Leading Off:
● FL-Sen: You've heard of the Chewbacca defense? Well, Carlos Beruff is trying out its closely related Kryptonian cousin, the Superman defense. Beruff, a wealthy Republican businessman who is seeking Florida's open Senate seat, has gotten a well-deserved ton of shit for referring to Barack Obama as "this animal we call president," so of course he's now claiming his remarks were "taken out of context."
That's a total crock—you can watch the video yourself—but then Beruff decided go full-on Lex Luthor. "Animal" was just a bit of filler, explained Beruff. "I could have called him a bird, plane, anything." As Adam Smith observed, "This, of course, makes complete sense." He's right! Beruff says he was taken out of context? Well, Smith has helped put it all into proper context:
"Unfortunately, for seven and a half years this PLANE we call president, because he's a PLANE, okay—seven and a half years, has surgically and with thought and very smart, intelligent manner, destroyed this country and dismantled the military under not one, not two, but three secretary of defenses. And they've all written books about it."
Look up in the sky—it's a total freaking moron running for Senate!
Senate:
● AZ-Sen: Ah, this is fantastic. Earlier this week, Sen. John McCain released a web video slamming his GOP primary opponent, former state Sen. Kelli Ward, over the debacle she's most infamously known for: the public hearing she convened as a sitting legislator two years ago to address the topic of "chemtrails," the amusing conspiracy theory that airplanes are secretly spraying an unsuspecting populace with nefarious chemicals to CONTROL YOUR BRAINZ!!!
The video itself goes about things all wrong, with a portentous narrator and stentorian music that makes this lunatic theory seem entirely serious and very much worth worrying about—particularly if you're a primary voter. But it's unlikely that McCain's going to try this tack again, because Ward just got a brilliant assist from someone who would very much like her to unseat the incumbent: Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick.
In a great bit of sleuthing, Kirkpatrick's office dug up a letter from a constituent that McCain's congressional office forwarded to the Environmental Protection Agency just last year, a letter in which this concerned citizen asked his senator to look into "the spraying coming from the unmarked planes." Explained the correspondent, "My dearest friend said those are Chemical Trails planes, they omit chemical emissions and leave those nasty steaks in the sky."
McCain told the EPA that his constituent had "encountered a problem," and no doubt a team of crack investigators on loan from the X-Files got right on it. A McCain spokesperson tried to fob off the matter by claiming that the senator's office gets tons of mail every year, including on UFOs, and told TPM reporter Caitlin MacNeal if she were to compare Ward's hearings with the letter McCain receive, it would mean "you may have been abducted by aliens yourself." Cute, but no doubt McCain wished instead he'd buried that letter in Area 51.
McCain himself went on the offensive against Kirkpatrick earlier this week with his first TV buy. The narrator unsurprisingly hits Kirkpatrick on Obamacare, arguing that it's wrecked the state. The narrator then says the congresswoman bragged about her Obamacare vote before some audio of Kirkpatrick saying "it's also the one I'm most proud about" plays, with the narrator then insisting that Kirkpatrick is putting Arizonans at risk. The recent PPP poll that found McCain leading Kirkpatrick by just 42-36 also found Obama with a 43-49 approval rating in the state. That's actually better than the 53-44 margin Obama lost Arizona by in 2012, and it's much stronger than the senator's 34-52 score. But as long as the president is unpopular here, it makes sense that the GOP would tie Democrats to all things Obama, especially Obamacare.
● NH-Sen: A new poll from MassINC for WBUR shows, as every other poll has shown, a tight Senate race in New Hampshire, but with a small twist. MassINC finds Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan edging GOP Sen. Kelly Ayotte 48-46 when leaners are included; in all the other surveys taken this year, though, it's been Ayotte with the small lead. That's not, however, a difference worth getting excited over, especially since this is MassINC's first poll and we have no direct trendlines to compare it to. Also of note: Hillary Clinton leads Donald Trump 44-42.
● NJ-Sen: Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez was indicted last year on corruption charges, but he's given no indication that he's planning to resign or quietly retire in 2018. Indeed, Politico reports that Menendez recently held a fundraiser attended by powerful New Jersey Democrats like Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop (a likely 2017 gubernatorial candidate), the state party chair, and the party chairs for several important counties. Menendez ended March with a little more than $1 million on-hand, and his fundraiser hauled in more than $600,000. Menendez's trial has not been scheduled yet.
According to a new Quinnipiac poll, Menendez is unpopular at home, but not toxic. Quinnipiac gives him a 34-40 job approval rating, and Democrats side with him by a 44-27 margin. Even with Menendez's legal problems, any Democrat who wants to unseat him in the primary won't have an easy time beating an incumbent with powerful party leaders behind him. Ex-Sen. Robert Torricelli has made the most noise about challenging Menendez in a primary, but The Torch has had his own ethics issues in the past. Of course, if Menendez is found guilty before it's time to run for re-election, this contest will look a lot different. But right now, Menendez seems to be charging full speed ahead towards 2018.
Gubernatorial:
● IN-Gov: Republican Gov. Mike Pence is out with his second TV spot and once again, he emphasizes the state economy. Pence appears in front of a crowd bragging about new jobs and billions of dollars in investments from businesses.
● OR-Gov: On Tuesday, former Oregon Medical Association head Bud Pierce decisively defeated businessman Allen Alley in the GOP primary. With most precincts in, Pierce prevailed 48-29. Sadly, with Alley's defeat, we'll lose the chance to hear his ill-considered slogan, "Less Salem, more Oregon" again. (Hilariously, Alley lost Marion County, which contains most of Salem, 64-20.) Pierce, who lent his campaign at least $1 million, will now face Democratic Gov. Kate Brown in a November special election to fill the final two years of ex-Gov. John Kitzhaber's term. Daily Kos Elections currently rates the general as Likely Democratic.
● VT-Gov: On Wednesday, state House Speaker Shap Smith announced that he would seek the Democratic nod for lieutenant governor rather than re-enter to the gubernatorial race. Smith ran for governor for several months last year, and he looked like the early primary frontrunner. However, Smith suspended his campaign in November after his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer.
In February, Smith flirted with getting back into the race, saying his wife's treatment was going well, but he says he decided that he couldn't raise enough money in a relatively short amount of time. Vermont's filing deadline is next week and unless there's a very late surprise, it looks like August's primary will be a three-way race between ex-state Sens. Matt Dunne and Peter Galbraith and former state Transportation Secretary Sue Minter.
House:
● FL-02: Neal Dunn is out with his second TV spot in this safely red seat, and he leans heavily on his medical background to do some old fashioned Obamacare bashing. Clad in scrubs and standing in front of medical equipment, Dunn calls Obamacare "a total disaster." Dunn then implores voters to end the program by sending in a doctor, not another politician. That doesn't make any sense, but whatever. Dunn is the best-funded of the four Republicans running in the late August primary.
● FL-26: Ex-Rep. Joe Garcia and businesswoman Annette Taddeo are out with dueling Democratic primary polls… that basically say the same thing. Garcia's survey from Expedition Strategies (a group we've never seen anything from) shows him defeating Taddeo 53-28 in their late August match. Back in January, a PPP survey for Garcia gave him a smaller 34-24 edge.
Taddeo's poll from Anzalone Liszt Grove Research gives Garcia a slightly smaller 48-27 lead. The memo argues that, when voters hear about Taddeo, she'll gain: After voters are only exposed to positive messages about Taddeo, primary voters choose her 69-21. Of course, we don't live in a world where Democrats will only hear positive messages about Taddeo. At the end of March, Taddeo held a $500,000 to $316,000 cash-on-hand edge; even if Taddeo outspends Garcia, he will have the resources to advertise. While Taddeo is the favored candidate of national Democratic leaders, Garcia still has powerful friends in Congress, so he should be able to continue to bring in cash.
The winner will face freshman Republican Rep. Carlos Curbelo in November. This Miami-area seat was transformed from a seat that Obama won 53-46 to one he carried 55-44, but neither side thinks that the well-funded Curbelo is doomed. The DCCC and House Majority PAC have reserved a total of $5 million in TV time for the fall (see our House item for more), and the NRCC has also purchased airtime here.
● KY-01: A year after losing Kentucky's gubernatorial primary by just 84 votes, ex-state Agriculture Commissioner James Comer got an easy win on Tuesday. Comer defeated Mike Pape, a former district director for retiring GOP Rep. Ed Whitfield, by a 61-23 margin, with Hickman County Attorney Jason Batts taking 14. Comer won't have any trouble in the general for this 66-32 Romney western Kentucky seat.
Comer started the contest with much more name-recognition than Pape, and he also brought in more cash and got help from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Pape drew national headlines when he ran an ad featuring three "Mexican" men, complete with bogus mustaches and accents, cutting their way through a fence marked "U.S. Border Do Not Cross" in the middle of the night, saying that they wanted to stop Mike Pape. The spot probably didn't cost Pape many votes in this very conservative area, but it clearly didn't do enough to help him.
Interestingly, none of the allegations that dogged Comer in his gubernatorial campaign resurfaced this time. Last year, Comer's college girlfriend came forward and accused him of abusing her two decades ago and taking her to get an abortion, and her former roommates confirmed parts of her story. Comer denied everything and in turn accused one of his primary rivals of paying her to lie. This year, none of Comer's congressional opponents seized on the story, and it barely, if ever, came up on the campaign trail.
● LA-02: On Wednesday, East Baton Rouge Mayor-President Kip Holden announced that he would challenge Rep. Cedric Richmond, a fellow Democrat, in this safely blue seat. Holden runs the state's largest parish but as we've noted before, he faces tough odds in the November jungle primary. Richmond has been a fairly low-key member congressman (though he is always the Democrats' super star player in the annual Congressional Baseball Game), and he doesn't seem to have done anything to alienate voters. Indeed, while Holden stressed his own accomplishments in his campaign announcement, he doesn't appear to have made a case for why voters should fire Richmond.
Geography also works against Holden. Richmond hails from New Orleans, and Orleans Parish and suburban Jefferson Parish make up about two-thirds of the 2nd District's population. By contrast, only about 14 percent of this seat is in Holden's East Baton Rouge. About 78 percent of this district is in the New Orleans media market while just 22 percent watches Baton Rouge TV, so voters will be much better acquainted with Richmond than Holden. Money is also likely to be a problem for the challenger. Holden struggled to raise cash for his unsuccessful lieutenant governor bid last year, while Richmond ended March with $483,000 in the bank. Holden filed with the FEC a few weeks ago, so maybe he's gotten a jump on fundraising. If no one takes a majority in the November jungle primary, there will be a December runoff between the top two vote-getters.
● NV-03: Gun-obsessed Assemblywoman Michelle Fiore had just $74,000 in the bank at the end of March, and boy does it show in her opening ads. In Fiore's first spot, she speaks to the camera from what looks like the set of the most boring game show in history. Fiore tells the audience that she's the "only conservative running in Nevada's 3rd Congressional District who voted against the largest tax increase in state history as I promised I would."
But that spot is a gem compared to her second commercial. Fiore stands in front of a green screen that displays some text from the Constitution and for some reason, the document keeps scrolling to the right rather than staying still. (It's almost as if the Constitution is trying to flee the ad.) Fiore once again emphasizes her conservative record and she just barrels through without stopping for breath. It's unclear if these spots are actually airing on TV (for the sake of Las Vegas viewers, we hope not), but Jon Ralston says that if they are, the buy is very small.
Fiore appears to only be a minor factor in the June 14 GOP primary for this swingy seat, which suits Democrats just fine. Team Blue would rather face wealthy perennial candidate Danny Tarkanian than state Senate President Michael Roberson, and Fiore is trying to draw from the same group of tea party friendly voters as Tarkanian.
● TX-19: The GOP runoff for this safely red Panhandle seat is on Tuesday, and former Texas Tech Regent Jodey Arrington is out with an ad against Lubbock Mayor Glen Robertson. Interestingly, Arrington stars in the attack ad himself rather than employing a scary-voiced narrator to do his dirty work for him. Arrington bemoans "empty promises, increased spending, and massive debt," before revealing that he's talking about what's going on in Lubbock, not in DC. Arrington continues by saying he's for "lower taxes, less spending, and less debt."
The Texas Tribune's Abby Livingston gives us a good lay of the land ahead of next week's primary. There aren't any real ideological issues between Arrington and Robertson. However, Arrington, a former George W. Bush aide, has the support of the former president and his allies, ex-Gov. Rick Perry, and other members of the old Texas political establishment (though only Perry has recorded an ad for Arrington). For his part, Robertson has been primarily self-funding his bid, and he's outspent Arrington. Robertson has also blasted Arrington as a member of the establishment, which isn't a label Republican candidates usually like to have attached to them. Robertson outpaced Arrington just 27-26 in the March primary, and it's far from clear who has the edge on Tuesday.
● House: The Democratic group House Majority PAC has made its third round of TV reservations for the fall. As usual, HMP's press release only lists the reservations by media market, but it's clear what markets correspond to what seats:
Colorado Springs, CO: $228,000 (CO-03)
Denver, CO: $1,910,270 (on top of previous $1,104,036 reservation): CO-03, CO-06
Grand Junction, CO: $132,148 (CO-03)
Miami, FL: $1,179,782 (FL-26)
Omaha, NE: $380,000 (NE-02)
Boston, MA/ Manchester, NH: $199,500 (NH-01)
Syracuse, NY: $371,621 (NY-24)
San Antonio, TX: $851,618 (TX-23)
You can find our continuously updated spreadsheet tracking House fall TV reservations here. So far, HMP and their allies at the DCCC have made most of the fall bookings; while the NRCC has announced that they're spending to defend six seats, they haven't revealed how much money is going into each market. And as we've noted before, while early ad reservations help lock in cheaper rates, they can be adjusted or cancelled, so this list could change and will definitely continue to expand.
With the exception of NE-02, all the seats in HMP's newest round of reservations are Republican-held. The only real surprise is in Colorado's 3rd District, where ex-Democratic state Sen. Gail Schwartz is challenging Republican Rep. Scott Tipton. The DCCC recently added Schwartz to their "Red to Blue" list for top candidates, but this seat is a tough target: Tipton beat a credible Democratic candidate 53-41 in 2012 as Romney was carrying this western Colorado seat 52-46. However, HMP has reserved at least $360,000 for the fall here (it's impossible to know how much of the money going to the Denver market will be for ads here or for the 6th District). That's not an overwhelming amount, but it suggests that national Democrats are taking this contest seriously.
Mayoral:
● Portland, OR Mayor: On Tuesday, Democratic state Treasurer Ted Wheeler took 57 percent of the vote in the non-partisan primary, giving him the majority he needed to win without needing to go through a November general election. Wheeler originally looked likely to run for governor in 2018, when John Kitzhaber was to be termed out. However, Kitzhaber scrambled everyone's plans when he resigned last year and Kate Brown became governor.
Wheeler considered challenging Brown in the Democratic primary, but he eventually decided to take on Portland Mayor Charlie Hales instead. Hales soon decided not to seek re-election (interestingly, Hales was the third mayor in a row to call it quits after just one term), and Wheeler became the clear frontrunner. Wheeler's only notable opponent was Multnomah County Commissioner Jules Bailey. But Bailey, who refused to accept donations greater than $250 (even though he didn't always strictly adhere to this self-imposed rule), was badly outspent by Wheeler, and he ended up taking just 17 percent.
Other Races:
● MI Supreme Court: On Wednesday, Donald Trump released a list of 11 judges whom he says he would consider appointing to the U.S. Supreme Court. Three of these judges are state justices who will soon face voters in swing—if not outright Democratic-leaning—states. Colorado Justice Allison Eid and Minnesota Justice David Stras face re-election races in 2018, while Michigan Justice Joan Larsen is on the ballot this coming November. Larsen was appointed to Michigan's Supreme Court in 2015 by Gov. Rick Snyder to fill an open seat, and the 2016 election will decide who will serve out the last two years of the term; the winner will then face voters again in 2018. Usually, state judicial races are low-key affairs, but this one could be interesting if Democrats try to tie Larsen to Trump.
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.