The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, and Carolyn Fiddler, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.
Leading Off
● MI-Gov: Back in November, The Detroit News reported that Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan was looking far and wide for a candidate to oppose Gretchen Whitmer, a former state Senate minority leader who is the frontrunner in the Democratic primary for governor. Things don't seem to have changed much in the ensuing two months, with Bridge Magazine now writing that Duggan, United Auto Workers President Dennis Williams, and prominent Detroit pastor Wendell Anthony all asked Sen. Gary Peters to run. Bridge, a publication of a nonpartisan think-tank called Center for Michigan, also says that Democratic operatives tried to recruit Rep. Dan Kildee, who thought about running in early 2017.
Campaign Action
Both men, however, said no, and spokespersons for Kildee and Peters each made it clear to Bridge that neither would be changing their minds. Duggan himself, meanwhile, has definitively said he won't run, and his own aide only said in response to the story that he "has had positive meetings with Gretchen Whitmer as well as other potential candidates."
So why are Duggan and friends apparently so averse to having Whitmer as their nominee? It's been hard to understand their reluctance, but Bridge writes that "anxiety has increased about her campaign momentum, fundraising, and name recognition," and a few Democrats, all off the record, say they fear that Whitmer isn't going to inspire voters to show up. However, another party leader suggests that internal party tensions are to blame, saying, "There's well-intentioned institutional Democrats, insurgent Berniecrats, and other traditional stakeholders. And it's all colliding with fears of gender bias in getting someone to enter this race."
Bridge also notes that it's not at all uncommon for Michigan Democrats to wage these internecine fights. In 2002, some power-brokers attempted to find an alternative to Attorney General Jennifer Granholm, who ended up winning the governorship 51-47. Eight years later, there was another unsuccessful attempt to stop Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero, who badly lost the general. The Detroit News also says that in 2014, former United Autoworkers President Bob King wanted an alternative candidate to presumptive nominee Mark Schauer. The person King unsuccessfully tried to lure into the race was ... Gretchen Whitmer.
It's often very tough to gauge how good or bad a candidate is, especially when we still have a long way to go before the primary. It was only a few months ago that plenty of Democrats openly worried that Virginia gubernatorial nominee Ralph Northam was running a dull and unfocused campaign, but Northam ended up winning decisively. In this case, it's likely that Whitmer, who has never run statewide before, does have little statewide name recognition, but that would be true of most candidates. What's more, Whitmer hasn't started spending on paid voter contact yet, and it looks like she'll have the money to get her name out.
It's a lot harder to tell how "inspiring" Whitmer is or isn't. (Again, see Northam, Gov. Ralph.) However, there's little question that anger at Trump has inspired Democrats across the nation to turn out regardless of who their candidates are. And at a time when the #metoo movement has become a major focus in America, having a woman as Team Blue's nominee could indeed be quite inspiring.
Whitmer does face a couple of other candidates in the primary, though evidently former Detroit Health Commissioner Abdul El-Sayed and wealthy businessman Shri Thanedar don't seem to have great appeal to Duggan & co. Republicans, meanwhile, are focused on a battle between state Attorney General Bill Schuette and Lt. Gov. Brian Calley, with a couple of more minor players hovering at the edges. The candidate filing deadline is in late April.
4Q Fundraising
Click here for our chart rounding up all Senate fundraising numbers. As per usual, we'll have a chart of House numbers after the reporting deadline, which is Jan. 31.
● FL-Sen: Bill Nelson (D-inc): $2.4 million raised, $8 million cash-on-hand
● MA-Sen: Elizabeth Warren (D-inc): $2.9 million raised, $14.1 million cash-on-hand
● NV-Sen: Jacky Rosen (D): $1.6 million raised, and $1.8 million cash-on-hand
● GA-Gov: Casey Cagle (R): $6.7 million raised (in eight months), $5.7 million cash-on-hand
● IA-Gov: Ron Corbett (R): $875,000 raised (in 2017)
● NV-Gov: Steve Sisolak (D): $2.5 million raised (for 2017), $5.75 million cash-on-hand
● TX-Gov: Andrew White (D): $179,000 raised (in three weeks), additional $40,000 self-funded, $104,000 cash-on-hand
● CA-36: Brown Pelzer (R): $180,000 raised, $140,000 cash-on-hand
● FL-27: Matt Haggman (D): $412,000 raised, $747,000 cash-on-hand
● IL-17: Cheri Bustos (D-inc): $550,000 raised, $2.8 million cash-on-hand
● KS-02: Steve Watkins (R): $200,000 raised
● MA-03: Barbara L'Italien (D) $320,000 raised
● NJ-04: Josh Welle (D): $180,000 raised
● SC-05: Archie Parnell (D): $340,000 raised (in 10 weeks), $220,000 cash-on-hand
● TX-07: John Culberson (R-inc): $345,000 raised, $595,000 cash-on-hand; Lizzie Pannill Fletcher (D): $200,000 raised; $400,000 cash-on-hand; Jason Westin (D): $123,000 raised; $219,000 cash-on-hand
● WI-06: Glenn Grothman (R-inc): $241,000 raised; $540,000 cash-on-hand
Senate
● AZ-Sen: The GOP firm Data Orbital takes a look at the late August primary for this open seat, and they give Rep. Martha McSally a 31-22 lead over disgraced former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio; former state Sen. Kelli Ward is just behind with 19 percent. The only other survey we've seen of the three-way primary came last week from GOP pollster OH Predictive Insights on behalf of the local ABC affiliate, and they gave McSally a much-smaller 31-29 lead over Arpaio, with Ward at 25. McSally, who is the favorite of the GOP establishment, is likely to be the only candidate with the resources to seriously advertise on TV, and if she's already running at least even with the very well-known Arpaio before she's aired any ads, that's good news for her.
● MN-Sen-B, MN-Gov: On Tuesday, ex-Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty went on Fox and said he would not seek the GOP nomination for this November's special election. Pawlenty did repeatedly say that he was still interested in public service and that there were many ways to do it, which may be a sign he's still thinking about a comeback bid for governor.
Pawlenty was reportedly the national GOP's top choice to challenge Sen. Tina Smith, a Democrat who was appointed to this seat after Al Franken resigned. It's unclear who, if anyone, is their second choice. There were reports last week that Rep. Tom Emmer, who narrowly lost the 2010 race for governor, was Plan B, but Emmer's chief of staff said he was happy where he was. That's not a no, and Emmer may face more pressure to run now that Pawlenty is out of the running. The only noteworthy Republican who has entered the race yet is state Sen. Karin Housley.
● ND-Sen: Last week, Rep. Kevin Cramer announced he would not challenge Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, even after Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell both tried to recruit him. State Sen. Tom Campbell, a wealthy potato farmer who began airing ads months ago, has the GOP field to himself, but plenty of Republicans don't seem sold on him. And they may have an alternative soon: Rob Port of the conservative state blog Say Anything reports that businessman Gary Emineth, a former state party chair who is close to Cramer, has been considering getting in. On Tuesday, Emineth was asked about Port's story while he was guest hosting a conservative talk radio show, and while he said the topic wasn't supposed to come up, he admitted he was seriously thinking about a Senate run.
Emineth doesn't appear to have run for office before, though he did consider running here early in the 2012 cycle for what was an open-seat race, saying at the time he'd think about it "[i]f my life gets simpler within the next 90 days." Emineth said seven years ago that if he got in, he'd run a tea party-flavored campaign, and he doesn't seem to have changed much since then. Port writes that Emineth would likely "be a bomb-thrower" against Heitkamp, which "will ingratiate him with a Republican base in North Dakota which is thirsty for an aggressive campaign" and could help him get his name recognition up quickly.
However, while Emineth spoke well of Trump during the 2016 presidential primary at a time when much of the party establishment still opposed him, his pro-Trump credentials aren't perfect. In July of that year, when there was still some scattered talk about Republican National Convention Delegates staging a floor fight against Trump's nomination, the Republican National Committee successfully pushed for a rule that prevented delegates from voting however they wanted regardless of their state's primary or convention results. Emineth, whom The Hill described at the time as a "top donor" for the RNC-Trump joint finance committee, resigned his post there in disgust.
And Emineth was not quiet about his criticism. On his way out he declared, "I was on the Trump finance committee and I just resigned because that bully tactic is absurd," and, "You don't do this in America. You do this in other countries." Emineth concluded, "If that's how they're doing the Republican Party, they can have it." Most voters don't care about the inner workings of the RNC rules, but if Campbell can portray Emineth as siding with Never Trumpers over Trump, Emineth could have problems.
However, it sounds like Cramer, a loud Trump ally who represents the entire state in the House, would help Emineth, and GOP sources told Port the two are "in cahoots." Cramer doesn't seem to be interested in helping Emineth just because they're friends, either: Cramer was reportedly pissed at Campbell for entering the Senate race while he was still considering, and this could be a good way to get his revenge.
● NJ-Sen: The GOP may have a candidate to take on Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez soon. An unnamed GOP source tells InsiderNJ that Bob Hugin, the executive chairman of the pharmaceutical company Celgene, is "definitely running," and the state GOP is "coalescing around Hugin." Hugin, who is close to despised former Gov. Chris Christie, is wealthy, and Politico recently wrote that he could self-fund.
New Jersey is a very blue state, but Menendez's numbers took a tumble during his corruption trial. The judge declared a mistrial in November after jurors didn't reach a verdict, and the government hasn't announced if they'll try again. Menendez has made it clear he plans to run this year, and the state Democratic Party has closed ranks behind him.
● OH-Sen: Primaries in America can get nasty, but thankfully, the cops usually don't need to be called. Usually. On Saturday, Rep. Jim Renacci filed a police report alleging that a former staffer who now works for his chief rival for the Republican nomination for Senate, Mike Gibbons, stole documents from Renacci's campaign for the purpose of aiding her new boss.
Renacci says that in October, one of his field directors (whose name has not been disclosed) left his campaign for governor and joined Gibbons' Senate bid. No problem there, it would seem. But on Jan. 5, state Treasurer Josh Mandel, whom Gibbons was running against, dropped his bid for Senate, and Renacci openly expressed an interest in switching races. Renacci claims that his former staffer accessed internal campaign documents that contained information about his supporters and emailed them to herself on that very day, even though she had signed a nondisclosure agreement with the Renacci campaign. Renacci's people say that Gibbons then used the stolen information to contact people to win their support.
Gibbons' team denies any wrongdoing, but the police in Wadsworth, Ohio (a small city near Akron) say they are investigating the matter.
● PA-Sen: GOP Sen. Pat Toomey has endorsed Rep. Lou Barletta's campaign to take on Democratic Sen. Bob Casey. Barletta very much seems to have the insider track in the May primary: The only other candidate who had much money at the end of September was self-funding businessman Paul Addis, but Addis' anti-Trump rhetoric probably won't play well with Republican voters.
● TN-Sen: The anti-tax group the Club for Growth is out with a poll from WPI Intelligence showing Rep. Marsha Blackburn, whom they're supporting, crushing former Rep. Stephen Fincher in the August GOP primary. The January survey gives Blackburn a 66-13 lead, which isn't that different from the 58-11 Blackburn edge Triton Polling & Research gave her last month in a survey for the Tennessee Star. Fincher, who retired last cycle, did have a credible $3.7 million in the bank at the end of 2017, so if his problem is minimal name-recognition, he'll have the resources to fix that. However, Blackburn had a stronger $4.6 million on-hand, and it does seem that quite a number of Republicans across the state already know and like her.
To be trollish, the Club for Growth also tested a hypothetical primary match between Blackburn and retiring Sen. Bob Corker, a sometimes Trump antagonist. They show Blackburn destroying the incumbent 63-25.
Gubernatorial
● AZ-Gov: Campaign finance reports covering all of 2017 are in. GOP Gov. Doug Ducey took in $2.5 million during the year, and he had $2.7 million in the bank. On the Democratic side, state Sen. Steve Farley outraised Arizona State University professor David Garcia, who lost a tight 2014 general election for state schools superintendent, $513,000 to $300,000. Farley also held a $232,000 to $94,000 cash-on-hand edge. However, Garcia has released two polls giving him huge leads over Farley in the late August primary, while no one has dropped contradictory numbers. And while this contest has attracted little attention, Garcia's polls also showed both Democrats locked in close races with Ducey.
● CO-Gov: Tuesday was the first day that candidates for governor from both parties were allowed to collect signatures to appear on the June primary ballot, and they need to turn the petitions in by mid-March. The only other way for candidates to reach the primary ballot is to take at least 30 percent of the vote at their April party assembly (also known as the party convention), but that process can be unpredictable. Any candidate who wants to advance to the primary needs to decide very soon if they want to go through the expensive and time consuming process of collecting 1,500 valid signatures from each of Colorado's seven congressional districts (which the Denver Post says can cost more than $200,000), or if they want to risk it all at the assembly.
On the Democratic side, all the major candidates have made their choices. Former state Sen. Mike Johnston says he'll collect signatures, but he also left the door open to competing at the assembly. Lt. Gov. Donna Lynne and businessman Noel Ginsburg also are gathering petitions, while Rep. Jared Polis says he'll try both methods. The only candidate who is placing her fate firmly in the hands of the convention delegates is former state Treasurer Cary Kennedy.
On the GOP side, Attorney General Cynthia Coffman still hasn't announced what method she'll try. Former Rep. Tom Tancredo, a favorite of the far-right, is the only candidate who says he won't collect petitions and will depend on the convention to advance. State Treasurer Walker Stapleton, investment banker and Mitt Romney nephew Doug Robinson, and wealthy businessman Victor Mitchell will all collect signatures.
While candidates from both parties can try gathering petitions and competing at the assembly, there's a good reason many of them just decide to ignore the convention altogether. As the Denver Post writes, if anyone takes less than 10 percent of the delegates' vote, they can't be on the primary ballot no matter how many signatures they have. But this doesn't apply to candidates who skip the assembly process, so it makes sense for some of them to just ignore it and focus on getting petitions.
● MO-Gov: How much longer can Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens last? Following an explosive report last week that Greitens had sought to silence a woman he'd had an extra-marital affair with by threatening her with a photo he'd taken of her while she was bound, blindfolded, and naked, four fellow Republicans in the state legislature have now called on him to resign. Notably, one of them, longtime state Rep. Nate Walker, was an early backer of Greitens when he ran for governor. According to the New York Times, Greitens had in fact spent the weekend "telephoning scores of legislators" to try to shore up his support, but obviously that effort was to no avail.
And there's really no way out. Greitens has cancelled all public events, and a lawyer for the ex-husband of the woman Greitens was involved with says he's handed over to law enforcement officials as much as five hours of previously undisclosed recordings of the ex-wife detailing her encounters with the governor. What's more, a new survey from Republican pollster Remington Research conducted for the newsletter Missouri Scout shows that his favorability rating has plunged to a negative 32-47, from 42-41 just a week earlier. The "good news," such as it is, is that 43 percent of voters think he should remain in office compared to 37 percent who say he should go.
But what really matters is what state lawmakers do next. Greitens has spent his entire first year in office feuding with Republican legislators, leaving him virtually friendless in the capitol. Even Walker, who was one of the few Republican elected officials who supported him in the 2016 gubernatorial primary, fell out with Greitens last year when the governor ousted the state's education commissioner. Greitens has stubbornly refused to leave so far, but if he doesn't voluntarily walk the plank soon, don't be surprised if we start hearing talk of impeachment. If Greitens departs, GOP Lt. Gov. Mike Parson would serve as governor until Greitens' term ends in early 2021.
● NE-Gov: While state Democratic Party Chair Jane Kleeb said last year that she'd run against GOP Gov. Pete Ricketts if an experienced candidate didn't come forward, she's announced she won't jump in. Omaha community activist Vanessa Ward recently entered the Democratic primary to challenge Ricketts, though few Democrats have much optimism that anyone can defeat the governor in such a conservative state.
House
● CA-45: This week, Mission Viejo Mayor Pro Tem Greg Raths formed an exploratory committee for another potential bid against Rep. Mimi Walters, a fellow Republican. Raths never came close to beating Walters in either the 2014 or 2016 races. But thanks to California's top-two primary system, where the two candidates with the most votes advance to the general regardless of primary, he could be a threat to Team Blue's chances.
Raths ran in the 2014 top-two primary for what was an open seat and took third place with 24 percent, while Walters led a little-known Democrat 45-28. Raths tried again in 2016 and took third with 19 percent, with Walters and Democrat Ron Varasteh taking 41 percent and 28 percent, respectively. Democrats didn't seriously target this 55-43 Romney seat in either of those two cycles, so Raths didn't attract much notice.
This Orange County seat went for Clinton by a 50-44 margin, however, and Democrats are making a play for it. Four notable Democrats are running and so is Varasteh, who has self-funded $200,000 to his campaign despite losing 59-41 in 2016. If Raths can take close to 20 percent of the June top-two primary vote again and the Democrats split the Democratic primary vote enough, there's a chance that Walters and Raths could be the ones to advance to the general election.
● FL-27: Back in May, Miami-Dade County Commissioner Xavier Suarez, a former Republican who used to serve as mayor of Miami, expressed interest in running as an independent for this open seat. We'd heard nothing from Suarez since then until this week, when he said he wouldn't do it.
● NY-02: Suffolk County Legislator DuWayne Gregory, who ran against GOP Rep. Peter King in 2016 and had been considering a rematch, kicked off a second bid on Tuesday. Last cycle, Gregory lost 62-38 in a race that didn't attract outside attention, and the veteran King, who has always done a good job of putting just enough distance between himself and his party, will be hard to unseat this year. New York's Long Island-based 2nd District, around three quarters of which is in Suffolk County with the rest in Nassau County, also moved against Democrats in the last presidential election: In 2012, it voted for Barack Obama by a 52-47 margin but went for Donald Trump 53-44. However, we've seen lots of districts like this snap back in special elections over the past year, and in a wave, even King could find himself at risk. Gregory will face activist Liuba Grechen Shirley in June's Democratic primary.
● WA-08: On Tuesday, realtor Mona Das ended her bid for this open swing seat. Das, a Democrat, hadn't raised much cash, and she said she didn't have the resources to continue. A number of other Democrats are running in the August top-two primary
Grab Bag
● Deaths: John Spellman, the last Republican to serve as governor of Washington, died on Monday at age 91. Spellman was elected in 1980, not so much because of Ronald Reagan's coattails but because conservative Democratic governor Dixy Lee Ray was defeated in the primary by then-state Senator Jim McDermott, who didn't play well outside of his Seattle base. (Though it's possible the very moderate Spellman—who was best known for enacting environmental protections during his term—could have defeated Lee in the general by running to her left.) Spellman was not just the last Republican governor in Washington but the state's last governor to lose a re-election battle; he lost to Democratic Pierce County Executive Booth Gardner in 1984. Gardner kicked off the Dems' longest-in-the-nation gubernatorial winning streak of any state.
Despite his short gubernatorial stint, Spellman's main legacy may be at the county level. As a county commissioner, he fought for the transition to an executive system, and then served as King County's first County Executive from 1969 until 1980. He was also one of the prime movers in the construction of the (then-innovative, now-imploded) Kingdome.
