Leading Off:
● LA-Sen: This is an actual statement from state Treasurer John Kennedy on Rep. Charles Boustany, a fellow Republican and one of Kennedy's rivals in the November jungle primary for Louisiana's open Senate seat:
I want to be very clear that my campaign played absolutely no role in creating this story alleging Congressman Boustany's sexual relationships with prostitutes that were later murdered, his staff's alleged involvement in running the bar and hotel where this illicit behavior took place, or publishing the book.
Um … wow.
The story that Kennedy is referring to, and also helping spread, of course—Kennedy slapped this very statement up on his Facebook page—can be found in a just-released book by investigative journalist Ethan Brown. Brown, who is best-known for his previous volume about a grisly murder-suicide that took place in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina, has now written about the murders of eight prostitutes between 2005 and 2009 in a book called "Murder in the Bayou." These women were all killed in Jefferson Davis Parish, which is in the southwestern corner of Louisiana, and have come to be collectively known as the "Jeff Davis 8."
So how does this relate to the Senate race? According to three anonymous sources that Brown cites in his book, Boustany, whose House district includes Jefferson Davis Parish, was a client of some of the victims. Brown also says that a Boustany aide named Martin Guillory (who goes by the nickname "Big G") operated a motel where prostitution took place, though Guillory claims he had no knowledge of any illegal activity taking place on his watch. That seems to be as far as it goes, though, as Brown assures his readers that there's "no evidence that either Congressman Boustany or Big G had any involvement with the murders of the Jeff Davis 8."
Naturally, Boustany's campaign responded by rejecting Brown's allegations, calling them "completely false." It also denied any knowledge of Guillory's connection to the Jeff Davis 8 and says he's no longer working for the congressman as of last week. Brown says he stands by his reporting, though until now, none of Boustany's opponents have sought to make an issue of these allegations. But with the publication of "Murder in the Bayou" Tuesday, the story is getting wide circulation, and Kennedy, at least, is sensing an opportunity in promoting the charges while pretending to distance himself from them, elevating the rhetorical trick of apophasis into high art.
This is a very strange situation, and it's impossible to know how voters will react, especially if no new evidence emerges. But it's lost on no one that the man Boustany, Kennedy, and many others are hoping to succeed, Sen. David Vitter, saw his gubernatorial bid last year completely wrecked by his own prostitution scandal. What's unexpected, though, is that Kennedy's the one getting out in front on this, seeing as he's led in all public polling to date. That suggests he might not be quite so certain of his standing and would like to eliminate one of his rivals to shore up his own chances. It's also possible that Boustany is the candidate that Kennedy would least like to face in a December runoff, so he's hoping to knock him out of contention now.
Besides Kennedy and Boustany, the other main Republican is Rep. John Fleming, a member of the far-right Freedom Caucus. (Former KKK leader David Duke has gotten a lot of media attention but fortunately has little support.) On the Democratic side, the key contenders are Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell, who is backed by Gov. John Bel Edwards, and attorney Caroline Fayard, who recently earned an endorsement from New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu.
All the candidates will compete on one November ballot and, in the very likely event that no one takes a majority, the top two vote-getters will advance to a December runoff. Kennedy probably figures that his chances of making it to the Senate are better if Boustany collapses. But it's one thing to post on Facebook; it's quite another to run the kind of TV ads Edwards used to torpedo Vitter. And unless we learn more here, the story could completely fizzle. Stay tuned.
Senate:
● CA-Sen: SurveyUSA takes a look at the all-Democratic general election and gives Kamala Harris a 44-27 lead over Rep. Loretta Sanchez. This poll did not give voters the option to say that they'd skip this contest; other surveys have shown that a high proportion of conservatives are planning not to vote in this race.
● MO-Sen: On Monday, the DSCC announced that they would spend $1 million here, making them the first major Democratic group to start spending in this race. Now, End Citizens United is joining them, and they've launched a $770,000 buy that will last until Sept. 27. Their spot contrasts Democrat Jason Kander's decision to enlist in the military after 9/11 with Republican Sen. Roy Blunt's posh D.C. life.
Gubernatorial:
● OR-Gov: icitizen: Kate Brown (D-inc): 44, Bud Pierce (R): 27 (43-28 Clinton) (July: 42-35 Brown)
House:
● CA-49: According to court documents cited in a new Politico report, Democrat Doug Applegate was accused of stalking and harassment by his ex-wife, Priscilla Greco, who twice obtained restraining orders against him amidst their divorce over a decade ago. In response, Applegate noted that the orders were never made permanent, saying the court "rejected any findings of wrongdoing" on his part.
More importantly, Greco released a statement on Applegate's behalf, sharply rejecting any attempts to use their marital history against her former spouse:
"I'm disappointed that someone is making disrespectful and uninformed personal attacks against our family. Doug and I are parents first, and we raised two amazing children together. I support his run for Congress and I will be voting for him in November."
A spokesperson for GOP Rep. Darrell Issa, whom Applegate is trying to unseat this fall, called the revelations "disturbing," but if the person who made the original accusations is now endorsing the very person she once made them against, that makes it harder for the story to gain traction.
● FL-26: Oh, you dumb sonofabitch:
Joe Garcia, the former Miami Democratic congressman running for his old seat, told supporters in a candid moment over the weekend that Hillary Clinton "is under no illusions that you want to have sex with her, or that she's going to seduce you."
Do we even need to count all the ways in which this is awful? We do not. And the full context doesn't make it any better: Unbelievably, these comments came amidst a comparison Garcia sought to make between Clinton and Lyndon Johnson! Garcia, who faces a difficult task in unseating GOP Rep. Carlos Curbelo, already has a reputation for distasteful behavior, and this certainly won't help. He eventually apologized, claiming that his remarks "were intended to speak to Secretary Clinton's relentless focus on getting the job done, despite the unjust gender stereotypes and biases women in public life are subjected to." Whatever, bro.
● IA-01: After treating Rep. Rod Blum like political roadkill pretty much since the day he first got elected, Republicans finally appear to have found a defibrillator. Blum, a freshman, lucked into a narrow victory two years ago when he picked up a Democratic open seat in the Cedar Rapids area thanks to 2014's towering red wave, and he seemed to treat his own win as a fluke. Not only did he vote a hard conservative line, making no concessions for the fact that Iowa's 1st Congressional District voted for Barack Obama by a 56-43 margin, but he also engaged in a personal jihad against John Boehner, opposing the then-speaker's re-election and earning a spot on the GOP establishment's shit-list.
But Blum has waged a political comeback of sorts, thanks to the two biggest figures in his party: Paul Ryan and Donald Trump. For whatever reason (though it was probably just expedience), Ryan seemed willing to forgive Blum's transgressions against his predecessor and even held a fundraiser for him earlier this year. And after a long and glaring omission, Blum also eventually got added to the NRCC's "Patriot Program," which is designed to help the party's most vulnerable members, and they’ve even started running ads on Blum's behalf (see our Ad Roundup below for more).
Trump is likely playing an even bigger role. Iowa is one of the few swing states that Trump has a good a shot at flipping: As of this writing, our polls-based forecast model gives him an 85 percent of winning the Hawkeye State. And while Trump may not carry the 1st District, it's not hard to see him doing better there than Mitt Romney did. Blum recently released a poll showing him with a 50-43 lead on his Democratic opponent, Monica Vernon, and while we can't say for certain that Trump is buoying Blum, at the very least, he doesn't appear to be much of a drag, because Vernon didn't respond with any contradictory numbers of her own.
Right after Iowa's June primary, we moved this race from Tossup to Lean Democratic. At the time, we would have been genuinely surprised had Blum managed to pull off another win. Now, we no longer would be. We aren't prophesying a Blum victory by any means, but circumstances have changed and this contest could go either way. While we try to avoid playing ping-pong with our race ratings, Donald Trump has warped the electoral continuum in strange ways. We have to adjust accordingly, so we're moving this one back to Tossup.
● IN-09, IN-02: Recently, unnamed GOP sources confessed to Politico that their polling has found unexpectedly close races in two GOP-held seats in Indiana, though they didn't provide any actual data. Politico also says that the NRCC recently ordered new polls in the 9th District, an open seat in the southern part of the state that Mitt Romney carried 57-41.
Yet it wouldn't be a complete shock if IN-09 is competitive. Wealthy Republican Trey Hollingsworth only moved to Indiana from Tennessee last year, and the DCCC added Democrat Shelli Yoder to their Red to Blue program in July. However, neither national party appears to have purchased any airtime here.
However, until now, there'd been no serious talk of Republican Rep. Jackie Walorski being in any trouble in the 2nd District, a South Bend-area seat that backed Romney 56-42. At the end of June, Walorski held a $1.06 million to $190,000 cash-on-hand edge over Democrat Lynn Coleman, a former investigator for the South Bend police. The DCCC hasn't added Coleman to either their Red to Blue program or even their lower-tier Emerging Races list, and no one appears to have reserved any airtime here either. However, Walorski first won this seat back in 2012 by just 1 point, which was far closer than we had expected.
It's always tough to know what to make of these anonymous reports about parties being worried about their candidates, which is why we always view them with a heavy dose of skepticism. But if Democrats are serious about putting either seat in play, the best way to demonstrate it would be to air some ads.
● House: The Congressional Leadership Fund, which is close to Speaker Paul Ryan, has announced $10.7 million worth of spending in several House races, which we've added to our continuously updated sheet tracking outside spending in House races. None of these investments come as any surprise. The Detroit News also reports that the DCCC has reserved $484,000 in Michigan's 1st District, while the NRCC has reserved a total of $1.5 million, which is $500,000 more than had been previously reported.
Ad Roundup:
● FL-Sen: Americans for Prosperity is up with what they say is a seven-figure ad buy arguing that Democrat Patrick Murphy cast votes to help his special interest allies.
● IL-Sen: Independent Voice for Illinois spends $110,000 once again arguing that Democrat Tammy Duckworth is weak on national security issues, while Republican Sen. Mark Kirk is better.
● IN-Sen: Democrat Evan Bayh says that he was never a lobbyist and stresses his record. The spot concludes with a shot of Bayh throwing a basketball backwards without looking, and one of his sons catches it mid air and dunks it. The Senate Leadership Fund hits Bayh for voting for Obamacare.
● LA-Sen: Republican Charles Boustany stresses his roots in Louisiana.
● MO-Sen: The Senate Leadership Fund, which reserved $2.5 million in Missouri months ago, has two spots (here and here). Both ads argue that Democrat Jason Kander is pretending not to be a liberal.
● NC-Sen: In the first spot in their $8.1 million campaign, Senate Leadership Fund says that Democrat Deborah Ross voted to make community college more expensive.
● NH-Sen: Senate Leadership Fund, under the name Granite State Solutions, attacks Democrat Maggie Hassan's record as governor, arguing that she repeatedly tried to pass higher taxes and more spending.
● OH-Sen: Republican Sen. Rob Portman highlights his support from the state teamsters union.
● PA-Sen: Republican Sen. Pat Toomey says that Democrat Katie McGinty pushed a tax increase and wants one even larger than Hillary Clinton. Americans for Prosperity is out with a $1.1 million spot arguing McGinty got rich after sending taxpayer money to failed companies.
● IN-Gov: Democrat John Gregg features several men in suits kicking footballs as Gregg explains that for too long, the state's leaders have punted on education, and argues Republican Eric Holcomb wants to keep on punting.
● MO-Gov: Several veterans praise Republican Eric Greitens' work on his non-profit and push back on unspecified attacks from Democrat Chris Koster as "total crap."
● NC-Gov: Democrat Roy Cooper decries the state of education in North Carolina.
● VT-Gov: In her first general election ad, Democrat Sue Minter focuses on education and jobs.
● AK-AL: In his first ad, Democrat Steve Lindbeck decries Republican Rep. Don Young's ethics issues. Lindbeck says that Young took $300,000 for a Louisiana company then did nothing when it threatened to outsource Alaska jobs to Louisiana, memorably declaring that "the Don Young of 40 years ago would have fought like hell for those jobs. I will." (It's a reference to this story.) Politico says the campaign is putting $57,000 behind the spot, a sum that goes decently far in a small state like Alaska.
● CA-24: Democrat Salud Carbajal stresses his work helping veterans. Republican Justin Fareed’s ad features him on a horse again, and talks up his local roots.
● CA-52: In his first spot, Democratic Rep. Scott Peters talks about student loan debt.
● FL-18: Democrat Randy Perkins has two ads (here and here) featuring him with his daughters talking about his business record running a disaster relief company and his hard work. The NRCC argues that Perkins got rich through other people's misery and accuses him of scamming a school district, though they don't provide any details about that explosive charge.
● IA-01: House Majority PAC says that Republican Rep. Rod Blum wants to privatize Social Security and cut benefits. The NRCC, which until recently was reluctant to help Blum, says that Democrat Monica Vernon tried to increase taxes while raising her own salary.
● IA-03: The NRCC says Democrat Jim Mowrer backs "the death tax" and "crushing EPA regulations."
● ME-02: In her first ad, Democrat Emily Cain stresses her work in the legislature and even says she worked with GOP Gov. Paul LePage to cut taxes. Remarkably, the spot features a still photo of Cain alongside a cheerful-looking LePage.
● MI-01: Democrat Lon Johnson talks about defending Social Security and the Second Amendment. The NRCC claims that Johnson actually lives in an expensive penthouse in Detroit rather than in the Upper Peninsula.
● MN-03: In her first ad, Democrat Terri Bonoff talks about her background. She concludes that "we need to step up and stand up to Donald Trump," which really comes out of nowhere.
● MT-AL: Democrat Denise Juneau vows to protect public lands.
● NY-01: In his first ad, Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin highlights his military career and record in Congress. The narrator praises Zeldin for introducing legislation "keeping weapons out of the hands of terrorists," though he never says if that legislation actually went anywhere.
● NY-22: Republican Claudia Tenney's first ad features her on a motorcycle as the narrator praises her for fighting corruption in the legislature. The NRCC goes after Democrat Kim Myers on education, arguing she voted to slash school jobs while increasing the superintendent's pay.
● WI-08: Republican Mike Gallagher says that Democrat Tom Nelson wanted higher taxes on Social Security and lied about Gallagher's record.
The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir and Jeff Singer, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, and Stephen Wolf.
