The Rothenberg Political Report

New York 23 Remains a Toss-Up

2009-11-06T14:58:00.004-05:00

Bill Owens' victory in New York's 23rd was the good news for Democrats this week and continued the party's winning streak in competitive House special elections. But the dynamic that helped Owens win- including a divided Republican Party- can't be ignored and aren't likely to be replicated again. For now, his reelection next year is a Pure Toss-Up.

Here are our latest House ratings.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Pure Toss-Up (2 R, 13 D)

AL 2 (Bright, D)
FL 8 (Grayson, D)
ID 1 (Minnick, D)
IL 10 (Open; Kirk, R)
MD 1 (Kratovil, D)
MS 1 (Childers, D)
NH 1 (Shea-Porter, D)
NH 2 (Open; Hodes, D)
NM 2 (Teague, D)
NY 23 (Owens, D)
OH 1 (Driehaus, D)
OH 15 (Kilroy, D)
PA 6 (Open; Gerlach, R)
PA 7 (Open; Sestak, D)
VA 5 (Periello, D)

Toss-Up/Tilt Republican (1 R, 1 D)

LA 3 (Open; Melancon, D)
WA 8 (Reichert, R)

Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic (0 R, 4 D)

CO 4 (Markey, D)
FL 24 (Kosmas, D)
IL 14 (Foster, D)
MI 7 (Schauer, D)

Lean Republican (2 R, 0 D)

CA 3 (Lungren, R)
CA 44 (Calvert, R)

Lean Democratic (0 R, 3 D)

AL 5 (Griffith, D)
NY 24 (Arcuri, D)
NY 29 (Massa, D)

Republican Favored (9 R, 0 D)

AK A-L (Young, R)
CA 45 (Bono Mack, R)
MI 11 (McCotter, R)
MN 3 (Paulsen, R)
MN 6 (Bachmann, R)
NE 2 (Terry, R)
OH 2 (Schmidt, R)
OH 12 (Tiberi, R)
PA 15 (Dent, R)

Democrat Favored (2 R, 11 D)

AZ 5 (Mitchell, D)
CA 47 (Sanchez, D)
DE A-L (Open; Castle, R)
GA 8 (Marshall, D)
LA 2 (Cao, R)
MO 4 (Skelton, D)
NY 19 (Hall, D)
NY 20 (Murphy, D)
NC 8 (Kissell, D)
OH 18 (Space, D)
PA 10 (Carney, D)
TX 17 (Edwards, D)
VA 2 (Nye, D)

Total seats in play: 48
Republican seats: 16
Democratic seats: 32

Florida 8: A Lesson on How Not to Win Re-Election

2009-11-05T09:00:00.002-05:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

After almost 30 years doing this, I shouldn’t be surprised by anything Members of Congress do. But even I was taken aback when Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) referred to an adviser to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke as a “K Street whore.”

Democratic colleagues called the comment “absurd” (Rep. Bill Pascrell of New Jersey) and “inappropriate” (Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland), and Rep. Anthony Weiner (N.Y.) even said that the freshman Congressman is “one fry short of a Happy Meal.”

I didn’t meet Grayson during either of his two Congressional runs (2006 and 2008), but I heard plenty about him. My first and only meeting with the Congressman occurred earlier this year, in late March, in Orlando, Fla., when we spoke at the same event.

At the time, a handful of names of possible GOP challengers were already floating around, including former state Sen. Dan Webster and Orange County Mayor Richard Crotty. Both have since passed on the race.

Smart freshmen from difficult districts, when asked about their re-election prospects, will respond either that they are focused on doing their job on Capitol Hill or that they know that they’ll have a tough fight on their hands and will do everything they can to deserve re-election. Some even say something nice (e.g., “he’d be formidable”) about a potential opponent.

Grayson did none of those things. Instead, with not a whit of humility, he proceeded to bash, then dismiss, Webster and Crotty. A Grayson aide has since said in print that potential opponents have decided against challenging the Congressman because “they don’t want to be gutted like a fish.”

Grayson’s problems, from what I can tell, include an exaggerated sense of his intellect to cover up some self-esteem issues and a misguided belief that voters supported him because they actually liked him.

The Congressman has terrific academic credentials. He graduated in three years, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from Harvard. He has a law degree, with honors, from Harvard Law School, and he’s only a doctoral dissertation short of a Ph.D. in government from Harvard.

He’s also made millions in business and as an attorney, making him one of the wealthiest Members of the House.

But Grayson’s official House Web site provides some clues to Grayson the man.

His bio begins with a quote from Deuteronomy, “Justice, justice, ye shall seek,” and continues, “There is right, and there is wrong. We in Central Florida have sent someone to Washington who fights for what’s right.”

Note that the Congressman isn’t merely fighting for what he believes to be right, or that he is trying to work with others to improve things. His side stands for right, while the other side is wrong.

The bio continues by telling us that Grayson “was admitted to an exclusive public high school,” and while in that school, “he achieved the highest test score among almost 50,000 students who took the test.”

It also asserts that “life at Harvard wasn’t easy. Alan cleaned toilets, and worked as a night watchman.” And he “graduated from Harvard in the top two percent of his class.” Surprisingly, given what he does include, Grayson does not include his SAT scores or his IQ.

Grayson clearly has some issues with who he is and where he came from. And that shows, not only in his bio but also with the way he deals with those who may disagree with him.

Grayson was elected to Congress not because of who he is and was, but because he wasn’t Ric Keller, the incumbent Republican. The challenger won because of a big Democratic wave in a competitive but Republican-leaning district that President George W. Bush won with 55 percent in 2004. Barack Obama carried it with 52 percent last year — roughly the same showing as Grayson. The district’s Democratic Performance Index is only 44 percent, making it a difficult district for any Democrat in a normal year.

Keller, of course, had a shockingly close 53 percent to 47 percent primary win about 10 weeks before last year’s general election, a sure sign of his problems in the district. And Grayson outspent Keller by almost 2-to-1, $3.21 million to $1.77 million, in the race.

It was his money and the mood for change that made Grayson a winner, not the public’s affection or admiration for him.

So where does Grayson stand politically after his “whore” comment, after saying that Republicans want sick people to “die quickly” and after comparing the nation’s health care system to the Holocaust? In very hot water.

Grayson’s comments resonated with some grass-roots Democrats, but elections in Florida’s 8th district aren’t won by those kinds of voters. Swing voters, and particularly Republican-leaning swing voters, are likely to pick the next Congressman.

Republican strategists don’t have a top-tier challenger to Grayson, but given the Congressman’s public persona, they probably don’t need one to make for a competitive contest. A competent, well-funded challenger with some private-sector experience would give Grayson a headache.

Those who say that Grayson will or won’t win re-election at this point are getting too far ahead of themselves. The race is a long way from developing. But it’s already clear that Grayson loves controversy, thinks he can do no wrong and is widely seen as the loosest of cannons. That’s enough to almost guarantee he’ll be in the political fight of his life.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on November 3, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Stu Talks 2009 Elections on NewsHour

2009-11-05T00:09:00.004-05:00

Stu joined the Hotline's Amy Walter in discussing the 2009 election results on PBS NewsHour. You can read the transcript here or watch the video below.

2010 Gubernatorial Ratings

2009-11-04T11:00:00.000-05:00

With victories in New Jersey and Virginia, Republicans now control 24 governorships compared to 26 for the Democrats heading into 2010. Next year, 37 states will elect a governor including the nation's largest states such as California, Texas, New York, and Florida.

Here are our latest gubernatorial ratings.
# - Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (4 R, 4 D)

CA Open (Schwarzenegger, R)
HI Open (Lingle, R)
RI Open (Carcieri, R)
VT Open (Douglas, R)
KS Open (Parkinson, D)
OK Open (Henry, D)
TN Open (Bredesen, D)
WY Open (Freudenthal, D)

Toss-Up (4 R, 6 D)

Brewer (R-AZ)
Gibbons (R-NV)
FL Open (Crist, R)
MN Open (Pawlenty, R)
Culver (D-IA)
Paterson (D-NY)
Ritter (D-CO)
MI Open (Granholm, D)
PA Open (Rendell, D)
WI Open (Doyle, D)

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (1 R, 2 D)

GA Open (Perdue, R)
Patrick (D-MA)
Strickland (D-OH)

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (3 R, 3 D)

Rell (R-CT)
AL Open (Riley, R)
SC Open (Sanford, R)
Quinn (D-IL)
ME Open (Baldacci, D)
NM Open (Richardson, D)

Currently Safe (6 R, 4 D)

Herbert (R-UT)
Heineman (R-NE)
Otter (R-ID)
Parnell (R-AK)
Perry (R-TX)
SD Open (Rounds, R)
Beebe (D-AR)
Lynch (D-NH)
O'Malley (D-MD)
OR Open (Kulongoski, D)

Some House Recruits Have Yet to Measure Up to Hype

2009-11-04T09:00:00.002-05:00

By Nathan L. Gonzales

During the election off-year, the House campaign committees spend much of their time recruiting and then promoting their top candidates — like college football teams touting their class of high school prospects before they hit the field. But a year out from Election Day, Democrats and Republicans have highly touted recruits who have either flamed out or are far from living up to the early hype.

Simply put, both parties have candidates looking to get back on track.

This spring, Springfield, Ore., Mayor Sid Leiken was touted as one of a handful of top recruits by the National Republican Congressional Committee. By challenging Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) in the 4th district, Leiken was supposed to be an example of the GOP’s effort to recruit top-notch challengers in districts that haven’t been competitive in recent cycles.

Leiken filed on May 13, but his campaign derailed less than a month later after it came to light that he paid his mother $2,000 for campaign polling to a company that wasn’t registered with the state. Over a number of days the story grew bigger as facts trickled out.

“It’s the difference between an article and a story,” according to a House GOP strategist.

Leiken choked back tears as he admitted to failing to properly document the transaction, and the secretary of state is looking into it. The matter was not insignificant, but it didn’t have to completely disrupt his campaign.

“You have to get good people around these candidates for them to succeed,” according to one GOP consultant who believes Leiken could have weathered the storm with better advice.

Instead of giving DeFazio a run for his money (the incumbent had $583,000 in the bank on Sept. 30), Leiken is facing fundraising troubles on top of everything else. The mayor raised just $52,000 through the end of the third quarter and had a paltry $21,000 in his campaign account at the end of September.

According to one GOP source, Leiken is making some changes in his campaign, but it may be too late to change the narrative of the race. For now, he may not even be Republicans’ hottest race in Oregon, with strategists becoming more excited about their prospects in the 5th and even 1st districts.

Across the country in Florida, a once-hot Democratic candidate is having trouble living up to early expectations as well.

For years, Democrats have believed that Rep. Bill Young (R) is close to retiring in Florida’s 10th district. Growing impatient because the former Appropriations chairman continues to seek re-election, this cycle Democrats recruited state Sen. Charlie Justice (D) into the race to see if they could smoke Young out. But Justice’s early fundraising has been mediocre, and Democrats are a long way from scaring Young into retirement.

Justice filed on April 24, raised $86,000 his first quarter of fundraising and $77,000 in his second. Those are less than spectacular numbers for a star recruit. He ended September with $101,000 in the bank, but Young had four times that amount.

“He needs to put in the work to build his operation and make sure he has the money to compete,” admitted one House Democratic strategist. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.), who is the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s vice chairwoman for incumbent retention this cycle, has been assigned to Justice to help jump-start his campaign.

The jury is still out on several other notable early recruits.

Republicans believe Manchester Mayor Frank Guinta will mount a strong challenge against Rep. Carol Shea-Porter (D) in New Hampshire’s 1st district. Guinta got into the race early and drew fire from Democrats after being at a bar when a brawl broke out and failing to call the police.

Democrats believe the mayor’s candidacy was derailed by the incident and highlight the fact that he only raised $126,000 in the third quarter. But Republicans point out that Guinta’s total was only slightly behind Shea-Porter’s $141,000 raised for the quarter and that he ended September only about $100,000 behind the incumbent in cash on hand.

Along with Leiken, California Assemblyman Van Tran (R) was part of a recruiting class built to expand the GOP playing field by challenging Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.).

And like Guinta, Democrats believe Tran’s candidacy has stalled after he raised $92,000 in the third quarter. But after raising a whopping $254,000 from mid-May to June, Tran was going to have difficulty keeping up. After tapping friends and family for contributions, a candidate’s second quarter of fundraising is thought to be considerably more difficult.

Tran had $283,000 in the bank on Sept. 30 compared with $769,000 for Sanchez.

When trouble begins to surface for candidates, early detection is critical.

“Now it’s an identified problem, and we can sit down and try and solve it,” according to one GOP strategist, who would rather advise a candidate after a poor fundraising quarter in the off-year than later next year after resources are invested. “We’re not trying to be ‘survival of the fittest.’ We’re trying to build something.”

Republicans joke that at least their alleged flameouts are raising more money than the Democrats.

Polk County Supervisor of Elections Lori Edwards was supposed to give Democrats a chance at competing for the 12th district seat that Rep. Adam Putnam (R) is vacating in Florida.

She filed on March 2, put together $101,000 through June but raised just $39,000 from July through September and had only $77,000 on hand on Sept. 30. Her likely GOP opponent, former state Rep. Dennis Ross (R), was sitting on $255,000 at the same point.

Similarly, Democrats believe state Rep. Todd Book (D) is their best possible challenger to Rep. Jean Schmidt (R) in Ohio’s 2nd district. But he comes from the least populated portion of the district and raised $64,000 in his first two months in the race, ending September with less than $45,000 in the bank. His opponent in the Democratic primary, David Krikorian, had a head start and showed $115,000 in cash on hand, while Schmidt had $235,000 in the bank.

Schmidt will never be completely safe and Book has time to get on track, but he’s not off to a roaring start. When candidates come up short in fundraising, it’s distressing because that’s all they should be doing at this point, according to one Democratic strategist.

But in the end, even an imperfect challenger could get significant support from their party’s national campaign committee if the race is ultimately deemed as a winnable opportunity.

This story first appeared in Roll Call on October 29, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New 2010 Senate Ratings

2009-11-03T12:00:00.001-05:00

It looks like Democrats will get a credible contender against Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley (R). That doesn't mean he is in imminent danger of losing reelection, but we are moving him from Currently Safe to Clear Advantage.

Here are our latest Senate ratings.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
*- Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (0 R, 1 D)

DE Open (Kaufman, D)

Toss-Up (4 R, 3 D)

KY Open (Bunning, R)
MO Open (Bond, R)
NH Open (Gregg, R)
OH Open (Voinovich, R)
IL Open (Burris, D)
Dodd (D-CT)
Reid (D-NV)

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (2 R, 3 D)

Burr (R-NC)
Vitter (R-LA)
Bennet (D-CO)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Specter (D-PA)

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (2 R, 0 D)

Grassley (R-IA) #
FL Open (LeMieux, R)

Currently Safe (10 R, 12 D)

Bennett (R-UT)
Coburn (R-OK)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Isakson (R-GA)
McCain (R-AZ)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
KS Open (Brownback, R)
Bayh (D-IN)
Boxer (D-CA)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Feingold (D-WI)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Inouye (D-HI)
Leahy (D-VT)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Schumer (D-NY)
Wyden (D-OR)
MA Open (Kirk, D)

New Print Edition: 2010 Senate Overview

2009-11-03T09:00:00.003-05:00

The October 30, 2009 print edition of the Rothenberg Political Report is on its way to subscribers.

The print edition of the Report comes out every two weeks. Subscribers get in-depth analysis of the most competitive races in the country, as well as updated House and Senate ratings, and coverage of the gubernatorial races nationwide. To subscribe, simply click on the Google checkout button on the website or send a check.

Here is a brief preview of the introduction to this edition:

Senate Overview – The Lay of the Land

With the landscape changing noticeably over the summer, Democrats can no longer assume that they will have a net gain of seats in next year’s midterm elections. Of the 13 Senate seats now regarded as seriously “in play,” seven of them are currently held by Democrats.

The candidacies of GOPers Mark Kirk (IL) and Mike Castle (DE) put into play races that ordinarily wouldn’t draw any attention. And recent GOP candidates in Nevada, Arkansas and Colorado make those contests worth watching. Democrats still have a half-dozen GOP-held seats to shoot at, but the national shift has also diminished their prospects in those states as well.

Three months ago, we wrote that Democratic Senate gains “in the order of 2-4 seats certainly seem reasonable.” Gains of that magnitude are still possible, of course, but the most likely outcome is somewhere between a Republican gain of two seats and a Democratic gain of two seats.

Subscribers to the print edition get a state-by-state breakdown and most recent polling in every Senate race.

New York 23 Moved to Toss-Up

2009-11-02T12:30:00.003-05:00

One of the most complex House races in recent history got more interesting over the weekend when liberal GOP state Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava (R) dropped out of the race and endorsed Democratic attorney Bill Owens on the heels of Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman, a registered Republican, surging in recent polls.

The national GOP has shifted gears and is now supporting Hoffman, and while we believe he has a slight advantage in tomorrow’s balloting, the dynamics of this race are simply too uncertain (and subsequent polling too unreliable) to make a definitive prediction.

Previously, Scozzafava and Hoffman were dividing the Republican vote in such a way that Owens looked to win with less than 50% of the vote. But now with Scozzafava out, Owens’ path got substantially more difficult. We’re moving the race from Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic to Pure Toss-Up.

Here are our latest House ratings. 2009 races in italics.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Pure Toss-Up (3 R, 12 D)

AL 2 (Bright, D)
FL 8 (Grayson, D)
ID 1 (Minnick, D)
IL 10 (Open; Kirk, R)
MD 1 (Kratovil, D)
MS 1 (Childers, D)
NH 1 (Shea-Porter, D)
NH 2 (Open; Hodes, D)
NM 2 (Teague, D)
NY 23 (Open; McHugh, R) *
OH 1 (Driehaus, D)
OH 15 (Kilroy, D)
PA 6 (Open; Gerlach, R)
PA 7 (Open; Sestak, D)
VA 5 (Periello, D)

Toss-Up/Tilt Republican (1 R, 1 D)

LA 3 (Open; Melancon, D)
WA 8 (Reichert, R)

Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic (0 R, 4 D)

CO 4 (Markey, D)
FL 24 (Kosmas, D)
IL 14 (Foster, D)
MI 7 (Schauer, D)

Lean Republican (2 R, 0 D)

CA 3 (Lungren, R)
CA 44 (Calvert, R)

Lean Democratic (0 R, 3 D)

AL 5 (Griffith, D)
NY 24 (Arcuri, D)
NY 29 (Massa, D)

Republican Favored (9 R, 0 D)

AK A-L (Young, R)
CA 45 (Bono Mack, R)
MI 11 (McCotter, R)
MN 3 (Paulsen, R)
MN 6 (Bachmann, R)
NE 2 (Terry, R)
OH 2 (Schmidt, R)
OH 12 (Tiberi, R)
PA 15 (Dent, R)

Democrat Favored (2 R, 11 D)

AZ 5 (Mitchell, D)
CA 47 (Sanchez, D)
DE A-L (Open; Castle, R)
GA 8 (Marshall, D)
LA 2 (Cao, R)
MO 4 (Skelton, D)
NY 19 (Hall, D)
NY 20 (Murphy, D)
NC 8 (Kissell, D)
OH 18 (Space, D)
PA 10 (Carney, D)
TX 17 (Edwards, D)
VA 2 (Nye, D)

Total seats in play: 48
Republican seats: 17
Democratic seats: 31

One Down, Two to Go: The Outlook for the 2009 Elections

2009-11-02T09:00:00.002-05:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

We are still a few days away from Election Day, but party strategists, operatives and local activists are already blaming their own nominees for their defeats.

The clearest evidence that the Virginia gubernatorial race is over — apart from a blizzard of surveys showing Republican Bob McDonnell well over the 50 percent mark in the ballot test and leading Democrat Creigh Deeds by double digits in many surveys — is that White House insiders have already passed the word that it is Deeds who blew the race.

The assertion by Obama loyalists that Deeds would have done better by embracing President Barack Obama, as they say New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine (D) has, ignores the fact that Corzine comes from a more Democratic state and that because Corzine is in a multicandidate race, he may need only 44 percent of the vote to win. If Deeds gets 44 percent of the vote in Virginia, he will be soundly defeated.

If George W. Bush were still in the White House, Deeds almost certainly would be elected governor of Virginia, so it’s a little difficult to swallow the argument that national politics has nothing to do with the Virginia results. But it’s also important to note that Virginia Republicans united behind their nominee and that McDonnell has kept his focus on jobs, taxes and transportation, rather than stressing social issues.

The ability of McDonnell to roll up big margins outside Northern Virginia, against a Democratic nominee from rural Bath County, can’t be ignored, especially considering all of the growth in Northern Virginia and the hype about the region’s political importance in state races. The red parts of Virginia are acting red again, even against a Democratic nominee who was expected to have considerable appeal in those parts of the state.

In New Jersey, the battle between Corzine and Chris Christie (R) is too close to call. Late polling in the race is all over the place, from Corzine having a mid-single-digits lead to Christie having a slightly smaller advantage.

Recent polls show Independent Chris Daggett getting anywhere from 7 percent to 20 percent, a mind-boggling range. Republican attacks on Daggett in paid media seem to have driven up his negatives, which could help Christie peel off some of the Independent’s supporters.

While Christie should outperform the polls, his own numbers have eroded dramatically. Daggett is proving to be a considerable factor, and he could be Corzine’s salvation. The stronger Daggett’s showing, the more likely that Corzine earns a narrow win. Three months ago, that seemed impossible, which shows how successful the governor’s campaign has been in making Christie the issue.

It’s a widely accepted rule of politics that incumbents “get what you see” on the ballot test, winning little or none of the undecided vote. It’s also generally true, as I wrote recently, that support for Independent and third-party nominees tends to slip in the final days of the campaign, unless of course the Independent or third-party candidate has a chance to win (see New York’s 23rd district, below). Both of those factors work to Christie’s advantage in the campaign’s final days.

In any case and no matter the result, the result in the Garden State will say little or nothing about Obama.

In New York’s 23rd district, another three-way race, Republican nominee Dede Scozzafava now seems like an afterthought.

Baseball statistician-turned-political-statistics guru Nate Silver, who seems to question the integrity and veracity of every Republican or conservative poll that he doesn’t like, has raised questions about the newest Club for Growth survey, which shows Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman holding a slight lead of 32 percent to 28 percent over Democrat Bill Owens.

In fact, more than one poll (public and private) shows that the liberal Republican has slid into third place and that the race is statistically even between Hoffman and Owens. (For the record, Club for Growth pollster Jon Lerner is among the least likely pollsters to fudge numbers or manipulate data.)

The fact that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is attacking Hoffman — and that a new Club for Growth ad being aired in the district’s three major media markets attacks Owens, contrasts him with Hoffman and ignores Scozzafava — is further proof that the special election has become a two-way race between the Democratic nominee and the Conservative Party nominee.

Interestingly, the National Republican Congressional Committee’s independent expenditure campaign in the race has run three TV spots — all of which have attacked Owens but ignored Hoffman.

That strategy either assumes that Hoffman is irrelevant — a conclusion clearly not warranted by any of the recent polling or accepted by GOP operatives — or is intended to help Hoffman in the event that he emerges as the stronger opponent against the Democrat in the final days of the three-way contest. It isn’t hard to figure out what Republican strategists are doing.

Owens deserves to be favored in the race, if only because of the presence of a credible Republican and a credible Conservative Party nominee.

Democrats could win two out of the three races, but only because multicandidate contests might allow Corzine and Owens to sneak through with a minority of the vote. A win is a win, but even if that happens, it’s not great news for Democrats for 2010.

In fact, Democrats might be better off were Hoffman to win the special election in New York. Yes, that outcome would prevent Democrats from expanding their House majority, but a Hoffman win might embolden the Club for Growth and encourage conservatives to take on other Republicans who aren’t entirely pure. And encouraging a bigger GOP civil war is something that could help Democrats win more than a single additional seat in the House.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 29, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

A Road Well-Traveled in Drive to Hold Power: Destroy the Opposition

2009-10-29T09:00:00.001-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

I had to chuckle when I read reports that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada is preparing to run a decidedly negative campaign this year, with an unnamed adviser saying Reid would “vaporize” his opponent.

That’s not exactly a new standard for the Nevada Democrat, who understands full well how to run a campaign and what he’ll need to do to win a fifth term.

But the report in Politico, followed by reverberations in other media outlets, reminded me that there is no secret to how Democrats will try to hang onto their large majorities in the House and Senate next year if the national political environment is unfavorable: Destroy the opposition.

That strategy is standard operating procedure for incumbents, regardless of party, and it has been used for years. If your own negatives are high, drive up your opponent’s. Make him or her as unpopular as you are, and voters will be faced with a different kind of choice.

It won’t be a matter of which candidate voters like; it will be a question of which of the two unappealing candidates has the experience or has delivered for constituents. Voters will take the devil they know, not the devil they don’t know, vulnerable incumbents will hope.

You can expect Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd (D) to use the same tactic against his eventual Republican challenger if he can’t move his own numbers dramatically before Republicans pick a nominee against him.

GOP strategists particularly on the House side used this approach repeatedly from the mid-1990s through the 2006 election, when they found themselves overwhelmed by a partisan wave that they couldn’t hold back.

Their strategy for a decade was clear: Hit the Democratic challenger again and again and yet again just for good measure to be sure that the opponent’s name identification is upside down (a higher unfavorable than favorable rating).

Indeed, that’s exactly what then-Sen. Jesse Helms (R) did to then-Gov. Jim Hunt (D) 25 years ago in North Carolina’s 1984 Senate race, when Helms came from behind to beat the once-popular challenger by almost 4 points.

Reid’s strategists apparently have been watching New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine’s (D) re-election bid, noting his success in driving up Republican Chris Christie’s negatives, even if they believe that Corzine waited too long to unload on his opponent. Still, there’s a problem here.

While Corzine has boosted Christie’s negatives, it hasn’t helped the governor in the ballot test. His standing — in name identification, job performance and the ballot test — haven’t budged.

Second, while the scorched-earth strategy often works for vulnerable incumbents, it doesn’t always work. If it did, Republicans would not have lost the House and Senate in 2006. They certainly tried to do what had proved to be successful — and what Reid’s strategist has promised to do.

When a party, or a candidate, is unpopular, it (or he) isn’t an ideal messenger. Republicans used the same tactics in 2006 and 2008 that had proved effective since they took control of Congress in 1994, but the political environment had shifted and their attacks didn’t stick on Democratic challengers the way they once had. Republicans weren’t deemed credible messengers, so their attacks fell flat.

For Harry Reid, that’s potentially a serious problem.

Multiple polls all show the same thing: Silver State voters have soured on the Senate Majority Leader. In many respects, his numbers look like Corzine’s. But unfortunately for Reid, he isn’t likely to have the benefit of a third-party candidate siphoning votes away from his Republican opponent.

In the eight head-to-head ballot tests conducted by three different polling firms over the past two months pitting Reid against either state Republican Chairwoman Sue Lowden or businessman/unsuccessful candidate Danny Tarkanian (R), Reid has drawn 39 percent to 43 percent of the vote.

Going back to May, there have been six different surveys testing Reid’s name identification. His “unfavorable” ratings in the six have been as follows: 54 percent, 50 percent, 46 percent, 50 percent, 52 percent and 50 percent.

In January, just days after President Barack Obama’s inauguration, a Republican poll found Reid’s unfavorable rating to be 47 percent, and shortly after the 2008 election, a Research 2000 poll for Daily Kos (D) showed the Senator’s unfavorable rating to be 54 percent.

The Senator showed $8.7 million in the bank at the end of September, and he has aired TV ads. But as long as his negatives remain high, and as long as his eventual GOP challenger has the resources to compete, Reid will be in for a fight. And he can’t allow his race to be merely a referendum on his performance.

Anonymous threats to “vaporize” the opposition may make a cute quote in a newspaper story, but they sound less intimidating from the campaign of a candidate with unfavorable ratings in the low 50s. Still, it’s probably the only strategy available to the Senate Majority Leader.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 26, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New Jersey Governor Moved to Toss-Up

2009-10-26T12:16:00.000-04:00

Recent polls confirm the closeness of the New Jersey gubernatorial race, reflecting the inability of Republican challenger Chris Christie to keep the contest as a referendum on unpopular Gov. Jon Corzine (D). Instead, Democrats have made the contest recently about Christie.

Independent Chris Daggett continues to show well in the polls, sometimes reaching the upper teens in ballot tests. As we noted earlier, the stronger Daggett’s showing, the better chance that Corzine can eke out a narrow victory with between 40% and 45% of the vote.

While Corzine’s image has not improved, his attacks on Christie have successfully raised questions about the challenger’s integrity. And the Governor continues to try to make the contest into a partisan race by bringing big-name Democrats into the Garden State.

But Corzine’s continued weakness (both in terms of poor job ratings and high personal “unfavorable” rating) still gives Christie a potential path to victory in the contest’s final days..

While our fundamental analysis of the race has not changed, the combination of recent polling – including Daggett’s strength – and Corzine’s success in changing the dynamic of the race suggests that the Governor now has a reasonable chance of winning the three-way contest with well under 50% of the vote. Move from Lean Takeover (Republican) to Toss-Up.

Here are our latest gubernatorial ratings. 2009 races in italics.
# - Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (4 R, 5 D)

CA Open (Schwarzenegger, R)
HI Open (Lingle, R)
RI Open (Carcieri, R)
VT Open (Douglas, R)
KS Open (Parkinson, D)
OK Open (Henry, D)
TN Open (Bredesen, D)
VA Open (Kaine, D)
WY Open (Freudenthal, D)

Toss-Up (4 R, 7 D)

Brewer (R-AZ)
Gibbons (R-NV)
FL Open (Crist, R)
MN Open (Pawlenty, R)
Corzine (D-NJ) #
Culver (D-IA)
Paterson (D-NY)
Ritter (D-CO)
MI Open (Granholm, D)
PA Open (Rendell, D)
WI Open (Doyle, D)

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (1 R, 2 D)

GA Open (Perdue, R)
Patrick (D-MA)
Strickland (D-OH)

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (3 R, 3 D)

Rell (R-CT)
AL Open (Riley, R)
SC Open (Sanford, R)
Quinn (D-IL)
ME Open (Baldacci, D)
NM Open (Richardson, D)

Currently Safe (6 R, 4 D)

Herbert (R-UT)
Heineman (R-NE)
Otter (R-ID)
Parnell (R-AK)
Perry (R-TX)
SD Open (Rounds, R)
Beebe (D-AR)
Lynch (D-NH)
O'Malley (D-MD)
OR Open (Kulongoski, D)

Will the Buckeye State Swing Back to the GOP in 2010?

2009-10-26T09:00:00.002-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

Get out your map and draw a big fat bull’s-eye on Ohio. The state looks to be a test of whether the GOP can bounce back strongly after two terrible election cycles, and that makes it a possible bellwether of what’s going on nationally.

Not quite three years ago, a Democratic wave in Ohio swept Republicans out of all but one of the state’s top offices. Then-Rep. Ted Strickland won the governorship, bringing former state Attorney General Lee Fisher along with him as lieutenant governor. Richard Cordray won the state treasurer’s race, Marc Dann was elected attorney general and Jennifer Brunner was elected secretary of state.

The lone Republican elected statewide, by the narrowest of margins, was Mary Taylor. Taylor, 43, won election as state auditor with 51 percent, a margin of fewer than 50,000 votes out of more than 3.8 million cast.

Taylor’s victory was all the more surprising given that her party’s nominee for governor, Ken Blackwell, drew just 37 percent — more than 460,000 fewer votes than Taylor. Then-Sen. Mike DeWine (R) drew just 44 percent in his unsuccessful bid for re-election.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that after controlling the state for years, the Ohio GOP got slaughtered in 2006 and again in 2008. In addition to losing the state’s top offices, the party lost a U.S. Senator, four U.S. House seats and its majority in the Ohio House of Representatives over the past four years.

But timing is everything in politics, and Ohio once again looks like a barnburner in next year’s midterm elections.

Strickland’s opponent in his race for re-election will be former Rep. John Kasich (R), 57, a high-energy populist conservative who will have to defend himself against Democratic attacks that he was a managing director at Lehman Brothers, the financial services firm that declared bankruptcy in 2008 and helped trigger the nation’s financial crisis

Strickland, 68, starts as the favorite in the race, though his job approval numbers aren’t as stratospheric as they once were.

The race is worth watching not only because of the state’s size and reputation as a swing state, but also because Ohio’s governor is one of three statewide officeholders on the state Reapportionment Board, which draws the state legislative districts after the next census. Plus, if Kasich wins, he could have a hand in deciding who carries Ohio in the 2012 GOP presidential primary.

Republican Taylor is one of the other members of the Reapportionment Board, and she, too, will have a fight on her hands. To challenge her, state Democrats have recruited Hamilton County Commissioner David Pepper, 37, a former Cincinnati city councilman.

A graduate of Yale and Yale Law School, he is the son of former Procter & Gamble CEO John Pepper. Most observers believe that Taylor, who served in the state Legislature and is a certified public accountant, will begin the race with a slight advantage, but this no slam-dunk for her.

The third vote on the Reapportionment Board belongs to Ohio’s secretary of state. But the incumbent, Brunner, is running against Fisher for the open-seat Democratic Senate nomination. Party insiders have urged Brunner to drop her Senate bid, and she is likely to come under continued pressure to do so after her third-quarter fundraising was so weak. But she recently reiterated her intention to stay in the race.

Brunner’s open seat looks to be a battle between state House Minority Leader Jennifer Garrison, 47, a Democrat from Marietta, and Republican state Sen. Jon Husted, 42, a former Speaker of the Ohio House. Democratic insiders had expected Franklin County Commissioner Marilyn Brown (D) to be their party’s nominee, but she unexpectedly dropped out of the race earlier this month.

The two other statewide contests are also interesting, though for different reasons.

DeWine is now running for one of his old jobs — attorney general. The post is currently held by Cordray, 50, who won a special election to fill the vacant office after Dann was forced to resign after becoming embroiled in a sexual harassment scandal.

In the state treasurer’s race, Kevin Boyce (D), 38, who was selected by Strickland to fill the post when Cordray become attorney general, faces state Rep. Josh Mandel (R).

Boyce, who is black, previously served on the Columbus City Council. Mandel, who is Jewish, was undergraduate student body president at Ohio State University and served two tours of duty in Iraq as a member of the Marines. Mandel, 32, represents a normally Democratic Cuyahoga County (Cleveland)-based legislative district in the state House.

Given the youth of many of the statewide hopefuls (five are under 45), some of the winners are likely to show up in future gubernatorial and Senate races.

Next year’s Senate race is also crucial. With moderate Republican George Voinovich retiring, a Democratic win by either Fisher or Brunner would put another liberal Democrat in the Senate, while a victory by former Rep. Rob Portman (R) would confirm that the state had swung back to its competitive norm.

Two House seats, Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy’s Columbus-based 15th district and Rep. Steve Driehaus’ Cincinnati-based 1st, will also be at risk. Republicans need to win at least one, and possibly both, to have a chance to have the kind of banner year that they are hoping for.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 22, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Landscape Shift Means More Trouble for House Democrats

2009-10-22T09:00:00.001-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

Already prepared to deal with challenging midterm turnout dynamics that favor the GOP, national Democratic strategists now find themselves looking at higher unemployment numbers, potentially divisive foreign policy decisions and a president who lacks the luster that he had immediately after his inauguration.

This new political reality has a significant effect on the election prospects of dozens of Democratic candidates for the House, whether incumbents, challengers or open-seat hopefuls.

More than a dozen Democratic Members who were already headed for competitive contests now find themselves in even more serious danger in next year’s midterm elections. Before the election cycle ends, most of them are likely to be underdogs for re-election.

Those at greatest risk represent Republican-leaning or conservative districts, as well as districts where a big turnout for Barack Obama by African-American and younger voters helped Democratic candidates for Congress.

The list of Democratic freshmen most affected by the national shift includes Reps. Bobby Bright (Ala.), Walt Minnick (Idaho), Frank Kratovil (Md.), Travis Childers (Miss.), Harry Teague (N.M.), Steve Driehaus (Ohio), Mary Jo Kilroy (Ohio) and Tom Perriello (Va.).

Three of those freshmen — Kratovil, Driehaus and Kilroy — face rematches, while Teague is being challenged by former Rep. Steve Pearce (R), who gave up his seat to run for the Senate.

Given midterm issues and the current political environment, Democrats seem certain to lose at least two of those four seats, with a loss of three quite probable and a Republican sweep of all four certainly possible.

Though the next tier of at-risk Democrats initially appeared slightly less vulnerable, Reps. Betsy Markey (Colo.), Suzanne Kosmas (Fla.), Bill Foster (Ill.), Eric Massa (N.Y.) and Mark Schauer (Mich.) also find themselves in significantly more trouble.

Alan Grayson (Fla.), who started off in this group of freshmen, now looks worse off after his self-inflicted wound on the House floor, even though Republicans do not yet have a top-tier challenger.

One way to look at Democratic problems is to focus on open seats. With Republican Reps. Mark Kirk (Ill.), Jim Gerlach (Pa.) and Mike Castle (Del.) running statewide, Democrats might look like a lock to make important open-seat gains. But they aren’t, at least not yet.

Democrats could well win all three, but Republicans have recruited potentially strong candidates in the Illinois and Pennsylvania districts, and they have good pickup opportunities of their own in the open seats being vacated by Democratic Reps. Charlie Melancon (La.) and Joe Sestak (Pa.).

At the moment, Democrats are likely to pick up two GOP-held seats: Castle’s and that of freshman Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao (La.).

Of course, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has made a significant recruiting effort to put additional Republican-held seats into play by recruiting challengers to Reps. Charlie Dent (Pa.), Patrick Tiberi (Ohio), Mary Bono Mack (Calif.), Lee Terry (Neb.) and, yet again, Michele Bachmann (Minn.). But the overall direction of the cycle makes it much more difficult for those Democratic challengers than it would have been in 2006 or 2008.

If House losses in the 2010 elections are limited to the districts already mentioned, some Democratic insiders will breathe a huge sigh of relief, since net Democratic losses would be only in the eight- to 15-seat range. That would mean the political environment didn’t drown plenty of Democrats in potentially dangerous districts.

A gain of 12 to 15 seats would be a good showing for the GOP, but it would be a disappointment to overly optimistic Republicans who expect gains of at least three dozen seats.

Over the past two cycles, Democrats were able to defeat popular Republican incumbents because voters were so dissatisfied with President George W. Bush and his party. GOP incumbents who hadn’t been in trouble for years suddenly found themselves in tough races.

This cycle, Democratic strategists hope to avoid the same fate for long-term incumbents such as Reps. Loretta Sanchez (Calif.), Ike Skelton (Mo.), Bart Gordon (Tenn.), Vic Snyder (Ark.), Rick Boucher (Va.) and Chet Edwards (Texas), as well as for more recently elected Members who don’t yet look highly vulnerable, including Reps. Christopher Carney (Pa.), Larry Kissell (N.C.), Glenn Nye (Va.) and John Adler (N.J.).

The shift in national mood has boosted GOP fundraising, and Democratic strategists must hope that core constituencies aren’t disappointed by how Congress ultimately deals with health care reform or how the president handles Afghanistan and Iran.

But November 2010 is still a long way off. Democrats could win another House special election next month, and we don’t yet know how Congress will ultimately deal with health care, what will develop in Afghanistan and Iran, or where the economy will be. But even if the news is more upbeat for Democrats a year from now, the new political landscape is bad news for the dozen or so House Democrats at greatest risk.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 19, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New Print Edition: Missouri Senate & New York 29

2009-10-20T09:00:00.002-04:00

The October 16, 2009 print edition of the Rothenberg Political Report is on its way to subscribers.

The print edition of the Report comes out every two weeks. Subscribers get in-depth analysis of the most competitive races in the country, as well as quarterly House and Senate ratings, and coverage of the gubernatorial races nationwide. To subscribe, simply click on the Google checkout button on the website or send a check.

Here is a brief preview of the introduction to this edition:

Missouri Senate: Family Matters
By Nathan L. Gonzales

A Senate race between the Carnahans and the Blunts in Missouri won’t have a lot of surprises, but there could be plenty of suspense.

Secretary of State Robin Carnahan (D) and former House Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R) come from the Show Me State’s most prominent political families and are slated to face off in next year’s U.S. Senate race to replace retiring Sen. Kit Bond (R).

At the beginning of the year, Republican strategists were not particularly optimistic about holding the open seat. But as the national political environment has shifted and the threat of a serious GOP primary has faded, Republicans are growing more optimistic.

But Carnahan is the probably the best candidate Democrats could have wished for. She comes from a well-liked political family, holds statewide office, and isn’t burdened by a legislative voting record her opponents can dissect.

The race will likely come down to the national environment and campaign tactics and strategy. And if history is any guide, this should be another barn-burner. Subscribers get the full story in the print edition of the newsletter.

New York 29: Partisan Guns Blazing
By Nathan L. Gonzales

Republicans may lose yet another congressional seat in New York this fall, but they’re hoping that their Empire State comeback includes defeating freshman Cong. Eric Massa (D) in the 29th District next year. Subscribers get the full story in the print edition of the newsletter.

Is the New Jersey Gubernatorial Race a Tossup?

2009-10-19T09:00:00.000-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

Anyone in his right mind would now have to rate next month’s gubernatorial election in New Jersey as a tossup. After all, virtually every poll shows the race within the margin of error, and some recent surveys show Gov. Jon Corzine (D) leading GOP challenger Chris Christie.

Moreover, climbing out on a limb to give one of the candidates an advantage in a virtual dead heat isn’t the best way to guarantee that your percentage of “correct calls” remains high so that you can send out a press release after the elections to brag about how astute you are.

But this column is about analysis, scenarios and best guesses, and since I still believe that Christie has the single best chance of winning the Garden State governorship, I see no reason to crawl completely off the limb I’m on. But, I must admit, I’m not oozing with confidence.

As I noted a couple of weeks ago in a column, Corzine’s numbers are going nowhere fast — in other words, he is not “gaining” on Christie. He remains stuck pretty much where he has been for many months — in the 39 percent to 42 percent range, even in a just-released Quinnipiac University survey.

The public’s view of the governor remains heavily negative in three recent polls that show a dead heat. A Public Policy Polling (D) survey found Corzine’s name ID at 55 percent unfavorable, while Fairleigh Dickinson University had his unfavorable rating at 54 percent and Quinnipiac showed it at 53 percent.

Christie’s unfavorable numbers weren’t good — 44 percent in PPP’s survey, 42 percent in the FDU poll and 40 percent in Quinnipiac’s — but they weren’t nearly as bad as Corzine’s.

In the FDU survey, a stunning 69 percent said Corzine’s performance as governor was only fair or poor. In Quinnipiac’s, 56 percent of likely voters disapproved of how he has handled his job. These numbers suggest that Corzine won’t get many voters who are still undecided.

One Republican strategist I talked with recently equated Corzine’s political positioning to that of a “beached whale,” adding, “We can’t move his numbers, and he can’t move his numbers.”

But if Corzine’s numbers haven’t moved, Christie’s have — down. The erosion in Christie’s standing has made the race tight.

While the GOP challenger was around 50 percent on the ballot test in July and August, he has slid into the low to mid-40s in most recent surveys, all but erasing his lead over Corzine. His personal negatives have risen correspondingly.

Independent Chris Daggett seems to be drawing enough votes away from Christie to make it possible for the governor to sneak into a second term with less than 45 percent.

While about half of those polled say they don’t yet have an opinion of Daggett (the number is a stunning 73 percent in Quinnipiac’s poll), Daggett has qualified for public financing, participated in a televised debate and been endorsed by both the Sierra Club and the Newark Star-Ledger.

But nobody is entirely certain how Daggett will do on Election Day.

The recent PPP survey showed Daggett drawing 13 percent, while an early October SurveyUSA poll put him at 14 percent, the same as the new Quinnipiac poll. Surveys that don’t include a three-way ballot test (requiring respondents to volunteer their preference for him) put Daggett in the mid-to-upper single digits. FDU showed him at 17 percent in a three-way ballot test but only 4 percent when respondents had to volunteer his name.

Unlike Corzine and Christie, who are guaranteed one of the top two positions on the ballot in each county, Daggett’s ballot position in each county was decided by random drawing.

Daggett lucked out in two counties, Gloucester and Bergen, the state’s most populous county, drawing the third spot behind the two major-party nominees. But elsewhere, he is buried among the nine other Independent and third-party hopefuls.

“If Daggett is going to get 17 percent of the vote, it will be because people are actively searching for him on the ballot, not because voters simply are dissatisfied with Corzine and Christie and looking for someone else to vote for,” says Matt Friedman of PolitickerNJ.com, an astute observer of New Jersey politics and of the gubernatorial contest.

But ballot placement is only one of Daggett’s problems.

Independent candidates often lose support toward the final weeks of a campaign, either because they come under attack or, more often, because their supporters start to worry about “throwing away” votes on a candidate who can’t win. (Veteran Democratic and Republican operatives argue that, for a number of reasons, Daggett has no chance to win the election.)

In the 2006 Texas gubernatorial race, for example, two Independent candidates, Texas Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn (who was elected as a Republican) and entertainer Kinky Friedman, drew a combined 38 percent in a mid-September SurveyUSA poll. A month later, the two candidates combined for 35 percent in another SurveyUSA poll, and a week before Election Day they drew 38 percent. When the votes were counted, however, Keeton Strayhorn and Friedman combined to draw 30 percent, significantly below what surveys had shown.

Christie has started to criticize Daggett’s tax plan, and he is almost certain to argue in the coming weeks that since the Independent candidate can’t win, a vote for Daggett is, in fact, a vote for four more years of Corzine. Whether Christie is successful with that message will determine who wins, Corzine or Christie.

Daggett is the single best thing to happen to Corzine politically. In a two-man contest against Christie, the governor would have little chance to win. But a three-way race presents a very different dynamic.

If Daggett’s number on the ballot test slides to the low double digits (10 percent to 12 percent) or below, Corzine almost certainly will lose. On the other hand, if Daggett gets at least 17 percent, the governor should win. If Daggett’s showing falls into the 13 percent to 16 percent range, either major-party candidate could emerge victorious.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 15, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New York 23: Another Train Wreck for House Republicans?

2009-10-15T09:00:00.001-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

While Republican prospects for the 2010 Congressional elections are improving and the GOP is likely to win at least one, and quite possibly both, of this year’s gubernatorial elections, the special election to fill an open seat in New York’s 23rd district is trending the other way.

A lack of campaign resources and a classic political squeeze from the left and the right have severely damaged the prospects of Republican Dede Scozzafava, a six-term state Assemblywoman from Watertown.

While initial polling showed Scozzafava leading Democratic attorney Bill Owens and Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman, Owens has caught Scozzafava in recent private polling, and Hoffman continues to gain strength, making him a considerable factor in the contest and a growing problem for Scozzafava down the stretch.

GOP insiders have grown extremely nervous about the race. They worry about Scozzafava’s poor fundraising, lack of a compelling message to Republican base voters and weak showing in polling in the crucial Syracuse media market, which makes up about 30 percent of the sprawling district.

“She needs a solid win in the Syracuse area, and she isn’t getting anything close to that,” one veteran dispassionate analyst from the area said. “And she is having problems raising money from Republicans, who point to her support for ‘card check’ and President [Barack] Obama’s stimulus package and say that she isn’t a real Republican.” Not a single House Republican voted for the stimulus bill.

Heavy TV advertising by the Club for Growth, which is backing Hoffman, in all three major media markets has peeled conservative voters away from the Republican, and GOP insiders worry that the bleeding will continue. Hoffman is also on TV, portraying Scozzafava as a “fake” Republican and a liberal Albany politician.

So far, conservative critics of Scozzafava have complained primarily about her record on taxes and spending, but some expect that her liberal positions on social issues, including abortion and gay marriage (which is mentioned in Hoffman’s spot), will soon become more of an issue. Both Scozzafava and Owens favor abortion rights, while Hoffman does not.

However, the Republican just received the endorsement from the National Rifle Association, and it could be important in fashioning her appeal to right-leaning voters in the district.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has slammed the Assemblywoman as a “typical Albany politician” in TV ads that charge that she supported tax breaks that her company benefited from “while raising taxes on you.”

While the National Republican Congressional Committee is advertising heavily for Scozzafava and doing everything it can to help her, the combined advertising of the DCCC, the Owens campaign and the Club for Growth has been overwhelming the Republican nominee. Scozzafava is now finally on the air in the Syracuse market, but she is simply not carrying her weight on TV.

“If Dede doesn’t raise money and get on TV, there is only one direction for her to go, and it’s down,” a thoughtful Republican said.

Democratic insiders, however, remain cautious about Owens’ chances in the race, noting that although Obama won the district narrowly, the party has no political infrastructure there. The Democratic performance in the district is 47.5 percent, according to the National Committee for an Effective Congress, a Democratic group.

Some Republicans worry that while the national environment has shifted significantly to their advantage from where it was when Democrats won a special election in northeastern New York earlier this year, Scozzafava is unable to take advantage of the shift, in part because of her record on taxes, support for a Democratic state budget and support of the stimulus package.

“Intensity is a huge problem. She doesn’t have a message to appeal to Republican voters who care about bigger government and higher taxes,” one Republican said.

GOP insiders also note that, as was the case in the 20th district special election, Democrats have once again picked a nominee who does not have a legislative record.

“Democrats got their blank-slate candidate, so we have nothing to hit him on,” groaned one Republican strategist who is familiar with the race.

Strategically, there are two big things to watch in the race. Do Democrats who like Scozzafava’s record in the Assembly and her position on key issues “come home” to Owens as Election Day nears, draining Scozzafava of one of her sources of support? And does Hoffman continue to peel more Republicans away from the Assemblywoman?

Owens, who is not insisting on a public option in the health care reform bill and does not support gay marriage, is a registered Independent. Yet he just received the endorsement of the Working Families Party even though Scozzafava’s husband, Ron McDougall, is a United Auto Workers member and president of one of the state’s central labor councils.

Capitol Hill Republicans are doing what they can to show that Scozzafava would be a part of their team.

NRCC Chairman Pete Sessions (Texas) has publicly embraced her, and on Friday Rep. Jeb Hensarling (Texas) released a statement endorsing her as “the only Republican who can win” and invoking the name of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to try to mobilize Republican voters behind Scozzafava. Hensarling and Sessions, of course, are largely unknown back in the New York district.

With three weeks to go, this contest is very much up for grabs. The three-way race makes for a number of possible scenarios, including ones that have Scozzafava finishing first, second or even third. She is in real trouble.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 13, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New York 23 Moved to Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic

2009-10-13T09:00:00.004-04:00

Battling Democrat Bill Owens, the DCCC, Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman, and the Club for Growth, it's getting tougher to see how Dede Scozzafava (R) and the NRCC keep this seat in GOP hands. Read more about the race in Stu's Roll Call column. We're moving the race from Pure Toss-Up to Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic, which would be a takeover for the Democrats.

And we're moving Cong. Alan Grayson (D- Florida's 8th District) from Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic to Pure Toss-Up. But the Republican nomination remains up in the air.

Here are our latest House ratings. 2009 races in italics.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Pure Toss-Up (2 R, 12 D)

AL 2 (Bright, D)
FL 8 (Grayson, D) *
ID 1 (Minnick, D)
IL 10 (Open; Kirk, R)
MD 1 (Kratovil, D)
MS 1 (Childers, D)
NH 1 (Shea-Porter, D)
NH 2 (Open; Hodes, D)
NM 2 (Teague, D)
OH 1 (Driehaus, D)
OH 15 (Kilroy, D)
PA 6 (Open; Gerlach, R)
PA 7 (Open; Sestak, D)
VA 5 (Periello, D)

Toss-Up/Tilt Republican (1 R, 1 D)

LA 3 (Open; Melancon, D)
WA 8 (Reichert, R)

Toss-Up/Tilt Democratic (1 R, 4 D)

CO 4 (Markey, D)
FL 24 (Kosmas, D)
IL 14 (Foster, D)
MI 7 (Schauer, D)
NY 23 (Open; McHugh, R) #

Lean Republican (2 R, 0 D)

CA 3 (Lungren, R)
CA 44 (Calvert, R)

Lean Democratic (0 R, 3 D)

AL 5 (Griffith, D)
NY 24 (Arcuri, D)
NY 29 (Massa, D)

Republican Favored (9 R, 0 D)

AK A-L (Young, R)
CA 45 (Bono Mack, R)
MI 11 (McCotter, R)
MN 3 (Paulsen, R)
MN 6 (Bachmann, R)
NE 2 (Terry, R)
OH 2 (Schmidt, R)
OH 12 (Tiberi, R)
PA 15 (Dent, R)

Democrat Favored (2 R, 11 D)

AZ 5 (Mitchell, D)
CA 47 (Sanchez, D)
DE A-L (Open; Castle, R)
GA 8 (Marshall, D)
LA 2 (Cao, R)
MO 4 (Skelton, D)
NY 19 (Hall, D)
NY 20 (Murphy, D)
NC 8 (Kissell, D)
OH 18 (Space, D)
PA 10 (Carney, D)
TX 17 (Edwards, D)
VA 2 (Nye, D)

Total seats in play: 48
Republican seats: 17
Democratic seats: 31

Nevada Senate Moved to Toss-Up

2009-10-12T10:25:00.003-04:00

With recent polls continuing to show Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) trailing potential GOP challengers in next year’s midterm election, Reid’s hold on his Nevada Senate seat looks increasingly questionable. We are moving the seat from Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party to Toss-Up.

We are also moving two other Democratic-held Senate seats, Arkansas (Blanche Lincoln) and Colorado (Michael Bennet) from Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party to Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party, based on their standings in polling and the improved quality of recent Republicans who have entered those contests.

Here are our latest Senate ratings.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
*- Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (0 R, 1 D)

DE Open (Kaufman, D)

Toss-Up (4 R, 3 D)

KY Open (Bunning, R)
MO Open (Bond, R)
NH Open (Gregg, R)
OH Open (Voinovich, R)
IL Open (Burris, D)
Dodd (D-CT)
Reid (D-NV) *

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (2 R, 3 D)

Burr (R-NC)
Vitter (R-LA)
Bennet (D-CO)
Lincoln (D-AR) *
Specter (D-PA) *

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (1 R, 0 D)

FL Open (LeMieux, R)

Currently Safe (11 R, 11 D)

Bennett (R-UT)
Coburn (R-OK)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Isakson (R-GA)
McCain (R-AZ)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
KS Open (Brownback, R)
Bayh (D-IN)
Boxer (D-CA)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Feingold (D-WI)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Inouye (D-HI)
Leahy (D-VT)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Schumer (D-NY)
Wyden (D-OR)

Delaware Senate: Race Is Turned Upside Down by Castle’s Entry

2009-10-12T09:00:00.002-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

Count me as at least moderately surprised that Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.) announced on Tuesday that he will run for the remaining four years of now-Vice President Joseph Biden’s Senate term.

Castle, who served eight years as Delaware’s governor, from 1985 to 1993, has had plenty of opportunities to run for the Senate. Each time, he took a pass, even though Republican strategists drooled at the thought that he might be a candidate.

But when the Congressman, who turned 70 earlier this year, announced his Senate candidacy, he turned a layup for Democrats into an exceedingly competitive contest, assuming that state Attorney General Beau Biden (D) enters the race.

Castle “spent his entire summer moving up and down the state and talking to people,” said one GOP insider close to the Congressman. “He loves Delaware. He loves policy. He likes to campaign. It’s what he does. So in the end, I wasn’t shocked.”

Castle is the only Republican in the state who could give the GOP a chance of winning the Senate seat, currently occupied by appointed Sen. Ted Kaufman (D), who was widely seen as a place holder for Beau Biden, the son of the vice president.

Castle was first elected to the state House in 1966. Since then, he has served in the state Senate, as lieutenant governor (under Republican Gov. Pete du Pont), as governor and, since 1993, as Delaware’s lone Congressman. That means that he has run statewide 12 times during the past 30 years.

Castle won re-election (admittedly against nominal opposition) 61 percent to 38 percent last year and 57 percent to 39 percent in 2006 — two of the worst election cycles in recent memory for Republicans.

Still, there is no doubt that Delaware, once regarded as a swing state, has swung reliably into the Democratic column. The state has gone Democratic in the past five races for governor, president and Senate, and Democrats hold solid majorities in both chambers of the state Legislature. Castle and state Auditor R. Thomas Wagner Jr. are the only Republicans elected statewide.

A press release from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee issued minutes after Castle’s announcement shows a number of lines of attack that the party will direct at the Congressman.

After noting Castle’s “four decades in politics,” the release hit the Congressman for having “built-up a record of supporting ... George Bush’s economic policies, including tax cuts for the super-wealthy, that drove Delaware’s economy into a ditch — and now won’t support any of the Obama-Biden plans to fix it.”

Democrats hope to portray Castle as the past and Beau Biden, 40, as the future, something they did at least somewhat successfully in 2000, when then-Gov. Tom Carper (D) defeated longtime Sen. Bill Roth (R).

Efforts to paint Castle as an extension of George W. Bush, however, won’t be easy, since the Congressman is widely regarded as one of the few moderate Republicans left in the House.

As CQ’s Politics in America 2010 notes, Castle “was one of only three House Republicans to vote for all six of the new Democratic majority’s signature bills at the start of the 110th Congress,” and he has supported embryonic stem cell research, Amtrak reauthorization and legislation to combat global warming.

Beau Biden has far less political experience and demonstrated vote-getting ability than Castle.

Beau Biden worked as a federal prosecutor before joining a Wilmington law firm in 2004. Two years later, he ran for Delaware attorney general, winning narrowly, 53 percent to 47 percent. A member of the Army National Guard, he recently returned from a tour in Iraq and has not yet announced his political plans.

Since Delaware’s attorney general is up for election next year, Beau Biden would be risking his current office by jumping into a difficult Senate race against Castle.

Democratic insiders acknowledge that Castle will be a formidable nominee and they hope that Beau Biden will run for the seat, even though a loss to Castle would be embarrassing to the vice president.

“If Beau doesn’t run and Republicans win the seat, the vice president hasn’t saved himself from embarrassment,” one Democrat argued, noting that the national media certainly would take note of a Republican victory regardless of whether the Democratic nominee was named Biden.

“Ultimately, the pressure is on Joe to produce the strongest possible candidate to save the seat,” agreed one Republican observer with extensive knowledge of the state’s politics. “And that means Beau Biden.”

Republicans now have credible candidates in both President Barack Obama’s former Illinois Senate seat and Biden’s Senate seat, and the uneven track record for the incumbent party in similar cases has to be a cause for concern among party strategists (See Obama, Biden Seats in Danger?, July 29).

Both Castle and Biden are likely to be well-funded, as outside groups certainly would spend heavily on the race in the expensive Philadelphia and inexpensive Salisbury, Md., media markets.

It would be easy to rate the Delaware Senate race as a tossup, and that certainly would not be an unreasonable place to put it. But Castle begins ahead in the early polling conducted on a hypothetical Castle-Biden contest, and the overall cycle currently looks to favor the GOP nationally. Moreover, until Biden actually announces his candidacy, he could still decide against taking on Castle.

Even given the state’s Democratic bent, that’s enough reason to give Castle a slight edge. And that’s more than enough reason to give the DSCC indigestion and the vice president’s office a severe migraine.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 8, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Virginia Governor Moved to Lean Takeover

2009-10-09T13:30:00.001-04:00

According to the latest Washington Post survey, former Attorney General Bob McDonnell (R) leads state Sen. Creigh Deeds (D) 53%-44% with a little more than three weeks before Election Day. The poll confirms that Deeds has squeezed everything he can out of the controversy surrounding McDonnell's graduate school thesis, but is still trailing the Republican. We're moving the race from Toss-Up to Lean Takeover.

Here are our latest gubernatorial ratings. 2009 races in italics.
# - Moved benefiting Democrats
* - Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (4 R, 6 D)

CA Open (Schwarzenegger, R)
HI Open (Lingle, R)
RI Open (Carcieri, R)
VT Open (Douglas, R)
KS Open (Parkinson, D)
Corzine (D-NJ)
OK Open (Henry, D)
TN Open (Bredesen, D)
VA Open (Kaine, D) *
WY Open (Freudenthal, D)

Toss-Up (4 R, 6 D)

Brewer (R-AZ)
Gibbons (R-NV)
FL Open (Crist, R) *
MN Open (Pawlenty, R)
Culver (D-IA) *
Paterson (D-NY)
Ritter (D-CO)
MI Open (Granholm, D)
PA Open (Rendell, D)
WI Open (Doyle, D)

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (1 R, 2 D)

GA Open (Perdue, R)
Patrick (D-MA)
Strickland (D-OH)

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (3 R, 3 D)

Rell (R-CT)
AL Open (Riley, R)
SC Open (Sanford, R)
Quinn (D-IL)
ME Open (Baldacci, D)
NM Open (Richardson, D)

Currently Safe (6 R, 4 D)

Herbert (R-UT) *
Heineman (R-NE)
Otter (R-ID)
Parnell (R-AK)
Perry (R-TX)
SD Open (Rounds, R)
Beebe (D-AR)
Lynch (D-NH)
O'Malley (D-MD)
OR Open (Kulongoski, D)

McMahon, WWE Seek Mainstream Credibility

2009-10-09T09:00:00.000-04:00

By Nathan L. Gonzales

The day before Linda McMahon (R) officially announced her candidacy for Senate, political reporters at major media outlets received a glossy black folder from World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. that included full-color brochures, press clippings, a DVD and a personalized cover letter from the WWE’s chief operating officer, which mentioned her potential run against Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.).

Since McMahon’s announcement, political coverage has been reduced to poor puns, and because of the stigma surrounding professional wrestling, her candidacy has largely been dismissed.

But stranger things have happened in politics.

The McMahon family has proved to be very successful in the entertainment world, and the combination of a crowded Republican primary, Linda McMahon’s commitment to spending considerable personal money, and Dodd’s soft poll numbers creates a scenario where she could win.

And even if she doesn’t win the nomination, the WWE stands to gain more of the mainstream credibility that it craves.

The WWE clearly realized that every story that mentions McMahon will also mention the company.

“It was strictly done to educate people about WWE,” Robert Zimmerman, WWE’s vice president of public relations and corporate communications, said of the slick media packets. “There’s been a lot of evolution in the company that the media has not been paying attention to.”

The WWE has recently been touting itself as a PG company after a few years of racier content. That will be used by McMahon’s opponents.

Zimmerman spent six years as vice president of public relations for Fox News beginning in 1998, so he’s familiar with the political players and publications in Washington.

The promotional DVD that reporters received in the packet was less than a week old because it included a clip of former “The Price Is Right” host Bob Barker hosting WWE’s “Monday Night Raw” program on Sept. 7. It also included a couple of quick clips of McMahon without identifying her. According to Zimmerman, the DVD was the regular corporate “sizzle reel” that is updated every six months or so.

Simultaneously, McMahon launched her Senate campaign in an unorthodox manner.

On Sept. 16, she handed over her reins as CEO to her husband, Vince (who is already WWE chairman and is the face of the company), and commenced a weeklong television buy in the expensive New York City market almost a year before the Aug. 9, 2010, primary. Approximately 25 percent of general election voters in Connecticut watch NYC television.

The campaign rollout included television ads during the Notre Dame football game and on the season premiere of “Saturday Night Live,” as well as full-page ads in the New York Times and Hartford Courant. It’s just the beginning of what McMahon says will be a $30 million campaign. Most of that will come from her own pocket because she’s not accepting contributions from political action committees and she’s capping individual contributions at $100.

Veteran Republican media consultant Mike Murphy was openly critical of her strategy.

“Wresting [sic] Queen McMahon to run/lose for Senate in CT. Idiotic, but it will cost Simmons $$. Shame on her payday seeking R consultants,” Murphy wrote on his Twitter account, going after McMahon’s consultants, which include media consultant Scott Howell, pollster Hans Kaiser and former National Republican Senatorial Committee Political Director Mike Slanker.

Murphy’s not the only GOP consultant grumbling. But the premise of the criticism, that McMahon absolutely can’t win, may be wrong.

“She’s more serious than people realize,” according to a Senate GOP strategist who is not taking sides in the race. “She’s hired smart people and taking their advice. Most businesspeople don’t [when they run for office].”

Murphy’s criticism implies that McMahon’s consultants are taking advantage of her naiveté.

In reality, the 61-year-old Greenwich resident helped grow the WWE from 17 employees to 500 employees and a company that made more than $525 million in revenue last year. The Stamford headquarters, complete with WWE flag, is visible off Interstate 95.

“None of the McMahons are stupid people,” said Dave Meltzer, editor of Wrestling Observer Newsletter. “They’ve far and away built the most successful wrestling business in history.”

McMahon’s political interest is not a surprise. She’s personally contributed to both parties in recent years (slightly more to Republicans) and was recently appointed by Gov. Jodi Rell (R) to a position on the state board of education.

As a company, the WWE has been involved in registering young voters through the Smackdown Your Vote program, and both President Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) delivered video messages to WWE events. Behind the scenes, Lowell Weicker, a former governor and Senator, has served on the WWE board since 1999.

“This is a race to create an image of her,” one GOP consultant said of McMahon’s initial tactics. “My guess is that she wanted to prove she’s a serious candidate and shape the talk about her,” another GOP strategist explained.

McMahon has to walk a fine line between touting her credentials as a successful businesswoman and not being defined by wrestling or her husband. She doesn’t mention the WWE by name in her ads.

Aside from the large shadow of the business, it remains to be seen how McMahon transitions to the role of candidate. “She’s not a dynamic public speaker,” according to Meltzer, who has been covering the wrestling industry for 38 years. “But she’s very smart.”

Former Rep. Rob Simmons currently leads in polls testing the GOP primary, but that’s largely a function of higher name identification. State Sen. Sam Caligiuri is also in the GOP race along with former Ambassador to Ireland Tom Foley and libertarian economist Peter Schiff. Foley has personal money and should be able to raise it, and Schiff is raising money from libertarians across the country.

With no runoff, someone could win with significantly less than 50 percent of the vote. And based on Dodd’s current poll numbers, the GOP nominee, whoever it is, will have a fighting chance in the general election. It’s unclear whether the May convention will winnow the field.

It took extraordinary circumstances and a crowded field to get former wrestler Jesse “The Body” Ventura elected governor of Minnesota. He won the 1998 race as the Reform Party candidate with 37 percent, while then-St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman (R) received 34 percent and state Attorney General Skip Humphrey garnered 28 percent. Ventura was a more charismatic figure.

“They’re not immune to making bad decisions,” Meltzer said of the McMahons, citing the infamous single season of the XFL, Vince McMahon’s failed football experiment, and an unsuccessful restaurant in Times Square as evidence. “Sometimes they taxed themselves and tried to do too much.”

In this case, Linda McMahon really doesn’t have a lot to lose, except for a few million dollars.

If she runs a serious campaign, there is virtually no risk of damaging the family business she helped build that will likely be passed down to her son, daughter and son-in-law, wrestler Triple H.

“If Vince flopped, that’s a different story,” Meltzer said. When the XFL failed, “it took an aura away from Vince” and the business suffered. In this case, there is only an upside for the candidate and the company. “In the fans’ eyes, she’s just Vince’s wife.”

This story first appeared in Roll Call on October 6, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Vote for Us — We Aren’t Nearly as Bad as the Other Guys!

2009-10-08T09:00:00.000-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

Next year’s elections are starting to look like a choice between bad and worse, if we are to believe the most recent batch of polling data, including the consistently reliable NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

The Sept. 17-20 survey, conducted by Democratic pollster Peter Hart of Hart Research Associates and Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies, shows President Barack Obama’s job approval at 51 percent, down 10 points from April.

Congress’ job approval, in contrast, has fallen by only 6 points over the same time. But of course, Members of Congress shouldn’t take anything positive from that. With an approval rating of 22 percent in the most recent survey, they don’t have much further to fall.

The two worst bits of news for Democrats are the narrowing of the Democratic advantage on respondents’ preferences for next year’s elections and the dip in the Democratic Party’s ratings.

In October of last year, 49 percent of registered voters polled said they wanted a Democratic-controlled Congress, while only 36 percent said they preferred a Republican-controlled Congress. That’s a hefty 13-point Democratic advantage.

The September poll, however, has the Democratic edge down to 3 points — 43 percent to 40 percent over the GOP.

It’s worth noting that the wording of the question used by the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll to measure voters’ partisan preferences in the next election differs from that used in many (probably most) other surveys.

Most pollsters (including recent surveys by Bloomberg, Franklin & Marshall and Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research for Democracy Corps) use a variation of the Gallup generic question — “If the elections for Congress were being held today, which party’s candidate would you vote for in your Congressional district — the Democratic Party’s candidate or the Republican Party’s candidate?”

That’s not an unreasonable wording, but Peter Hart prefers the question as posed in his NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll to measure generic preference: “What is your preference for the outcome of next year’s Congressional elections — a Congress controlled by Republicans or a Congress controlled by Democrats?”

“We had two different questions [to measure generic sentiment] in our 1994 September and October surveys,” Hart, whose extensive work in political polling undoubtedly makes him one of the nation’s most accomplished and respected pollsters, told me in a recent interview. “We found out that the [traditional] generic ballot question didn’t help us see what was coming. [The question we now use] gave us better insight into what happened.”

Hart speculates that since some respondents know the name and party of their incumbent Member of Congress, they insert that name mentally into the question being asked, thereby altering the intended purely “generic” nature of the question.

The decline in the percentage of voters who want Democrats controlling Congress is worrisome for Democratic strategists because the public’s image of the party has also eroded.

In February, 49 percent of respondents had very or somewhat positive feelings toward the Democratic Party, while 31 percent had somewhat or very negative feelings toward it.

In September, the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll found only 41 percent with very or somewhat positive feelings and an almost equal 39 percent with very or somewhat negative feelings.

You might assume that the GOP has benefited from this Democratic decline. Don’t. The Republican Party’s image has improved so little since February that it might as well as have not improved at all.

In February, 26 percent of respondents had a very or somewhat favorable view of the Republican Party, and in September, that number had inched up to 28 percent. Meanwhile, the party’s combined negatives fell from 47 percent to a still far-too-high 43 percent.

Republicans argue that the midterm elections will be a referendum on Obama and on Democratic control of Congress, so the public’s attitude toward the Democrats is far more important than how they feel about the GOP.

While I certainly agree with the direction of that assessment, it’s unwise to dismiss the low GOP numbers cavalierly.

Negative ratings as high as the Republican Party is now carrying give Democratic candidates and campaign committees an opportunity to demonize GOP candidates, possibly limiting the damage to Democrats in the midterms.

In October 2006, NBC News/Wall Street Journal polling showed the Democratic Party with only a net +4 in image (39 percent positive/35 percent negative) among registered voters, while the GOP’s was -13 (35 percent positive/48 percent negative). Democrats gained 30 House seats.

Two years later, in October 2008, the net Democratic advantage among registered voters was a mere single point (39 percent positive/38 percent negative), while the Republican Party’s image was far worse, a net of -17 (31 percent positive/48 percent negative). Democrats gained 20 more seats.

Of course, it’s certainly important to note that both elections were “about” George W. Bush and the Republican Party, and that even if the GOP’s image remains upside down (higher negatives than positives), the party is likely to gain House seats next year.

It is difficult for the Republican Party to improve its image right now, but the party surely will need a far more favorably inclined public before it crawls entirely out of the deep hole that it now is in. Some new spokesmen might be a start.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 5, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Delaware Senate Moved to Lean Takeover

2009-10-06T11:08:00.001-04:00

Cong. Mike Castle's (R) entry into the U.S. Senate race to fill the remainder of Vice President Joe Biden's term dramatically alters the dynamic of the race.

Even if Attorney General Beau Biden (D) runs for the open Senate seat – certainly not guaranteed given the cordial relations between Castle and Joe Biden over the years, and the fact that Castle would be filling only the last four years of Biden’s unexpired term -- Castle, the former governor who has been elected statewide for over 25 years, has the early advantage in the race.

An early March Public Policy Polling (D) survey had Castle leading Biden 44%-36%. Susquehanna Polling & Research (R) showed Castle up 55%-34% in late April. And a Sept. 30 Rasmussen Reports poll had the Republican ahead 47%-42%. The latter survey also showed that both men are very well-liked. Castle was at 61% favorable/34% unfavorable and Biden 60% favorable/32% unfavorable.

We're moving the Delaware Senate seat from Currently Safe for Democrats to Lean Takeover for the GOP. However, even if Beau Biden takes a pass on the contest, the combination of the state’s Democratic bent and Castle’s popularity strongly suggest a very competitive contest.

Here are our latest Senate ratings.
#- Moved benefiting Democrats
*- Moved benefiting Republicans

Lean Takeover (0 R, 1 D)

DE Open (Kaufman, D) *

Toss-Up (4 R, 2 D)

KY Open (Bunning, R)
MO Open (Bond, R)
NH Open (Gregg, R)
OH Open (Voinovich, R)
IL Open (Burris, D)
Dodd (D-CT)

Narrow Advantage for Incumbent Party (2 R, 2 D)

Burr (R-NC)
Vitter (R-LA)
Reid (D-NV)
Specter (D-PA)

Clear Advantage for Incumbent Party (1 R, 2 D)

FL Open (LeMieux, R)
Bennet (D-CO)
Lincoln (D-AR)

Currently Safe (11 R, 11 D)

Bennett (R-UT)
Coburn (R-OK)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Isakson (R-GA)
McCain (R-AZ)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
KS Open (Brownback, R)
Bayh (D-IN)
Boxer (D-CA)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Feingold (D-WI)
Gillibrand (D-NY)
Inouye (D-HI)
Leahy (D-VT)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Schumer (D-NY)
Wyden (D-OR)

New Print Edition: Kentucky Senate & Ohio 12

2009-10-06T09:00:00.001-04:00

The October 2, 2009 print edition of the Rothenberg Political Report is on its way to subscribers.

The print edition of the Report comes out every two weeks. Subscribers get in-depth analysis of the most competitive races in the country, as well as quarterly House and Senate ratings, and coverage of the gubernatorial races nationwide. To subscribe, simply click on the Google checkout button on the website or send a check.

Here is a brief preview of the introduction to this edition:

Kentucky Senate: That’s What He Said
By Nathan L. Gonzales

Open seats are usually tougher to defend for the incumbent party, but in the case of Kentucky in 2010, Republican strategists are more than happy to start with a clean slate.

Almost immediately after Sen. Jim Bunning (R) narrowly won a second term in 2004, Democrats started thinking about his next race. A number of top elected officials eyed the contest, but the Democratic field narrowed to state Attorney General Jack Conway and Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo, whom Bunning defeated five years ago. Subscribers get the full story in the print edition of the newsletter.

Ohio 12: A Day Late and a Dollar Short?

Even Democrat Paula Brooks’s political foes see her as a formidable candidate. But many of them think that she may have chosen the wrong district and the wrong cycle to run for Congress.

Early last cycle, the Democrat explored a run in the open 15th District race. She eventually deferred to fellow Franklin County commissioner Mary Jo Kilroy (D), who won the general election at a time when Democrats had the wind at their backs.

Now Brooks is running in the neighboring 12th District, but she’ll likely face a dramatically different environment in the mid-term election, and she’ll have to knock off incumbent Cong. Pat Tiberi (R) to get to Congress. Subscribers get the full story in the print edition of the newsletter.

New Jersey Governor: Don’t Believe the Corzine Surge Just Yet

2009-10-05T09:00:00.000-04:00

By Stuart Rothenberg

The gubernatorial race in New Jersey has not changed fundamentally recently, no matter what you may read in poorly produced Associated Press stories distributed by the Democratic Governors Association, the Democratic National Committee or Gov. Jon Corzine’s (D) campaign.

I’ve become accustomed to crazy rumors and assertions at the end of campaigns, and most of them are baseless.

A couple of days before Election Day 2006, CBS executives planning the network’s coverage were in a frenzy about a possible Republican surge that challenged all of their assumptions about the election and disrupted their plans for election night. After checking around with reliable pollsters, I told them the sky wasn’t falling on Democrats.

In other years, when Republicans were headed for gains, I’ve heard late rumors about Democratic surges that were equally untrue.

A Wednesday AP story reporting that Corzine “is closing the gap in the New Jersey governor’s race” and has “pulled to within 4 percentage points of Republican Chris Christie” is technically true but gives such a distorted view of the contest that it can only mislead readers.

The same impression was left by reports on newjerseynewsroom.com, an independent news site, on Bloomberg.com and in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Describing Corzine as closing the gap or pulling closer conveys the impression that Corzine is gathering support and increasing his standing in the contest. He is not. He hasn’t moved in the Quinnipiac University poll (or in other polls, for that matter) since the beginning of the year.

Corzine’s chances of winning re-election now are no better than they were a month ago. The governor continues to be stuck between 38 percent and 42 percent in the ballot test, where he has been for many months, and the fundamentals of the race continue to favor the Republican challenger.

Corzine was at 39 percent among likely voters in the newest Quinnipiac survey, not much different from his 37 percent showing at the end of August, his 40 percent showing in early August or his 38 percent showing in mid-July.

The most recent Quinnipiac poll showed Christie leading Corzine by 4 points because the Republican’s vote has slipped from 46 percent or 47 percent in other Quinnipiac surveys to 43 percent. In turn, Independent candidate Chris Daggett’s number in the ballot test has risen to 12 percent in the most recent Quinnipiac poll, up from the 7 percent to 9 percent he had been drawing in other recent Quinnipiac surveys.

There is no statistically significant movement from late August to late September among likely independent voters.

Corzine’s attacks on Christie have driven the challenger’s negatives up, as the DGA points out, so that Christie’s personal ratings are only 38 percent favorable/38 percent unfavorable. Of course, what the DGA forgot to mention is that Corzine’s ratings are 34 percent favorable/56 percent unfavorable — much worse than Christie’s.

No, Corzine’s unfavorable ratings haven’t moved, but that’s because his name identification is high and voters already viewed him unfavorably before the race began. The governor’s job approval mirrors his name ID ratings at 36 percent approve/58 percent disapprove. (A month ago, Corzine’s job rating was little different at 34 percent approve/60 percent disapprove.)

Quinnipiac’s latest poll found that the top campaign issue by far for likely voters is taxes (41 percent, compared with the second most important issue, the economy/unemployment/jobs, which drew 17 percent). And which candidate has the advantage on that issue? Christie “is the big winner” on that issue, Quinnipiac University Polling Institute Director Maurice Carroll says.

Quinnipiac found that 61 percent of likely voters (and 71 percent of likely independent voters) said that property taxes — the single most salient issue in polling — would likely go up if Corzine is re-elected, while only 34 percent of likely voters (and 38 percent of likely independent voters) thought property taxes would go up if Christie wins next month.

What evidence should you look for if the fundamental dynamics of the race are changing?

Corzine’s numbers in the ballot test need to show some life. Ballot tests a year out don’t mean a great deal, especially if the candidates haven’t spent money or engaged, but this race has been active for months and state voters have seemed more focused on politics earlier than in the past.

Alternatively, a full-scale shift of Christie voters to Independent Daggett would suggest that Democrats had made Christie an unacceptable alternative to the governor, giving Corzine a chance to squeeze out a win with just 40 percent of the vote in a three-way race.

But that has not happened yet, and the bigger concern for Corzine is that Daggett voters will move away from him and toward Christie as the election nears and Daggett voters decide that they want to be with a winner, or that voting for an Independent is a “wasted” vote.

Corzine still has a month to change the contest’s dynamics, and nobody can predict what surprises or mistakes are yet to come. But the new Quinnipiac poll doesn’t show that much has changed, no matter what hype you read in a lot of the news coverage.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on October 1, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.