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Morning Digest: Rick Scott kicks off long-planned Senate campaign against Bill Nelson [1]

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Date: 2018-04-10  

1Q Fundraising

Be sure to keep our Senate fundraising roundup handy, since we update that as new numbers come in. As per usual, we'll have a House roundup after reports are due at the FEC on April 15.

● IN-Sen: Joe Donnelly (D-inc): $1.63 million raised, $6.4 million cash-on-hand

● MO-Sen: Claire McCaskill (D-inc): $3.9 million raised, $11.5 million cash-on-hand

● NJ-Sen: Bob Hugin (R): $352,000 raised (since mid-February), additional $7.5 million self-funded, $6.8 million cash-on-hand

● NV-Sen: Jacky Rosen (D): $2.6 million raised, $3.5 million cash-on-hand

● PA-Sen: Lou Barletta (R): $1.26 million raised, $1.6 million cash-on-hand

● WI-Sen: Kevin Nicholson (R): $1 million raised, $800,000 cash-on-hand

● AR-02: Clarke Tucker (D): $500,000 raised (in two months), $440,000 cash-on-hand

● FL-06: Nancy Soderberg (D): $375,000 raised

● FL-16: David Shapiro (D): $402,000 raised

● KY-06: Amy McGrath (D): $665,000 raised, $625,000 cash-on-hand

● MA-03: Daniel Koh (D): $911,000 raised

● NC-13: Kathy Manning (D): $600,000 raised, $1 million cash-on-hand

● OH-10: Theresa Gasper (D): $200,000 raised

● TX-32: Colin Allred (D): $400,000 raised

● WI-01: Paul Ryan (R-inc): $10.5 million cash-on-hand

Senate

● AZ-Sen: Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema recently put down $400,000 to launch her first TV ad campaign. Her opening spot features Sinema and her brother Paul Sheldon, who introduces himself as a police officer and Marine veteran. Sheldon praises his sister for fighting for veterans and being a friend to law enforcement, while Sinema calls herself an independent voice who will get things done if elected to the Senate.

● WI-Sen: Wealthy businessman Eric Hovde has announced he won't run seek the GOP nomination to take on Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin. Hovde narrowly lost to former Gov. Tommy Thompson in the GOP primary for this seat in 2012 and self-funded $6 million in the process, meaning he could have been a major contender had he run this cycle. Hovde's decision, which came after close to a year-and-a-half of indecision, leaves businessman Kevin Nicholson and state Sen. Leah Vukmir as the only notable Republicans competing in the Aug. 14 primary.

Gubernatorial

● GA-Gov: Campaign finance reports covering the period of Jan 31. to March 31 are out. While state elected officials were forbidden from raising money during the legislative session, which spanned most of this period, these reports do tell us how much money all the candidates have heading into the May 22 primary.

On the Democratic side, former state House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams outraised former state Rep. Stacey Evans $1 million to $322,000 (because both Democrats resigned from the legislature last year, neither of them was prohibited from raising money during the session). Abrams has continued to invest heavily on personnel and organizing rather than TV ads, and she spent much of the money she brought in; at the end of March, it was Evans who held a $1.5 million to $900,000 cash-on-hand edge.

On the GOP side, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle continues to dominate the money race. Cagle ended March with $4.5 million in the bank, considerably more than the $1.6 million that Secretary of State Brian Kemp and businessman Clay Tippins each had. State Sen. Michael Williams wasn't far behind with $1.3 million, while former state Sen. Hunter Hill had $1.1 million. Hill and Tippins, who were allowed to raise money during the session, each took in just north of $400,000 during these two months, while none of the other three raised more than $35,000.

● ME-Gov: Each party's gubernatorial candidates are taking very different approaches to the issue of instant-runoff voting after a state judge recently ordered the secretary of state's office to proceed with implementing the new electoral system for the June 12 primary. Republicans have strongly opposed instant-runoff, and several of their candidates wouldn't rule out a legal challenge if they lost an instant-runoff primary. Indeed, GOP opponents of the law may soon end up taking their case to the state Supreme Court to try to block its implementation.

However, every Democrat said they would abide by the results of an instant-runoff primary—except for state Attorney General Janet Mills, who declined to comment by saying she didn't want to weigh in on what she might do because the issue was currently in court. Former state House Speaker Mark Eves, one of Mills' many primary rivals, had previously accused her of trying to undermine instant-runoff after lawyers in the attorney general's office expressed their opinion that the new system couldn't be used in June. Mills may stand to benefit from a return to the old plurality-winner method, since she likely has higher name recognition than many of her rivals.

● OK-Gov: News on 6 recently released a Sooner Poll survey from mid-March that tested each party's gubernatorial contests in the June 26 primary. On the Republican side, Sooner has Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett with just a 22-21 edge against Lt. Gov. Todd Lamb, while no other candidate in the crowded field topped 8 percent. In the likely event that no candidate wins a majority, there would be an Aug. 28 primary runoff.

On the Democratic side, former state Attorney General Drew Edmondson holds a much wider 34-12 edge over former state Sen. Connie Johnson. We had not previously written about Johnson, who lost the 2014 Senate special election by 69-29 to GOP Sen. James Lankford. However, she has so far raised very little money in her gubernatorial bid.

● SC-Gov: Michigan-based pollster Target-Insyght has released a survey of South Carolina's June 12 gubernatorial primaries; pollster Ed Sarpolus said he became interested in this race after comparing Donald Trump’s approval rating in Michigan to his standing in other states. On the Republican side, Gov. Henry McMaster holds a 46-22 lead over former state cabinet official Catherine Templeton, while Lt. Gov. Kevin Bryant takes 6 percent. McMaster is right on the cusp of clearing the 50 percent mark needed to avoid a June 26 runoff, but his much higher name recognition is likely bolstering his lead, an advantage that may not remain once his well-funded opponents have introduced themselves to the electorate.

On the Democratic side, state Rep. James Smith and businessman Phil Noble are tied 27-27, while attorney Marguerite Willis earns 21 percent; however, all three candidates had relatively low name recognition. Smith maintains significant support from major national Democrats like Joe Biden and influential state Democrats, but so far, that doesn't appear to have translated into a lead in the polls. However, this is the first survey of the Democratic primary we’ve seen that had at least 300 respondents, which is the minimum we require for a poll to be included in the Digest, so we don’t have much data to work with.

● SD-Gov: Republican firm Rockbridge Strategy is out with a poll of the June 5 Republican primary, where they have Rep. Kristi Noem winning by 44-33 against state Attorney General Marty Jackley. Rockbridge president Kyle Robertson claimed his company didn't have any clients in South Dakota, but Jackley's campaign has accused him of secretly working with Noem, pointing out that Robertson was previously the business partner of her campaign manager.

Despite that allegation, Jackley hasn't released any contradicting numbers, and the only other poll we've seen of this race was a Moore Information survey from February that had Noem ahead by 40-35. Meanwhile, Noem debuted a TV ad that praises her work on behalf of veterans.

● VT-Gov: Democrat Christine Hallquist, who stepped down as CEO of the Vermont Electric Cooperative in February, announced over the weekend that she would challenge GOP Gov. Phil Scott. Hallquist's former company serves much of northern Vermont, so she could have some good connections; back in November, the executive director of the state Democratic Party also said he was "extremely excited" about the prospect of her running. She faces environmental activist James Ehlers and eighth-grader Ethan Sonneborn (yes, really) in the August primary.

Hallquist would make history as the first transgender statewide-elected official in the country if she beat Scott, but the odds are very much against her. While Vermont is a reliably blue state in federal elections, voters have been fine sending Republicans to the governor's office. Scott, who is pretty moderate by modern GOP standards, posted a 63 percent approval rating in Morning Consult's last poll, which was done during the final quarter of 2017. Vermont's last GOP governor, Jim Douglas, won decisively even during the 2006 and 2008 Democratic waves, and Hallquist is going to need a lot to go right to keep Scott from also getting re-elected in an otherwise bad political climate.

● WI-Gov: The Republican Governors Association has reserved $5.1 million in TV time for the final weeks of the race to help Gov. Scott Walker.

House

● CA-10: In response to a poll from fellow Democrat Michael Eggman that argued he was the most electable choice against GOP Rep. Jeff Denham, venture capitalist Josh Harder has dusted off his own mid-February survey from Benenson Strategy Group that, predictably, makes the opposite claim. Harder declined to publicize numbers from his initial ballot tests, as Eggman did, and only shared the results of matchups after both positive and negative statements were read about each candidate. Harder's poll, of course, found him performing better than Eggman, while Eggman's naturally showed the opposite.

What accounts for the difference? It's all in the wording, which you can see compared side-by-side here. The two big differences are in the campaigns' positive statements about Harder and their negative statements about Eggman. While Eggman's characterization of Harder might sound positive (especially if you're a liberal), calling Harder a "true progressive" who wants a $15 minimum wage is liable to be something of a negative with many voters in a closely divided district like this one.

Put another way, in an informed ballot, positive messages should reflect the way candidates themselves would describe their own priorities, and Harder's campaign has taken exception to Eggman's characterization. In a statement to Daily Kos Elections, a Harder aide said that the campaign's focus was on "access to health care," "comprehensive immigration reform," and "bringing more good jobs" with "a livable wage," saying that any other messaging was "disingenuous to the campaign we are running."

But this problem cuts both ways, because it's just as misleading to go too easy on yourself on the negative side. Harder's negative statement about Eggman is similar to Eggman's own, but it ups the ante by saying that Eggman has promised "to advance Nancy Pelosi's agenda." That's certainly a fair preview of likely Republican attacks on Eggman. But it would also be a fair preview of likely Republican attacks on Harder, because we know the GOP loves to use Pelosi as a bludgeon. It's not as though Harder would be immune to such attacks, so failing to invoke Pelosi as a boogeyman with regard to himself amounts to letting himself off easy—and could yield data that misinforms.

All of this helps explain why we usually ignore informed ballot polling. While the message testing such polls contain can help candidates guide their campaigns, the world hypothesized by every informed ballot matchup represents an idealized universe that simply will never come to pass. It's impossible to communicate your preferred message to every voter, and you never know what kinds of negatives your opponents will actually bash you over the head with. For horserace analysis, you're always best off just sticking with the initial ballot.

● CT-05: GOP state Sen. Kevin Witkos announced on Monday that he would not seek this open seat

● FL-17: The anti-tax Club for Growth has endorsed state Sen. Greg Steube in the August GOP primary for this red seat.

● KY-06: Last week, Lexington Mayor Jim Gray released a month-old Democratic primary poll showing him leading retired combat pilot Amy McGrath 52-19 in the May 22 contest to take on GOP Rep. Andy Barr. McGrath's campaign has responded, but not with a primary poll of their own. Instead, they're out with a Garin-Hart-Yang poll from early February that shows her trailing Barr 48-44, while Gray leads the incumbent 49-47.

The memo argues that it's remarkable that McGrath is keeping it so close despite having considerably lower name identification than Gray, though it's not the most persuasive pushback to Gray’s primary survey. However, McGrath only began advertising after both polls were done, so she may be able to make up ground in the primary after she gets her name out.

The third Democratic candidate, state Sen. Reggie Thomas, only took 6 percent of the vote in Gray's primary poll and wasn't even mentioned in McGrath's memo. Thomas' campaign insisted to Spectrum News' Nick Storm that the primary "is far more competitive than what you have been led to believe," but they declined to release any numbers of their own.

● MI-08, MI-Sen, MI-Gov: On behalf of the political tipsheet MIRS News, Target-Insyght takes a look at the general election in this 51-44 Trump seat in the Lansing area. They give GOP Rep. Mike Bishop a 45-39 lead over former Defense Department official Elissa Slotkin, who faces no serious Democratic primary opposition. The horserace matchup came after a question asking, "What issue for candidates running for Statewide Office should be their number ONE priority when they get to Lansing," and hypothetical Senate and gubernatorial matches.

In the governor's race, the sample gives Democratic frontrunner Gretchen Whitmer a 43-39 lead over GOP frontrunner Bill Schuette in this district, while Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow leads venture capitalist Sandy Pensler 48-40. Barack Obama lost this seat 51-48 while he was carrying Michigan 54-45, so if both Democratic statewide candidates are leading here, that's good news for them and possibly also for Slotkin. Still, it's worth noting that Whitmer is a former state senator from the Lansing area while Stabenow represented an earlier version of this district, so it's possible they're just doing disproportionately well where they're best known early in the race.

● ND-AL: On Saturday, state Sen. Kelly Armstrong, who stepped down as state party chair to seek this open seat, won the state GOP endorsement with the support of 61 percent of the delegates at the party convention. Fellow state Sen. Tom Campbell, a wealthy potato farmer who took just 35 percent, soon announced that he would stay in the race and compete in the June primary.

As we've written before, while the party endorsement can play a big role in party politics in North Dakota, it's not the be-all, end-all. In 2016, state Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem decisively won the party endorsement for governor, but wealthy businessman Doug Burgum decided to stay in the primary and ended up winning it 59-39. Like Burgum, Campbell does have the resources to self-fund a campaign. However, he's probably going to have a much tougher job rallying voters against the unhappy political establishment the way now-Gov. Burgum did two years ago, especially since Campbell has some big potential vulnerabilities.

● OH-12: Economist and TV commentator Tim "There's no I in Kane" Kane is out with his first TV spot ahead of the May 8 GOP primary. Kane stands in front of his kitchen sink (we're not sure of the symbolism of that; maybe his kitchen table was cluttered?) and tells the audience about his local roots and service in the Air Force, and declares that American needs "a tough approach to rogue dictators in places like North Korea that threaten our national security."

● PA-04: On Monday, state Rep. Mary Jo Daley dropped out of the May 15 Democratic primary for this new 58-38 Clinton seat and endorsed fellow state Rep. Madeleine Dean. There are no women in Pennsylvania's 18-member House delegation, and Daley said that she wanted to make it easier for another progressive woman to win this seat. Last month, former Rep. Joe Hoeffel entered the race with a poll giving him a 25-17 lead over Dean, while Daley and gun-safety activist Shira Goodman took 9 and 5 percent, respectively, numbers that worried Democrats who wanted to elect a woman to this Montgomery County seat.

● PA-05: The enormous field of contenders in Pennsylvania's 5th Congressional District got whittled down a bit on Sunday night, when Democrats in Delaware County (which makes up about 80 percent of the district) held a vote on whether to formally endorse a single candidate. No one managed to clear the 55 percent threshold to earn the party's backing, but two also-rans wound up bailing.

During the voting, 2012 nominee George Badey dropped out and gave his backing to attorney Mary Gay Scanlon, who finished in first with the support of 46 percent of delegates after four rounds of balloting. Similarly, former CIA officer Shelley Chauncey quit and threw in with former federal prosecutor Ashley Lunkenheimer, who took second place with 32 percent.

Following the meeting, the Delaware Democrats more or less tried to frame the vote as a dual endorsement, calling Scanlon and Lunkenheimer the "favorites" to win the party's nomination in June—a tacit acknowledgement that the huge number of hopefuls from "Delco" (as locals call it) could split the vote and allow someone from Philadelphia to win, even though it only makes up a small part of the district.

Meanwhile, Lunkenheimer is headed onto the airwaves with her first TV ad, and it's a good one. When Lunkenheimer starts off by referencing her career as a federal prosecutor, it sounds like a typical introductory biographical spot, but she astutely links each bullet point on her resume with major issues that will resonate with progressives. She explains that she "took assault weapons from violent criminals who shouldn't have had them in the first place"—and in Congress, she'll "fight the NRA to ban assault weapons."

She uses the same structure to describe how she convicted a financial advisor who stole seniors' life savings, so she "won't let Paul Ryan steal your Medicare and Social Security." The final bullet point is the most subtle and emotional: Lunkenheimer says simply, "[M]y wife and I are raising three kids. I know how Donald Trump's hatred affects families." The message couldn't be clearer.

● PA-09: Former state Revenue Secretary Dan Meuser has launched another ad ahead of the May 15 GOP primary for this open 65-31 Trump seat. Meuser tells the audience that he wants to defund sanctuary cities and build the border wall.

Legislative

● NV State Senate: On Monday, state election officials ruled that conservative groups had not collected enough valid signatures to trigger a recall against Democratic state Sens. Joyce Woodhouse and Nicole Cannizzaro; an earlier recall effort against state Sen. Patricia Farley, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats, failed months ago. Carolyn Fiddler has the background on this whole affair.

The decision means that Democrats are all but certain to keep at least a narrow majority in the state Senate for a few more years. With Farley included, Team Blue currently holds a 12 to nine edge in the upper chamber, and this year's map (only half the chamber is up) isn't good for the GOP. While the GOP does have a shot at replacing Farley, who is retiring, in her 48-47 Clinton seat, they don't have any other realistic targets.

By contrast, Democrats can go after two open GOP seats in the Las Vegas area: the 51-43 Clinton SD-09, and the 48-46 Trump SD-20. Unless something very surprising happens, Republicans will need to wait until the 2020 elections, when Woodhouse and Cannizzaro are next scheduled to face the voters, to have a shot at the majority.

● Special Elections: From the desk of Johnny Longtorso, we coincidentally have two special elections to replace two Senate leaders who resigned due to their relationships with lobbyists.

[END]
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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/4/10/1755721/-Morning-Digest-Rick-Scott-kicks-off-long-planned-Senate-campaign-against-Bill-Nelson#18

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