Tag: Polls

With the outsider and/or netroots candidates (I threw in the “and/or” because Jack Conway doesn’t really fit the “outsider” tag) having overperformed polling expectations in basically all the major primaries (Arkansas, Pennsylvania, and both sides in Kentucky), I thought it would be worth a quick look at what pollsters came closest to getting it right before Tuesday.

• Arkansas: The two polls in the two weeks, from R2K and Mason-Dixon before the primary both gave Blanche Lincoln a lead in the 10-ish ballpark, quite different from her 45-42 finish. The closest prediction came from back in mid-April, in the TalkBusiness poll (conducted by Zeta|3), which gave Lincoln a 7-point lead (38-31) and was also the only pollster to see D.C. Morrison breaking into the double digits (at 10 — he ended up at 13).

• Kentucky (D): The night’s closest result, a 44-43 win for Jack Conway, has to be seen as a surprise: no public pollster had given Conway a lead over Dan Mongiardo since PPP back in December. (A Conway internal in early May gave himself a 4-point lead.) Honors in this category probably go to SurveyUSA, who one week before the primary foresaw a dead heat, in the form of a 38-37 Mongiardo lead.

• Kentucky (R): The 59-35 Randslide was a bigger Paul edge than most pollsters saw, although if you follow the trendlines, there was a pretty clear break for Paul among undecideds at the end that put him on a trajectory for 59. The three last pollsters to hit this race all caught that trend: SurveyUSA on the 9th-11th saw it at 49-33, and PPP and Magellan on the 15th-16th saw 52-34 and 55-30 respectively. I’ll give Republican firm Magellan the nod, for almost nailing the margin.

• Pennsylvania: As I’d expected, Pennsylvania’s primary saw the incumbent rule making a comeback, as most undecideds broke Joe Sestak’s way for a 54-46 victory over Arlen Specter (the Pollster aggregate going in was 43-all). With most pollsters projecting a dead heat, I was a little skeptical at the time of Suffolk’s one-week-out prediction of a 9-point margin (49-40), but that turned out very close to the actual margin.

• PA-12: There’s not much polling data to compare here (Pollster doesn’t have an aggregate), but two of the pollsters that we tend to like, PPP and R2K, both whiffed, predicting a narrow Tim Burns victory (rather than the actual 53-45 Mark Critz win). The winner here is the Global Strategy Group poll that came straight from the Critz camp, accurately prediciting an 8-point spread (44-36); the best public poll came from, of all places, Susquehanna (a Pennsylvania-based Republican pollster, although working for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review rather than Burns here), whose last poll of the race gave a 44-38 edge to Critz.

While we’re talking about the 12th, how did we at SSP do? We had a sophisticated model running behind the scenes helping us with our projections as the night progressed, and our numbers guru jeffmd shares his assessment:

The model (in my not-so-unbiased opinion) did decently well, but as with these types of models, suffers from the all-too-tenuous uniform swing assumption. Uniform swing was clearly not out in force today, considering, for example, a 6.63% Critz overperformance in Cambria County (Critz’s base) and a 5.83% underperformance in Washington County (Burns’ home base). Variability in precinct size is also an issue. In terms of predicting percentages, the model got pretty close with about 1/3 of precincts in (see graph below), but in terms of raw votes, the model seemed to underestimate the number of votes cast (second graph). For what it’s worth, this is a problem also present in the Coakley-Brown model. Regardless, it’s something SSP Labs will continue to refine moving forward.

• AR-Sen: Labor seems quite keen to finish the job against Blanche Lincoln in the runoff; the AFSCME just anted up $1.4 million for the coming weeks. This includes not just an IE blitz on the state’s inexpensive airwaves, but also 30 staffers on the ground, with a particular emphasis on driving up African-American turnout. Meanwhile, Mark Blumenthal took an in-depth look at the AR-Sen poll released yesterday by DFA giving Bill Halter the lead; he had some of the same issues with question order that we did.

• KS-Sen: Rep. Jerry Moran is out with an internal poll from POS that gives him a dominant lead over fellow Rep. Todd Tiahrt in the GOP primary for the open Senate seat. Moran leads 53-27, including a similar 51-33 among those who are “favorable” to the Tea Party movement (despite Moran being somewhat more moderate than the social conservative Tiahrt… Moran’s appeal to them may be that Tiahrt is one of those pork-hugging Appropriators).

• KY-Sen: Quickest post-primary implosion ever? Rand Paul, after getting bogged down by questions yesterday over his feelings about the Civil Rights Act, dug his hole even deeper on the Rachel Maddow show last night. He tried to walk that back today on safer turf on Laura Ingraham’s show, saying that he would have voted for it in 1964 and wouldn’t support repeal of anti-discrimination laws today, although he also said that it was a political mistake to go on a liberal talk show in the first place. Democrats like John Yarmuth and Jim Clyburn are still going on the offensive, while Republican leaders like Jim DeMint and John Cornyn are busy mumbling “no comment.” Even Jeff Sessions is backpedaling. Nate Silver is circumspect about how much damage this may have actually caused Paul in Kentucky, but casts some very suspicious eyes in the direction of Rasmussen’s new poll of the race today.

• NV-Sen: Busgate seems to be the second half of Sue Lowden’s quick one-two punch to her own nose. Having been called out that her name is on the donated campaign bus’s title (despite previous contentions that it was leased), she’s now admitting that she “misspoke” about her bus. The FEC is starting to take up the matter.

• PA-Sen: Biden alert! Looks like the White House is eager to move past that whole Arlen Specter endorsement, as the Vice-President (and Scranton favorite son) is gearing up to campaign on behalf of Joe Sestak.

• WA-Sen: I’m just getting more and more confused about the state of the Republican field, as Sarah Palin, out of pretty much nowhere, gave an endorsey-supporty-type thing in favor of Clint Didier today. Is this a shot across Dino Rossi’s bow to keep him from jumping in (which is locally rumored to be imminent), an endorsement after finding out that Rossi isn’t getting in (which competing local rumors also assert), or just Palin marching to the beat of her own off-kilter drum? Didier, in case you’ve forgotten, is a long-ago NFL player turned rancher who, of the various GOP detritus in the race right now, has been the one most loudly reaching out to the teabaggers. The Rossi-friendly Seattle Times must see him as at least something of a threat, as they recently tried to smack him down with a piece on the hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal farm subsidies Didier has enjoyed.

• AL-Gov: A little more information is surfacing on that shadowy birther group, the New Sons of Liberty, that’s been promising to dump seven figures in advertising into the Republican gubernatorial field. The group has a website up now, and it lists a real-world address that’s the same as Concerned Women for America, a group who’ve been supportive of Roy Moore in the past.

• GA-Gov: Insider Advantage has another look at the Republican gubernatorial primary in Georgia. They don’t see much of note, other than a bit of a Deal uptick: Insurance Comm. John Oxendine is at 23, followed by ex-Rep. Nathan Deal at 15, ex-Sos Karen Handel at 14, Eric Johnson at 5, Jeff Chapman at 2, and Ray McBerry at 2. (April’s poll had Oxendine at 26, Handel at 18, and Deal at 9.)

• MA-Gov: Grace Ross, the other Dem in the primary (and the 2006 Green Party candidate), has had to pull the plug on her candidacy, lacking the signatures to qualify. Incumbent Deval Patrick, whose political fortunes seem to keep improving, has the Dem field to himself now.

• NY-Gov: Suddenly, there’s a fourth candidate in the GOP gubernatorial race. In a year with no Mumpowers or Terbolizards, this guy may be the winner for this cycle’s best name: M. Myers Mermel. He’s a Westchester County businessman who had been running for Lt. Governor and reportedly had locked down many county chairs’ support in that race but inexplicably decided to go for the upgrade. This comes on top of word that state GOP chair Ed Cox, worried that the Steve Levy thing may have blown up in his face, has been trying to lure yet another guy into the race: recently-confirmed state Dept. of Economic Development head Dennis Mullen. Frontruner ex-Rep. Rick Lazio is undeterred, naming his running mate today: Greg Edwards, the county executive in tiny (by NY standards) upstate Chautauqua County.

• AL-07: Terri Sewell, the one candidate in the race with money, is out with an internal poll from Anzalone-Liszt showing a three-way dead heat. Sewell is tied with Jefferson Co. Commissioner Shelia Smoot at 22 apiece, with state Rep. Earl Hilliard Jr. at 20. Attorney Martha Bozeman is at 7. By contrast, a Smoot poll from April had Smoot in the lead, at 33, to Hilliard’s 28 and Sewell’s 9. The intervening event? Sewell hit the TV airwaves; she’s likely to be the only candidate able to do so.

• AR-01: This is charming: when a state Rep., Tim Wooldridge (one of the two contestants in the Democratic runoff in the 1st) proposed a bill changing the method of execution in Arkansas to public hanging. Now, granted, several other states do allow hanging as alternate method (both blue states, oddly enough), but public hanging?

• LA-03: Hunt Downer, the former state House speaker, has been acting candidate-like for a while, but is finally making it official, filing the paperwork to run in the Republican primary in this Dem-held open seat. Downer seems like the favorite (in the primary and general) thanks to name rec, although he’ll need to get by attorney Jeff Landry in the primary, who has a financial advantage and claims an internal poll from April giving him a 13-point lead over Downer.

• NY-15: There’s one more Dem looking to take out long-long-time Rep. Charlie Rangel, who’s looking vulnerable in a primary thanks to ethics woes. Craig Schley, a former Rangel intern, announced he’s running (he also ran against Rangel in 2008). With the field already split by Vince Morgan and Jonathan Tasini (UPDATE: and Adam Clayton Powell IV), though, that may just wind up getting Rangel elected again.

• PA-12: PPP has more interesting crosstab information from PA-12, showing the difference candidate quality, and appropriateness for the district, can make. Tim Burns had 27/52 favorability among self-declared “moderates,” while Mark Critz had 67/27 favorables. (Guess who won?) Compare that with Scott Brown in Massachusetts, who had 62/31 favorability among moderates. And here’s an interesting tidbit: the NRCC spent fully one-tenth of its cash on hand on PA-12. (In order to get spanked.)

• VA-02: A lot of Republicans who’ve lent support to Scott Rigell in the primary in the 2nd may be wondering what they’re getting themselves into, as more detail on his contributions record comes out. Not only did he give money to Barack Obama in 2008 (as has been known for a while), but he also contributed to Mark Warner and in 2002 gave $10,000 to a referendum campaign that would have raised sales taxes in the Hampton Roads area. If he hadn’t already kissed Tea Party support goodbye, it’s gone now.

• Turnout: The WaPo has interesting turnout data in Arkansas and Pennsylvania. Arkansas turnout, juiced by the competitive Senate campaigns, was actually higher than the 2008 presidential primary.

• House GOP: That highly-touted ban on earmarks imposed on its members by the House GOP leadership? Yeah, turns out that’s just kind of more of a “moratorium” now. One that’s set to expire in January, so they can resume appropriating away once the election’s over.

Public Policy Polling (5/14-16, Colorado voters, 3/5-8 in parens):

John Hickenlooper (D): 44 (50)

Scott McInnis (R): 44 (39)

Undecided: 12 (11)

(MoE: ±4.1%)

Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper’s numbers have come back down to Earth, although perhaps PPP’s March poll of this race was more of an outlier than anything else. Still, PPP continues to find Hickenlooper with solid 47-33 favorables, a cut above McInnis’ 31-30 spread… and incumbent Gov. Bill Ritter, for that matter, whose numbers have slid down to 34-52. Ritter definitely did the Democratic ticket a solid by stepping aside, but this will be no cakewalk going forward.

AR-Sen: Democracy For America is out with a new poll that they commissioned from Research 2000 on the Democratic primary runoff, and it finds Halter ahead of Lincoln by 48-46. A couple of caveats, though: the runoff top lines are buried under a series of issues-related questions, which could suggest that the runoff was tested later in the question order; also, keep in mind that this was a snap overnight poll with no callbacks instead of their usual method. We’ll probably be seeing plenty of polling out of Arkansas over the next three weeks, so I wouldn’t get too excited about a quickie poll like this one.

Meanwhile, Lincoln still has a pretty powerful weapon in her arsenal — the unqualified support of Bill Clinton. Clinton will campaign with Lincoln in Little Rock on May 28.

CT-Sen: Markos does a very thorough job rounding up the independent push-back against the New York Times’ over-the-top hit pieces against Democrat Richard Blumenthal.

FL-Sen: Here’s an amusing slice of parochialism. NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg, a famous independent, is refusing to endorse Charlie Crist’s Senate candidacy because Crist vetoed a controversial teacher “merit pay” bill passed by the Florida state legislature.

KY-Sen: After initially vowing to seek a recanvass of the statewide vote, Democrat Dan Mongiardo has instead elected to concede the race to AG Jack Conway.

Meanwhile, Rand Paul says that he now plans to be “best friends” with Mitch McConnell — a dude whom he shared tense relations with during the primary season. The bigger story for Paul right now, though, seems to be the national attention that some of his uncompromising views are receiving. Think Progress takes a look at Paul’s reservations with the 1964 Civil Rights Act, specifically the idea that private businesses can’t be as racist as they want to be. (The original source of that nugget, a Louisville Courier-Journal editorial interview, offers a pretty damning assessment of Paul: “The trouble with Dr. Paul is that despite his independent thinking, much of what he stands for is repulsive to people in the mainstream.”)

PA-Gov: How’s this for some thin-skinned bullshit? Republican Attorney General (and gubernatorial nominee) Tom Corbett is subpoenaing Twitter to provide “any and all subscriber information” on two user accounts who have been anonymously criticizing Corbett in missives under 140 characters long. Corbett is apparently going after these two users for their “violations of the laws of Pennsylvania” — whatever that means. It sure doesn’t look like an abuse of office for a politician to use the justice system to silence his critics, does it?

ID-01: Moose Lady to the rescue! Sarah Palin is returning to Idaho on Friday to help pump up the flagging candidacy of Vaughn Ward, whose bid for Congress hit a few snags recently, including allegations that he’s actually a closeted Democrat.

IN-03: Were you wondering how disgraced GOP Rep. Mark Souder got dimed out of office? Souder’s colleague in the Indiana delegation, fellow Republican Mike Pence, effectively claimed his scalp yesterday, saying that he directed the House Ethics Committee to the attention of Souder’s philandering ways. That’s some stone cold shit right there!

NY-14: Lake Research for Carolyn Maloney (5/10-12, likely voters):

Carolyn Maloney (D-inc): 75

Reshma Saujani (D): 7

Undecided: 17

(MoE: ±4.9%)

PA-06: We missed this in yesterday’s round-up, but Doug Pike has conceded the Democratic nod to take on Rep. Jim Gerlach to Manan Trivedi. Pike also issued an unqualified endorsement of Trivedi for the general election.

SC-05: Veteran Dem Rep. John Spratt is hitting back hard against recent NRCC attacks that have attempted to label Spratt as an “amnesiac” with a faulty memory. Spratt, who recently disclosed that he has been diagnosed with early-stage Parkinson’s disease, is calling the NRCC’s missives an attempt to sow doubt about his health, which he calls “beneath contempt”. Even Spratt’s Republican foe in the race, state Sen. Mick Mulvaney, attempted to put some daylight between himself and the NRCC.

VA-05: Feda Kidd Morton, a favorite of the teabagger scene, is in a bit of hot water for an opinion piece she wrote for a local newspaper back in February that turned out to be heavily cribbed from an article written by syndicated conservative columnist Joseph Sobran. In response, Morton says she did no wrong because, “restating principles of the Constitution is no different than restating the Ten Commandments.” Yuh huh. And if you are a Scottish Lord, then I am Mickey Mouse.

Public Policy Polling (5/14-16, Colorado voters, 3/5-8 in parens):

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 44 (43)

Jane Norton (R): 41 (43)

Undecided: 14 (14)

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 44 (45)

Tom Wiens (R): 36 (37)

Undecided: 20 (18)

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 45 (46)

Ken Buck (R): 39 (36)

Undecided: 16 (14)

Andrew Romanoff (D): 43 (44)

Jane Norton (R): 41 (39)

Undecided: 16 (17)

Andrew Romanoff (D): 41 (44)

Tom Wiens (R): 37 (36)

Undecided: 22 (20)

Andrew Romanoff (D): 41 (45)

Ken Buck (R): 38 (34)

Undecided: 22 (21)

(MoE: ±3.0%)

No huge changes in the top lines here, though it is certainly nice to see Bennet with his head back above water for change against NRSC favorite Jane Norton, thanks in large part to Bennet’s improvement among independent voters. But speaking of Norton, it’s looking like she’s in for a rough ride against teabagger favorite Ken Buck, the District Attorney of Weld County. Check out these primary trend lines:

Jane Norton (R): 31 (34)

Ken Buck (R): 26 (17)

Tom Wiens (R): 5 (7)

Others: 10 (9)

Undecided: 29 (32)

(MoE: ±4.6%)

If you haven’t seen it already, check out this Denver Post profile on Norton’s rather vacuous campaign, in which she has a hard time defending the very existence of her candidacy to reporters. It’s stuff like that that really deflates the notion that Norton is in any way formidable. And, for what it’s worth, PPP’s Tom Jensen is willing to put his dollar on Buck winning the primary right now.

In the Democratic primary, Bennet’s lead is looking a bit more comfortable:

Michael Bennet (D-inc): 46 (40)

Andrew Romanoff (D): 31 (34)

Undecided: 23 (26)

(MoE: ±4.7%)

I’m sure Romanoff supporters may point to the late surges of candidates like Jack Conway, Joe Sestak, and Bill Halter as evidence that Romanoff can still win this. Maybe so! But remember that all of those examples were backed by serious financial muscle, whereas Romanoff is at a severe disadvantage in that department.

• CA-Sen: Good news for Tom Campbell, in the form of the Senate half of M4’s poll of the California GOP primary: he leads Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore, 33-28-15. (Of course, with his plans to briefly go dark to conserve funds, that gives Fiorina a chance to play catchup when the margin’s not that big.) Bad news for Campbell, though: the NRA has him in its metaphorical crosshairs, sending out a mailer to members attacking Campbell and, while not endorsing, offering kind words for Fiorina and DeVore.

• CT-Sen: This is going to make it a lot easier for Richard Blumenthal to make the case that the “in Vietnam” controversy is something of a cheap shot. A longer-form video release of the appearance (provided, ironically, by the Linda McMahon campaign, undercutting their own hatchet job) where the offending phrase occurred have him correctly referring to having “served in the military, during the Vietnam era” in the very same speech. That’s not stopping Vietnam vet Rob Simmons, who, sensing an opening, has rolled out web advertising with “Blumenthal Lied About Vietnam” in very large letters.

Blumenthal is getting more explicit backing from Democratic bigwigs now, as his mea culpa/attempt to get back on the offense seems to have had the desired effect. Rep. Chris Murphy, the likeliest guy to pick up the pieces if Blumenthal had to bail out, offered his unqualified support; so too did Howard Dean. And here’s one thing that’s actually good about Rasmussen‘s one-day, no-callback samples: they can strike fast. They polled Connecticut, and while the trendlines aren’t appealing, they find Blumenthal still beating McMahon even in the heat of the moment before the story has had time to digest, and beating the other, unmoneyed GOP opponents by pretty wide margins. Markos has some really nice pushback against Rasmussen in general, today, asking why they always poll quickly when there’s the potential for a good Republican narrative but not when the narrative doesn’t fit (as seen in their failure to poll the Sorta Super-Tuesday primaries).

• FL-Sen: Charlie Crist has been trying to woo union support, starting with a speech at the state AFL-CIO convention this weekend. It’s another indication that he’s trying to move squarely onto Kendrick Meek’s turf and monopolize as much of the left-of-center vote as he can, now that he’s free from his GOP shackles. Meanwhile, quixotic Democratic candidate Jeff Greene has apparently been seen wooing Ukrainian strippers, in 2005 on his 145-foot yacht while cruising the Black Sea. Not so, claims his campaign spokesperson; he was busy traveling with his rabbi at the time instead.

• KY-Sen: In case you needed one more data point on how thin-skinned Rand Paul and how likely a meltdown from him is at some point before November, here’s an anecdote from last night: he refused to take the customary concession call from Trey Grayson, at least according to the Grayson camp.

• NC-Sen: Here’s a big score for Elaine Marshall: Third-place finisher Kenneth Lewis gave his backing to Marshall in her runoff against Cal Cunningham. This move isn’t so surprising, given that Lewis’s supporters, like Rep. Eva Clayton, were already gravitating toward Marshall, but it ought to steer much of Lewis’s African-American and youth base in her direction as well.

• NV-Sen: Three items, all of which are very, very bad for Sue Lowden. First, the Club for Growth finally weighed into the Senate primary, and they backed right-winger Sharron Angle (maybe not that surprising, since they backed her in the 2006 primary for NV-02). That ought to give Angle a further shot of adrenaline, though, on top of her Tea Party Express endorsement and polling momentum. Lowden is also still bogged down in controversy over her luxury bus, doubling-down on her claims that use of the $100K vehicle was leased despite also having stated elsewhere that the bus was “donated” (which means it would have needed to be reported as an in-kind contribution). That’s nothing, though, compared to the (by my count) quintupling-down on Chickens-for-Checkups, simultaneously trying to fight top Nevada journo Jon Ralston on the fact that, yes, people are bartering for health care while trying to claim that she never actually said anything about Chickencare at all.

• NY-Sen-B: The only GOP big name left who hadn’t said anything definitive about participating in the GOP Senate primary for the right to get creamed by Kirsten Gillibrand finally said a public “no.” Orange County Executive Ed Diana said he’ll stick with his current job, to which he was elected in November to a third term.

• UT-Sen: Looks like that teabaggers’ victory in Utah might be short-lived. Bob Bennett seems to be more interested than before in running as a write-in in the general (where, despite the complex dynamics of a write-in campaign, he faces better odds with the broader electorate than with the narrow slice of extremists running the GOP convention). We may know tomorrow what his plans are, as he emphasized “Stay tuned tomorrow.”

• WA-Sen: If Dino Rossi really is still interested in running for Senate, this isn’t a particularly good way of showing it. Rossi is scheduled to make a blockbuster appearance on May 25… to give opening remarks at a dinnertime seminar for local real estate investors focusing on strategies for profiting off foreclosures. Because nothing says “I’m a man of the people” than knowing all the ins and outs of how to profit off the people’s misery.

• AL-Gov: Artur Davis is out with an internal poll, that seems mostly oriented toward countering the sense that he’s losing ground among his African-American base. The poll shows Davis leading Democratic primary rival Ron Sparks 46-33. It also shows Davis leading 50-25 among African-Americans (despite the defections of some prominent local black groups), while trailing Sparks 42-41 among whites.

• FL-Gov: Bill McCollum is going to have to start taking moneybags Rick Scott seriously, and he’s striking hard, sending out a press release calling him an “embarrassment” and a “fraud,” presumably in reference to allegations leveled against Scott’s health care firm. Scott’s ginormous introductory ad buy is now estimating at $6.3 million.

• KS-Gov: Sam Brownback is drawing some heat for taking things out of context. Now, politicians take things out of context all the time, but his sleight-of-hand in attempting to fight efforts to more tightly regulate the business of car loans to military members may be a fridge too far.

“CNN Money on May 13 reported that ‘Raj Date … agreed that the additional (Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection) regulation might cause some dealers to stop arranging loans,” Brownback said in the letter.

But Brownback’s letter did not include the rest of Date’s comment, which was this, “There will be some dealers who say, ‘If I have to play by an honest set [of] rules, then I can’t be in this business anymore.’ I’m not going to shed any tears for these dealers.”

• MA-Gov: You may recall last week’s Rasmussen MA-Gov poll where, in an effort to find some sort of good news, they found that, if liberal activist Grace Ross somehow beat incumbent Dem Deval Patrick in the primary, she would lost to GOPer Charlie Baker. Well, it’s looking like Ross is in danger of not even making it onto the ballot. The state SoS says she has only a little more than half of the 10,000 signatures she needs; Ross promises an announcement tomorrow morning on her next step. (The upside for Patrick, if Ross qualifies for the primary though, would be $750K in public financing for his campaign, which he wouldn’t be entitled to if he were running unopposed.)

• ME-Gov: There’s been some ongoing controversy in the sleepy Maine governor’s race about how Republican candidate Steve Abbott (former CoS to Susan Collins) wound up with GOP voter lists, but this is a strange turn: the state Republican party chair, Charlie Webster, is now saying that Abbott’s camp flat-out “stole” it.

• GA-09: The special election to replace Nathan Deal (where GOPers Tom Graves and Lee Hawkins are in a runoff) seems to have winnowed the Republican field for the regularly-scheduled GOP primary, too. Former state Senate majority leader Bill Stephens has dropped out of contention in that field.

• HI-01: Even if something incredibly dramatic happens between now and Saturday’s drop-dead date in the special election in the 1st, things are still pretty much cast in stone. In the all-mail in election, now 43% of all ballots sent out have been returned.

• IN-03: State Sen. Marlin Stutzman (whose name rec is sky-high right now after running fairly well in the GOP Senate primary against Dan Coats) says that he’s going to strike while the iron is hot, and get into the race to replace resigning Rep. Mark Souder. Other GOPers confirming that they’ll run include state Rep. Randy Borror, Ft. Wayne city councilor Liz Brown, and recent primary loser Phil Troyer. Another recent primary loser, Bob Thomas, is a potential candidate.

• OH-16: After having found an excuse to hide behind the door the last time Barack Obama came to Ohio, Rep. John Boccieri was proudly with him when he visited Youngstown yesterday. Perhaps he can sense a bit of a turning of the tide? Troublingly, though, Senate candidate Lee Fisher wasn’t present.

• PA-12: PPP digs through the data from their last pre-election poll in the 12th and finds what may really have done the Republicans in. There’s one entity in the district even more unpopular than Barack Obama (who had 30% approval), and that’s Congressional Republicans, who were at a miserable 22/60. In nationalizing the election, Tim Burns tied himself to the nation’s least favorite people of all.

• PA-19: After having surviving his primary last night despite publicly seeking another job, it looks like Rep. Todd Platts exposed himself to all that danger for no reason at all. Platts announced yesterday that the Obama administration had let him know that he wasn’t going to be selected for the Government Accountability Office job he’d been angling for.

• CT-AG: Here’s one of the weirdest career crash-and-burns I’ve seen lately: SoS Susan Bysiewicz went in a few months from likely next Governor to somehow not even eligible to run for the lower-tier job she dropped down to. Connecticut’s Supreme Court unanimously ruled that she didn’t meet the criteria for legal experience required to become AG, reversing a lower court’s decision. Former Democratic state Sen. George Jepsen now has the AG job pretty much to himself. At any rate, with Bysiewicz now combing the “Help Wanted” section, that gives the Connecticut Dems a fallback plan for the Senate if Richard Blumenthal does need to bail out (although Bysiewicz may be seriously damaged at this point too).

• OR-St. House: Here are a couple races with interesting implications that I forgot to watch last night: two Republican state Reps. from the high-desert parts of Oregon (the state’s Republican stronghold) committed the unthinkable heresy of not only bipartisanship but supporting tax increases to close the state’s budget gap. Both Bob Jenson and Greg Smith survived their primaries, though, after teabaggers, right-to-lifers, and even their state House minority leader turned their wrath against them.

• Arizona: One other election result from last night that most people, us included, seemed to overlook was Proposition 100 in Arizona. In a surprise, at least to those people who think that it’s a rabidly anti-tax year (which would be those people who didn’t pay any attention to Measures 66 and 67 earlier this year in Oregon), the people of this red state voted by a fairly wide margin for a temporary sales tax increase as part of a package of changes to close the budget gap. It’s a victory for Jan Brewer, actually, who backed the plan (perhaps feeling safer to do so, having solidified her position with her support for the “papers please” law).

• 1994: When you have a wave, a lot of dead wood washes up on the beach. Prompted by ’94 alum Mark Souder’s mini-scandal and resignation, Dana Milbank looks back at the wide array of scoundrels and rogues who were swept in in 1994.

• History: History’s only barely on the side of Blanche Lincoln when it comes to runoffs. It turns out that the person who finishes first in a runoff wins 72% of the time, but when that’s limited only to runoffs in primaries, the success rate is only 55%… and Lincoln’s victory over Bill Halter last night was a particularly close one.

• CT-Sen: Richard Blumenthal just ended his presser, and it was forceful and an attempt to go back on the offensive. (Reid Wilson‘s tweet sums it up pretty well: “Shot: Dick Blumenthal’s press conference. Chaser: Mark Sanford’s press conference. Study in opposites.”) He admitted to misspeaking on “in Vietnam,” but went after the NYT for the implied impugning of those who served stateside. Good damage control, but we’ll have to wait a few days to see if it takes. The local establishment seems to be taking a wait-and-see attitude, too, as Joe Lieberman is publicly saying he’s still undecided on the race (recall, though, that Blumenthal endorsed Ned Lamont, and Lieberman tends to be one who holds a grudge); the DSCC, though, is cranking things up defending Blumenthal.

Meanwhile, the GOP has been taking credit for funneling this oppo research to the Times… however, after initially taking a premature victory lap around the ring bellowing with arms raised, the Linda McMahon camp has suddenly pulled earlier references to feeding the info to the NYT off its website.

• FL-Sen: Billionaire Jeff Greene is going up with not one but two different introductory TV ads, calling himself a job-creating outsider. Looks like he’s serious about spending some major cash on his rather quixotic bid in the Democratic primary,.

• KY-Sen (pdf): One last poll sneaked across the finish line, from Republican pollster Magellan (not working on either candidate’s behalf). In their poll of the GOP primary, they find, consistent with most pollsters, a big edge for Rand Paul; he leads Trey Grayson 55-30. PPP has some pretty tantalizing tidbits of cat fud that they found in the crosstabs of their GOP primary poll, though. Grayson supporters, i.e. establishment Republicans who probably secretly like their earmarks, really, really, don’t like Rand Paul. Grayson supporters give Paul 23/53 favorables, and only 40% of them say they’ll vote for Paul, while 43% flat-out say they won’t vote for him.

• WA-Sen: While the Glenn Thrushes and Chris Cillizzas of the world seem to have some inside information that leads them to say that Dino Rossi is on the precipice of announcing his Senate run, there’s just nothing in the local press that seems to bear that out. Instead, all we’ve got is a lot of lower-level Republicans getting impatient and starting to take each their frustrations out on each other. Clark Co. Commissioner Tom Mielke sent around an e-mail to various other state GOPers saying that Rossi’s dithering is angering the base and hurting Republican chances of picking up the seat. The Seattle Times somehow got ahold of the e-mail and a bunch of responses from other insiders, if you want a glimpse behind the state GOP’s curtain. Another insider, Mathew Manweller, pointed out that Mielke has an axe to grind as a Don Benton supporter, but also told the Times over the weekend that “Dino probably has to make a decision here and let people know within a week or so, or the milk is going to sour.”

• WI-Sen: As expected, wealthy businessman Ron Johnson formally announced yesterday that he’s getting in the GOP primary to go against Russ Feingold, joining three other never-before-elected rich guys. Wondering how Johnson made his fortune? Just one word: plastics.

• IA-Gov: In case the ideological fault lines in the GOP gubernatorial primary in Iowa couldn’t get any clearer, Mitt Romney announced he’s endorsing Terry Branstad for a return engagement. In fact, this may say more about Romney’s plans than anything, as he seems to be trying to monopolize the sane/establishment wing of the party for 2012 against a Palin/Huckabee split among the nutters.

• NY-Gov: The Conservative Party is trying once again to upstage the Republicans in New York; their latest move involves moving their nominating convention up to May 28, three days before the GOP nominating convention. They’re committed to backing Rick Lazio, and this is a move designed to force the GOP’s hand into backing Lazio as well, rather than party-switching Steve Levy, in order to avoid a NY-23-style split between the GOP and the Conservatives.

• WI-Gov: Looking for some traction in the GOP primary, Mark Neumann is accusing Milwaukee Co. Exec Scott Walker of “working part-time” so he can campaign. (Does any officeholder not work part-time in the months leading up to an election?) Meanwhile, there was a big-time Walker walk-back, after he initially voiced displeasure with Arizona’s anti-illegal immigrant law and then got deluged with negative comments on his Facebook page. Now suddenly he’s for it, saying he changed his mind after talking to the Arizona state senator who proposed it.

• WY-Gov: Well, this is progress… I guess. Natrona County Democratic chair R.C. Johnson says she’ll take one for the team and run for Governor on the Democratic line if no other viable candidate does. (The state party convention came and went last weekend without any takers.) Don’t bowl us all over with your enthusiasm, R.C.!

• HI-01: Three of Hawaii’s Democratic ex-Governors (John Waihee, George Ariyoshi, and Ben Cayetano) put out coordinated statements urging voters to, whatever else they might do, not vote for Charles Djou in the messed-up special election. Waihee said Djou winning would be a “nightmare.”

• SC-05: Well, this is more than a little tasteless: the NRCC issued a statement referring to “Amnesiac John Spratt” and accusing him of having “completely forgotten” who he’s working for. Spratt, of course, recently revealed that he’s in the early stages of Parkinson’s Disease, and his opponent, Mick Mulvaney, has carefully steered clear of turning that into a campaign issue. Have no fear, Mick, the NRCC’s always willing to do what you aren’t.

• VA-05 (pdf): So what’s it like being in the World of Hurt? Pretty good, at least according to his own internal poll. Robert Hurt claims a POS poll gives him 35% of the vote in the GOP primary, with his nearest rival, Ken Boyd (the other non-teabagger in the race) lagging at 10%. The assorted teabaggers accumulated together account for another 9%.

• Things in General: CQ has a moderately interesting article today on other pending anti-incumbent primaries. Mostly I’m including it because one quote lingered with me, and I wanted to blockquote it for future reference, as a useful bit of perspective for anyone who gets a little too worked up about whatever’s being hyperbolically, breathlessly being reported on in the news any given day:

“We overreact to everything here in Washington,” said longtime Democratic media consultant Steve Murphy.

• AR-Sen: The White House hasn’t given up on trying to put Blanche Lincoln over the top tomorrow; they’re out with a new Barack Obama robocall on her behalf, saying she’s “standing on the side of workers.” Greg Sargent’s head is busy exploding from all the logical disconnect, since Lincoln’s main argument is that Bill Halter’s union support is an indication of how he’s a tool of Beltway liberals.

• AZ-Sen: I know, I know, people pick up and move on from jobs all the time, and you shouldn’t read too much into it. But when your campaign manager and deputy campaign manager depart on the same day, in the middle of a dogfight against an insurgent primary opponent, it’s going to always send up red flags. John McCain’s camp maintains they weren’t fired but are moving over to the national GOP’s fundraising operations.

• CA-Sen: This isn’t a good time for Tom Campbell to be cutting back on advertising, with the June 8 GOP primary fast approaching and Carly Fiorina still within striking distance and pitching in a few million dollars of her own. He’s cutting back on TV ad buys for the campaign’s final two weeks (although certainly not going dark) and will be focusing on direct mail instead. This could mean he’s running low on money, feeling confident enough in the primary to start marshaling general election resources… or both.

• IL-Sen: I don’t know if it’s much of a sign of strength to release an internal poll that shows you tied, but it seems like the Alexi Giannoulias camp is eager to push back on the meme that he’s somehow been fatally wounded by the Broadway Bank saga. Greenberg Quinlan Rosner finds Giannoulias and Mark Kirk tied at 44-44. For comparison purposes, they also let it be known that their previous (unreleased) poll, immediately after the Feds’ seizure of the bank in late April, had Giannoulias in much worse shape, down 43-37, so it’s possible the worst of the damage has passed as the story slips down the memory hole.

• KY-Sen: Wow, turns out not only Democrats get to whine about Fox News’ selective treatment of the news. Trey Grayson is getting in on the act, griping about Rand Paul’s constant presence on the network and the softball questions he gets thrown. That’d be fine if he were, y’know, not trying to win the GOP primary, where questioning the almighty Fox is an act of heresy. (Ironically, at the same time Grayson was having his press conference to level the charges, Rand Paul was busy appearing on Fox.)

• CA-Gov: In the Fix endorsement hierarchy, this probably slots in as “12) The “Oh shit, do I have to accept this endorsement?” Endorsement.” Meg Whitman just got Dick Cheney’s endorsement, fittingly in an op-ed in the Orange County Register. Meanwhile, a new poll from M4 Strategies (on behalf of the Small Business Action Committee) finds Whitman in better shape than the last few polls have: they say she leads Steve Poizner 49-32.

• CT-Gov: Yet another pre-convention dropout, as the minor candidates jump out of the way. This time it was on the Republican side, as Danbury mayor Mark Boughton plans to pull the plug on his campaign and sign on as Lt. Governor Michael Fedele’s running mate.

• NM-Gov: The Albuquerque Journal polled the Republican gubernatorial primary, which, like many other primaries, has moved into “fast-approaching” territory (on June 1). They find a two-way duel at the top, between former state party chair Allen Weh and Dona Ana County DA Susana Martinez. Weh leads 31-30, while Pete Domenici Jr. has discovered that you’ve gotta have something more than name rec as a reason to run; he’s lagging at 10. Martinez was also the latest female politician to get the endorsement of Sarah Palin this week, so we’ll have to see if that gives her some momentum to break away.

• NV-Gov: Mason-Dixon, for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, also looked at the Republican gubernatorial primary in their most recent poll. (Recall they released the surprising results of Sue Lowden 30, Sharron Angle 25, Danny Tarkanian 22, John Chachas 3, and Chad Christensen 2 in the Senate primary last week.) They find, to no one’s surprise, that Jim Gibbons’ time is about done. Brian Sandoval leads the incumbent Gibbons, 45-27, with Mike Montandon clocking in at 6.

• OR-Gov: One more Republican gubernatorial primary, and this one actually is a surprise: while most pollsters (especially SurveyUSA) have given Chris Dudley a significant edge in Oregon, Eugene-based Lindholm says that Allen Alley is narrowly in the lead. Alley is ahead of Dudley 29-26, John Lim is at 10, and Bill Sizemore is at 4. One caveat: I’ve never heard of Lindholm before today, although they do maintain they aren’t working for any of the candidates in the race. At any rate, maybe there’s some potential for a surprise tomorrow.

• NY-13: Here’s some interesting cat fud in the primary in the 13th, where GOP state Sen. Andrew Lanza was seen going after GOP candidate Michael Grimm over campaigning at a Memorial Day event. Lanza had been associated with running for the seat himself, and says he’ll back ex-Rep. Vito Fossella in case the odd rumors about a comeback come true.

• NY-24: After refusing to commit to his re-election bid back in April after getting pressed from all sides on his HCR conduct, Dem Rep. Mike Arcuri announced today that he will indeed be seeking a third term. (J)

• OR-05: After some earlier suspicions that moderate state Rep. Scott Bruun, the NRCC’s preferred recruit, might not even get past teabagging businessman Fred Thompson (no, not the Fred Thompson), SurveyUSA polled the GOP primary and found that Bruun is very likely to prevail. Bruun leads Thompson 46-25, including 52-30 among the “already voted.”

• WV-01: Political scientist Boris Shor has attracted some good notices, at 538 and similar places, for his work on extrapolating DW-Nominate-type scores into the state legislatures. Looking at Mike Oliverio’s votes in the West Virginia state Senate (where he’s about as conservative as the average WV Senate Republican), Shor projects Oliverio as the most conservative Democratic member of the House, more so than even Walt Minnick.

• CfG: Speaking of Walt Minnick, he was one of only three Democrats to get the seal of good housekeeping from the Club for Growth. Minnick, Gene Taylor, and Bobby Bright all managed to break 50% on the CfG’s scoring system; in fact, Bright got up to 64% positive.

• Polltopia: PPP wants your input on where to poll next: California, Iowa, Michigan, South Carolina, or Washington? PPP’s Tom Jensen is also teasing that another NRSC-backed candidate is in some trouble, in a poll to be released tomorrow. Don’t leave us hanging, Tom!

AR-Sen: Blanche Lincoln refuses to say whether she’d want Barack Obama to campaign with her – and for once, I can’t blame her for being wishy-washy. She still managed to get in a dig at “the far left” in an interview with The Hill, which should really help her consolidate the base if she wins the primary. And graciously, she said that she wouldn’t run as an independent if she were to lose the primary – which is good to know, since she only filed as a Dem. Meanwhile, the SEIU just threw down another $330K on TV ads and phonebanking to support Bill Halter.

DE-Sen: A good get for the Democrat: The Delaware State Education Association, a big teacher’s union, has switched their endorsement from GOPer Mike Castle to Chris Coons. Though the DSEA has supported Castle in the past, they cited unhappiness over his votes against the stimulus (which had a lot of education money) and healthcare reform. Meanwhile, Castle secured his party’s nomination with 70% of the vote at the GOP convention, but teabagger Christine O’Donnell pledged to fight on through the primary.

IN-Sen: Not that anyone expected otherwise, but Dem Rep. Brad Ellsworth was officially nominated by the state party, over joke candidate Bob Kern.

KY-Sen: A shadowy 527 organized by Lexington, Ky. “media specialist” Tim Isaac is running ads linking Rand Paul to absolutely batshit fucking insane radio host Alex Jones. (Paul appeared on the show a few times and kissed Jones’s ass.) Probably too little, too late – and in this case, Isaac’s refusal to announce the size of the buy is pretty glaring, since it seems like a blatant attempt to play local media. On the flipside, Paul said on Friday that he’s pulling his attack ads from the air – which, given how little time there is before election day, again seems like a way to gin up some press coverage. I guess that’s politics.

PA-Sen: An ugly late hit from Arlen Specter, which he prays doesn’t make it back east: He’s running web ads attacking Joe Sestak for his “F” rating from the NRA. Sestak doesn’t have much time to raise hell about this, but this is obviously not a winning issue for Specter in Philly. Anyhow, Tuesday should be a barn-burner, with Specter and Sestak now tied at 44 apiece (with 11% undecided) in Muhlenberg’s final tracking poll. (Kudos to Muhlenberg, btw, for what turned out to be a genius marketing move in providing this tracker.)

UT-Sen: Game on? Orrin Hatch is vowing to run for re-election in 2012, when, as the world is engulfed in flames foretold by a Mayan end-times prophecy, he’ll be a spry 78. Will Jason Chaffetz seize the day, or let opportunity pass him by a second time? I also have to wonder if nervous incumbents will try to change the law regarding convention nominations before the next cycle rolls around, lest they become Bob Bennett Vol. II.

AL-Gov: Ron Sparks, as expected, just scored the endorsement of the Alabama Democratic Conference, the state’s old black political organization. This means that he, and not African American primary opponent Artur Davis, has secured the backing of all four of Alabama’s major black political groups. Pushing back against this unusual narrative, Davis announced endorsements from two fellow members of Congress: Jesse Jackson, Jr. and John Lewis, neither of whom represent Alabama (though Lewis was born there). Not sure this really helps Davis’s “D.C.” image.

CA-Gov: Steve Poizner, who has been making late headway in the polls, is finally airing some broadcast TV ads in the Bay Area, painting Meg Whitman as an apostate to the conservative movement. If I were a mouth-breather, I’d vote for him. As ever, no word on the size of the buy, but given how rich Poizner is, I’d guess it’s substantial.

FL-Gov: Lawton Chiles III, son of the late governor of the same name, apparently wants to challenge Alex Sink in the gubernatorial primary this year, according to people close to him. The filing deadline for state races is not until June 18th, though even if he gets in right now, Chiles would have a major financial gap to make up with Sink. Maybe the young he-coon thinks he got some walk in him?

NV-Gov: Man, this is just an absolutely brutal profile of GOP Gov. Jim Gibbons, who regularly disappeared Mark Sanford-like during the meltdown of 2008, when his state needed leadership most. Just read it.

AL-07: EMILY’s List made a small independent expenditure (sub-$30K) for mailers and phonebanking on behalf of Terri Sewell. Someone from EMILY really needs to explain why they endorsed Wall Street attorney Sewell over the well-known progressive (and equally pro-choice) Shelia Smoot.

CA-19: God bless KFSN-TV! Without them, we wouldn’t have yet another poll of the fascinating CA-19 primaries. Even the pollster notes: “Compared to identical SurveyUSA polls released one and two months ago, the contest is unchanged.” I guess the good news is that Dick Pombo looks slated to lose.

DE-AL: As expected, wealthy heiress Michele Rollins won the GOP’s nomination for Delaware’s at-large House seat, though it took her two rounds of balloting at the state convention. However, opponent Glen Urquhart has pledged to stay in through the primary.

FL-22: Your liberal media: A local TV reporter, Angela Sachitano, has been covering the FL-22 race for WPTV… and has also been serving as an informal media advisor to whacked-out Republican Allen West. Her employer, of course, is saying there’s no harm done, and that they’ve taken unspecified “appropriate action.” Typical liberals!

HI-01: Sue Lowden would be proud: Charles Djou is busy spending time with his chickens, so he can count them before they hatch. Said Djou to Sean Miller of The Hill: “This election is pretty much over.” Djou was later seen hanging out with a bunch of lazy grasshoppers who were scoffing at hard-working ants preparing for winter. You’ve also got to wonder why he’s spending $88K on TV ads attacking (for the first time) Ed Case if this thing is “over.”

ID-01: Hoo boy this is good! Republican Vaughn Ward, the supposed establishment favorite in the race, has fired his campaign manager just a week-and-a-half before the primary. (Though CQ’s Greg Giroux tweets that Ward is now supposedly saying his CM quit.) Read the Politico’s piece for a full account Ward’s long string of failures – it’s like he’s been touched by the ghost of Bill Sali.

Still, Ward might yet win. An independent poll last week from Greg Smith & Associates showed Ward leading Raul Labrador in the primary, 34-16, but with 50% undecided. The general election numbers (PDF) are really weird, though – Smith tested Rep. Walt Minnick “jungle-style” against both Labrador and Ward together. Yeah, Idaho doesn’t do their elections that way, so I don’t get the choice, but in any event, Minnick was at 50% with both Republicans combining for 20%.

MA-05: Rep. Niki Tsongas, in a diary on Blue Mass Group, says that her quote in the NYT last week has been “misinterpreted” and that she “will always welcome President Obama to Massachusetts and the Fifth District.” Good.

PA-06: Doug Pike sure must enjoy being in the apology business. For the zillionth time this campaign, he’s had to walk something back. In this case, it’s a misleading mailer he sent out claiming he’d been awarded a “100% pro-choice rating” by NARAL. Not so fast, says the group – we haven’t endorsed anyone in this race. Egg, face, repeat.

PA-12: A Pittsburgh TV station yanked a Democratic ad attacking Tim Burns for supporting a national sales tax instead of income taxes. A conservative victory over rascally Dems? Not quite – the station, WPGH, is owned by Sinclair Broadcasting, who you might remember from 2004, when they forced their member stations to air a “documentary” swiftboating John Kerry just two weeks before election day.

Undeterred, the DCCC just chipped in another $40K for ads. Also, we mentioned the SEIU’s big ad buy here last week – click this link if you want to see the ad itself.

SC-02: A sign of life from Dem Rob Miller’s otherwise somnolent campaign? Miller has a poll out from Anzalone-Liszt showing Rep. Joe Wilson up 49-34. That might not seem like much to brag about, but Miller’s making hay of the fact that he only has 34% name ID, and says that Wilson’s incumbency is hurting him.

VT-AL: Retired 71-year-old businessman John Mitchell says he’s joining the GOP field to take on Rep. Peter Welch. He joins conservative radio show host Paul Beaudry and businessman Keith Stern. It looks like none of these Republicans have yet raised a dime.

British Elections: I don’t know about you, but the political spectrum across the pond always felt like Anarchy in the UK to me. Fortunately, SSP’s EnglishLefty surfs to the rescue with a detailed explanation of the fault lines between the Labour Party (which just got turfed) and the Liberal Democrats (who’ve joined a coalition with the Tories). The ensuing comments are enlightening as well.

Public Policy Polling (5/15-16, likely voters, 5/1-2 in parens):

Rand Paul (R): 52 (46)

Trey Grayson (R): 34 (28)

Undecided: 7 (21)

Other: 7 (4)

(MoE: ±3.0%)

Stick a fork in ‘im? Either we’re the subject of the biggest case of respondent hornswaggling in polling history, or Rand Paul should win this one in a walk. Let’s take a moment to reflect on just how formidable Grayson seemed when he first started “exploring” this race, and when he started threatening to primary incumbent Sen. Jim Bunning out of existence. Little did he — or anyone else, really — suspect that the Alex Jones-brown-nosing, never-before-elected son of Libertarian fetishist icon Ron Paul would knock off the star player of the Kentucky Republican Party’s bench in a primary. That’s an accomplishment for the ages.

Sadly, PPP chose not to spend its finite resources on the Democratic primary. That’s a real shame, considering that that’s actually looking like a real race after several recent polls have shown state AG Jack Conway closing in on Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo. But, we don’t have to wait too much longer until the final poll of this race — the one with the 0.0% margin of error — is released.