Leading Off:
● AZ-01: Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu was already one of the most despicable human beings running for Congress this year, but now he's cemented his hold on the very bottom spot. Before moving to Arizona, Babeu served as headmaster of the DeSisto School, a private school for troubled youth in his home state of Massachusetts. The school, known for treating students with an "intense discipline regimen," was a nightmarish disaster that shut down in 2004, after state investigators found massive violations of basic dignity like these:
The probe resulted in a court order to stop specific activities, including punishments that put students in chairs facing corners for hours at a time, withholding food from students and strip-searching. The court also ordered the school to stop group showers and allow students to use the bathroom in private.
That was all well-known when Babeu first sought the Republican nomination in Arizona's 4th Congressional district back in 2012—a bid that was derailed when a former lover of Babeu's, an unauthorized immigrant, alleged that Babeu had threatened him with deportation if he did not remain quiet about their relationship. Babeu denied the allegations but acknowledged he was gay and quit the race a few months later.
Babeu's now waging a second congressional bid (this time in the swingy 1st District), and his DeSisto history has re-emerged thanks to a home video obtained by a local TV station, ABC15, in which Babeu spoke highly of the harsh punishment of the children under his care. ABC15 had investigated Babeu's tenure back in 2012, after which Babeu denied knowing anything about the school's abusive practices and had his lawyers send a threatening letter to the station.
But in this newly emerged video, taken at a family Christmas gathering in 1999, Babeu goes into great detail about what went on at DeSisto. He calls his students "bonkers" and explained, among other things, that they could be made to sit in a chair facing the corner of a room "for weeks." He also indicates that food might be withheld, saying students "have to be free of anything, any distraction, like food to TV, radio." To get better, he insists, "They need to feel hopeless and feel depression and complete failure." Babeu's claims to have known nothing about what was going on under him wouldn't have absolved him of responsibility even if true, but in any event, they are now rendered indisputably false.
And in a remarkable coincidence, the Massachusetts state attorney who ran the investigation of DeSisto is someone Babeu is now hoping will be his colleague a year from now: Democratic Rep. Katherine Clark. Should Babeu prevail, though, Clark's welcome won't be warm. In new comments, Clark accused Babeu of trying to "stonewall" her inquiry and just absolutely lacerated him:
"It was really just a cesspool of really horrendous practices towards children. I think it's rather appalling to think that he is overseeing people with badges and guns, and that he thinks he is fit to run for Congress." […]
"It was ritualistic child abuse—a sort of lord of the flies situation, where some of the children were groomed into positions of disciplining other children, including some really egregious things like students strip searching other student when they arrived at the school."
Added Clark, "The things that went on at that school still really haunt me, and I think they should haunt him." Babeu, however, continues to dispute just about everything, claiming yet again that he had "no involvement in discipline or student affairs." That's utterly belied by this new video, and it's going to be a hard line to keep taking. If there's any justice, he'll ride it to another ignominious failure.
4Q Fundraising:
If you haven't yet, be sure to check out our massive fourth quarter House fundraising chart, with numbers for over 100 races. And our Senate fundraising chart is pretty much entirely filled in at this point, too.
● AR-Sen: John Boozman (R-inc): $652,000 raised, $1.5 million cash-on-hand; Conner Eldridge (D): $308,000 raised, $448,000 cash-on-hand
● KY-Sen: Rand Paul (R-inc): $193,000 raised, $1.2 million cash-on-hand (Paul may still have some extra money in his now-defunct presidential account, though)
● LA-Sen: Charles Boustany (R): $553,000 raised, $1.6 million cash-on-hand; John Fleming (R): $105,000 raised, $2.2 million cash-on-hand; Rob Maness (R): $27,000 cash-on-hand
Senate:
● AL-Sen: At the end of December, Sen. Richard Shelby held an insane $17 million to $293,000 cash-on-hand advantage over Republican primary rival Jonathan McConnell. McConnell's only real hope is that well-funded outside groups like the Club For Growth and the Senate Conservatives Fund will come to his aid and prevent Shelby from winning a majority of the vote in the March 1 primary, which would force the two men into an April runoff. Unfortunately for McConnell, neither organization has shown any inclination to get involved. With time running out, McConnell has released a poll that, when you cut through the campaign's spin, has a clear message to outside groups: We're on a road to nowhere, but come on inside.
McConnell's survey, conducted by Thomas Partners Strategies (whom we've never heard of before now) gives Shelby a 55-25 lead over McConnell. McConnell is arguing that if conservative groups spend enough money, they can knock Shelby down a few points and send him to a runoff, which McConnell can win with more help. The memo includes an unreleased December poll giving Shelby a 64-15 edge, and argues that despite the senator's recent multi-million dollar spending spree, he's actually lost support.
However, the January poll really just underscores how well-positioned Shelby is. The incumbent posts a 55-29 lead over "Someone else" and has a 56-27 favorable rating with primary voters. In other words, McConnell's big problem isn't that he's unknown and underfunded, it's that primary voters are perfectly happy to keep Shelby around. The memo argues that Shelby "is now just 5 points above the threshold for a runoff, and heading in the wrong direction," but it's hard to believe that these numbers exactly panic Shelby. Incidentally, this may be the first time we've ever seen a candidate release a poll showing him losing by 30 points.
Kind of surprisingly, Shelby actually bothered to release his own poll to counter McConnell. The McLaughlin & Associates survey gives Shelby a 75-9 edge over McConnell, and has the senator posting a 79-14 job approval rating. McLaughlin has a horrible track record, but there just doesn't seem to be enough of a race here for that to matter.
● CA-Sen: Rep. Loretta Sanchez brought in $865,000 in the final quarter of 2015, which certainly isn't great for a mammoth state like California and is a far cry from the $1.9 million raised by her chief rival, state Attorney General Kamala Harris. But lurking beneath both sets of numbers are some serious weaknesses. Harris, for her part, has an exceptionally high burn rate: Of the $7.9 million she raised last year, she has only $4 million left in the bank and has been criticized for spending a fortune on high-priced consultants and luxury hotels. She since claims to have retooled, but that's still an amazing sum to spend without airing even a single TV ad.
Sanchez, meanwhile, recently propped up her own campaign with a one-time trick: In November, she sold a campaign office she'd bought a few years earlier, earning her $496,000 and leaving her with $2 million in cash-on-hand. That means that over half of her quarterly haul came from this one real estate transaction, and at least part of those revenues will get eaten up by rent, since she still needs a campaign HQ, of course.
Democrats aren't in any danger of losing this Senate seat that Barbara Boxer left open with her retirement; rather, with a penniless GOP field, the only question is which Democrat will win. Harris leads in polling and money, but given each candidate's flaws, the outcome remains uncertain.
● FL-Sen: When GOP Rep. David Jolly absurdly announced that he was going to stop raising money for his own campaign, we figured that this was a phony effort to look high-minded and distract from what was going to be a lousy fundraising haul. But we didn't know just how right we were: Jolly took in a mere $112,000 in the fourth quarter, which would have been pitiful even if he were running for the House. Seeing as how he's running for Senate in what's now the third-largest state in the union, it's beyond feeble. He'd be better off dropping out now and sparing himself the embarrassment.
● LA-Sen: Attorney Caroline Fayard recently became the first Democrat to enter this open seat race, but Gov. John Bel Edwards has another candidate in mind. Edwards says he's encouraging Public Service Commissioner Foster Campbell to get in. Campbell has been mulling a bid for a while, and he said on Thursday that he expects he'll decide in the next two weeks.
● MD-Sen: Rep. Donna Edwards' fundraising struggles continue. In the fourth quarter of 2015, she took in just $600,000, which was only about half the $1.1 million that fellow Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen raised. But the bigger problem for Edwards is that she spent even more—around $700,000—leaving her with only $300,000 in her campaign account. Van Hollen, meanwhile, has a hefty $3.7 million saved up. Van Hollen's cash reserves have shrunk a bit, but he's been spending heavily on TV ads to build up his name recognition.
Edwards, meanwhile, has yet to air a single advertisement. EMILY's List did shell out $1 million to run a spot on her behalf, but that was over two months ago, and there hasn't been any indication since then that EMILY's intends to re-up.
So what's going on with Edwards, who's earned enthusiastic endorsements from of a wide array of progressive organizations (including Daily Kos) and would make history as only the second black woman to join the Senate if she were to prevail? In an article last month in the Washington Post, reporter Rachel Weiner put forth the argument that Edwards has "positioned herself as an outsider" during her congressional career and hasn't spent much time building up a donor base.
But while Edwards came to Congress by beating an incumbent in a primary, she ran the DCCC's Red to Blue program in 2014 and was even considered a possible option to chair the full committee this cycle. That's not really the mark of an outsider—and in any event, plenty of insurgents have created strong small donor programs precisely because of their outsider status (like Bernie Sanders).
Still, while Van Hollen has dominated in both money and endorsements, polling still shows a tossup. Edwards with a small lead. And in 2006, a white candidate more closely tied to the establishment (then-Rep. Ben Cardin) only narrowly beat an underfunded black challenger (former NAACP president Kweisi Mfume) in that year's Democratic primary for Senate. So this nomination is still up for grabs, but Edwards faces difficult obstacles.
● PA-Sen: Another big union get for Katie McGinty in the Democratic primary: the state branch of AFSCME, which represents 67,000 workers.
Gubernatorial:
● VT-Gov: It's been quite a while since we last heard from him (October, to be precise), but former Democratic state Sen. Peter Galbraith says he's still considering a bid for Vermont's open governorship. Galbraith might have gotten a bit of extra room when state House Speaker Shap Smith dropped out of the race in November, leaving only former state Sen. Matt Dunne and former state Transportation Secretary Sue Minter in the Democratic primary, but if he actually wants to run, he's wasting valuable time on the sidelines.
House:
● AL-01: Tea partier Dean Young almost defeated now-Rep. Bradley Byrne in the 2013 GOP runoff for this red coastal seat, but his rematch isn't going incredibly well. As of the end of 2015, Byrne has $613,000 in the bank for the March 1 primary, while Young had a mere $12,000. Young has aired some TVs ads hitting Byrne's record while the congressman is running his own spots, but it doesn't look like there will be much to see next month.
● AZ-02: Freshman GOP Rep. Martha McSally is really, really good at fundraising. She's also really, really lousy at filing her fundraising reports properly. A week ago, she re-filed an astounding twenty-six reports with the FEC, in order to correct years' worth of errors that had left hundreds of thousands of dollars unaccounted for. This has been an ongoing issue for McSally, who in her brief political career has gone through at least five campaign treasurers and received now fewer than 14 letters from the FEC pointing out deficiencies in her filings.
And this isn't the first time McSally's been forced to fix prior FEC reports. Last year, for instance, she somehow managed to submit a filing claiming she'd raised an impossible $5.6 million in the first six months of 2015. The Arizona Republic's editorial page was harsh, saying of McSally, "It is reaching the point that it is difficult to ascribe the word 'error' to her reports; this many failures begins to look intentional."
What's so crazy here is that McSally can most certainly afford to hire good help. In the fourth quarter, she pulled in a whopping $708,000 (well, if her latest reports are right) and has a massive $2 million saved away. Her Democratic opponents trail far behind: Ex-state Rep. Matt Heinz took in $186,000 and has $306,000 on hand, while ex-state Rep. Victoria Steele raised just $44,000 and had the same amount in the bank. But Arizona's 2nd was the site of the closest House race in the nation in 2014, and that was with the wind at McSally's back. She may yet be vulnerable, especially since she just can't seem to get her act together.
● FL-18: Martin County School Board member Rebecca Negron, a Republican, is up with the first TV spot in the campaign for this 52-48 Romney South Florida seat. The ad promotes Negron's background as a nurse, with the narrator arguing she "fought for her patients against an out of control bureaucracy," with Negron jumping in to make the expected slam on Obamacare. The narrator also notes she opposes Common Core, before he promotes her agenda.
This is one of those classic ads that really crams way too many talking points into 30-seconds instead of focusing on one memorable idea (for a counter-example, see this IL-10 spot). The viewer just comes away with the impression that Negron is a generic Republican, which doesn't help her stand out from the pack in this crowded primary. There's no word on the size of the buy.
Negron is married to incoming state Senate President Joe Negron, but that hasn't helped her bring in that much cash. Negron only raised $108,000 in the last quarter of 2015, though she has a decent $337,000 on hand. Negron actually has the second-most money in the bank of the entire GOP field though: The top dog is physician Mark Freeman, who self-funded his way to a $1.16 million warchest.
Farm owner Rick Roth and ex-state Rep. Carl Domino (who badly lost the 2014 general election) each have a little under $300,000 on hand; attorney Rick Kozell and veteran Brian Mast have a little more than $200,000 in the bank, while pundit Noelle Nikpour has only $148,000 to spend. On the Democratic side, businessman and national party favorite Randy Perkins leads attorney Jonathan Chane $1.37 million to $288,000 in cash-on-hand.
● IA-01: Ex-state Rep. Pat Murphy unexpectedly lost this 56-43 Obama eastern Iowa seat to Republican Rod Blum in 2014, and he's hoping to avenge his defeat this year. National Democrats, including Steny Hoyer, prefer ex-Cedar Rapids Councilor Monica Vernon, and you can tell by the two candidates' fundraising.
Murphy took in just $44,000 during the final three months of 2015, while Vernon brought in $200,000. Vernon, who entered the race about six months before Murphy, also posts a $609,000 to $86,000 cash-on-hand lead. This time last cycle, a few months before Murphy beat Vernon in the primary, Vernon only led Murphy $271,000 to $224,000 in money in the bank. A third Democratic candidate, businessman and former Saturday Night Live cast member Gary Kroeger, only has $8,000 to spend.
Blum had a terrible relationship with John Boehner, and national Republicans were reluctant to help him. Blum only raised $119,000 during the fourth quarter; however, thanks in large part to self-funding, he has a little more than $1 million on hand. New Speaker Paul Ryan is hosting a fundraiser for Blum, so maybe he'll get more national party support in the fall than he would have under Boehner's regime. Still, a candidate as conservative as Blum won't have an easy time in what's usually a blue seat.
● ME-02: Citing disappointing fundraising, Bangor City Councilor Joe Baldacci dropped out of the Democratic primary for Maine's 2nd Congressional District on Friday. Baldacci, the brother of ex-Gov. John Baldacci, took in just $62,000 in the final three months of 2015—his second weak quarter in a row—and had only $76,000 cash-on-hand. By contrast, his rival for the nomination, former state Sen. Emily Cain, raised $277,000 and has $552,000 banked.
Baldacci immediately threw his support to Cain upon exiting the race, which should be the default move in situations like this but is not something you always see. Cain will need all the help she can get to defeat GOP Rep. Bruce Poliquin, who recognizes just how endangered he is in this blue-tilting district. Poliquin pulled in another strong quarter, raising $338,000. That leaves him with a very strong $1.6 million cash-on-hand.
● NE-02: Freshman Democratic Rep. Brad Ashford initially showed little interest in raising money to defend his 53-46 Romney seat, but he's changed his tune recently. In the final three months of 2015, Ashford hauled in just north of $300,000, and he has $681,000 in the bank. Roll Call attributes at least part of his improvement to his new chief of staff, ex-state Sen. Jeremy Nordquist.
This Omaha seat should be the top GOP House target in the country, but neither of Team Red's candidates are following Ashford's lead and stepping up their game. Former General Don Bacon hauled in a pitiful $38,000 and he only has $135,000 to spend, while ex-state Sen. Chip Maxwell actually has negative $8,000 in the bank. If Republicans want to find a better candidate, they're running out of time. In Nebraska, any current elected official who wants to be on the 2016 ballot needs to file by Feb. 16, even if they're seeking a different office than the one they currently hold; the filing deadline for everyone else is March 1.
● NH-01: Well that was a nice little stunt. Just the other day, GOP Rep. Frank Guinta made a big deal of how he repaid his mother and father $355,000 for a 2010 loan that Guinta then illegally re-loaned into his campaign, in an attempt to get a long-running scandal behind him. (Guinta always claimed that the money was his, but the FEC concluded he had indeed borrowed the funds, so when he dumped that cash into his campaign account, it instead amounted to a contribution from his parents that broke donation limits.)
But reporter David Bernstein made a good catch: Guinta's most recent FEC report still shows this bogus $355,000 loan on the campaign's books, meaning that Guinta waited until after the end of the quarter to repay it (assuming he's telling the truth about that). That in turn means that the $367,000 he said he had on hand as of Dec. 31 is a fiction; it's really more like $12,000.
This sort of sleight-of-hand might make Guinta's fourth-quarter report look better than it is, but it won't help him in real life. While his primary opponent, former business school dean Dan Innis, didn't raise a lot in the last three months of the year, his $91,000 beats Guinta's crappy $71,000, and when you take the loan repayment into account, Innis has more cash-on-hand, too, with $130,000 in the bank.
Finances are stronger on the Democratic side: Ex-Rep. Carol Shea-Porter pulled in $211,000 and has $168,000 on hand, while businessman Shawn O'Connor did not raise much (only $36,000) but had previously self-funded heavily and has $800,000 available.
● NJ-05: As we've written previously, Wall Street has aggressively abandoned GOP Rep. Scott Garrett over his steadfast refusal to moderate his retrograde views on gays, and now he's reaped his reward. In the final three months of 2015, Garrett raised a pitiful $161,000, while his Democratic opponent, attorney Josh Gottheimer, took in a hefty $374,000.
Thanks to years chairing a subcommittee of particular importance to the financial industry, Garrett does still have plenty of money banked—$2.4 million. But Gottheimer's stockpiled a lot of cash, too, with $1.3 million in his campaign account. Garrett remains the favorite thanks to this district's small but tenacious Republican tilt, but he's a big sleeper pick to go down in November.
● NV-04: Ever since Sen. Harry Reid endorsed him last year, state Sen. Ruben Kihuen has been drowning in union endorsements. On Thursday, the powerful Culinary Union joined in and threw its support behind Kihuen. Culinary represents workers at most of the resorts on the Las Vegas strip, and their backing can definitely make a big difference in the Democratic primary to face freshman Republican Cresent Hardy.
Kihuen doesn't have a clear path to the Democratic nod though. Philanthropist Susie Lee has been partially self-funding her bid, and she had a $647,000 to $373,000 cash-on-hand lead over Kihuen at the end of 2015. Ex-Assembly Speaker John Oceguera and ex-Assemblywoman Lucy Flores are also seeking this seat. Neither of them has raised much money but thanks in part to self-funding, Oceguera has $204,000 in the bank.
Flores, a former Reid protégé who badly lost the 2014 lieutenant governor's race, has just $84,000 on hand. Flores drew some attention when she endorsed Bernie Sanders last month. (Kihuen is backing Hillary Clinton.) If Sanders supporters unite behind her she could have a shot, but Nevada's June congressional primary will be held months after the Feb. 20 presidential caucus.
Whoever emerges with the Democratic nod will have a good chance to make it to Congress. Awful Democratic turnout helped Hardy win in 2014, but he won't have a fun time in a presidential year. Obama carried this suburban Las Vegas seat 54-44, and 2012 Democratic Senate candidate Shelley Berkley won it 48-42 even as she was narrowly losing statewide. Hardy isn't a particularity formidable fundraiser either. Hardy had $660,000 in the bank at the end of 2015, a whole lot less than other vulnerable freshman like Arizona's Martha McSally, Florida's Carlos Curbelo, or Maine's Bruce Poliquin.
● NY-19: In a move that seems to cut against type, Democrat Zephyr Teachout just earned an endorsement from Rep. Sean Maloney, who represents a district next door to the one she's seeking. Maloney is one of the more moderate members of the Democratic caucus and has generally been quite friendly toward Wall Street; Teachout, on the other hand, is an outspoken progressive who has railed against the corrupting influence of big money in politics.
But the two do share something in common: Both have lost statewide campaigns to now-Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Cuomo handily won the 2006 Democratic primary for attorney general, a race in which Maloney took just 9 percent. Teachout fared better in her 2014 challenge to Cuomo in that year's gubernatorial primary, losing 63-33. Is this really the tie that binds? Who knows, but whatever the reason, Teachout will take it, since she has to get by Livingston Town Councilman Will Yandik for the Democratic nomination before she can even think about the general election in this open swing seat.
● PA-02: On Thursday, newly-inaugurated Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney endorsed state Rep. Dwight Evans' primary campaign against indicted Democratic incumbent Chaka Fattah. During last year's mayoral primary, Evans was one of the most prominent African American politicians to back Kenney, who is white, so it's no surprise to see Kenney return the favor. It's possible that Kenney's support could help Evans appeal to white voters who might be leaning toward state Rep. Brian Sims or another one of Fattah's two primary foes.
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.
