Normally I try to avoid reading the conservative Washington Examiner but this headline grabbed my attention:
Senior Republicans are sounding the alarm about Rep. Lou Barletta's, R-Pa., struggling Senate campaign in Pennsylvania, fretting that his lackadaisical, disorganized effort will hand a third term to incumbent Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa.
President Trump rallied support for Barletta in a string of Wednesday afternoon tweets. But the congressman is taking fire from Republicans at home and in Washington who worried that he is relying too much on the president to boost his flagging Senate bid. Barletta has been a disappointing fundraiser and been too slow to ramp up a capable statewide campaign operation, his critics charge.
"The sense is, nobody knows what the fuck he’s doing," a Republican strategist with Pennsylvania ties said, requesting anonymity in order to speak candidly. "He's not really working it hard. It's a sad thing, because people like Lou."
"Casey should be vulnerable," this Republican added. "But Lou is just like a ghost."
Red flags about Barletta were raised anew after he won the party's Senate nomination on Tuesday with 63 percent of the vote despite being Trump's handpicked candidate and enjoying the support of Pennsylvania's GOP machine. The fourth-term congressman defeated little-known and underfunded state legislator Jim Christiana. Barletta's camp dismisses the criticism, pointing to Casey receiving only 62,000 more votes than those in the GOP primary combined despite registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans by more than 800,000. They also insist that Barletta isn't running a sluggish Senate bid.
By the way, the Washington Examiner also interviewed someone who knows how expensive and tough it is to run for higher office in Pennsylvania:
"There are six or seven other races that are much more attractive from a fundraising point of view than slogging it out in a state like Pennsylvania," former Sen. Rick Santorum, a Barletta supporter, told the Washington Examiner. "People tend to like to win states like Montana or North Dakota, which are a lot less expensive than Pennsylvania. I get it. He's going to have a hard time — he's got to continue to show that his race is a viable race."
"I think this race will be one of those races if they don't fund, they're going to kick themselves in November for not having funding," Santorum added, who still believes the race is "winnable" for Barletta.
What’s funny was there were already warning signs from the Pennsylvania GOP about Barletta’s candidacy:
Retiring state Rep. John Taylor and HRCC Chair Mark Mustio are worried about the consequences of the state Republican Party endorsing Congressman Lou Barletta’s Senate campaign could have on down ticket races. The House Republican Campaign Committee is tasked with electing – and re-electing – GOP candidates to the state House.
“Mark, I wanted to express my concern about the potentially negative effects of the top of our ticket to our House colleagues in 2018,” Taylor wrote in an email obtained by PoliticsPA.
Taylor’s concerns stem Barletta’s emphasis on immigration and his close ties to President Trump. Taylor believes that the election could become a referendum on Trump, hurting southeast Republicans.
“I am concerned that Lou Barletta’s candidacy, with the media emphasis on immigration and the President, may cause each of our House seats to be a referendum on the President as well. Our message, from the top to the bottom of the ticket, will be lost and it could be a straight party vote against up in the Southeast,” Taylor wrote.
“I’m also concerned about the possibility of the 2018 election becoming more of a referendum on Donald Trump than on his policies of economic growth and a strong foreign policy that work for all of us,” Mustio wrote.
Mustio and Taylor both confirmed the authenticity of the emails to PoliticsPA.
Both Taylor and Mustio have endorsed one of Barletta’s Senate primary opponents, their colleague State Rep. Jim Christiana’s (R-Beaver).
While few in the party have openly expressed concerns about Barletta, their worries about Trump echo those voiced by many Republicans in the Philadelphia suburbs.
Trump’s popularity in the Southeast has never been very strong, with Clinton winning all of the southeast Congressional districts, and a large majority of the state House districts in the region in 2016. In 2017 Democrats made massive strides, picking up county and local seats that have been Republican for over 50 years, and in some cases seats that have never been held by Democrats.
“All five of the counties in the Southeast were rocked in the election last November. While results in Philadelphia were not surprising, the outcomes in Chester, Bucks, Delaware, and Montgomery certainly were,” Taylor wrote.
“We lost seats we have held for generations.”
But the entire Pennsylvania Republican delegation decided to endorse him anyway:
Congressman Lou Barletta (R-Luzerne) announced the endorsement of the current Republican members of Congress from Pennsylvania in his run for Senate.
In a letter signed by the 11 current Pennsylvania Republican Congressmen, Barletta is described as a “straight shooter who is not afraid to stand-up and fight for the people he represents.”
The letter was signed by Congressmen Ryan Costello (R-Chester), Charlie Dent (R-Lehigh), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Bucks), Mike Kelly (R-Butler), Tom Marino (R-Lycoming), Patrick Meehan (R-Delaware), Scott Perry (R-York), Keith Rothfus (R-Allegheny), Bill Shuster (R-Bedford), Lloyd Smucker (R-Lancaster), and Glenn Thompson (R-Centre).
Including this clown:
Sen. Pat Toomey endorsed U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta for a U.S. Senate seat in a recent video announcement.
Barletta is vying for the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic incumbent Sen. Bob Casey. Others who are also seeking the Republican nomination in the Senate race include Paul Addis, Cynthia Ayers, Jim Christiana and Paul DeLong.
Barletta, who is currently the U.S. representative for the 11th district, was reportedly encouraged to run for the Senate seat by the White House administration. Toomey called Barletta a "trusted conservative and a relentless fighter for hardworking Pennsylvanians."
"When we recently needed an ally in the House to pass the most sweeping tax reforms in a generation, Lou was there every step of the way," Toomey said in the announcement. "It's time we all unite behind Lou and support him with our time, our energy, and most of all, with our vote."
Toomey also cited Barletta's work in trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act and attempting to end sanctuary city policies as other reasons for his support.
If the Pennsylvania GOP was really this concerned, they should’ve tried to find a better candidate or try to persuade it’s members from endorsing Barletta early on. But it’s the bed they made by doubling down on Trumpism. Also, this race doesn’t seem like a high priority for Republican Senate Leadership:
On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told the Washington Post that he believes nine states will decide the battle for Senate control: Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Tennessee and West Virginia.
To some extent, Barletta's problem is the large number of battleground states for control of the Senate, now held by Republicans by the slimmest of margins, 51-49. That means competition will be stiff for campaign cash from the party's major donors.
Five states -- Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia -- where Democratic senators are running for re-election gave Trump a double-digit percentage win over Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016's presidential election. Those are big targets for Republicans, while Trump eked out a win in Pennsylvania of less than one percentage point.
Trump may deliver millions of dollars to help Barletta's campaign, but Barletta could still be hobbled without substantial outside help from other Republican super PACs like McConnell's.
While major Republican campaign-spenders consider where to spend their money, Barletta hasn't wowed anybody with his own fundraising: he had $1.3 million in the bank at the end of April, compared to Casey's $10 million.
Besides fundraising, Casey -- the 58-year-old son of former Gov. Robert P. Casey who has won five statewide elections -- has a list of built-in advantages.
For one, Democratic voters are showing more enthusiasm for the November election, according to polls by Franklin and Marshall College and Muhlenberg College. Democrats also have a 5-4 registration advantage over Republicans that has helped Democrats win 18 of the last 24 statewide elections, including Casey's 2012 victory by more than 9 percentage points.
Plus, Casey has approval ratings that reflect no apparent weakness, backlash or scandal that is typically the undoing of an incumbent, pollsters say. Meanwhile, Barletta is so closely identified with Trump that the race may end up being a referendum not on Casey, but on a president whose voter approval rating right now is too low to help Barletta, said Christopher Borick, a political science professor at Muhlenberg College.
And as G. Terry Madonna and Michael Young pointed out in two our of their five, observations, both the Senate and Governor races are going to be referendums on Trump:
A Pennsylvania referendum on President Trump in November was guaranteed by the results of the Republican primary nominating Scott Wagner and Lou Barletta for governor and U.S. Senate , respectively. Wagner, a blunt, hard-charging conservative, has modeled himself after Trump and his policies, while Barletta is a longtime Trump supporter who made his reputation as an immigration hard-liner. Elections should be referendums and this year they will be.
Lou Barletta vs. Bob Casey is fated to be a premier national U.S. Senate race in 2018. As a Trump supporter, Barletta is unique. He espoused Trumpian views before Trump himself did. As mayor of Hazleton, he gained national prominence confronting the federal government over immigration policy and went on to co-chair the Trump campaign in Pennsylvania. Barletta and Trump are joined at the hip on the issues, while Barletta will face in Casey one of the Senate's leading Trump critics.
The Democratic majority path lies through Pennsylvania. The Keystone State can help us deliver the Big Blue Wave of 2018 but we have to be ready. Click below to donate and get involved with Sen. Casey, Gov. Wolf, Lt. Gov. nominee, John Fetterman (D. PA), and the Democratic nominees for Congress’ campaigns: