY-23

• CT-Sen: Pro wrestling CEO Linda McMahon is apparently doing the things that normal candidates do when running for office, starting with her first radio ad. However, she’s already having to acknowledge that she hasn’t done a good job recently of doing another thing that normal politicians do, which is vote. She skipped the 2006 general election (the same year in which she donated $10K to the DCCC) and also the 2008 GOP primary.

• DE-Sen: There are a couple of interesting rumors that Delaware scribe Ron Williams (who doesn’t have the highest batting average out there) examines: one is that Beau Biden may run for AG again instead of Senate. (However, Williams seems to debunk that rumor, using some pretty definite phrasing in saying that “AG Biden will soon announce his candidacy for the U.S. Senate seat…” and also saying that Mike Castle is unlikely to want to run against Biden.) Meanwhile, there are rumors that the state’s other Senator, Tom Carper, is having some health problems and may not seek re-election in 2012. Carper himself denies the rumor, though, saying he’s fine. New Castle County Exec Chris Coons gets flagged as a likely Carper successor, though.

• MA-Sen: The bill to allow a temporary appointed Senator to fill Ted Kennedy’s seat until the Jan. 19 special election cleared another hurdle yesterday, passing the state Senate 24-16. A reconciled version still has to pass both houses but could do so today, so conceivably we could have a Deval Patrick signature today too. The momentum today seems to be with former DNC chair Paul Kirk, not Michael Dukakis for the appointment; Kennedy’s widow Victoria and sons Patrick and Teddy Jr. now all publicly back Kirk for the job (Kirk now chairs the JFK Presidential Library).

Meanwhile, former Red Sox rightie (although he’ll always be a Phillie to me) Curt Schilling says he won’t run for Senate. However, City Year head Alan Khazei made his entry into the race, on the Democratic side, official today.

• CA-Gov: Two decidedly unsurprising developments: ex-eBay CEO Meg Whitman formally “opened” her Republican candidacy with a rally and her first ads (although technically she’s been running since February), while AG Jerry Brown opened an exploratory committee for the Dem nod.

• NJ-Gov: Yet another poll of the New Jersey governor’s race shows Chris Christie with a sizable lead, although Jon Corzine does break through that 40% ceiling that’s been plaguing him. Rasmussen shows Christie ahead of Corzine 48-41, with independent Chris Daggett at 6%. Rasmussen’s previous look in early September pegged it at 46-38. And if there’s any doubt about what Jon Corzine’s last-ditch strategy is for winning this thing, check out this picture of his new billboard.

• VA-Gov: After a bit of post-debate waffling on the issue last week, Creigh Deeds came out in favor of new taxes to fund transportation projects. Promising to raise taxes is always a risky strategy, but given how paralyzed northern Virginia is, taxes to build infrastructure might actually be a winner in that part of the state. Also, Josh Goodman has a thoughtful piece on Deeds’ belated momentum in the polls: it’s a delayed reaction to the Bob McDonnell thesis, as it took a while to trickle down, via negative ads, to the non-WaPo-reading rabble.

• AR-04: It’s looking like the scandal surrounding Blue Dog Mike Ross, concerning his sale of a $263K pharmacy to the USA Drug chain (which is actively lobbying in the health care debate) for $420K, may have some legs. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington filed a complaint with the Justice Department asking for an investigation if there was a quid pro quo. Ross is busy attacking the messenger, calling ProPublica.com (which broke the story) a “leftist” organization.

• NY-23: The NRCC is up with a radio ad in the 23rd, and Dede Scozzafava’s camp seems flummoxed by it, to the extent that her spokesperson publicly asked the NRCC to save its money instead of spending it this way. The ad spends most of its time attacking Dem Bill Owens, trying to link him to Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi, with only a brief mention of Scozzafava’s positive qualities at the end. Scozzafava already questioned the NRCC’s airing of an anti-Darrel Aubertine ad when it looked like he’d be the candidate, and in a weird development, the NRCC’s website features a link to a story from Human Events questioning whether Scozzafava is too liberal. Not exactly what we’d call “teamwork.” Meanwhile, Bill Owens just got the endorsement of the regional SEIU, ordinarily a foregone conclusion for a Democrat but maybe not a sure thing with labor-friendly Scozzafava in the mix.  

• SC-01: Carroll “Tumpy” (his actual nickname) Campbell III made it official; he’ll be challenging Henry “Smoky” (that’s just our unofficial nickname for him) Brown in the GOP primary. The challenge from the son of the popular governor may prod the rather lackadaisical 73-year-old Brown into retirement.

• VA-02: Democratic freshman Rep. Glenn Nye got a sixth potential GOP opponent, in the form of Scott Taylor, a businessman, former Virginia Beach mayoral candidate, and former Navy SEAL. Taylor isn’t even the only former Navy SEAL running (so too is Ed Maulbeck); other GOPers are auto dealer Scott Rigell, Army Reserve Brig. Gen. Bert Mizusawa, businessman Ben Loyola, and former local GOP chair Chuck Smith. Although Nye’s R+5 district poses a theoretical challenge, note that none of his challengers has held elective office.

• Mayors: Boston mayor Tom Menino, who’s been in office for 16 years, had the weakest electoral showing of his mayoral career in yesterday’s primary election, pulling in 50.5% of the vote against a fractured field. He’ll face off in November against city councilor Michael Flaherty, who finished second with 24%. Flaherty, who is also an insider, doesn’t present as much as a contrast with Menino as the candidates who fell by the wayside.

• CO-Sen: It’s primary protection week at the White House. Fresh off hosting a big fundraiser for Arlen Specter, Barack Obama officially endorsed Sen. Michael Bennet, who’s fending off an ideologically curious primary challenge from former CO House Speaker Andrew Romanoff. (J)

• FL-Sen: Marco Rubio has picked up his second endorsement from Florida’s GOP House delegation. 5th District Rep. (and Main Street Partnership member, although certainly one of its less ‘moderate’ members) Ginny Brown-Waite endorsed Rubio yesterday, giving his Senate candidacy a potentially useful endorsement in the Tampa and Orlando exurbs. Back in June, dark red Panhandle Rep. Jeff Miller gave Rubio his official blessing. (J)

• MA-Sen: On a recent appearance on Fox Business, Harvard law professor and TARP watchdog Elizabeth Warren refused to flat-out say “no” when asked if she’d consider running for Ted Kenneday’s Senate seat. Warren is one of the most important progressive thinkers and activists in America today, but with little time, no prior electoral experience, and no campaign warchest, it’s hard to see how a potential candidacy could catch fire. (D)

Also, as expected, the Massachusetts legislature moved halfway toward modifying state law to allow temporary appointment of a stopgap Senator until the special election. The bill cleared the state House, 95-58; it is also expected to pass the state Senate, although procedural tactics will allow the Republicans to drag it out till next week.

• CA-Gov: Jerry Brown is being coy about when (or if) he’ll announce his gubernatorial bid, appearing at a function with three other would-be governors but saying “The people of California are not anxious to hear from their candidates yet, and the deadline for filing papers isn’t until March – so tune in.” Hopefully he left off the part about turning on and dropping out.

• NY-Gov: David Paterson either isn’t getting the message or has an admirable single-mindedness, but either way, he’s gearing up for a re-election run, hiring a campaign manager, Richard Fife (who previously managed the failed-to-launch Carolyn Maloney senatorial campaign).

• OR-Gov: We have our first poll of the Oregon governor’s race since people started piling into it, courtesy of vaunted local pollster Tim Hibbitts’ firm on behalf of the Portland Tribune and Fox 12 News. Ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber has wide leads over his Republican opponents (although still below the 50% mark): 43-23 over state Sen. Jason Atkinson and 46-21 over Allen Alley. Ex-SoS Bill Bradbury, who made it offical yesterday, isn’t tested. In other news, ex-Sen. Gordon Smith hadn’t seemed likely to make the race, and now it’s even much less likely, as he took a cushy new job in DC as president of the powerful lobby National Association of Broadcasters. This would leave Rep. Greg Walden as the one Republican of interest who has yet to weigh in on the race.

• SC-Gov: Lt. Governor Andre Bauer has made the offer to stand down from running in the 2010 gubernatorial election if he has to succeed Mark Sanford in the event of a resignation (or impeachment). But he’s attaching an expiration date to that offer now (only through next month), saying he needs to get started on his campaign.

• NY-23: Here’s a weird thought: could the ACORN scandal wind up sinking the Republican in the special election in the 23rd? The Conservative Party is going after Dede Scozzafava for her previous relationship with the Working Families Party, whose line she’s run on in the past. The WFP often works together with ACORN, so now Doug Hoffman is accusing her of palling around with the “radical left” and demanding she disavow the WFP. (Also noteworthy though expected: state Sen. Darrel Aubertine endorsed Dem candidate Bill Owens yesterday.)

• PA-11: Lackawanna County Commissioner Corey O’Brien has taken a step toward actually challenging crusty Rep. Paul Kanjorski in the Democratic primary by opening up a campaign account and filing a statement of candidacy with the FEC. O’Brien remains in exploratory mode, but says that he’ll have “more to say” on his campaign by the end of the year. (J)

• SD-AL: It’s starting to look like Republicans are going to make a real effort at giving Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin an actual race in 2010. The latest potential candidate whose name is being circulated in GOP circles is state Rep. Blake Curd of Sioux Falls. Secretary of State Chris Nelson says that he’s getting “very close” to making a decision, and state Rep. Shantel Krebs says that she’s still in “sit-and-wait mode” to see what Curd and Nelson decide. (J)

• Cap & Trade: A poll taken for the Environmental Defense Fund shows, contrary to conventional wisdom, support for cap-and-trade in some conservative Dem districts. While we haven’t seen the question wording yet, Greg Sargent says the numbers are positive in NC-11, IN-09 and VA-05, and promises full results soon. He also rightly points out:

When the cap and trade debate heats up again, we’ll hear lots more about how risky it is for “marginal” Dems to support it. It’s striking how often reporters (myself included) just accept the view that such votes are risky in districts like these, simply because someone, somewhere, claimed this is the case.

• Voting Rights: This is a welcome surprise. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a controversial Indiana law requiring voters to show identification last year, following a challenge to it in federal court. This year, though, there was a challenge to it in state court, and an appellate court in Indiana struck down the law for violating the state constitution’s Equal Privileges and Immunities Clause (primarily since it didn’t require mail-in voters to provide ID). The state plans to appeal to the Indiana Supreme Court. Has the pendulum swung far enough that challenges to voter suppression are likelier to get a fair hearing in state courts now instead of the federal system?

• CO-Sen: Former state House speaker Andrew Romanoff officially kicked off his primary challenge to Michael Bennet yesterday, with appearances in Pueblo, Colorado Springs, and Denver. Romanoff, however, wasted no time in demonstrating that he won’t be running to Bennet’s left, saying that he’s opposed to the card-check portion of EFCA. If he isn’t going to run to Bennet’s left, that leads to the question of: what other kind of an angle can he work, other than just “it’s my turn?”

• IL-Sen: Here’s an interesting development in the Illinois Senate race: EMILY’s List has weighed in, endorsing (surprise) Cheryle Jackson. EMILY’s List isn’t always a magic bullet in these type situations (see Tinker, Nikki), but it does expose Jackson to a nationwide base of donors. Politico does observe something odd, though: EMILY’s List hasn’t endorsed a female Senate candidate who seems to have at least somewhat better odds of making it out of her primary… Jennifer Brunner.

• NY-Sen-B (pdf): Some leftovers from yesterday’s Marist poll of NY-Gov: Kirsten Gillibrand is still having some growing pains, with an approval of 26% excellent or good, 38% fair, and 9% poor (with 27% not sure) and losing a head-to-head against ex-Gov. George Pataki, 48-44 (Pataki has been completely silent on the issue, but you’ve gotta wonder if the consistent numbers are getting him more interested). For yucks and giggles, they also matched Gillibrand up against Eliot Spitzer in a Dem primary, which she won 57-29. (Spitzer also loses a primary to David Paterson 60-31, and receives a general “no” on the issue of running again, 27/69.)

• IL-Gov: State GOP chair Andy McKenna, who briefly provoked a Mark Kirk temper tantrum when he said he’d run in the Illinois senate primary, has decided he still really wants to run for office, and instead has headed over to the Governor’s race, where there was no top-tier candidate or even clear frontrunner. This seemed to spook one of the candidates, suburban state Sen. Matt Murphy, who bailed out of the race and signed on as McKenna’s running mate. While McKenna has the fundraising connections and can self-fund as well, McKenna has never won a race (he finished 4th in the GOP Senate primary in 2004, meaning he lost not only to Jack Ryan but also Jim Oberweis), and he’ll still have to face DuPage County Board Chair Bob Schillerstrom (who has at least 900,000 constituents) as well as a gaggle of other state Senators. (H/t GOPVOTER.)

• MI-Gov: SoS Terri Lynn Land has signed onto Oakland Co. Sheriff Michael Bouchard’s ticket as his running mate. Land, you’ll recall, was widely expected to run for Governor but surprised everyone by endorsing Bouchard instead. (There was a brief rumor that she’d run in MI-03 after a Vern Ehlers retirement, but that doesn’t seem to be happening.)

• NH-Gov: Rasmussen throws in gubernatorial numbers as part of its sample from Sep. 14 that found Kelly Ayotte up on Paul Hodes by 8 in the Senate race. The results help cast a little more doubt on the composition of that particular sample, as the state’s widely popular Democratic Governor, John Lynch, leads former Senator John Sununu (who I’ve never seen mentioned in connection with that race) by only 48-43. Lynch beats the only announced candidate, businessman Jack Kimball, 52-31, and vaguely interested state Senator Chuck Morse 51-29.

• NJ-Gov: PPP tried out some alternate scenarios in New Jersey involving replacement Democrats for Jon Corzine (although Corzine hasn’t made any moves to get out, and it’s unclear why he would at this point, with his numbers improving somewhat). The bottom line is, it wouldn’t help anyway; Rep. Frank Pallone loses big-time to Chris Christie 43-23 (with Chris Daggett at 15). Newark mayor Corey Booker doesn’t fare much better, even though he has very high approval ratings: he loses 41-33-13.

• OR-Gov: We’ll definitely have a contested primary on the Democratic side, despite the entry of heavyweight ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber. Former SoS Bill Bradbury is staying in the race, preparing to announce today, and yesterday releasing a video endorsement from his most prominent backer, former Gov. Barbara Roberts, who preceded Kitzhaber in office. Meanwhile, Kitzhaber released a literal shitload of endorsements yesterday, with many of the state’s key Democrats (AG John Kroger, Treasurer Ben Westlund, Superintendent of Education Susan Castillo, Multnomah County Chair Ted Wheeler, ex-Portland mayor Vera Katz, ex-Rep. Darlene Hooley) and some names who’d been bandied about as possible candidates (state Sen. Mark Hass, Portland city counilor Randy Leonard) on board — not a lot of oxygen left for Bradbury, or for Rep. Peter DeFazio, if he still wants to get in.

• PA-Gov: Scranton mayor Chris Doherty is almost certain to run for the Democratic nod for Governor, insiders are saying. He’s staffing up (including some heavy hitters, including media pro Tad Devine) and polling.

• TX-Gov: Rasmussen’s new poll of the Texas governor primary on the Republican side has a big surprise: it’s the first poll in ages (since May) to give a lead to Kay Bailey Hutchison. KBH leads incumbent Rick Perry 40-38, with somebody named Debra Medina, who’s from the Ron Paul wing of the party, pulling in 3% of the vote… apparently pulling in enough of Perry’s base of teabag/secession nuts to flip the race to KBH. Rasmussen’s May poll had Perry up 42-38.

• CA-42: Republican Rep. Gary Miller has drawn a wealthy primary challenger, Lee McGroarty, an executive with an investment firm. Ethical clouds related to real estate deals have followed Miller, but he’s probably more vulnerable to an anti-insider primary challenge than a Democrat in this R+10 Orange County district.

• NY-23: After Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts dropped their barely-explicable holds on the confirmation of Rep. John McHugh for Secretary of the Army, the New York Republican was confirmed last night. The three candidates — Democrat Bill Owens, Republican Dede Scozzafava, and Conservative Doug Hoffman — now are waiting to see when the special election is scheduled. State law requires David Paterson to schedule the election between 30 and 40 days from his announcement of the date, so in order to schedule the election on the regular election day of Nov. 3 (like everyone expects will happen), he’ll need to delay the announcement for at least another week.

• Campaign Finance: Last month, a federal judge ruled that Connecticut’s relatively new campaign matching fund system violated the First Amendment, saying it impermissibly put unfair burdens on “hopeless” minor party candidates that it did not also place on equally hopeless major party candidates running in uncompetitive districts. (The decision was in part based on the Supreme Court case that struck down the federal Millionaire’s Amendment last year.) AG Dick Blumenthal is appealing to the Second Circuit. Meanwhile, some folks in Arizona are concerned that this ruling might implicate their own public financing system. (D)

• MA-Sen: AG Martha Coakley wasted no time in announcing her candidacy for the special election for the Massachusetts Senate seat; unlike the myriad members of the House delegation, she’s not waiting to see if a Kennedy gets in. Meanwhile, people are definitely talking about a candidacy by Curt Schilling, retired from the Boston Red Sox. If Schilling runs, he’s ineligible to do so as a Republican, though; he’s registered as an independent, and he doesn’t have enough time under Massachusetts to change his registration to be able to run as an R. (Schilling himself acknowledges he may not be the best candidate, although he clearly is enjoying the spotlight.)

• NC-Sen: Former state Sen. and Iraq vet Cal Cunningham seems to be acting more like a candidate, and he got a big boost from a recent speech to a Democratic group in Charlotte which has gone viral, as they kids say these days. He lit Burr up with zinger after zinger, effectively summing up the anonymous Burr this way: “In 15 years on Capitol Hill you can’t name one thing that Richard Burr has done to make your life better, and I can’t either.”

• NV-Sen: Feeling confident after seeing several polls giving her an edge over Harry Reid, Nevada GOP chair Sue Lowden is resigning her post, presumably with an eye toward a Senate run. Since there are already announced candidates (former SoS candidate Danny Tarkanian), she’s resigning as of Sep. 30 to avoid a conflict of interest.

• PA-Sen, PA-Gov (pdf): Franklin & Marshall is out with a poll of the Pennsylvania races, although the undecideds are bizarrely large. Case in point, Arlen Specter leads Joe Sestak 37-11 in the Dem primary (with 46% don’t know and 6% other). Specter bests Pat Toomey in the general, 37-29, while Toomey beats Sestak, 26-22. (As an amusing aside, Sestak and Toomey had a Specter-free debate at Muhlenberg College last night and then adjourned to a local pub together for a round of beers and further private trash-talking of Specter.) F&M also polled the GOP gubernatorial primary, where Tom Corbett leads Jim Gerlach 15-6 (with 73% don’t know!). Outgoing Gov. Ed Rendell has quickly plunged from most popular figure in the state to least popular, with a favorable of 32/53.

• MN-Gov: Former Dem state House leader Matt Entenza recently hired Friend of SSP Dana Houle to manage his campaign for governor. Congrats to Dana, and best wishes to Entenza, who made a wise choice. (D)

• NV-Gov: You know your political career is over when other members of your own party are using your name as a cudgel against their opposition. Minor GOP gubernatorial candidate Mike Montandon issued a press release attacking John Ensign over his alleged recruiting of recently-retired federal judge Brian Sandoval into the gubernatorial primary. (Although presumably the intent was to besmirch his opponent Sandoval, by linking him to Ensign.)

• VA-Gov: One more poll to mention in Virginia, not as favorable as the PPP poll from Tuesday. Rasmussen’s latest look at the race gives Bob McDonnell a 51-42 lead over Creigh Deeds with leaners (49-39 without), not much changed from the early August sample of 47-38. The entire one-day sample was on Sep. 1, after news of McDonnell’s anti-fornicator manifesto had broken. Speaking of said master’s thesis, Deeds is already on the air with radio spots (wisely airing only in northern Virginia) attacking McDonnell over the thesis. In another sign of Dems’ renewed confidence in this race, the DNC is pouring a truckload of cash into the race: $5 million.

• CA-50: Dave Roberts, a city councilor and former mayor in Solana Beach, confirmed today that he’ll be a candidate in the 50th against GOP Rep. Brian Bilbray. Roberts, an openly gay veteran, has sounded more conservative notes than the other Dems in the primary, 2006 candidate Francine Busby and attorney Tracy Emblem; he recently changed his registration from Independent to Democratic. (UPDATE: The Roberts camp informs us that he is not a veteran.)

• FL-16: The DCCC sounds happy with its recruit to go against freshman Tom Rooney, 36-year-old St. Lucie County Commissioner Chris Craft. He also has a compelling backstory, as seen in this recent interview.

• NH-01: Here’s a poll of the hotly contested race in the 1st, courtesy of Populus Research (the same guys who polled NH-Sen a few weeks ago and found no undecideds) on behalf of the conservative site Now Hampshire. Carol Shea-Porter leads GOP mayor of Manchester Frank Guinta, 46.3%-43.4% (I’m not sure what’s up with the extra significant digits when the MoE is still 4%, but who am I to nitpick?). Guinta previously released an NRCC internal poll in April that had him down 43-34.

• NY-23: Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava seems to have one Achilles heel in the NY-23 open seat special election: her brother Thomas (in the fine tradition of Billy Carter, Roger Clinton, and Neil Bush). Turns out she owns $1 million in preferred stock (and a 3% voting stake) in her brother’s troubled company, Seaway Valley Capital Corporation, a holding company whose subsidiaries owe $192,000 in back taxes. She maintains she’s a mere “passive investor,” although she is COO of an affiliated company, Seaway Capital Partners.

• KY-State Sen.: It looks like Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear is going to continue his stealth plan to dismantle the GOP’s majority in the Kentucky state Senate, one seat at a time. Still riding high off of Democrat Robin Webb’s recent win of a GOP-held state Senate seat, Republican Senate President David Williams is pre-emptively whining in the press about Beshear’s efforts to see that GOP Senate Majority Leader Dan Kelly gets nominated to a vacant circuit judgeship. This move has been rumored for some time, and back in July, the names of two Democrats were floated for a potential special election in Kelly’s seat in central Kentucky’s Bourbon territory: former state Rep. Jodie Haydon of Bardstown or Nicky Rapier, the son of the late House leader Kenny Rapier. (J)

• MA-Sen: Now we know the dates for the special election to fill the seat left behind by Ted Kennedy. Deval Patrick set the dates as Dec. 8 for the primary (which will be the real focus in this dark blue state) and Jan. 19 for the general. Meanwhile, while many possible contenders are waiting to see what Joe Kennedy II does, it looks like AG Martha Coakley (who has been sizing up a Senate run for years) isn’t wasting any time. One of her representatives picked up filing papers today.

• FL-Sen: It shouldn’t be a surprise that Marco Rubio didn’t like Charlie Crist’s pick of George LeMieux as interim Senator, since approximately nobody liked it. Rubio takes to NRO to say he would have picked conservative Orlando-area state Sen. Dan Webster instead (who could still surface as a candidate in FL-08).

• IL-Sen: Cheryle Jackson, president of Chicago’s Urban League, hasn’t gotten much attention yet in the Democratic primary. However, she just got several noteworthy endorsements, from Rep. Bobby Rush and the Cook County Democratic Women Organization.

• NC-Sen: Maybe Rep. Bob Etheridge is moving toward a Senate run after all? He just launched a blistering salvo toward Richard Burr over health care reform in a DNC conference call today, attacking Burr’s “Patients Choice Act” counterproposal. Etheridge wouldn’t say anything about his intentions for 2010, though.

• NY-Sen-B: Somehow the New York Post got the ball rolling on the idea of an Eliot Spitzer comeback, either with a run for Comptroller or even Kirsten Gillibrand’s Senate seat. Spitzer quickly acted today to dispel the idea.

• SC-Sen: Democrats are back to the drawing board on a challenger for Jim DeMint. State Sen. Bradley Hutto had sounded very interested, but announced over the weekend that he won’t run. Lawyer and former Fritz Holling aide Ashley Cooper is about the only other credible name on tap.

• NJ-Gov: The police department of Lambertville, NJ – the town where Chris Christie got seemingly preferential treatment after he was pulled over for speeding back in 2005 – says that their director is “no longer returning media calls.” Sketchy, huh? Christie’s varying tales about what exactly happened at that stop aren’t helping him, either. He’s now claiming that his identity as US Attorney only came up during the incident because the tow-truck driver recognized him. Shah, right. (D)

• SC-Gov: Seems like Mark Sanford’s up to his 10th or 11th life already. After rumors that the legislature was ready to do a special session to impeach him, now the state GOP is saying it’s not ready to issue an ultimatum letter threatning impeachment (although they throw the door open to any lawmakers wanting to draft the legislation individually).

• MO-04: It’s not unusual for a challenger to have nice things he said about an incumbent thrown back in his face. But this is kind of an extreme case: GOP state Sen. Bill Stouffer, chasing 33-year Rep. Ike Skelton in the 4th, has not only called Skelton “an outstanding advocate for the people of west-central Missouri and the state as a whole” but said it while sponsoring legislation to name a bridge after Skelton.

• NY-19: Republican Assemblyman Greg Ball continues to impress, well, at least Pete Sessions; he just got named to the “On the Radar” part of the NRCC’s “Young Guns” program. He’s running against sophomore Rep. John Hall in this R+3 district.

• NY-23: Looks like Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman is gaining some traction, seeing as Republican nominee Dede Scozzafava has started attacking him in the press. This could bode well for Democrat Bill Owens – back in 2004, in a state Senate race in the same part of New York, Dem David Valesky snuck through with a narrow win after a Conservative candidate helped split the right-wing vote in the district. (D)

• WI-05: Best wishes for a speedy recovery for Wisconsin’s Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, who has been diagnosed with treatable, early stage prostate cancer.