Nevada Republican Sharron Angle
Leading Off:
• NV-Sen: Jon Ralston reports that Sharron Angle, one of the worst GOP candidates of 2010, is considering another run for the Senate. Two legislators are circulating a letter urging her to get in, and Angle herself added a postscript admitting she is interested and telling would-be supporters, "Your financial support for this effort will make the decision much, much easier."
Democrats would be beyond overjoyed if Angle somehow beat Rep. Joe Heck in the GOP primary, but that's extremely unlikely. While Angle still has her supporters in the far-right, very few other Republicans have any interest in seeing her on another general election ballot after her last campaign. Indeed, as a March Daily Beast story shows, Angle has largely faded into obscurity since her loss to Sen. Harry Reid, and she'd have a very tough time raising money against the well-financed Heck.
And while a low-turnout primary would help a candidate like Angle with a few excited supporters, there are limits. Last year, establishment Republican Mark Hutchison faced Sue Lowden in the primary for lieutenant governor. While Lowden (who lost the 2010 primary to Angle) positioned herself as the tea party candidate, she still lost 54-36.
It also doesn't help Angle that she lost to the hated Reid (even though she continues to argue without any evidence that the election was stolen). GOP primary voters can forgive many things, but not losing an election they think they should have won. Indeed, an August 2011 PPP survey gave Angle a horrible 31-52 rating with Republicans: While many voters have since forgotten about her, Heck will remind them about her 2010 defeat if he needs to. Still, if Angle can at least force Heck to waste some resources in the primary or move to the right, that would be good news for presumptive Democratic nominee Catherine Cortez Masto.
Senate:
• MD-Sen: Democrat Chris Van Hollen is out with his second spot. This ad features various supporters, including state Attorney General Brian Frosh, praising Van Hollen as someone who has stood up to special interest groups like the NRA and oil companies. The Baltimore Sun's John Fritze says this spot is airing in the Baltimore media market, where neither Van Hollen nor primary rival Donna Edwards are well known.
• MO-Sen, NV-Sen: If you're a regular Digest reader, you've seen reference recently to a new conservative group called One Nation that's been spending money to run ads on behalf of vulnerable Republican senators. The organization is not a super PAC but a 501(c)(4), a type of non-profit that is supposed to promote "social welfare" causes and cannot primarily engage in political activity. Unlike super PACs, these non-profits don't have to disclose their donors, and of course, the rules on limiting political activity are regularly flouted.
There had been talk in recent years about clamping down on these abuses, but after Republicans in Congress successfully mau-maued the IRS with trumped-up charges that the agency had unfairly targeted tea party groups, those enforcement efforts have collapsed. (One grotesque example: A North Carolina "social welfare" outfit called Carolina Rising spent 97 percent of its $5 million budget on ads to help Republican Thom Tillis defeat Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan last year.)
So that's left groups like One Nation free to spend freely—but just who are these guys? If your first guess was that they're a new Koch brothers front group, you would have been close. Turns out they're tied to the other top conservative dark money bogeyman, Karl Rove. One Nation's president, Steven Law, is also head of American Crossroads, Rove's most well-known electioneering vehicle, so it's a small world.
In any event, One Nation is running two new spots, each for $800,000: One in Nevada on behalf of GOP Rep. Joe Heck, and, more interestingly, another in Missouri to boost Republican Sen. Roy Blunt. Both are dishwater-dull: The Heck ad praises him for supporting "bipartisan solutions" to create jobs, while Blunt gets props for fighting "to provide jobs for veterans." (It also has a great quote of him saying he wants to "make that strength of the military even stronger.")
While Nevada's unquestionable a tossup race, Blunt is heavily favored for re-election. He does, however, face an energetic challenge from Democratic Secretary of State Jason Kander, and there's an outside chance Blunt could be vulnerable if all the breaks go Kander's way. This ad from One Nation is, undoubtedly, an initial effort to ensure that doesn't happen.
• NH-Sen: The ongoing battle between Republican pollsters and everyone else over whether New Hampshire's Senate race is a tossup or solidly in the GOP corner continues. PPP's latest poll finds Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan edging Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte 44-43, virtually unchanged from their August numbers, which put Ayotte ahead 44-43. That's also similar to the results that most non-partisan outfits have found; only Republicans are convinced that Ayotte has got this one in hand. Also good news from PPP: Both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders lead the GOP field by around 6 to 7 points on average.
• WI-Sen: St. Norbert College has often has weird polling results in the past, but the school's latest survey of its home state of Wisconsin is in line with what other shops have found. Democratic ex-Sen. Russ Feingold is hammering GOP Sen. Ron Johnson by a 51-40 margin, which is pretty close to the 50-36 spread Marquette came up with last month. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders also beat the three Republicans they were each tested against, with Ben Carson coming closest (49-45 Clinton) and Donald Trump by far the weakest (55-37 Sanders).
Gubernatorial:
• LA-Gov: Harper Polling takes a look at Sunday's jungle primary and like almost everyone else, they show Democrat John Bel Edwards and Republican David Vitter advancing to the November runoff:
John Bel Edwards (D): 36
David Vitter (R): 26
Jay Dardenne (R): 14
Scott Angelle (R): 14
An unreleased August poll
reportedly showed Angelle trailing Vitter 26-18 for second place. At the time, an 8-point deficit looked pretty good for Angelle. But the primary is just days away and unless this poll is very wrong, he and Dardenne have run out of time. A
pair of Market Research Insight polls recently gave Vitter only a 2 to 4-point lead against Angelle, but every other recent survey has shown him easily advancing to the runoff.
Note that this poll was conducted Oct. 16 and 17. On Oct. 18, New Orleans-based investigative reporter Jason Berry published an interview with Wendy Ellis, a former prostitute who alleged that in 2000, she became pregnant with Vitter's baby and that he exhorted her to abort it. We haven't seen any polls conducted after the story broke, so we don't know if it has done Vitter any damage. However, Ellis' story is so far uncorroborated, and unless the polls are badly overestimating the senator, it will need to severely damage Vitter to cost him his spot in the runoff.
Angelle and his allies aren't giving up though. Angelle has a new spot where he sums up his economic agenda, while Louisiana Rising accuses Vitter of lying about Angelle.
House:
• CA-52: Sophomore Democratic Rep. Scott Peters pulled off tight wins in this swingy San Diego seat, and the GOP wants to target him this cycle. However, retired marine Jacqueline Atkinson has been a weak fundraiser, and Roll Call's Emily Cahn says that the NRCC is looking for a new candidate. (They're also searching for someone to run against Ami Bera in the 7th District and Raul Ruiz in CA-36.) However, while the NRCC is reportedly "really aggressive " about trying to find someone, they may not have much luck in the end. The powerful San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce recently backed Peters, and GOP operatives tell Cahn that they're afraid the endorsement has scared off strong would-be contenders.
• FL-13: Ex-Gov. Charlie Crist kicked off his bid for the Democratic nod on Tuesday, but St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Kriseman quickly endorsed ex-Obama administration official Eric Lynn instead. This district is dominated by St. Petersburg, so Kriseman could help the little-known Lynn get his name out and raise money. Lynn has a credible $500,000 on hand, though his fundraising took a hit after Crist started eyeing this seat.
However, Alex Sink, who came close to winning a redder version of this seat in 2014, has endorsed Crist. Sink called Crist a "perfect candidate" for Congress back in July, so it would have been really weird if she didn't support him.
• IA-01: Cedar Rapids City Councilwoman Monica Vernon has released a new poll from Anzalone Liszt Grove showing her with a narrow 40-38 edge on former state House Speaker Pat Murphy in the Democratic primary, while ad executive Gary Kroeger is far behind at 6. Only 16 of voters are undecided, which seems quite low for a distant primary where no one's run a single ad, though both Vernon and Murphy did run here last year, too.
This is the second survey of the race we've seen so far. Murphy put out an internal back in July, shortly before he decided to make a second go of it, that had him up 43-34 on Vernon with Kroeger at 12. But even if Murphy's numbers are more accurate at the moment, Vernon just crushed him in third-quarter fundraising, $253,000 to just $74,000. (Kroeger took in just $16,000.) She's also swamping him in cash-on-hand, $564,000 to a mere $87,000. When it comes time for candidates to start spending money to get their names out there, Vernon will have a big advantage.
• KY-01: When this seat opened up a month ago, former George W. Bush aide Scott Jennings sounded interested in running. However, in an interview with the National Journal, Jennings calls Agriculture Commissioner James Comer "a superior candidate with a superior resume in this race." This is not the type of thing you say about someone you're thinking about challenging, so we can almost certainly cross Jennings off the potential candidates list.
• MI-10: Shelby Township Treasurer Michael Flynn has quietly ended his bid for the GOP nod. (I guess he's out like Flynn.) Three Republicans are currently running to succeed Candice Miller in this Romney 55-44 seat: Rich guy and 2014 4th District candidate Paul Mitchell, state Sen. Phil Pavlov, and ex-state Sen. Alan Sanborn.
Thanks to self-funding, Mitchell has a large $364,000 to $126,000 cash on hand lead over Pavlov, while Sanborn only has $26,000 in the bank. However, Mitchell only just moved to this suburban Detroit seat from the other side of the state, so his money may not be able to buy him love. A few other candidates expressed interest in running after Miller announced her retirement in March, but no one has made any moves here in months. Back in April, state Sen. Jack Brandenburg sounded very likely to jump in, saying he was "90 percent there." It seems that last 10 percent was a lot larger than Brandenburg thought.
• PA-15: On Tuesday, the National Journal published a piece quoting moderate Republican Rep. Charlie Dent saying that if the House remains as chaotic as it is, he may retire. However, Dent is walking that back, telling The Morning Call that he was, in the words of reporter Laura Olson, "commenting generally about legislators who are thinking of retiring," rather than talking about his own plans.
But Dent told the National Journal, "I'm preparing as if I'm running for re-election right now. But we'll see what happens. The next two months are going to be pretty intense." Unless Dent began the quote by saying "Other people are telling me, 'I'm preparing as if I'm running for re-election right now,'" or he has a weird habit of referring to other people as "I," he was definitely talking about himself.
Dent's own declaration that he's running again is also far from iron clad: He tells The Morning Call that his "plan is to run and we're putting together a team and an organization and getting ready to roll." If Dent really wants to put all doubts about his intentions aside, there's nothing from stopping him from simply saying, "I'm running for re-election," instead of talking about his plan to run for re-election. After all, his original quote was that he was "preparing" to run, which is pretty much the same thing as saying his plan is to run. Then again, maybe he just enjoys torturing Democrats with the prospect of an open Romney 51-48 seat in a presidential cycle.
• TX-27: Back in June, tea partier John Harrington announced that he would challenge Rep. Blake Farenthold in the GOP primary, and there were reports that Harrington could self-fund. However, Harrington never made much of an impression, and he quietly terminated his campaign about a week ago.
At the beginning of the year, Farenthold looked very vulnerable in a primary. A former staffer sued him for sexual harassment, and he's also earned headlines for embarrassing behavior. However, no credible candidates have showed any interest in challenging Farenthold, and he's managed to keep his head down during 2015. The filing deadline is in December so there's still time for someone to jump in, but it looks like Farenthold will skate to renomination without much trouble in this safely red seat.
Legislative:
• Specials: Johnny Longtorso fills us in on the last special before Nov. 3:
South Carolina SD-45: Democrat Margie Bright Matthews easily won this seat, defeating Republican Alberto Fernandez by an 89-11 margin. This is the seat formerly held by Democrat Clementa Pinckney, one of the nine slain in the mass shooting at Emanuel AME Church back in June.
Mayoral:
• Sacramento, CA Mayor: On Wednesday, Mayor Kevin Johnson announced that he would not seek re-election next year. Johnson has been dealing with some ugly headlines over the last few weeks: A woman named Mandi Koba recently came forward and said that in 1995, when she was 16, Johnson molested her. Johnson may have retired anyway: No mayor has won a third term here before. However, it's very likely that Koba played at least some role in convincing him to call it quits.
There are several local politicians eyeing a run for California's sixth largest city. Councilor Angelique Ashby, a close Johnson ally, has already confirmed that she'll jump in the race. Darrell Steinberg, the former leader of the state Senate, says that he "will be ready to announce (his) intentions soon." Ex-Assemblyman Roger Dickinson and Councilor Allen Warren have also been mentioned as potential candidates. The city of Sacramento is heavily Democratic, and Johnson's successor is likely to identify as a Democrat, though this race is officially non-partisan. The primary will be in June and assuming no one takes a majority, the top two vote-getters will advance to the November general.
• San Francisco, CA Mayor: Back in August, prosecutors presented evidence in federal court against Raymond "Shrimp Boy" Chow and said that Mayor Ed Lee was one of several local politicians whom undercover FBI agents caught taking bribes as part of the investigation. The candidate filing deadline had already passed, but we wondered if the news would encourage a credible candidate to run as a write-in. Well, the write-in deadline has passed and the answer is no. Lee faces several Some Dude foes on Nov. 3 and unless there's a major last-minute development, he looks safe for re-election.
The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir and Jeff Singer, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, and Stephen Wolf.