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12:29 PM PT (David Jarman): MT-St. Sen.: One state legislative chamber that's potentially up for grabs but isn't getting a lot of play this year is Montana's state Senate, where the GOP picked up the chamber in 2010 and hold with a 28-22 edge. The Billings Gazette has a helpful preview of the state's five biggest Senate race, 3 of which are GOP-held and 2 of which are Dem-held (one of which is MT-AL candidate Kim Gillan's seat in Billings).
More broadly, Louis Jacobsen at Governing, the lone pundit who's been out there handicapping the legislative chambers, is out with his final round of ratings of state legislatures. He sees a likely wash: there are six chambers that are leaning toward flipping toward the out party: the GOP-held Colorado House and Maine House (along with the tied Oregon House, which is leaning Dem), and the Dem-held Wisconsin Senate and both chambers in Arkansas. Chambers listed as Tossups include the Dem-held Iowa Senate, Nevada Senate, and Washington Senate, the GOP-held New York Senate and both Minnesota chambers, and the coalition-controlled Alaska Senate. (I think he's leaving out some of the larger chambers that are subject to rapid churn, like the New Hampshire House and Pennsylvania House -- and Washington's Senate is definitely not a Tossup -- but mostly these feel about right.)
12:59 PM PT (David Jarman): WA-Gov: There's definitely been some tightening in the race for Washington's governor in the last month; there was a brief period (which seemed to coincide with Barack Obama's post-convention polling bulge) where Democrat Jay Inslee was putting up mid-single-digit leads, and now that's down to low-single-digit leads (or in the case of last week's Elway Poll, a small lead for GOPer Rob McKenna). Two new polls confirm that idea: SurveyUSA, on behalf of KING, find Inslee leading McKenna 47-46, down from a 3-pt. lead two weeks ago and a 5-pt. lead a month ago.
The University of Washington, on behalf of KCTS, find the exact same numbers if you stick with registered voters: Inslee leading McKenna 47-46. However, if you switch to LVs, Inslee actually does better (Washington was one of the few states in 2010 polling where we saw the enthusiasm gap working to the Dems' benefit, and that may apply again here): 49-46. (The LV margin in their previous poll a month ago was 47-46 for Inslee.)
Even when Inslee was trailing McKenna by significant margins prior to this summer, we expected that this was going to be a down-to-the-wire race in November, given the tension between the state's Democratic lean and McKenna's ability to overperform a generic Republican. Factor in a lot of RGA spending in the closing weeks, and it shouldn't be a surprise that this race is reverting to the mean; with that, we're moving it back to Tossup -- albeit with the faintest Inslee tilt -- after a brief stay at Lean Democratic.
Other results from SUSA's poll include a 54-40 lead for Barack Obama in the presidential race (unchanged from two weeks ago). There is also solid support for the state's two big ballot measures: same-sex-marriage is passing 52-43 (down from 54-41 two weeks ago), while marijuana legalization is passing 56-37. UW's miscellaneous numbers include a 56-36 lead for Barack Obama, a crushing 61-33 lead for Maria Cantwell in the Senate race, a 45-34 advantage for Dem Bob Ferguson in the open Attorney General's race, same-sex-marriage passing 58-37, and marijuana legalization passing 55-38.
1:09 PM PT: NRCC: Politico says they've gotten a hold of an internal NRCC document detailing which GOP incumbents are most desperate for funds in the final days of the campaign. Here's the full list:
Dan Lungren (CA-07), Brian Bilbray (CA-52), Judy Biggert (IL-11), Dan Benishek (MI-01), Chip Cravaack (MN-08), Frank Guinta (NH-01), Charlie Bass (NH-02), Chris Gibson (NY-19), Jim Renacci (OH-16), and Quico Canseco (TX-23).
The most interesting inclusion is Gibson. Every other race is in
our Tossup pile, but NY-19 still remains at Lean R. The polling hasn't quite been there for us to shift the race one column to the left yet, but it's hovering somewhere in that gray area between "Lean" and "Tossup." It seems like a real surprise may yet be possible.
2:02 PM PT: MO-Sen: Following on the heels of news that Now or Never PAC would parachute in with $800K on GOP Rep. Todd Akin's behalf at the 11th hour, the Missouri GOP is following suit with $700K of their own. Of course, you have to wonder where the state party got such money—few such outfits are that well-funded, and even if the MO GOP were, no one's really keeping that much cash around with so little time before the election. The only real possibility, therefore, is that the money came from the NRSC (they're refusing to comment)—and of course their chair, John Cornyn, rather famously said he was cutting Akin loose after his legitimate rape implosion, and really seemed to stick to his guns.
So what's happening here? Are Republicans actually seeing a chance for themselves? Or are they just conning themselves into imagining that the natural tightening you'd expect here is real movement back toward Akin? Is there no other candidate they could better spend the money on? Well, I've asked my four questions, but it may not matter. Akin's out with a new ad that—stunningly—features a woman who says she was a rape victim and has had an abortion but is support Akin because he "defends the unborn." (It's not clear if the two were linked. And of course, Akin doesn't even think such a linkage is possible.) It's absolutely amazing that Akin would want to call attention to the very topic which sunk his own candidacy.
Dem Sen. Claire McCaskill's also lowering the boom with one final new spot, featuring footage of Mitt Romney calling on Akin to drop out of the race and John McCain saying "he would not be welcome by Republicans in the United States Senate." You know she was just holding this anvil in reserve. Let's hope it's enough to keep the lid of Todd Akin's political coffin tightly shut.
2:30 PM PT: • HI-Sen (Merriman): Mazie Hirono (D): 55 (55), Linda Lingle (R): 40 (39).
• MI-Sen (EPIC-MRA): Debbie Stabenow (D-inc): 54 (55), Pete Hoekstra (R): 33 (35).
2:48 PM PT: CA-52 (SurveyUSA): Scott Peters (D): 46, Brian Bilbray (R-inc): 46; Romney 48-45. This is the first poll since Peters and Bilbray each put out internals claiming to be up 4 or 5 each around a week or so ago, though Bilbray notably refused to even provide the name of his pollster. A newspaper poll from the same time had the incumbent up 9, but seeing as Bilbray released internal polling showing a more modest lead, that makes the independent poll fairly hard to believe.
In any event, SUSA evidently believes the truth lies right smack in the middle, but I actually think these numbers are optimistic for Peters. Romney's up 3 in a district Obama won by 12. So either that 15-point turnaround represents a huge drop for the POTUS in the San Diego region (in which case Peters is still hanging on), or this sample is too red (meaning Peters is actually doing better than SUSA thinks).
3:41 PM PT: MN-02: This is unexpected: House Majority PAC is going into Minnesota's 2nd with a small $65K buy on behalf of Democrat Mike Obermueller, who is waging a longshot campaign against veteran GOP Rep. John Kline. (The minute-long spot, on stem cell research, is one that HMP has used elsewhere.) It's not clear why HMP is making this move: It's so little, so late, and they didn't even send out a press release about it (which is their usual m.o.). A head-fake? Or a possible late collapse in Kline's numbers? It's hard to say, but the former seems more likely than the latter.
3:45 PM PT: MI-11: I love Politico's headline for their new story about Republican nominee Kerry Bentivolio: "Bro: House candidate Bentivolio 'mentally unbalanced'". Says Bentivolio's brother Philip:
"I've never met anyone in my life who is conniving and dishonest as this guy," Phillip Bentivolio said, according to the Michigan Information and Research Service (subscription required). "He's my brother so it's hard to talk about this, but I believe that if he gets elected, he'll eventually serve time in prison."
But it sounds like there's a real beef here: Philip Bentivolio says his brother still owes him $20,000 from twenty years ago (!) and says he told Kerry that he would go to the media if he didn't get paid. I guess this is him making good on his threat, because Kerry responded by saying that
Philip has "serious mental issues." Of course, Kerry's the one who once testified in court that he has a "problem figuring out which one I really am, Santa Claus or Kerry Bentivolio," so maybe he's not best-equipped to opine on others' mental health.
4:14 PM PT: TN-04: Whether GOP Rep. Scott DesJarlais does or doesn't survive on Tuesday, Roll Call's Joshua Miller says a whole host of local Republicans are already eager to run in Tennessee's 4th District next cycle. The list of possible names includes state Sen. Jim Tracy, state Reps. Kevin Brooks and Joe Carr, former Bradley County Sheriff Tim Gobble, businessman Shane Reeves, and state Speaker Pro Tem Judd Matheny. One name that surprisingly isn't mentioned in Miller's piece: state Sen. Bill Ketron, a powerful legislator who seemingly hand-crafted the redrawn 4th to suit his tastes, then stunningly chose not to run against the freshman DesJarlais in this year's primary. Surely he's second-guessing that decision right about now.
4:21 PM PT: CA-35: You really have to wonder why Mike Bloomberg waited until so incredibly late in the game for his PAC to start spending so freely—he certainly could have had a bigger impact had he not waited until the absolute last second. But in any event, here's the latest of his big buys: He's pouring an enormous $2.4 million on to the airwaves against Rep. Joe Baca, who faces fellow Democrat Gloria Negrete McLeod (a state senator) on November 6. That's on top of some $265K in mailers that Independence USA had already paid for. As is usually the case with Bloombo, he's unhappy with Baca's stance on guns, but again, it's not clear why Baca merits any more special attention than any number of pro-gun congressmen.
4:50 PM PT: Predictions: If turnout and support is as high among minorities as polls indicate, and if President Obama gets at least as much support from white voters as Democratic House candidates did in the horrid 2010 midterm elections, Daily Kos Elections' dreaminonempty concludes that Romney cannot win the popular vote. But you may disagree with these premises—so peruse the data on voter registration, demographic trends, and recent polling, and then build your own electorate and predict what you think the presidential popular vote margin will be.