Republican Tom Cotton
Leading Off:
• AR-Sen, Gov: Early this week it was the Republicans who were crowing, and the Democrats who were despairing, about the state of play in Arkansas. A poll from the reliable crew at PPP had both Democratic incumbent Sen. Mark Pryor and Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Mike Ross trailing by 5-6 point margins. Republicans were trotting out their "even the lib'ruls at PPP" bullcrap, while Democrats worried that PPP's new numbers might be an indicator that Arkansas was even more perilous for Democrats than originally thought. Then, when the news arrived that Suffolk (as part of their new partnership with USA Today) was going to be releasing an Arkansas poll just one day after PPP, Democrats braced for a second dose of potentially bad news.
Yeah, not so much.
Suffolk threw the community of political junkies a bit of a curveball, with their new poll being the first nonpartisan poll in a month to show a lead for Mark Pryor over Republican challenger Tom Cotton. Suffolk's new poll, released on Wednesday, shows Pryor with a 45-43 lead over Cotton (two independent candidates split 5 percent of the vote). While PPP found Pryor very unpopular while voters were evenly divided on Cotton, Suffolk sees a different story. They give Pryor a meh 44-47 favorable rating but find Cotton no better off at 39-43.
Equally surprising, the open seat battle to replace outgoing Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe is closer than it has been in some time, according to the pollster. The new Suffolk poll, as has been the case elsewhere, had Republican Asa Hutchinson edging Democrat Mike Ross, but by a quite modest 43-41 margin (here, as in the Senate poll, third party candidates split 5 percent of the vote). While PPP found voters evenly divided on Ross while generally liking Hutchinson, Suffolk again sees things differently. They find Ross is the better-liked man, posting a 43-29 favorable rating to Hutchinson's 40-35. One thing both pollsters agree on is that Beebe is one popular dude: Suffolk pegs his favorables at 66-19, only a little better than what PPP found.
Downballot, the Suffolk poll also gave Democrats modest edges in several races, including a surprising seven-point lead for Democrat John Burkhalter in his battle with outgoing Republican Rep. Tim Griffin. Again, this is notably better for Team Blue than what PPP found. It's far too early to say whether PPP or Suffolk has a better read on the Natural State this year, but Arkansas Democrats are probably glad to have a poll that shows the sky isn't falling.
Senate:
• GA-Sen, Gov: SurveyUSA returns to the field on behalf of local news, and they find close contests for U.S. Senate and for governor. In the Senate race, Republican David Perdue leads Democrat Michelle Nunn 46-45, with Libertarian Amanda Swafford at 4: In early September, Perdue led 47-44. The gubernatorial contest has Democrat Jason Carter leading Republican Gov. Nathan Deal 45-44, with Libertarian Andrew Hunt at 4 percent. SurveyUSA's last poll had Deal up by one point.
These are decent numbers for both Democrats, but unfortunately, winning a plurality isn't enough in either race. Under Georgia law if no candidate wins more than 50 percent in November, the top-two vote-getters advance to a runoff. Frustratingly, the two runoffs would be held in different months: The gubernatorial contest would be Dec. 2, while the Senate race would be Jan 6. As Taniel explained back in May, Democratic turnout tends to disproportionately drop in Georgia runoffs. Nunn and Carter could win in a runoff but it won't be easy: Their best bet is to take 50 percent plus one vote in November.
Most polling we've seen has shown both Nunn and Carter with a long way to go if they want to break 50 percent. Since the mid-July Republican primary concluded only Landmark Communications has shown either Democrat taking more than 45 percent. If most polls are correct, each Democrat would need to win the undecideds overwhelmingly to have a shot at a majority, a difficult proposition. Each Libertarian is currently taking 4 percent and while there's no reason to expect them to swallow up more voters, there's also no guarantee that they'll lose most of their support. As Taniel demonstrated, minor parties tend to take a combined 2.1 to 4 percent in Georgia statewide races, averaging at 3 percent. Even if the Libertarians take only 2 percent, that could be more than enough to keep anyone from getting a majority.
Both national parties are taking each race very seriously, but Democrats have a lot of work to do if they want to win in November or pull off runoff victories.
• KS-Sen: Philip Rucker of the Washington Post has a good profile of Republican Sen. Pat Roberts, who is in an unexpectedly tough race against independent Greg Orman. There's one unsurprising but still interesting detail: Roberts' campaign has really been phoning this race in. As Rucker tells us, "Roberts has made few contacts with voters, such as door-knocks and phone calls, and has no significant volunteer corps, Kansas Republican officials said." Roberts is belatedly stepping up his game, bringing in national Republicans to campaign for him and appearing with Bob Dole on a statewide tour.
Still, as anyone who's been watching this race knows, it's Roberts' own fault that he's in as much trouble as he's in. After Indiana Republican Richard Lugar lost his primary in 2012 largely over his thin ties to his state, Roberts had plenty of warning that the issue could put him in danger. Roberts responded by doing nothing, and he didn't know how to respond when voters found out how little time he actually spent in Kansas. And it appears Roberts' still isn't sure how to deal with this:
As Roberts campaigned with Dole at a shopping mall in Dodge City this week, a man in the back of the crowd asked, "Can you tell us why Virginia would get three senators and Kansas only one?"
Roberts stayed silent and let Dole answer by noting that each state has two senators.
Yeah, I'm sure a civics lesson will make this go away.
• VA-Sen: Roanoke College: Mark Warner (D-inc): 46, Ed Gillespie (R): 27 (July: 47-22 Warner).
Gubernatorial:
• FL-Gov: We've got two new Florida polls, both of likely voters:
• Quinnipiac: Rick Scott (R-inc): 44, Charlie Crist (D): 42, Adrian Wyllie (Lib): 8 (July: 45-40 Crist, among registered voters)
• SurveyUSA: Scott: 43, Crist, 42, Wyllie: 4 (last week: 44-39 Scott)
The
$50 million question, of course, is where that final block of undecideds winds up. There's also the matter of which candidate Wyllie's supports drift over to, assuming he fades by Election Day, but that doesn't seem dispositive. Quinnipiac tried to answer that second question by asking Wyllie voters whom their second choice was; recalculated, Scott still leads by 2 points, 46-44, so we can't say very much about these erstwhile Libertarians.
Getting back to the undecideds, 39 percent of the respondents in SurveyUSA's poll identify as Democrats while just 20 say they're Republicans and 40 percent call themselves independents. Quinnipiac's undecideds are even more extreme, at 29 D, 8 R, and 64 I (though of course we're talking about a very tiny sample here). Florida also makes things tricky because lots of conservative Dixiecrats who despise Obama still consider themselves Democrats, though Quinnipiac, at least, relies in self-identification rather than official party registration statistics. (It's not clear what SUSA does.)
But in both cases, independents make up the plurality of the undecideds. So where are independents who have made up their minds leaning? We still don't know! SUSA sees them favoring Crist 39-34 while Quinnipiac finds them backing Scott 44-37. This race is truly as knife's-edge and unpredictable as they come.
• MA-Gov: MassINC's new poll, which finds Democrat Martha Coakley beating Republican Charlie Baker 46-36, is unsurprisingly little different than their survey from a week ago, which had Coakley on top 44-35. In between, a poll from SocialSphere managed to find Coakley up just 39-36, though, so only one of these firms can be right.
Baker, meanwhile, did a great job alienating women the other day, first flip-flopping on whether NFL commissioner Roger Goodell should resign in the wake of the NFL's disastrous handling of its ongoing domestic abuse scandals. Baker originally dodged, saying, "If we fired everybody every time we got into one of these situations, I don't know—I would like to see more data and more information." After an uproar, Baker then called for Goodell's head, which led to reporter Sharman Sacchetti to ask him why he'd changed his mind. Baker's incredibly offensive response:
"Okay, this going to be the last one, sweetheart, then I'm gonna have to go," said Baker, patting Sacchetti on the shoulder.
Baker later apologized, but
as Laura Clawson says, "you can't get around his initial instinct" to "sweetheart" and pat his way out of this one.
• MI-Gov: Rasmussen: Rick Snyder (R-inc): 47, Mark Schauer (D): 41 (July: 45-42 Snyder).
• NY-Gov: Marist's new poll of New York's gubernatorial race is the first since the Sept. 9 primary, and of course it still shows Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo winning. But Cuomo's 54 percent share is the lowest he's ever seen in a traditional poll (YouGov last gave him 52), and it's down from the 59 Marist gave him in July—and from the 65 Marist found in February. That suggests Cuomo's standing has indeed taken a hit since his weak primary showing, and indeed, he's only earning the support of 75 percent of Democrats now, compared to 81 percent in July. A similar proportion of independents have abandoned the governor, too.
So where have they gone? Some have drifted to Republican Rob Astorino, who sits at just 29 percent of the vote (though that's up from 24 last time). But others have gone over to Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins, if you can believe it, who now takes an outsize 9 percent, up from 6 in July. If Hawkins remains an outlet for discontented liberals, then Cuomo's Election Day performance could fall embarrassingly short of expectations.
It also shows that the Working Families Party had little to fear from refusing to cross-endorse Cuomo. If the Greens, who lack any serious infrastructure, can so easily be assured of winning the 50,000 votes they need to keep their ballot line for the next four years, then surely the well-organized WFP could have easily done so. Instead, they sided with Cuomo, who's utterly gone back on his word to help Democrats retake the state Senate. This was so predictable, yet a lot of people engaged in a lot of wishful thinking to imagine it wouldn't be. The best they can hope for know is that Democrats win in spite of him, and that he turns in a weak performance on Nov. 4.
House:
• AZ-02: Last week, Gabby Giffords' super PAC Americans for Responsible Solutions aired a spot against Republican Martha McSally, accusing her of opposing policies that would keep guns out of the hands of stalkers. The ad, which featured a woman whose husband and daughter were murdered, drew a good deal of righteous indignation, though it's not clear if it had any effect electorally one way or another.
However, McSally clarified on Tuesday that she supports a bill that would keep anyone convicted of a misdemeanor from buying a gun: In response, ARS has pulled the commercial. The NRA is a vocal opponent of this bill, so voters may not have heard the last of this matter.
• IL-13: This is not inspiring. The other day, Republican Rep. Rodney Davis released an internal poll showing him with a daunting 55-36 lead on Democrat Ann Callis. Callis' response? "I'm not 19 points behind. It's designed to show that I'm not going to win this race. And I'm going to win this race." A lot of words, but no contradictory data. Not good.
• NJ-03: The DCCC recently ran a spot against Republican Tom MacArthur, accusing him of profiting from York Risk Services as they were declining injured firefighters' insurance claims. The DCCC is now pulling the ad due to "new information that Tom MacArthur did not previously disclose".
Apparently, York's actions began after MacArthur had sold his stock with them and no longer had anything to do with his former company. Team Blue is going up with a replacement ad, and they are going to keep portraying him as a greedy insurance executive who got rich off while allowing people to suffer. However, this incident is only going to make it easier for MacArthur to argue that Democrats are trying to smear him.
Other Races:
• Providence Mayor: Can Buddy Cianci, the legendary former mayor of Providence and ex-con, pull off another comeback? A new poll from Fleming & Associates on behalf of local news says he can. Cianci, running as an independent, leads Democratic nominee Jorge Elorza 38-32; Republican Daniel Harrop takes 6 percent.
Cianci, who left office in 2002 before beginning his stint in prison, posts a 53-37 favorable rating. Elorza is less well known but has a good 45-17 rating. Outgoing Mayor Angel Taveras may have lost the Democratic primary for governor, but he's leaving on good terms with his city. Taveras has a 61-32 favorable rating, which could be very helpful if he seeks office again.
Grab Bag:
• WATN?: Amazing. Even though he was caught dead-to-rights illegally contributing more than the maximum allowed by law to New York Senate candidate Wendy Long, conservative activist Dinesh D'Souza has escaped jail time. While most criminal defendants shut up and throw themselves on the mercy of the court, D'Souza had spent every minute since his indictment arguing that the prosecution was all an Obama-directed conspiracy to shut him up. What's more, Judge Richard Berman knew D'Souza hadn't displayed the slightest bit of contrition:
Berman appeared to accept the prosecutors' position, playing a video in which D'Souza talked about selective prosecution - an effort at "spin," the judge said.
"I'm not sure, Mr. D'Souza, that you get it," Berman said before announcing the sentence. "And it is still hard for me to discern any personal acceptance of responsibility in this case."
In spite of that, Berman only sentenced D'Souza to eight months in a "community confinement center"—basically, a halfway house that allows D'Souza to leave during the day to go work. Well, I hope Berman feels like a fool now, because that's
exactly what D'Souza played him for:
"I've got a big smile on my face now, and I think I have for several hours. I can't wipe it off because this was really an effort to put me out of business, I mean, the government was trying to lock me up for between 10 and 16 months and a federal judge said no," D'Souza said Tuesday night on Fox News' "The Kelly File." "My own country tried to put me away and the court said no."
Next time a guilty criminal howls about "selective prosecution" and shows no remorse, how about we lock him up?
Ads & Independent Expenditures:
• AK-Sen: Republican Dan Sullivan gets some praise from Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski. The Democratic group Put Alaska First also spends $503,000 here.
• AR-Sen: The DSCC continues to hit Republican Tom Cotton for his vote against the Farm Bill, accusing him of hurting farmers. On the GOP side, Freedom Partners hits Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor on the VA scandal. The group recently spent $297,000 here.
• CO-Sen: The SEIU, NEA, and DSCC each go up for Team Blue in Spanish language spots. The first two hit Republican Cory Gardner while the DSCC ad praises Democratic Sen. Mark Udall. The size of the buy for the NEA spot is $200,000.
On the GOP side, the NRSC has their own Spanish-language ad out. Freedom Partners has an English spot, hitting Udall on Obamacare.
• IA-Sen: Freedom Partners does a compare and contrast between Republican Joni Ernst (who they like) and Democrat Bruce Braley (who they don't like). Freedom Partners is spending $399,000 here.
• KS-Sen: Freedom Partners spends $260,000 against independent Greg Orman, and there's a lot more to come.
• KY-Sen: Democrat Alison Grimes hits Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell for voting against raising the minimum wage, equal pay, and job training for veterans.
• LA-Sen: The DSCC accuses Republican Bill Cassidy of trying to replace Medicare with a voucher system.
• MI-Sen: A group called B-PAC has two spots (here and here) hitting Democrat Gary Peters, tying him to the Obama Administration. Ending Spending also goes after Peters, accusing him of increasing American debt to China.
• NC-Sen: We have the size of the buy for a recent Carolina Rising spot supporting Republican Thom Tillis: a hefty $2 million.
• NH-Sen: Ending Spending spends $700,000 once again accusing Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of being a corrupt Obama-loving townhall dodger.
• SD-Sen: Two 15-second spots from Democrat Rick Weiland (here and here). The first hits Republican Mike Rounds for wanting tax cuts for the rich. The second brings up Rounds' troubles with EB-5 visas, where Rounds allegedly helped sell immigration visas to the highest bidders (see here for background).
• NRSC: Various expenditures.
• AR-Gov: The RGA paints Democrat Mike Ross as a wasteful spender.
• CO-Gov: The pro-Democratic Make Colorado Great accuses Republican Bob Beauprez of profiting off his own failed bank.
• CT-Gov: Democratic Gov. Dan Malloy goes positive, stressing his triumph over adversity and investments in education.
• FL-Gov: The Florida Republican Party ties Democrat Charlie Crist to Obamacare. Crist himself has two spots (here and here). The first hits Republican Gov. Rick Scott for Medicare fraud; the second is positive, with Crist touting his bipartisan credentials.
• IL-Gov: Two new spots from Republican Bruce Rauner (here and here). The first is a Spanish spot. The second has a long clip of the late Harold Washington, the first African American mayor of Chicago, dissing fellow Democrat and incumbent governor Pat Quinn.
• ME-Gov: Planned Parenthood hits Republican Paul LePage on women's healthcare, while praising Democrat Mike Michaud.
• MI-Gov: The RGA ties Democrat Mark Schauer to Obamacare.
• MN-Gov: Republican Jeff Johnson portrays Democratic Gov. Mark Dayton as someone who wastes money.
• OK-Gov: This I didn't expect. The RGA has a spot out in Oklahoma, where Republican Gov. Mary Fallin has generally been seen as safe. The first half ties Democrat Joe Dorman to Obama, while the second part praises Fallin as an effective conservative.
A few weeks ago there were some polls showing a closer-than-expected contest. A Sooner Poll from early September showed Fallin leading by 18 points, indicating that Fallin was doing fine. The fact that the RGA is bothering to spend here so late in the game may be a sign that they think things are a lot more competitive though. We'll definitely want to see if anyone else gets involved in this contest.
• SC-Gov: Republican Gov. Nikki Haley emphasizes education funding, while Democrat Vincent Sheheen accuses Haley of ignoring problems at the Department of Social Services.
• CA-36: Democratic Rep. Raul Ruiz calls for protecting Social Security and Medicare.
• FL-18: Yet another ad for Democratic Rep. Patrick Murphy.
• GA-12: Democratic Rep. John Barrow continues to stress his conservative credentials, while Republican Rick Allen ties Barrow to Obama.
• IL-10: Two new spots for Republican Bob Dold! (here and here). In the first commercial, Dold portrays himself as a moderate problem solver, while casting Democratic Rep. Brad Schneider as an ineffective partisan. The second ad features Dold's sister praising him for respecting women's health decisions. For his part, Schneider ties Dold to national Republicans.
• MA-06: Democrat Seth Moulton.
• MI-07: Democrat Pam Byrnes.
• NE-02: The NRCC reserves $730,000 here to help bail out endangered Republican Rep. Lee Terry. I doubt Greg Walden is happy about having to spend this much in a Romney 53-46 seat.
• NH-02: Republican Marilinda Garcia.
• NJ-03: Republican Tom MacArthur portrays himself as a self-made businessman.
• NY-01: Republican Lee Zeldin goes positive on education and equal pay.
• NY-19: Republican Rep. Chris Gibson.
• WV-03: Republican Evan Jenkins accuses Democratic Rep. Nick Rahall of not standing up for coal miners.
• DCCC: We have new Democratic spots in CO-06, IA-03, IL-17, and TX-23. We also have various expenditures.
• NRCC: Various expenditures.
• Chamber: The deep pocked U.S. Chamber of Commerce goes up for the GOP in NY-19, NY-21, PA-06, and VA-10.
The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, with additional contributions from Jeff Singer, David Jarman, and Steve Singiser.