Could it really happen? A new report in Politico says that Republicans are now worried that Democrat Jon Ossoff could win the special election for Georgia's 6th Congressional District outright on April 18, by taking a majority of the vote and averting a runoff. In fact, even NRCC chair Steve Stivers acknowledges there's a problem, saying "[W]e know that Ossoff is real." Just how real? With less than three weeks left, the NRCC is set to begin an independent expenditure operation to try to hold Ossoff below 50 percent, though Stivers declined to say how much the committee would spend.
It had better be a lot, though: The same piece reports that Ossoff's fundraising haul is now up to a gargantuan $4 million, thanks to massive enthusiasm from progressive small-dollar donors. And while Stivers is, of course, speaking in reassuring tones, other Republicans are not so sure. One GOP operative quoted on the record by Politico, Tom Rehm, says, "The anxiety level is increasing, and it's creeping higher every day." Another, Jim Kingston (the son of former Rep. Jack Kingston) adds that "the fear is definitely out there" that Ossoff will seal it up in the first round.
And what does Ossoff say? For the first time, his campaign appears to be publicly allowing the possibility that it could be one-and-done. Ossoff campaign manager Keenan Pontoni told Politico, "If we're going into Game 6 in a best of 7 series, you wouldn't slow-play Game 6 because you know you have Game 7. We want to win Game 6." That's an aggressive stance, but if there's a chance, Democrats have to take it.
The question is, how realistic is that chance? There have been two recent surveys of the race, one from independent pollster OpinionSavvy, the other from Republican pollster Clout Research (which had a very poor track record under its old name, Wenzel Strategies). However, both had similar results: OpinionSavvy put Ossoff at 40 percent while Clout had him at 41.
In both cases, Ossoff was well out in front of all other candidates, but it's a long way to get from 40 to 50, especially in a district as traditionally Republican as this one. One analyst, the New York Times' Nate Cohn, has suggested that the early voting data looks positive for Ossoff, but we all remember what the early vote supposedly told us about last November's elections, so it would be wise not to get excited by this data.
However, one thing working in Ossoff's favor is the badly fractured Republican field. In a straight D-vs.-R race, it might be easier for the GOP to rally around a single standard-bearer. Instead, though, there are at least four or five plausible options in the running, so there's no one obvious choice with an (R) after his or her name for less plugged-in Republican voters to naturally coalesce around.
And that situation could get worse rather than better. Earlier this week, the Club for Growth launched a $250,000 round of ads attacking former Secretary of State Karen Handel, who's the nominal Republican frontrunner just by virtue of her higher name recognition. Now Handel has responded with a rather defensive-sounding spot in which she complains about the "gimmicks" her opponents have used in their own ads as a bunch of old-school CRT TVs loaded into the back of a pickup truck situated in a random field (because that's totally normal) play clips of them. (Also, how are those TVs plugged in?)
There's no word on the size of the buy, but Handel and all of her fellow Republicans face a serious conundrum: They're going to try to tear each other down in order to be the one who winds up in second place—for a runoff that might not even happen. So while Stivers while try his level best to keep Ossoff from securing a first-round knockout, he won't be getting any help from any of the GOP candidates, who will only be focused on their own fates. That's not a pleasant situation for any party to find itself in.
Of course, this could all be a Republican effort to try to up the expectations for Ossoff: If a runoff does ensue, which is still the most likely outcome, they’ll claim he somehow underperformed. That would be bunk, of course, but that’s typical politics. However, if the NRCC does actually shell out cash here before April 18, we’ll know they weren’t just playing games.