Swing State Project

It sure did not take long for names to pop up as successor to Rahm Emanuel. According to the Politico is mentioned as possibly running for the seat.

One potential name stands out: Cook County Commissioner Forrest Claypool, a well-known, reform-minded Chicagoland politician who has been a longtime ally of Emanuel’s. He is a former consulting partner with Obama’s political adviser, David Axelrod, and is close with Obama as well.

Claypool’s name has also been mentioned as a possible appointee to fill Obama’s soon-to-be-vacant Senate seat but he has publicly ruled out that possibility.

I do not know much about him, so I went to Wikipedia and read this about him.

Capitalizing on his record as a reformer, Claypool made a run for the Cook County Board in 2002. Waging a fierce campaign in which he attacked what he saw as patronage and a bloated bureaucracy in the county government, Claypool went on to upset incumbent Commissioner Ted Lechowicz 51-49% in the March 19 Democratic primary. (Lechowicz was a strong supporter of Cook County Board President John Stroger, Jr.) Because Claypool’s district (the 12th) is overwhelmingly Democratic, he faced only nominal opposition in the general election.

Claypool quickly allied hiself with fellow freshmen Commissioners Larry Suffredin (D) and Tony Peraica (R). The three were joined by sophomore Commissioner Mike Quigley (D). When, in December 2003, the four reformers garnered enough swing votes to defeat Stroger’s FY 2004 budget (the first time such a thing had happened to a Cook County Board President in three decades), Stroger gave Claypool a backhanded compliment, saying, “The media has prevailed, along with Mr. Claypool.” This quote ran under the banner headline, “Hell Freezes Over: Cook County Board rejects Stroger’s budget” in the Chicago Sun-Times. The following year (FY 2005), the County Board rejected Stroger’s plan tax increases again. The Chicago Tribune has credited Claypool and his allies for “bringing democracy” to and starting a “revolution” on the Board.

Anyone know anything about him?

(Proudly cross-posted at C4O)

This week has been nothing short of amazing! Barack Obama will be our next President. More and better Democrats will be going to Congress. The electoral map has undergone a major blue shift.

So why has this whole experience been bittersweet at best for me? Well, all is not well in my own home state. So what can we celebrate and what must we fix? Let me share with you the story of this election from behind the scenes.

First off, let’s start with the bad news. We lost in California. But wait, you ask, didn’t Obama win by about 24%? Isn’t that good? Of course it is, and that isn’t the problem.

The problem in California is that Barack Obama had hardly any coattails here. Look at how Prop 8, the marriage ban, may end up having to be stopped at the courts (again, hopefully). Look at how, barring the results in CA-44 & CA-04 changing in the provisional vote count, we have not gained any new Congressional seats. Look at how we’re still short of a 2/3 supermajority in both houses of the state legislature.

Simply put, we failed our mission in The Golden State. There were hundreds of thousands of “undervotes” here, meaning that people voted Obama for President but did NOT continue downballot to vote on Congress, the initiatives, and local races. This is nothing short of tragic, and there’s no excuse for the nation’s biggest Blue State to still show so much red! Because of the inept and disastrous “leadership” of the state party, the refusal of the DCCC to invest in real races like CA-44 & CA-46, and the horribly gawd-awful “leadership” by The Task Force & Equality California on the No on 8 campaign & their failure to have a real ground game, we missed the opportunity to turn the Obama victory into a progressive victory in California.

Now contrast what happened in California on Tuesday to what happened in Nevada on the same day. While one state didn’t change much, the other state next door underwent a massive transformation! Like Mountain West neighbors New Mexico & Colorado, Nevada is now officially a Blue State! And not just that, but Democrats now have a broad and clear mandate for progressive change.

Progressive Democrat Dina Titus was elected to Congress in a “swing district” that Bush won in 2004. Democrats now control both houses in the state legislature for the first time since 1991, including a 2/3 supermajority in the Assembly. Voters approved a good initiative that will actually help Nevada fully fund its schools. And of course, Barack Obama won the ex-Red State by a whopping 12%, including an 18% win in Clark County (Las Vegas Metro) and wins in the formerly Republican Carson City & Washoe (Reno) Counties!

So why were the results in Nevada so dramatically different? Let’s see, Harry Reid and the state party leaders actually began early in registering more Democrats and building an aggressive field operation while the GOP was power drunk and asleep at the wheel. The Obama campaign and the state party were effective in coordinating with the Dina Titus campaign, the Jill Derby campaign up north, and the local campaigns. All the candidates up and down the ballot had a clear and consistent message for change more. economy, energy & environment, education, health care, and so much more. Basically, Democrats worked together on the ground and that’s why we won!

So what lessons can we learn from this tale of two states? First off, there’s no real substitute for a grassroots door-to-door, face-to-face campaign. Despite the good last-minute ads, they may have been too little & too late to make up for the lack of a ground game for No on 8 in California. Meanwhile in Nevada, no amount of negative attack ads from the Republicans against Dina Titus & Barack Obama could make up for their complete lack of a ground game while we Democrats truly rocked the vote!

OSecondly, Nevada Democrats succeeded in translating an Obama victory into a progressive victory while California Democrats were simply lost in translation. Why couldn’t we win the 45th & 48th Congressional Districts when Obama carried them? Why couldn’t Debbie Cook win in the 46th when Obama carried it? Why were there so many undervotes statewide? Whatever the Nevada Democratic Party did right, the California Democratic Party needs to learn how to do it.

And finally, we should all be of good cheer! The West is ours if we want it! The results across the region prove that where Democrats work, Democrats win. But in places like California where state party leaders grew complacent, we lost out on real opportunities.

So what do we do next? After we’re done celebrating, we will go back to work! We have more work to do to keep progress going, so let’s do it! 😀

The 2006 election left a lot of unfinished business: a number of Republicans in Dem-friendly districts who survived strong challenges and got a two-year grace period. The 2008 saw another swath cut through these folks, but there are still some left to be picked off, so this list should give us an idea of where to train our fire in 2010 (and also where to expect retirements). Here are the top 10 most Democratic-leaning districts, rated by current PVI (note that PVIs will change soon, once clearer presidential numbers by district are released) represented by Republicans, before and after this week.

110th Congress	Rep.	PVI	111th Congress	Rep.	PVI
DE-AL	Castle	D+6.5	DE-AL	Castle	D+6.5
CT-04	Shays	D+5.4	NJ-02	LoBiondo	D+4.0
NJ-02	LoBiondo	D+4.0	IL-10	Kirk	D+3.6
IL-10	Kirk	D+3.6	WA-08	Reichert (?)	D+2.3
NY-25	Walsh	D+3.4	PA-06	Gerlach	D+2.2
NJ-03	Saxton	D+3.3	NY-03	King	D+2.1
NM-01	Wilson	D+2.4	PA-15	Dent	D+1.6
WA-08	Reichert	D+2.3	FL-10	Young	D+1.1
PA-06	Gerlach	D+2.2	IA-04	Latham	D+0.4
NY-03	King	D+2.1	NY-23	McHugh	R+0.2

Note that we’re down to only 9 GOPers left in districts with Dem-leaning PVIs (with the departures of Porter, Fosella, and Knollenberg as well).

Now let’s look at the flipside: Democrats in the darkest red districts. Not as much turnover here, but obviously it suggests Walt Minnick will be our greatest vulnerability for 2010 when he runs against a non-brain-damaged opponent.

110th Congress	Rep.	PVI	111th Congress	Rep.	PVI
TX-17	Edwards	R+17.7	ID-01	Minnick	R+18.9
UT-02	Matheson	R+16.9	TX-17	Edwards	R+17.7
MS-04	Taylor	R+16.3	UT-02	Matheson	R+16.9
TX-22	Lampson	R+15.7	MS-04	Taylor	R+16.3
ND-AL	Pomeroy	R+13.1	AL-02	Bright	R+13.2
MO-04	Skelton	R+10.8	ND-AL	Pomeroy	R+13.1
MS-01	Childers	R+10.0	CA-04	Brown (?)	R+10.9
SD-AL	Herseth	R+10.0	MO-04	Skelton	R+10.8
IN-08	Ellsworth	R+8.5	MS-01	Childers	R+10.0
GA-08	Marshall	R+8.4	SD-AL	Herseth	R+10.0

Nancy Boyda was #13 on the old list, and Don Cazayoux was #19. Kratovil and Markey will slot in on the new list at #11 and #13. Also, note that we now hold the 14th (ID-01) and 19th (TX-17) most Republican-leaning districts in the nation. The flipside of that, if you can imagine, would be if the Republicans held IL-02 (Jesse Jackson Jr. at D+34.9) and MA-08 (Capuano at D+33.0).

Traditionally, chairpersons of the National Republican Congressional Committee get to serve two terms. Current NRCC Chair Tom Cole had a pretty painful cycle, losing three special elections this year and at least another 23 seats this week (while taking back four deep red seats), so it’s no surprise that he wants another bite at the apple — he would love desperately to redeem himself in 2010, when the GOP has a chance to take a few of these seats back.

The only problem? House Minority Leader John Boehner is saying: “Nuh-uh!” From Roll Call:

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) has endorsed Rep. Pete Sessions (Texas) for chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee over NRCC Chairman Tom Cole (Okla.), who is seeking another term at the head of the committee.

Boehner’s public support of Sessions comes one day after Cole appealed to the House Republican Conference for a second term helming the committee, and the Minority Leader’s support could prove crucial to Sessions’ chances of winning the post in the upcoming leadership elections.

“Tom Cole has guided the NRCC through a difficult time for our party, and I’m sincerely grateful for his service to our team. But I believe having Pete Sessions at the helm of the NRCC in the next cycle will give House Republicans our best shot at rebuilding a majority coalition,” Boehner said in a statement. “Pete has the skills needed to recruit top-tier candidates and give them the support they need to challenge a Democratic Congress that has been bought and paid for by liberal special interests. We need Pete Sessions at the leadership table as the next chairman of the NRCC.”

Tom Cole finally dead? Stay tuned…

Here’s an update California’s 44th District, where Democrat Bill Hedrick has posted a breathtakingly close performance against GOP Rep. Ken Calvert. Hedrick Communications Director Lori Vandermeir sends us the following statement:

We’re currently down by about 4,600 votes but there are up to 100,000 ballots (provisional and late vote-by-mail) that have yet to be counted.  That process will begin today.

Both the OC Register and the Press Enterprise had earlier called this race for Calvert, but have since rescinded that claim and drawn the same conclusion we have – until every last vote has been counted, we will not know who has won.

As it stands now, with what has been counted, the results are:

Bill Hedrick 49%

Ken Calvert 51%

As I mentioned, Calvert is about 4600 votes ahead of us at this point in time, but with tens of thousands of votes to count, the final result is still uncertain.

We are urging any voter within Riverside or Orange County (who voted in the 44th congressional race) and were issued a provisional ballot to contact the registrar of voters in their county to demand their ballot be counted.

Mr. Calvert’s lawyers have descended upon the registrar’s office and his team have been having private conversations with the county registrar in Riverside County that we obviously are worried about.  We are gathering our lawyers now but really just need voters to help us demand their votes be counted.

So that’s where we stand at the moment.

Meanwhile, Calvert is finally declaring victory, but there are still tons of absentee and provisional ballots left to be counted in Riverside, where Hedrick actually beat Calvert by 53-47 in the early count.

Update: If you’ve voted by mail in Riverside County and want to check out the status of your ballot, this is a helpful link.

P.S. – And in case you didn’t see below, Democrat Tom Perriello is now leading by 832 votes in Virginia’s 5th District.

It’s official — Rahm Emanuel will sign on as Obama’s Chief of Staff (potentially a great move for Obama, in my opinion). While the timeline is unclear, Rahm will soon be stepping down from his seat in the House, triggering a special election. Rahm’s district has a PVI of D+18, so there’s no reason why we can’t fill this seat with a solid progressive.

This leads me to ask — where else might we see retirement (or resignation) announcements before the next election? Roy Blunt is stepping down as the House Minority Whip, and you have to wonder whether he’ll ride off into the sunset and quit politics altogether. And there are plenty of crusty GOP oldsters like Roscoe Bartlett (MD-06), Bill Young (FL-10), and Ralph Hall (TX-04) who may call it a day. And on the Dem side, Leonard Boswell will always be the subject of retirement rumors.

It’s never too early to start thinking ahead to the next round of elections. Which House seats do you think might open up in the next two years?

This is the diary I had hoped to be able to write Wednesday, but with the closeness of the Smith-Merkley US Senate race was happy enough to write a diary talking about the reasons why Merkley would win, as he indeed has.  This diary serves as my review of the Oregon campaign, in what can, without a doubt, be described as the best cycle for Oregon Democrats and other progressive organizations in my lifetime.  All of our goals were met and we beat back every single bad ballot measure to boot.

Cross-Posted from Loaded Orygun: http://www.loadedorygun.net/sh…

The Election by the Numbers:

Note: These numbers are still not completely final due to the delay in counting ballots in some counties (which was due to the extra-long ballot necessitated by the high number of ballot measures among other factors).

Total Number of Oregonians Who Voted: 1.835 million or 84%.

Highest Turnout County by %: Wallowa-90%.

Lowest Turnout County by %: Umatilla-79%.

Number of Counties won by Kerry (who won by 5%): 8.

Number of Counties won by Obama: 12.

Obama’s Margin of Victory (which will go higher as the last urban ballots are counted): 16%.

Number of Oregon House Seats Won by the Democrats: 36 (+5).

Number of Oregon House Seats Won by the Republicans in Multnomah County: 0.

Number of Oregon House Seats Won by the Republicans in either the Eugene or Portland metro areas: 3, all in outer Portland suburbs.

Number of Ballot Measures Proposed by groups other than the legislature: 8.

Number of them that passed: 0 (All 4 of the Legislature’s measures passed).

How did I do?:

My final projections were pretty well spot on in most cases this year.  Here is my record:

Statewide and Congressional Campaigns: 100%, I correctly called every single one, although to be honest except for Smith/Merkley none were close.

Ballot Measures: 11/12 correct, I thought Measure 61 would pass but with less votes than Measure 57, and it actually failed outright.  I thought Measure 65 would be a lot closer than it was (it lost by about 2-1).

State Legislature: Senate 3/3, House 16/18.  I missed 2 house races, both of which were very close.  I projected that Adamson and Eberle would win and neither did.  Forsberg appears headed to a narrow defeat as well, which is unfortunately predicted.

Overall I think I did rather well this year as I nailed virtually every prediction and the ones I missed I didn’t miss by much.

Winners/Losers and Awards:

The final section of this diary is my favorite as I have a bit of fun with the election results and who won and lost as well as hand out some awards.

Big Winners/Losers:

Winner: Barack Obama.  Carrying the state by near-record margins, Obama led the Oregon Democrats to perhaps their best results ever.  Oh and this ad may have put Merkley over the top:

Loser: John McCain.  He never contested the state and it was apparent why.  McCain suffered perhaps the worst defeat ever for a major party candidate in the state, certainly the worst since the 1960s.

Winner: Jeff Merkley and the DSCC.  Jeff fought his way through a tough primary and won the day by unseating Republican Gordon Smith.  He did it, in no small part, thanks to the DSCC which poured more into this race than any other race in the country.

Loser: Gordon Smith, Freedom’s Watch and the NRSC.  Despite their best efforts to lie to Oregonians and mislead them into thinking Smith is a moderate, they failed this time.  At times it even seemed that the more Smith and his allies spent on negative ads, the worse they did.  This is not to say that Merkley and our side did not run negative ads because we did but theirs seemed to backfire.

Electoral Trends:

Winner: The 36 county strategy.  Although they didn’t win everywhere, Oregon Democrats surged to near record performances across the state.  They won their first state legislative seat east of the Cascades since the 1990s and basically eliminated the Republican party’s presence in Portland and Eugene.

Loser: Fake moderate Republicans.  From Gordon Smith to John Lim to Jim Torrey and beyond, Oregon Republicans who claimed to be moderates were roundly defeated by Democrats in virtually every case.  Proving that Oregonians can indeed see beyond the hype.

Interest Groups/Endorsers:

Winner: Oregon SEIU.  Perhaps the biggest winner in the state among all the unions was the Oregon SEIU as it helped ensure a majority favorable to their concerns and helped Defend Oregon defeat all the nasty ballot measures to boot.

Loser: Big Business.  The Employee Free Choice Act (Card Check Unionization) was passed in Oregon last year and despite the best efforts of big business to elect candidates who would oppose it, they failed.  Oregon is a pro-worker and pro-union state and shall remain so at least for now.

Winner: Barbara Roberts.  I so love our former Governor and honestly its hard not to.  Barbara still clearly has a lot of political power as all of the persons she endorsed and measures she took positions on went the way she hoped.

Loser: Kevin Mannix and Bill Sizemore.  They go a combined 0 for 7 in the ballot measures this year and only one of them, Measure 64, was even close.  Back to the drawing board you morans!

The Media:

Winner: Tim Hibbits.  Oregon’s top political analyst called the Senate race for Merkley Tuesday night and turned out, as usual, to be spot on.  In more than 900 races in which Hibbits has made a projection, he has been wrong exactly twice.

Loser: The Oregonian.  For endorsing Gordon Smith because Merkley’s win would give the Dems too much power.  Really, that’s a bad thing?  Well the streak continues as the Oregonian has not endorsed a winning Republican in a major race in a long time.

Awards:

Biggest Surprise in a major election: Measure 65’s stunning rejection by a 2-1 margin.  I thought it would fail but that it would be very close.  I’m happy to be wrong.

Best Victory Celebration: A crowd in Portland spontaneously breaking out into singing the national anthem after finding out Obama won.

Best political ad: Obama’s ad for Merkley (see above).

Worst Political ad: The Hot Dog ad by the NRSC:

Most disgusting political ad: Merkley supports rapists by Smith’s campaign:

Best victory speech: Merkley’s victory speech in the US Senate race, which I just saw delivered at Portland State.  Waiting a few extra days for it didn’t make it any less sweeter when Sen.-elect Merkley, flanked by his wife, his mother and current Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), walked into the hall packed with lots of local supporters in a space designed for maybe 50-75 on a typical day.  Merkley spoke about the issues that matter both to Oregon and the nation and how he would be a new progressive voice for this state.

A key quote from Merkley’s speech:

Speaking at PSU’s Urban Center, Merkely said he couldn’t be “more honored” than to be serving with veteran Democrat Ron Wyden in the U.S. Senate and said that it is now “time for a problem solving, bi-partisan approach” to the many issues facing the country

Link to article about the victory: Jeff Merkley accepts his role as Oregon’s newest senator

Best-run campaign: Jeff Merkley (US Sen.).  One should not underestimate what Jeff and his team just accomplished as they unseated Gordon Smith, who many even in Democratic circles thought was untouchable.  Kudos to his staff and the army of supporters who carried the day.

Worst-run campaign: Mike Erickson (OR-5).  Not so much for how he ran the campaign as for how he reacted to all his personal scandals.  Whether it was taking his girlfriend to an abortion doctor and lying about it or taking a trip to Cuba supposedly for humanitarian reasons and instead partying the night away, Erickson in a textbook example of how NOT to run a campaign.  Yet he is utterly clueless about this and has, in fact, already been rumored to be running again in 2010.

Most-misleading campaign: Both sides of the Measure 64 campaign, the union payroll deduction.  Both sides stretched the truth more than a bit when it came to this proposed measure.  The yes folks overstated the danger of having public employee unions involved in politics while the no die claimed a far wider impact from this law than was likely (stifling the Oregon Food Bank among others supposedly).  Still, the good guys on the no side won, and I am very happy they did.  This criticism is not about their position but some of the ads they ran during this campaign.

Best-run campaign in a losing cause: Michele Eberle (OR House).  Came within inches of unseating a man with a long history in this state, Rep. Scott Brunn.  She may well win again if she runs in two years but given that this seat was not on anyone’s target list two years ago, the fact that she came this close says a lot.  Honorable mention to Jessica Adamson in Wilsonville as well.

Politician I am most happy to see lose: Gordon Smith.  After the misleading attack ads in what was without a doubt the most negative campaign in Oregon history, I really wanted to win this one.  We did, so I’m happy.

Let me know what you think.

Yesterday, GOPer Steve “Steve” Stivers was leading Mary Jo Kilroy by 321 votes in Ohio’s 15th District. The AP has corrected and updated their wildly wrong tally, and now that lead is down to 146 votes (and so says the Columbus Dispatch).

There are about 10,000 outstanding provisional and absentee ballots left to be counted, with 60-70% of those coming from Franklin County, where Kilroy edged Stivers by 48-43 in the count so far. The other ballots appear to be friendlier to Stivers, and one GOP operative quoted by the Politico says that this race will come down to less than 100 votes.

In 2006, Kilroy was trailing in the initial count by 3000 votes, and ended up only 1000 votes (or so) shy after provisionals were added and the recount kicked in. Let’s hope for some similar gains this time.

(From the diaries – promoted by James L.)

Important update: VA BOE repots a HUGE jump in Tom Perriello’s lead this afternoon from 30 votes to 834 votes. Goode has picked up a few votes here and there in Campbell and Pittsylvania County since, bringing Tom Perriello from +834 to his current total.

Race	Precincts In	Dem% – Rep%	Vote +-
VA-05	100%	Perriello 50.07% (158,523) – Goode 49.87% (157,894)	Perriello +629

I want to give yall a quick update on VA-05.

Firstly, get comfy.  We are winning this election, but I get the feeling this battle will take days, if not weeks to settle.

Secondly, progressives should be both eager and proud about working to win this race. Tom Perriello is a legitimate progressive phenomenon with a record of diplomatic work in conflict zones like Darfur and Afghanistan, and a natural ability to communicate to “real Virginians.” (not you commie types in NoVA!)

Perriello has made such an impression in VA-05 that he is now leading a 6-term Republican incumbent in an R+6 district by 30 votes with 100% reported.

Here’s whats happened in VA-05, and what we can expect in the coming days…

The battle for VA-05 (in yellow):

Winning the fifth district would turn a majority of Virginia’s Congressional seats blue.



Red=Republican, blue=Democratic, light blue=Dem pickup

Round 1: pre-Election Day

Barack Obama is a natural organizer, and that’s how he ran his campaign. Tom Perriello is the same way. Early on, the campaign invested in field operations, organizers, and GOTV apparatus. This was mostly in the southern, rural part of the district in places like Danville, Martinsville, and Bedford. Nobody had ever organized so heavily in southside. Tom saw that this would be necessary, and he set up an A+ field team and GOTV operation. State Senator and Gubernatorial Candidate Creigh Deeds said “I have never seen such local organization in my entire political life.”

Round 1, Tom.

Round 2 Goode Helps Us Close.

Tom’s momentum was helped in the last two weeks because of collosal screw-ups by Virgil Goode mis-using his office resources to promote a gay film. (Sultry full story here Goode was also running incredibly nasty attack ads distorting Tom’s skin color and making him look foreign, and calling Tom a “New York Lawer” (he never practiced law in New York.) Tom ran engaging positive ads like this one.

Election week polls showed the race to be within the margin of error.

Round 2, Tom.

Round 3 Election Day

Tom had a massive GOTV operation, as expected. Early in the night on Tuesday, MSNBC and other networks called the race for Goode. All of us knew that the networks were getting way ahead of themselves, and were under-estimating people’s support of Tom Perriello. Knowing what we did about the field operation, we called bullshit on the networks. Round 3, us.

Round 4: As the numbers came in

Later on in the evening, we saw Tom Perriello get closer and closer, the networks actually started “un-calling” the race for Goode. In fact, as the evening wore on, Perriello took a pretty substantial lead (well, at least compared to the 31-vote margin he currently holds). In fact, Tom Perriello actually had built up a lead of nearly 2,300 votes with 99.34% reporting. 305 of 307 precincts, and only about 800-1000 voters remained outstanding. Since, in the great state of Virginia, 800 voters can not cast 2300 votes, I called the race for Tom Perriello, drank a beer, a celebrated an un-imaginable upset in my Congressional race on a miraculous night that I will never forget as long as I live.

Round 4, youthful exuberance, O.R.E. (Obama Related Euphoria)

Round 5 Wednesday AM

Via a a commenter at CVille News, there was a huge shift towards Goode at 8AM due to VERIS machines in Danville City shifting 1,809 votes to Goode and subtracting 308 votes from Tom Perriello when they came back online at 8AM. I don’t expect foul play, as updated vote totals roughly mirror the 2004 results. But nevertheless, it was a shock to most of us who had gone to bed thinking Tom Perriello was the clear winner to wake up and see Virgil Goode ahead by several 100 votes. Richmond Times-Dispatch has more on the VERIS machine switch.

Round 5, Virgil and the bad guys.

Round 6 Wednesday day

What had looked like a certain win for Tom now looked like a near certain loss. However, all day yesterday Tom benefited from incoming results of district wide canvassing, and correction of human error, and his position continued to improve all day. He eventually took a small lead (initially he led by just 6 votes), and then his lead climbed to a staggering 31 votes, where it remains. Although we can expect that number to change with additional results coming in today.

How did the candidates spend their Wednesday?

Tom spent the day crossing the district to thank his volunteers and celebrate how far they had come together.

Virgil Goode holed up in his office in Rocky Mount with lawyers to figure out how to block the counting of provisional ballots.

Round 6, exasperation

Round 7 Upcoming days: The war over provisional ballots

The County will likely finish its canvass this week and we will have a rough count of where we stand without the provisional ballots. The state has until November 2th

This is where the story gets troubling:

Tom Perriello believes that we need to count ALL votes, including the provisional ballots. If that is done, he is confident that he will be elected.  

Virgil Goode on the other hand is challenging all provisional ballots, and his supporters are even saying “think like a bad guy.”

At around 1:45pm today, outside a conference room at the Albemarle County Office Extension on Fifth Street, a group of about five people strategized while the Albemarle County Registrar’s Office was on lunch break. Among them were Rachel Schoenewald, wife of the County GOP Chair Christian Schoenewald, and Clara Belle Wheeler. The group discussed how best to challenge provisional ballots that were cast by people on election day but who had received absentee ballots.

“Think like a bad guy,” said one woman. The phrase “integrity of the process” was batted around as a way of discussing the objection.

Round 8 The recount

Candidates in Virginia can request a recount if there is a difference of less than 1% (or, as an astute RK commenter points out, about 3,147 votes in this election.) We can be relatively certain that this will be the case.

A recount cannot be asked for until after the BOE certifies the election, which will occur Nov. 24. The request then needs to be filed within 10 days, or by Dec. 4.

Tom Perriello has said that he wants to ensure that we have a full “first count” before we have a recount. All signs are that Virgil Goode is lawyering up and ready to call for a recount as well.

Yesterday the Perriello campaign put out this statement:

“We are clearly seeing a very close election with vote totals from different counties changing rapidly, and Tom Perriello remains confident that when everyone’s vote is counted he will win this election and move ahead with his agenda for economic revival in the fifth district. Right now, our focus is on making sure every single vote is counted and every single voice is heard. The results need to be certified and there are provisional ballots that need to be considered. We are confident that people in the fifth district want change and that we are going to be successful in this election in the end.”

Tom Perriello has inspired people in the fifth district of Virginia like no other candidate ever has. His resume as a negotiator in conflict zones like Darfur and Afghanistan, his affable personality, his A+ staff, and his tireless campaigning have him neck-and-neck for the seat of deplorable xenophobe Virgil Goode. Goode is most notorious for his indecipherable rant against Muslims and immigration when Keith Ellison was elected in 2006, and under his watch this district has lost 1000s of jobs.

Tom gives me hope for my section of “real” Virginia, for the state of Virginia, and for my country. His service to those less fortunate has been the calling of his life, and he will make an incredible citizen-legislator.

We are winning! Spread the word.

And lets turn Virginia’s biggest district blue!