Turnout in Virginia, N.J. Could Be a Big Problem for Democrats

By Stuart Rothenberg

We’ve all been reminded repeatedly that Democrats face problems this year because of both the normal drop in midterm turnout and the mix of voters in nonpresidential years (See my “Democrats Face Challenges in Key Districts in 2010,” June 4, 2009). But those national problems will be magnified in a couple of states without high-profile races at the top of the ballot.

Democratic problems in both Virginia and New Jersey, where Republicans won governorships in November, could well be repeated in Congressional contests this year, in part because neither state has a statewide race on the ballot in November.

Republican strategists are bubbling with optimism about their chances of knocking off freshman Rep. John Adler (D) in New Jersey’s 3rd district, a south-central district that stretches from just north of Camden east to the Atlantic Ocean.

Adler won an open Republican seat 52 percent to 48 percent over Chris Myers (R), an unimpressive showing given the Democratic political wave and the fact that Adler spent $2.8 million on the race to Myers’ $1.2 million (and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee outspent the National Republican Congressional Committee by better than 2-to-1).

The district is fundamentally competitive. George W. Bush carried it 51 percent to 48 percent in 2004, while Barack Obama carried it 52 percent to 47 percent in 2008. In last year’s gubernatorial race, Republican sources say, Chris Christie (R) beat Gov. Jon Corzine (D) by 17 points, 56 percent to 39 percent).

Turnout in New Jersey is highest in presidential years, followed by off years when the gubernatorial election is held and then midterm election cycles. Sometimes, the midterm turnout is only slightly below the gubernatorial years — as in 2002, when 2.1 million Garden State voters cast ballots for Senator, compared with 2001, when 2.2 million cast their votes for governor. But sometimes the difference is stark — as in 1993, when 2.5 million voted for governor, and 1994, when just 2 million voted for Senator.

The last midterm election when there was no Senate race on the ballot in New Jersey was 1998. That year, turnout in individual House races was generally down 10,000 to 20,000 votes over the previous midterm election (when a Senate race was also on the ballot).

There were only two exceptions to this trend — in Democratic Rep. Donald Payne’s district, where turnout was already so low that it didn’t have far to fall, and in former Republican Rep. Mike Pappas’ district, where turnout in 1994 and 1998 was flat.

But Pappas was a controversial Republican incumbent in a year when Congressional Republicans overplayed their impeachment hand, and Democratic voters had reason to turn out, both to dump him and to express their outrage at Republican attacks on President Bill Clinton.

The lack of a statewide contest to generate interest and drive turnout could help the prospects of former NFL star Jon Runyan, the likely Republican nominee against Adler.

Often, as they did last cycle, Republican leaders in Burlington and Ocean counties quarrel over which county should produce the party’s nominee for Congress. But this time, both counties have lined up behind Runyan. Angry voters are likely to be more motivated, and that probably means more Republicans going to the polls.

In Virginia, the lack of a statewide contest could hurt as many as four Virginia Democratic House Members: Reps. Glenn Nye, Tom Perriello, Rick Boucher and Gerry Connolly.

Freshmen Nye and Perriello were swept into office during the ’08 Democratic wave, while Boucher, who is sitting in a district that gave Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) his best showing in the state (59 percent) during the White House election, has not faced a stiff challenger in years.

The state’s GOP nominee for governor last year, Bob McDonnell, won Nye, Perriello and Boucher’s districts with more than 60 percent of the vote, and he carried Connolly’s district by more than 10 points.

It’s difficult to compare turnout in Virginia in the 1998 election — the last time Members of Congress stood for election without a presidential or Senate contest above them on the ballot — to election years with statewide contests because seven of the state’s 11 House Members in the 1998 election ran without major party opposition in November.

None of the four who had opposition that cycle faced a serious threat, so the fact that they, like their unopposed colleagues, saw total turnout plummet doesn’t necessarily say something about turnout in 2010.

Still, Democratic strategists have to be worried about what effect the lack of a statewide contest will have on turnout. They certainly are aware of the problem, and they will be forced to pour additional resources into those districts to ensure that turnout in competitive Congressional districts doesn’t plunge.

None of this means that the endangered Democrats will lose. The two parties have very different views on the extent to which Adler is vulnerable, and the DCCC has the resources it will need to boost Democratic turnout in states where other races on the ballot could lull Democratic voters to sleep.

Still, with turnout a key factor, Democratic Party strategists will have to pay some additional attention to certain states, and New Jersey and Virginia will likely be on the list.

This column first appeared in Roll Call and on CQPolitics.com on April 12, 2010. 2010 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Can Polling Memos Change the Narrative About 2010 Races?

By Stuart Rothenberg

Here’s a bulletin for you: Anytime a campaign releases a polling memo, it is making an argument, not merely offering survey data for your information. Polling memos aren’t written to make you smarter.

This shouldn’t need to be said, of course, but when I see reporters swallowing spin as if it were information — as one Louisiana Gannett reporter did recently in writing about the state’s Senate race — I get very uncomfortable.

A number of Democratic polling memos from reputable polling firms have been circulating over the past couple of weeks — two from Anzalone Liszt Research about the Louisiana Senate race and about Rep. Bobby Bright’s (D-Ala.) re-election prospects, and one from Harstad Strategic Research about the Colorado Senate race — and readers should understand what’s going on with them.

I am not, I must emphasize, challenging the data. These are credible polling firms, and almost every pollster I know has released these kinds of memos in the past. I am only using Anzalone Liszt and Harstad as examples.

The purpose of the Louisiana poll memo is to alter the developing narrative that the state’s Senate race is essentially over and that Sen. David Vitter (R) won’t be seriously threatened by Rep. Charlie Melancon (D). The Alabama memo seeks to create a sense of inevitability about Bright’s re-election prospects and undercut GOP challenger Martha Roby’s credibility (and fundraising and buzz).

The Colorado memo seeks to rebut polling that shows appointed Sen. Michael Bennet (D) trailing in his race and to help him build momentum for his primary and the fall election.

I recently asked a pollster, not for attribution of course, about these kinds of memos and received a gloriously forthright answer: “Anyone who does a survey for strategic reasons isn’t going to release strategic information.”

Pollsters say that their surveys present only a “snapshot” of a race at a particular moment. That’s true. But often the snapshot presented in a memo is misleading, and the pollster knows it. Memos include numbers intended to build an argument that seems empirically based but isn’t. They don’t present the whole picture, because the whole picture isn’t in their client’s interest.

Even highly regarded, methodologically legit pollsters tell me to call them up privately if I want to get their real assessment about a race — don’t go by the memo they release. I get this from both Republican and Democratic pollsters, and I have received the same advice for years.

Actually, most pollsters hate to write these kinds of memos, but their clients want them to create a more favorable narrative, so they write them, usually using their words very carefully.

The Bright memo begins “Congressman Bobby Bright is well positioned to win re-election in Alabama’s 2nd Congressional district. Bright’s personal popularity and positive job rating are extremely high.” The memo looks at the Congressman’s excellent favorable/unfavorable ratings, respondents’ answers to questions about Bright’s qualities and his leads of 24 to 32 points over possible November opponents.

The memo ends with the following paragraph: “Bright leads Roby among virtually all gender, race, and geographic subgroups. Bright earns double-digit margins with white voters, African American voters, Independent voters, and in both the Montgomery and Dothan media markets.”

Bright, a conservative Democrat, won election to Congress because of the Democratic wave in 2008. He beat a politically damaged GOP nominee who had emerged from a bruising primary by six-tenths of a point (50.2 percent to 49.6 percent), winning by 1,790 votes out of more than 286,000 cast.

However highly regarded Bright is, this is a Republican district. President Barack Obama drew only 37 percent of the vote in it in 2008, losing it to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) by more than 25 points.

Bright does start off well-positioned for his re-election bid, but he is almost guaranteed to have a razor-close race against Roby, a Montgomery city councilwoman and the likely GOP nominee. Maybe he’ll win; maybe he won’t. Whatever the outcome, he won’t win by 20 points or carry white voters by double digits.

If Bright holds on to win re-election, he’ll win by a point or two. Given that, the Anzalone Liszt poll tells us little about November. Voters apparently don’t know anything about the Republican candidates, and it’s so far from Election Day that most voters haven’t given much thought to what their vote might mean or who they really will vote for in the fall.

The Bright memo reminds me of a June 15, 2009, Anzalone Liszt polling memo that listed all of Democrat Creigh Deeds’ advantages in the 2009 Virginia gubernatorial race.

That memo asserted: “Deeds has a high favorable rating, and a lower unfavorable rating, even though McDonnell spent more on television [during the primary]. Deeds also holds critical issue advantages that will make it difficult for McDonnell to make up ground.”

The memo said that Deeds held a 4-point lead in the race and was able to win votes across the state “including traditional Republican strongholds.” “At the same time, McDonnell will have a difficult time making inroads in increasingly Democratic Northern Virginia,” it asserted.

Of course, McDonnell won 59 percent to 41 percent, turning a 4-point deficit in the poll into an 18-point victory. Deeds didn’t do well in “Republican strongholds,” and McDonnell carried Fairfax County, the state’s largest county and the epitome of what is meant by “Northern Virginia.”

Polling memos sometimes contain useful nuggets of data, but they often leave out other important data and stress the narrative the campaign wants to create. Don’t take them at face value.


This column first appeared in Roll Call and on CQPolitics.com on March 18, 2010. 2010 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Rothenberg’s Dangerous Dozen House Seats for 2010

By Stuart Rothenberg

Regular readers of this column know that I’ve been rating the most vulnerable House seats — open and incumbent — for years. It’s that time again, and since there aren’t yet enough competitive open seats to rate by themselves, this list includes the dozen most vulnerable seats in the House.

There are two caveats that go with the list. First, there are strong arguments for including at least half a dozen other districts on the list. So, not being on this list doesn’t mean a contest is not extremely competitive. Second, since the midterm elections are still almost a year off, this list is likely to change significantly before November.

Louisiana’s 2nd: Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao, the only Republican to vote for the House’s health care reform bill, had no business winning this majority-black district. He won only because of the timing of the 2008 elections and the unique problems of then-Rep. William Jefferson (D). This time, Democrats are likely to have an unindicted nominee, which should end Cao’s service in Congress at one term. Two state Representatives have already announced they are running. Expect a turnover.

Delaware’s At-Large: Rep. Mike Castle’s decision to run for Senate was great news for the National Republican Senatorial Committee but bad news for House Republicans. Former Lt. Gov. John Carney (D) was already running when Castle made his announcement, so Democrats have a serious candidate in the race. Since the state leans Democratic, Republicans will need to find a formidable nominee even to contest the seat seriously.

Louisiana’s 3rd: With Rep. Charlie Melancon (D) running for Senate, this open seat gives the GOP an excellent takeover opportunity. The district gave President Barack Obama only 37 percent of the vote in 2008, so the Republican nominee should benefit from normal midterm dynamics. Of course, with a late August primary, the race won’t shake out for months.

Virginia’s 5th: Freshman Rep. Tom Perriello (D) seems more interested in doing what he thinks is right than getting re-elected. That’s the only way to explain his votes supporting House Democrats’ cap-and-trade and health care reform bills. State Sen. Robert Hurt (R) is expected to challenge Perriello, and the Congressman is in deep, deep trouble. Obama’s 48 percent showing last year in this district understates Perriello’s challenge next year.

Maryland’s 1st: Unlike Perriello, Rep. Frank Kratovil (D) has voted as if he is trying to be re-elected. But he barely scraped by Republican Andy Harris in an open-seat contest last time, and the midterm electorate will make his re-election bid more difficult. He has a chance to win another term, but the odds aren’t in his favor. Obama drew only 40 percent of the vote in the 1st in 2008.

Kansas’ 3rd: When Rep. Dennis Moore announced his retirement last week, Democratic prospects tanked. While Obama won this district with 51 percent, it generally leans Republican, and the open seat during a midterm election looks like a juicy GOP target.

Ohio’s 1st: Rep. Steve Driehaus (D) knocked off then-Rep. Steve Chabot (R) last year, and now Chabot is trying to return the favor. Expected lower turnout among Democratic core groups, especially younger voters and blacks, places this district at great risk even though Obama won it with 55 percent.

Ohio’s 15th: Freshman Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy (D) has many of the same problems — and the same challenges — that confront Driehaus in the state’s 1st district. Unlike Driehaus, Kilroy faces a rematch against an opponent who has never won district-wide. But former state Sen. Steve Stivers (R) should be a formidable foe.

Florida’s 8th: Rep. Alan Grayson (D), another freshman, has gone out of his way to be partisan and inflammatory. That’s a good way to raise money and attract the fawning admiration of liberal activists, but it isn’t the best way to get re-elected in this Republican-leaning district that went for Obama with 52 percent. The GOP doesn’t yet have a “name” challenger, and the party may never get one. But given Grayson’s recent behavior, they may not need one to take back this district after a single term.

New Mexico’s 2nd: Rep. Harry Teague faces former Rep. Steve Pearce (R), who gave up his seat in 2008 to run for Senate. Teague has tried to vote his district, but he isn’t being helped by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and Obama, who drew 49 percent of the district’s vote in 2008. Definitely a midterm problem for Democrats.

New Hampshire’s 2nd: The Granite State has swung strongly Democratic of late — probably too strongly considering the state’s fundamentals. This open seat, and the likely candidacy of former Rep. Charles Bass (R), should give Republicans at least an even money chance of winning back the district during the midterm elections. But attorney Ann McLane Kuster, the early favorite for the Democratic nomination and the daughter of a former liberal Republican state legislator, should be a formidable standard-bearer for her party.

New York’s 23rd: Special election winner Rep. Bill Owens won his seat with less than 50 percent of the vote, and if Republicans find a nominee who can appeal to both conservatives and moderates, Owens will find himself in trouble. His first vote was for the House health care reform bill.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on November 30, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Learning the Right Lessons From 2009 Results

By Stuart Rothenberg

Everyone and his brother has opinions about what happened on Tuesday, but not all assessments are equally correct, just as not all of the descriptions of the contests, while they were in progress, were equally on the mark.

What were some of the mistakes and mischaracterizations during the campaigns and after the voting?

One of the worst, I thought, was the widespread characterization of Dede Scozzafava, the Republican nominee in New York’s 23rd district, as a moderate. I realize that those of us in the media use that term to distinguish certain Republicans and Democrats from their more ideologically consistent colleagues, but in this case, the label was inappropriate.

Scozzafava doesn’t only support abortion rights — often a marker for Republican “moderates” — she supports gay marriage. But she doesn’t only support gay marriage; she supported President Barack Obama’s stimulus proposal that not a single House Republican favored. But she didn’t just support the stimulus package; she supports the Employee Free Choice Act (what opponents call “card check”), which is opposed by virtually the entire business community. And in the end, of course, she endorsed the Democrat in the race.

Scozzafava is a liberal Republican by any standard, and she should have been labeled as such. She is more liberal than every Republican in the House of Representatives and many Democrats.

The Republican county chairmen who picked Scozzafava should have appreciated how much opposition her selection would have generated, and they should have been aware of the likelihood that the Conservative Party would have picked its own nominee, thereby dividing the GOP.

Of course, Scozzafava would have in all likelihood held the seat for the GOP if Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman had not been in the race. And Hoffman might not have held it as the Republican nominee.

I also thought it amusing that by the end of the elections in Virginia and New Jersey so many observers were talking about how terrible Democrat Creigh Deeds and Republican Chris Christie were as candidates.

Sorry, but a year ago everyone I talked with, including New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine (D), told me that Christie was by far the GOP’s strongest candidate in the Garden State. It’s not as if the state’s Republican Party has produced a large stable of potential statewide candidates to choose from.

It’s certainly fair to criticize the governor-elect’s campaign and his performance during the race, but let’s not rewrite history. Christie was good enough to win. And he did.

Deeds soundly beat two Northern Virginia primary opponents, winning more than 45 percent in Fairfax and Arlington counties. Moreover, after his primary victory, he was widely hailed as the kind of Democrat who could keep the governorship in Democratic hands. Most mid-June polls showed the gubernatorial race close.

Again, he and his campaign had plenty of weaknesses and mistakes, but portraying him as some kind of inept buffoon who never really had a chance is rewriting history. And former Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell (R) ran an extraordinarily good campaign.

The “Pollster of the Cycle Award,” in my opinion, goes to SurveyUSA, which once again proved its worth, at least in pre-election polls. The firm’s final Virginia numbers were eerily close — the firm showed McDonnell winning 58 percent to 40 percent in its Oct. 30 to Nov. 1 poll, just shy of the actual final margin: McDonnell 59 percent, Deeds 41 percent.

In New Jersey, where Christie won by 4 points, the last SurveyUSA poll showed Christie up by 3.

Public Policy Polling was the runner-up in Virginia (it had McDonnell up by 14 points), while in New Jersey PPP (Christie by 6 points) and Quinnipiac University (Christie by 2 points) were narrowly behind SurveyUSA in accuracy.

SurveyUSA, PPP and Quinnipiac, however, dramatically overstated the support of Independent Chris Daggett in New Jersey.

Where there are winners, there are usually also losers. None of the major public pollsters was dramatically wrong in Virginia, but Research 2000, which polled for DailyKos, showed McDonnell with only a 10-point lead in late October, primarily because it overstated Deeds’ support.

In New Jersey, the Monmouth University/Gannett poll erred when it showed Corzine up by 2 points in its last survey. But by far the worst-performing survey in either state was Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research for Democracy Corps in New Jersey.

Democracy Corps polling showed Corzine pulling ahead in his race in early October and stretching his lead to 4 points (41 percent to 36 percent for Christie) among likely voters and 5 points in a higher-turnout electorate in its Oct. 29 to Nov. 1 survey. The survey showed Daggett drawing in the midteens. He actually drew just less than 6 percent.

Finally, after the results were in, I received e-mails — one from a group favoring public financing of campaigns and another from a candidate running against wealthy opponents — claiming that Corzine’s defeat and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s (I) narrow victory constituted a statement about voters’ views of wealthy self-funders.

“Millionaire self-funders beware” is how the Senate campaign of former Rep. Rob Simmons (R-Conn.) put it. “Voters ... are tired of self-financed, Wall Street-connected candidates,” Public Campaign wrote in a press release.

The idea that Corzine lost because he spent so much money or self-funded is laughable. His defeat was a referendum on the past four years and particularly the state’s economy and tax issues. As for Bloomberg, his spending did cause a backlash, but so did his perceived arrogance, especially his efforts to change the law that would have prevented him from seeking a third term.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on November 9, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Stu Talks 2009 Elections on NewsHour

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.

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

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.

Virginia Governor Moved to Lean Takeover

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)

In Virginia, Culture War Looks Very Much Alive on One Side

By Stuart Rothenberg

Somebody needs to tell Virginia gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds that the “culture wars” are over. Apparently, he didn’t get the memo.

Deeds is banking on completing his comeback in this year’s Virginia gubernatorial race by portraying Republican nominee Bob McDonnell, the commonwealth’s former attorney general, as a Neanderthal who opposes abortion, birth control and women in the workplace.

If that isn’t a “cultural” argument, I don’t know what is.

And yet, it was just two months ago that Ruy Teixeira, a senior fellow at the left- leaning Center for American Progress, assured us in an article, “The Coming End of the Culture Wars,” that “culture wars, far from coming back, are likely coming to an end as a defining aspect of our politics.”

And it was less than six months before that Peter Beinart, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, assured us in his Daily Beast post, “The End of the Culture Wars,” that President Barack Obama “wants to remove culture from the public debate.”

The president, wrote Beinart, thinks many conservative white Protestants and Catholics “will look beyond culture when they enter the voting booth as long as he and other Democrats don’t ram cultural liberalism down their throats.”

And 18 months ago, in March 2008, Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne Jr. wrote that the questions that “will most engage us will be about survival and prosperity, not religion and culture.”

Teixeira, Beinart and Dionne aren’t completely wrong, of course. The economy has pushed cultural issues to the back burner, and while Obama holds predictably liberal views on abortion and gay marriage (as evidenced by the president’s recent statement that the Defense of Marriage Act is “discriminatory” and “should be repealed”), he has not lectured the country about them.

Deeds, on the other hand, is using cultural issues as his ultimate wedge in Northern Virginia, and as we have seen recently, the White House (not to mention Democratic National Committee Chairman and Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine) is very much supportive of Deeds’ candidacy.

As reporters Anita Kumar and Jon Cohen wrote in the Washington Post on Sunday, “Deeds has made McDonnell’s 20-year-old thesis and his views on women centerpieces of his campaign, particularly in the more liberal, vote-rich northern part of the state.”

Deeds is now airing two different TV spots on cultural issues, citing McDonnell’s alleged positions against abortion, birth control “even for married couples” and working women.

This emphasis is interesting, considering that the top concern of voters is not cultural issues but the economy, at least according to the Post’s own poll, which showed that issue (the economy/jobs/unemployment) far ahead of other issues in the minds of voters.

After that, voters were most concerned about a quartet of issues: education, health care, taxes and transportation.

The same poll showed voters trusting McDonnell more than Deeds on the economy and jobs (48 percent to 43 percent), taxes (50 percent to 39 percent) and transportation (46 percent to 38 percent), while they trusted Deeds on health care (47 percent to 43 percent).

Yet Deeds continues to pound away, at least in Northern Virginia, on culture, and he is doing so for one reason and only one reason: He figures that it is good politics.

Deeds has been underperforming in crucial Northern Virginia, and his campaign wisely decided that hitting McDonnell on abortion and other cultural issues will peel off suburban moderate voters not enamored of Deeds’ rural roots from the Republican and motivate them to turn out in November for the Democratic ticket.

So far, few commentators have remarked about Deeds’ strategy given the top issues of the day. You can be sure that if it were McDonnell, not Deeds, who was bringing up abortion and other cultural issues, he’d be criticized for being divisive and for focusing on allegedly tangential matters at a time of economic distress.

Indeed, that was the message in a Nov. 10, 2005, E.J. Dionne Jr. column written shortly after Kaine’s election as governor. Dionne wrote that a “jovial” then-Gov. Mark Warner (D) talked about the “failure” of the GOP’s gubernatorial campaign, and its focus on hot-button social issues, and Warner stressed that voters preferred candidates who dealt with questions that governors “actually spend 98 percent of their time working on,” such as the budget, health care, education, transportation and job growth.

Instead, the Washington Post cheered Deeds on in a mid-August editorial for talking about abortion and called the McDonnell campaign “disingenuous and wrong” for complaining that Deeds’ attacks were divisive.

And oddly, no one has mentioned that Deeds, who ran as a moderate in the primary, is now relying on a pro-abortion-rights message usually employed by liberal Democrats in general elections.

“I think somebody like me, from my part of the state, can bring people together, can create consensus,” Deeds says in a new TV spot that is running at the same time that he is attacking his opponent in the two abortion/birth control ads.

It’s too soon to say whether Deeds’ strategy will work. Democratic conventional wisdom over the past few years says it won’t, and if Mark Warner was correct back in 2005, Deeds is toast. But, in any case, reports of the death of cultural issues have been greatly exaggerated.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on September 24, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Parties Watching 2009 Races for Clues

By Nathan L. Gonzales

With the midterm elections more than a year away, all eyes are on this fall’s gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey. But instead of simply tallying wins and losses, party operatives are digging below the surface for clues as to what the political environment will be like next year.

In Virginia, Republicans are watching how former state Attorney General Bob McDonnell (R) performs in three Congressional districts that span three very distinct regions of the commonwealth: Southside (Democratic Rep. Tom Perriello’s 5th district), the Valley (Republican Rep. Bob Goodlatte’s 6th district) and Southwest (Democratic Rep. Rick Boucher’s 9th district).

Republicans believe both Perriello and Boucher are vulnerable, but they’re looking for broader implications for other GOP-leaning districts that are currently represented by Democrats.

“If we get ... to the Bush 2000 number in those regions then we will have ‘bounced back’ in our base areas,” according to one House GOP strategist, referring to George W. Bush’s vote totals in the 2000 presidential race. “That’s the first step toward getting healthy.”

George W. Bush received 55 percent in the 5th and 9th districts and 60 percent in the 6th in 2000, when he faced then-Vice-President Al Gore. But Democrat Mark Warner outperformed Gore’s percentage by at least 10 points in the trio of districts in his successful 2001 gubernatorial run. And Gov. Tim Kaine (D) did about 8 points better than Gore in the 5th and 6th when he was elected to the governor’s mansion in 2005.

Kaine equaled Gore’s 2000 percentage in the 9th only because it was GOP nominee Jerry Kilgore’s home district. In similar fashion, McDonnell may have a hard time racking up big margins in the Shenandoah Valley and southwestern Virginia because his opponent, state Sen. Creigh Deeds (D), is from the 6th district. But Republicans believe their nominee will do well.

Both parties are also looking at how specific demographic groups perform statewide, including suburban voters, seniors, African-Americans and college students. All of them were keys to President Barack Obama’s victory in 2008, both in Virginia and elsewhere, and they will go a long way in determining which party is successful in 2010.

If McDonnell does well in Loudoun, Prince William and Stafford counties in the Northern Virginia suburbs, as well as Henrico County (a Richmond suburb) and the city of Chesapeake, Republicans believe it could foreshadow their ability to win over suburban voters in other states for the first time in four years.

Seniors have traditionally been an important voting group in midterm elections because of their propensity to vote. And Republicans believe Democrats gave them a window of opportunity by mentioning Medicare as part of the broader health care reform debate.

Meanwhile, both parties are interested in how dramatic the drop in turnout among African-Americans and college students will be when Obama is not on the ballot this fall.

Plus, overall turnout in both states is likely to be even lower next year because of the absence of any statewide or legislative elections.

In 2001, the Republican National Committee used the off-year gubernatorial elections to test-drive its 72 Hour Task Force. The RNC targeted areas with different get-out-the-vote tactics in an effort to hone its ground game for the 2002 midterm elections and ultimately Bush’s 2004 re-election. But this year, Republicans are taking a different approach.

“We’re done with experimenting,” one Republican strategist said. “We need to win.”

In the end, the RNC will spend at least $7 million in Virginia to help McDonnell take over the governorship after eight years of Democratic control. At least $5 million of that total will be spent on the ground in what one strategist called a massive, “Obama-style” get-out-the-vote effort.

“It’s an acknowledgement that the Obama campaign was in every way superior than the McCain campaign at getting people to the polls,” said the GOP strategist, referencing Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) failed bid for the presidency.

The Democratic National Committee, led by Kaine has also committed $5 million to the race.

But with Democratic nominees in both New Jersey and Virginia down in the polls, and facing the real possibility of losing both states, Democrats are quicker to downplay the 2009 results and much slower to draw any conclusions for 2010.

“The race will be decided by Virginia voters,” said one DNC official trying to set expectations low. “We’re not using it as any sort of litmus test.”

Strategists on both sides of the aisle do seem to agree that the New Jersey race is more an anomaly than a road map to the midterm elections.

“New Jersey is tougher,” according to one House GOP operative. “It appears to be more of a referendum on [incumbent Democratic Gov. Jon] Corzine than anything else.”

If former U.S. Attorney Chris Christie (R) defeats Corzine, it will be Republicans’ first statewide victory in more than a dozen years. Christie will need Democrats to cross over in order to win, but that doesn’t mean GOP candidates nationwide should expect Democratic support in next year’s midterms.

House Democratic strategists aren’t dismissing the New Jersey results entirely. They’re interested in the 3rd district, where Rep. John Adler (D) took over a Republican-held open seat in 2008 and could potentially be vulnerable next year.

There is a danger in projecting 2010 results simply based on 2009 outcomes. When Republicans won New Jersey and Virginia in 1993, it was the beginning of a tidal wave that reached its peak a year later. But when Republicans lost New Jersey and Virginia in 2001, they still made limited gains in 2002.

Even if they lose both governorships this fall and the expected special election in New York’s 23rd district, Democrats don’t consider the whole year a loss. They held New York’s 20th district in a competitive special election this spring, held a state House seat in Iowa, held a state Senate seat in Louisiana and took over a state Senate seat in Kentucky.

Rest assured that the party that wins big this fall will say it’s just a taste of what’s to come next year. The party that loses will be channeling former Speaker Tip O’Neill (D-Mass.) and dusting off the “all politics is local” mantra.

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

Poll Results Daunting for Democrats in ’09 Gubernatorial Races

By Stuart Rothenberg

Given that I’ve spent the past 30 years reporting on and analyzing candidates, campaigns and elections, it should come as no surprise that I believe that campaigns matter. I’ve seen more than enough candidates who appeared headed to victory stumble their way to defeat during the post-Labor Day stretch.

But cycle fundamentals are crucial, too, and poll numbers in the middle of September often are good predictors about the final result.

Yes, voters are increasingly likely to pay attention to candidates and campaigns as the calendar rolls through September and into October, so voter sentiment can change as events occur. But that is at least somewhat offset by the tendency of many voters to dismiss TV ads and charges late in the campaign as nothing more than election year politics.

Purely from a technical point of view, recent poll numbers in the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races remain horrendous for Democrats. And what has to be really scary to party strategists is the similarity in their candidates’ positioning in the two contests.

Public opinion analyst Mark Blumenthal of Pollster.com astutely observed a week ago that the best way to understand what is going on in the Garden State gubernatorial race is to focus on Gov. Jon Corzine’s (D) numbers in ballot tests, not on the margin of Republican challenger Chris Christie’s lead. The governor, after all, is a known commodity to Garden State voters, so his strength in ballot tests reflects the public’s view of his candidacy.

Corzine’s showing in ballot tests over the past 33 polls, dating back to a mid-January Monmouth University/Gannett survey, has ranged from a low of 35 percent to a high of 42 percent, a weak showing for a sitting governor. And Corzine hit 45 percent in that Monmouth/Gannett poll only when matched against conservative Steve Lonegan, who lost to Christie in the June GOP primary.

Corzine’s consistency suggests that he has hit something of a ceiling in the state. While incumbents — even Democratic incumbents — often underperform in New Jersey, in part because of the importance of the New York City and Philadelphia media markets, they rarely are in as bad a shape as Corzine is this late in an election year.

Four years ago, in polling conducted in mid-September and early October, Corzine was drawing 44 percent to 48 percent of the vote against his GOP opponent, Doug Forrester, in five nonpartisan polls (Fairleigh Dickinson University, Quinnipiac University, Monmouth/Gannett, Star-Ledger/Eagleton Institute of Politics and WNBC/Marist Institute for Public Opinion). But Corzine was then a sitting U.S. Senator, and he also held a lead of 2 to 8 points over Forrester in those same polls’ ballot tests.

Blumenthal’s point about Corzine’s numbers is also relevant in Virginia, where Democrat Creigh Deeds’ ballot test numbers are eerily similar to Corzine’s.

True, there is no incumbent seeking re-election in Virginia, but Democrats have held the governor’s office for eight years, and that makes the Democratic nominee this year the de-facto incumbent in the minds of many voters.

Deeds has drawn 37 percent to 43 percent of the vote in 10 polls conducted since July. In each of those surveys, he trailed Republican nominee Bob McDonnell by anywhere from the low single digits to the midteens. (Deeds looked much stronger in two mid-June polls, but those results undoubtedly were skewed by his June 9 primary victory, making them largely irrelevant.)

In six of the last eight surveys of likely voters, McConnell was over the 50 percent mark in the ballot test against Deeds, and in the other two, the Republican was at 49 percent.

Four years ago, the Virginia governor’s race looked tight. A mid-September Mason-Dixon Polling & Research survey of likely voters had Jerry Kilgore (R) leading Tim Kaine 41 percent to 40 percent. A month later, the same survey showed Kilgore ahead 44 percent to 42 percent. A mid-October Diageo/Hotline poll showed Kaine leading Kilgore 41 percent to 40 percent among likely voters.

Kaine eventually went on to win the race by almost 6 points, and he certainly was helped by then-President George W. Bush’s sinking poll numbers, as well as outgoing Gov. Mark Warner’s (D) popularity. Kaine also painted Kilgore as too conservative for the state, particularly for crucial Northern Virginia.

While Deeds and Corzine will now have almost eight weeks to change voters’ minds, they start from deep holes.

This time, neither Deeds nor Corzine get much advantage by blaming Bush for the economy or the public’s discontent (though they have already tried to do so), and the GOP has nominated candidates in both states who seem intent on ensconcing themselves in the political middle, exactly where most swing voters are. Because of that, many voters dissatisfied with the direction of the country, or of their state, will be more inclined to cast their votes for the Republican nominees than they were four years ago.

Corzine and Deeds will likely have to launch increasingly tough attacks on their GOP opponents, seeking to make the elections referendums on the Republican nominees. But that strategy will also give Christie and McDonnell the opportunity to paint their opponents as desperate and negative. A quick surge in multiple polls by either Democrat could change the dynamic, of course.

As Yogi Berra might put it, the two contests aren’t over until they are over, but the fundamentals, as reflected in state ballot tests, simply don’t look good for Corzine or Deeds.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on September 10, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Virginia Governor: Democrats Play It Smart by Nominating Deeds

By Stuart Rothenberg

The Virginia gubernatorial race just got a whole lot tougher for Republican nominee Bob McDonnell.

Instead of nominating a liberal from Northern Virginia (former state Del. Brian Moran) or an upstate New Yorker normally identified with the national Democratic Party (Terry McAuliffe), Old Dominion Democrats opted for a rural state Senator, Creigh Deeds, thereby giving the party a standard-bearer in the fall who can run as heir to the Mark Warner-Tim Kaine legacy of pragmatism.

One national Republican strategist has a simple formula in explaining recent Virginia elections, and it doesn’t seem far off the mark: The guy who looks extreme or stupid and is the focal point of the race loses.

Democratic gubernatorial nominee Mary Sue Terry lost the 1993 election to Republican George Allen because he defined her as too liberal. The same thing happened four years later, in 1997, when Jim Gilmore (R) defeated Northern Virginia car dealer Don Beyer (D).

On the other hand, now-Sen. Jim Webb (D) narrowly defeated Allen in the 2006 Senate race because Allen’s “macaca” remark (and his subsequent explanation of it) made him look intolerant and inept. Democrats used 2005 GOP gubernatorial nominee Jerry Kilgore’s accent to paint him as a none-too-bright hick. And Republican Bill Bolling won the state’s No. 2 office in 2005 by painting his Democratic opponent, former Rep. Leslie Byrne from Northern Virginia, as a kooky liberal.

Deeds’ rural roots and momentum make him a tough adversary for Republicans. He won’t be as easily defined (or demonized) as a liberal as Moran or McAuliffe would have been.

But McDonnell’s early campaign suggests that he too understands where the state is and how he needs to appeal to voters. He isn’t going to allow himself to be branded as an intolerant, ignorant redneck who is still fighting the Civil War. It will be up to Deeds and Virginia Democrats to brand the Republican as “too extreme” for Virginians. (Common Sense Virginia, a group funded by the Democratic Governors Association, has been hammering the Republican in TV spots for weeks.)

Deeds’ statewide strength on Tuesday is worth emphasizing. In winning 10 of the state’s 11 Congressional districts, he demonstrated broad personal and political appeal, at least among Democrats.

By all accounts, the Deeds-McDonnell race looks like a very competitive one, with campaign decisions, candidate performance and news developments deciding the winner.

Recent election results show how competitive the Old Dominion has become. Webb won his Senate seat by winning 49.6 percent of the total vote in 2006, while Mark Warner won the governorship in 2001 with 52.2 percent and Kaine won the state’s top office in 2005 with 51.7 percent. George W. Bush carried the state in 2004 with 53.7 percent, while President Barack Obama won with 52.6 percent.

Of course, McDonnell beat Deeds in the state attorney general’s race four years ago by just 323 votes, and Bolling beat Byrne to become lieutenant governor by drawing only 50.5 percent of the vote. (Any talk that McDonnell has an advantage in this year’s gubernatorial race because he “beat Deeds four years ago” should be swiftly dismissed as absurd.)

What lessons should we draw from the results?

First, money is a necessary but not sufficient resource. The biggest spender didn’t win the Democratic nomination, nor did the guy who was almost invisible on TV. Deeds didn’t have the most cash, but he had enough.

Second, polling in the state wasn’t as horrible as many of us assumed. While none of the surveys had Deeds winning by 24 points, most surveys picked up Deeds’ momentum. Public Policy Polling and SurveyUSA, in particular, had Deeds opening up a double-digit lead in their last polls. They deserve some applause for that, considering the difficulty of predicting the electorate in a low-turnout election.

Third, too many press spokesmen caught up in their own spinning and campaigns often get too cute by half in trying to use poll numbers — that they often know are misleading — to energize supporters.

Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post quoted McAuliffe senior adviser Mo Elleithee on Election Day as saying, “In the last 48 hours, the lead that Senator Deeds had taken in the last week started to collapse,” and an Elleithee Election Day get-out-the-vote e-mail cited the last night of a three-day tracking survey that showed Deeds and McAuliffe tied at 33 percent.

The e-mail was filled with disclaimers that the one-night results are “not definitive” and that the campaign never makes decisions “on one night’s worth of interviews because the sample is too small.” Nevertheless, the campaign released those numbers and constructed an argument based on them. The full three-night poll was never released, nor did Elleithee note that internal campaign polling over the previous week showed Deeds was pulling away and would win handily.

One McAuliffe campaign insider I spoke with after the results were in acknowledged that in the campaign’s final days “we knew things looked really bad, but things looked volatile.” That explanation is not convincing. In fact, those running the McAuliffe campaign knew very well what was happening.

The only conclusion possible is that the campaign was not telling the truth and that it was selectively using numbers that it knew should never be used to make a point that it knew was very dubious, at best.


This column first appeared in Roll Call on June 11, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Democrats Face Turnout Challenges in Key Districts in 2010

By Stuart Rothenberg

Democratic political strategists know that for all of their party’s advantages next year, they’ll almost certainly have significant turnout issues in more than a half-dozen highly competitive districts — even if President Barack Obama remains popular.

“Last cycle, our challenge was to make certain newly energized Obama voters continue to vote Democratic down the ballot. This time, our challenge is getting those same voters back out to vote again,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Executive Director Jon Vogel told me recently.

At least nine Democratic-held districts in five different states — Alabama’s 2nd (Rep. Bobby Bright) and 5th (Rep. Parker Griffith), Ohio’s 1st (Rep. Steve Driehaus) and 15th (Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy), North Carolina’s 8th (Rep. Larry Kissell), Virginia’s 2nd (Rep. Glenn Nye) and 5th (Rep. Tom Perriello), and Georgia’s 8th (Rep. Jim Marshall) and 12th (Rep. John Barrow) — could see a steep drop-off in the midterm among demographic groups that were energized by Obama’s candidacy and supported Democratic candidates across the board last cycle.

Eight of the districts have sizable African-American populations, including Ohio’s 1st district, which is more than one-quarter black and includes most of Cincinnati and Hamilton County.

The other district, Ohio’s 15th, is based in Columbus and includes Ohio State University, a huge source of young voters for the Obama campaign. (Younger voters are also important in Virginia’s 5th, which includes Charlottesville and the University of Virginia.)

African-Americans and college-age students turned out in considerable numbers for Obama, and it is far from clear whether they will do so again in the midterms. In fact, exit polls over the past few elections have shown that turnout for both groups has dropped in nonpresidential years.

For example, African-Americans made up 11 percent of all voters in 2004 and 13 percent of all voters in 2008, but only 10 percent of the 2006 midterm electorate. For younger voters, the drop-off is even more stark. Voters 18-29 years old constituted 18 percent of all voters in 2008 and 17 percent of all voters in 2004. But in the intervening 2006 midterm, they accounted for only 12 percent of all voters.

Along with the drop in turnout is the corresponding, but different, issue of vote choice. While black voters and 18-29-year-olds turned out in bigger numbers last year, they also gave a much greater percentage of their vote to Obama (and presumably to other Democratic candidates).

Without Obama on the ballot to bring out voters or define the overall election by his candidacy, it is uncertain how the two key voting groups will cast their ballots in individual contests. Some of these voters might return to their traditional voting preferences, especially if a number of Republican moderates are on the ballot.

Obviously, one huge question is how personally involved the president will become in the elections.

Obama has shown some limited willingness to play in some House and Senate races. Before his election, he recorded automated telephone calls for the Democratic nominee in last year’s special election in Louisiana’s 4th district and appeared in a TV ad for now-Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.). More recently, he has played a role in the New York and Pennsylvania Senate races and headlined fundraisers for Senate candidates. He will do a joint fundraiser for the House and Senate campaign committees later this month.

On the other hand, the president has generally tried to stay above the partisan fray, preferring calls for unity and bipartisanship and avoiding heavily partisan rhetoric.

Democratic campaign strategists acknowledge that while they would be happy to have the president fully engage in the midterms, they cannot assume he will be greatly involved. So, they are planning their own efforts to mobilize Democratic voters.

DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen (Md.) has already sat down with Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine to discuss how the two committees can coordinate their efforts to turn out Democrats next November.

Party insiders say their efforts will include targeting, messaging and building an infrastructure that will help national Democratic groups help Members’ campaigns to turn out key groups.

While strategists already can identify those districts where a drop-off in voting by African-Americans and younger voters could prove fatal to Democratic incumbents, the DCCC plans for much more elaborate targeting to allow the committee to communicate with those voters.

The DCCC also plans on investing resources into developing and refining its messaging to those voters. With the committee regarding “message” as an integral part of its field program, the DCCC is likely to engage in some extensive message testing to find out the best way to mobilize Obama voters who might otherwise sit out the midterm elections.

“For us,” Vogel says, “the question is what kind of message will get those voters to turn out.”

Finally, the DCCC will work with individual Members’ campaigns to build an infrastructure — and a tailored field campaign — in each district.

The DCCC’s recently hired national field director, Marlon Marshall, will play a key role in building organizations in key districts. Marshall, then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s (D-N.Y.) field director during the 2008 Democratic primaries, ran the Obama campaign’s Missouri field operation during the general election.

So far, GOP recruiting in districts that could see a drop in Democratic turnout has been promising. Former Rep. Steve Chabot (R-Ohio) is running again, and Steve Stivers, who narrowly lost to Kilroy last time, appears likely to opt for a rematch. Republican candidates against Bright and Barrow appear formidable, at least initially.

The National Republican Congressional Committee will need to win a few of these districts if the party is going to gain seats next year. But their efforts won’t surprise the DCCC, which has already taken concrete steps to minimize any drop in turnout.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on June 4, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

National Mood Isn't Always Visible on the Ground

By Stuart Rothenberg

Polls show that the nation’s political winds are not changing. President Barack Obama is up, while Republicans are down — and spending more time on trivial matters such as Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele than on rebuilding their brand.

The past couple of months have also seen some significant campaign developments that are affecting the two parties’ outlooks for 2009 and 2010 — not always as expected.

The special election in New York’s 20th district has become a barnburner, with Republican Jim Tedisco holding only the slightest (and statistically insignificant) advantage over Democrat Scott Murphy in the fast-approaching March 31 special election. For Republicans, the special election to replace appointed Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D) looks to be repeating a troubling pattern.

Even though the district leans Republican, soft GOP voters who like Obama are not embracing Tedisco. Some have gravitated to Murphy, who is young, has money to put into the race and has no legislative record, while others are undecided.

Tedisco has served in the state Assembly for years, and that makes him easily branded as a “typical politician,” which is exactly what a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee TV ad calls him.

One GOP insider whom I spoke with recently said the race “doesn’t look good,” in part because Murphy has been “rolling up the score” among independents. But strategists from both parties expect a close finish, and turnout, as is often the case in special elections, will determine the winner. A loss for Republicans would be demoralizing, but it could happen.

At the same time that Democratic prospects in the New York special election are brightening, the party’s prospects in the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial elections later this year are dimming.

Gov. Jon Corzine (D) is now running behind former U.S. attorney Chris Christie, the GOP’s likely nominee, in the Garden State, and tough economic conditions, which are not likely to improve in the short run, are forcing Corzine to make unappealing choices.

In Virginia, the crowded race for the Democratic nomination is allowing former state Attorney General Bob McDonnell to run free and clear, and to define himself.

Six months down the road, these two state races could look very different, but right now it appears unlikely that Democrats can retain both governorships. That would give Republicans something to crow about in November, and a sweep would certainly boost the GOP mood across the country heading into 2010.

Republicans caught a break in Kansas when Obama selected Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (D) for his Cabinet. Her confirmation will virtually guarantee that Republicans will hold the open Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) in order to run for governor.

In Connecticut, local media continue to raise questions about Democratic Sen. Chris Dodd’s past financial arrangements, and former Rep. Rob Simmons (R) is now widely expected to enter the Senate race against him.

Any Senate contest in the Nutmeg State is difficult for the GOP, and Dodd is a formidable foe, even with his depressed poll numbers. Still, this Senate contest wasn’t expected to be worth watching, so Dodd’s electoral problems are a welcome windfall for Republicans.

In Florida, Gov. Charlie Crist (R) is more likely than not to jump into the Senate race.

Normally, the governor’s office in almost any state is seen as a refuge from the partisanship of Capitol Hill. But the Sunshine State faces the same fiscal problems that other states do, and the next governor will have to make unpopular decisions. That might make the Senate look relatively appealing to Crist.

In any case, Democratic recruiting for the state’s Senate race has, at least so far, not been all that intimidating, leaving Republicans feeling better about their prospects of retaining retiring Sen. Mel Martinez’s open seat.

Ohio looks to be another dogfight, but the race took an unfortunate turn for Democrats when both Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner decided to seek the Democratic nomination. The primary could enhance the chances of former Rep. Rob Portman, the likely GOP Senate nominee.

While recent developments have caused Democrats a few problems, the party has reason to feel increasingly confident about its chances of taking open Senate seats in Missouri and New Hampshire.

The prospect of a bitter GOP primary in Missouri between Rep. Roy Blunt and former state Treasurer Sarah Steelman — with the winner facing Secretary of State Robin Carnahan (D) — is making GOP strategists nervous. Blunt has the backing of most insiders, but given his years in the House leadership and the problems that his son, Matt, had as governor, the conservative Steelman’s “outsider” message of reform might resonate.

Democratic prospects in Kentucky also are bright now, as GOP efforts to ease Sen. Jim Bunning (R) out of the race have backfired. With Democrats likely to nominate either Lt. Gov. Dan Mongiardo or state Attorney General Jack Conway for the Senate contest, GOP prospects of retaining the Bunning seat are not good.

In North Carolina, state Attorney General Roy Cooper (D) seems genuinely interested in challenging Sen. Richard Burr (R). Burr should run a far better race than then-Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R) ran last cycle, and the midterm electorate should not be as favorable for Cooper as it was for now-Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.). Still, a Burr-Cooper contest would be a titanic struggle, giving Senate Democrats another serious opportunity.

Finally, the Pennsylvania Senate race looks messier each day. Conservative Pat Toomey now seems likely to repeat his 2004 primary challenge to Sen. Arlen Specter (R), and Specter’s chances of surviving this time are worse than they were six years ago, when he won renomination with 50.8 percent.

Specter’s chances for winning a primary would be improved, of course, in a multicandidate race, and conservative, anti-abortion activist Peg Luksik said last week that she’s getting into the GOP contest. Any votes she gets almost certainly would be anti-Specter voters peeled away from Toomey.


This column first appeared in Roll Call on March 16, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

New Print Edition: New Jersey Governor & Virginia Governor

The March 6, 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 this edition:


New Jersey Governor: Don’t Blame Me
By Nathan L. Gonzales

With the current economic crisis, it’s a tough time to be a governor. But New Jersey’s Jon Corzine (D) is the only incumbent facing voters this year.

In 2005, Corzine made the jump from the U.S. Senate to the governor’s mansion on the heels of scandal surrounding Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey. Now, four years later, the national and state economic situation has worsened dramatically, and the governor’s polling numbers range from mediocre to extremely vulnerable.

Most Garden State Republicans are rallying behind the candidacy of former U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie and are excited about the opportunity to knock off the governor. They’ll be looking to pin responsibility for the state’s economy onto Corzine, while Democrats will look to associate Christie with former President George W. Bush.

But considering that Corzine hasn’t even started his reelection campaign and will spend millions of dollars of his own money when he finally does, and that Republicans haven’t won statewide in New Jersey in a dozen years, Republicans might want to keep that champagne on ice before they start putting this contest into the “win” column. For the whole story, you must subscribe to the print edition of the Report.

Virginia Governor: Bucking the Trend
By Nathan L. Gonzales

If you place a great deal of emphasis on long-term historical trends, you have to figure that Republicans will be victorious later this year in their effort to take back the Virginia governorship. But recent elections prove that Democrats are on the march in the Commonwealth and could retain the governorship for a third consecutive term.

Still reeling from more losses in the 2008 elections, local Republicans have coalesced behind former Attorney General Bob McDonnell as their nominee. Meanwhile, Democrats won’t know their nominee until June 9, when the competitive Democratic primary is over. Gov. Tim Kaine (D) is prohibited from seeking a second consecutive term.

Former DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe, former state delegate Brian Moran, and state Sen. Creigh Deeds, all have viable paths to the Democratic nomination, but there is no clear frontrunner in the race.

Given the state’s proximity to the nation’s capital, this race could take on more significance as Republicans try to regain relevancy. For the whole story, you must subscribe to the print edition of the Report.


For our latest ratings on all of the 2009-2010 gubernatorial ratings, click here.

Bad News Comes Early for Senate Republicans

By Nathan L. Gonzales

The 2010 election cycle is just a couple months old, and Senate Republicans have almost equaled their number of retirements from last cycle, when their party lost eight seats. But this time around, Senators with one foot out the door appear to be making their decisions earlier, instead of keeping party strategists guessing.

Just in the last two weeks, Ohio Sen. George Voinovich (R) and Missouri Sen. Kit Bond (R) announced their decisions not seek re-election. They join Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback (R) and Florida Sen. Mel Martinez (R), who announced last year their plans to exit the chamber.

“These Senators did the right thing for the party by making their decisions early, and in each state, Republicans now have a solid bench of potential candidates who are already hard at work,” said Brian Walsh, communications director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Last cycle, then-Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.) officially announced he wouldn’t seek re-election in January 2007, more than 20 months before Election Day. But the next four Republican announcements didn’t come until much later.

Former Sens. John Warner (R-Va.) and Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) didn’t announce their retirements until September 2007. And former New Mexico Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) waited even a month later. Former Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) never officially said he wasn’t seeking re-election, but now-Sen. Jim Risch (R) launched his campaign to succeed Craig in October 2007.

Republicans lost three of the five open seats last November, only retaining control of the seats in the two most Republican states (Idaho and Nebraska).

“At a time when statewide candidates need to raise millions of dollars to run a competitive campaign, there is no getting around the fact that an extra six months to raise money, develop an organization and travel around the state provides a tremendous advantage,” Walsh said.

There is no guarantee that Republicans would have won Virginia or New Mexico last cycle if Warner and Domenici had announced earlier. An early Allard decision didn’t help the GOP effort in Colorado.

Republicans would have preferred their incumbents run for re-election. But the early retirement decisions are better than waiting in limbo, and while an early start can’t change the political environment, it does give candidates more time for critical fundraising.


This story first appeared on RollCall.com on January 16, 2009. 2009 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Democrats Try to Use McCain to Saddle GOP Candidates

By Nathan L. Gonzales

President Bush has been a mainstay in Democratic television ads for the last three years, as Democrats try to use him as an anchor to bring down Republican incumbents and candidates.

Earlier this year, GOP presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) was thought to be an asset to Republican candidates downballot. But apparently Democrats believe McCain could be a liability in some districts, as he is starting to appear in some negative advertising.

“1980. Pac-Man is the new fad and Frank Wolf goes to Congress,” an announcer says in a television ad for Wolf’s Democratic challenger, Judy Feder, in Northern Virginia’s 10th district. “Twenty eight years later, Frank Wolf supports the McCain plan to tax your health care benefits.”

“Wolf even supports risking your Social Security in the stock market. And a constitutional amendment that criminalizes abortion, just like John McCain,” the ad continues. “Judy Feder will work with Barack Obama to fix our economy and fight for affordable health care.”

Two years ago, Wolf defeated Feder, 57 percent to 41 percent. Feder spent an impressive $1.5 million last cycle, compared with $1.8 million for Wolf. This cycle, each candidate raised about $1.9 million through Oct. 15 and both are advertising in the expensive Washington, D.C., media market.

Bush won Virginia’s 10th by 11 points in 2004, but Obama s doing very well in the region.



Earlier this cycle, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee used McCain and Bush against Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.).

The television ad used similar sound bites from all three men, talking about how the fundamentals of the economy are strong. McCain makes an appearance, but the last photo shows Shays hand in hand with Bush.

Bush lost Connecticut’s 4th district by 6 points in 2004, while Shays simultaneously won re-election by 4 points. But the Democratic wave is much higher this year.

McCain is losing the district by 20 points, according to an Oct. 15-18 University of Connecticut poll for Hearst Newspapers, and by 22 points, according to an Oct. 13-14 SurveyUSA poll for Roll Call.

It’s a stunning turnaround from earlier. McCain was precisely the presidential candidate that Republicans thought would help Members such as Shays and Wolf in their more moderate districts.



This story first appeared on RollCall.com on October 29, 2008. 2008 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

RNC, GOP tweak tactics to lure conservative Democrats

By Stuart Rothenberg and Nathan L. Gonzales

(CNN) -- While many in the media are single-mindedly focused on vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's outfits, Republican efforts to brand Sen. Barack Obama a socialist and the chances that Democrats will net nine Senate seats (giving them 60 seats in the next Senate), some other interesting things are going on -- things that are being missed.

One of those is an unreported major Republican National Committee radio buy in eight key states: Colorado, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.

The buy is interesting because it includes some states expected to be in McCain's column by this time (Montana, North Carolina and West Virginia, for example), but also because of the message of the 60-second spot: gun control. Read the rest of the story on CNN.com.

Defying the Numbers, Gilmore Presses On

By Nathan L. Gonzales and John McArdle

Despite polling and fundraising numbers that show him badly trailing his Democratic opponent, former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore (R) expressed optimism Tuesday night about his chances of winning a U.S. Senate seat this fall.

“It’s turning our way,” Gilmore said on the convention floor, just before President Bush spoke to the crowd by a video link. The Republican’s opponent, former Gov. Mark Warner (D), gave the keynote address at last week’s Democratic National Convention in Denver.

“Mark revealed himself at the DNC,” said Gilmore, who is not scheduled to take the main stage in St. Paul, Minn., even though he would welcome the opportunity. “When he gave that speech, he showed he is a true-blue Democrat who is going to support [Sen. Barack] Obama.”

And that, Gilmore said, will have an impact on voters in the commonwealth.

“All this business about Obama carrying Virginia isn’t true,” Gilmore said, “[Sen. John] McCain is going to carry Virginia.”

Still, Democrats do have reason to be confident about Warner’s chances.

An August 9-10 automated poll by SurveyUSA showed Warner leading Gilmore 58 percent to 34 percent in a general election matchup. Warner also held an extraordinary cash advantage of $5.1 million to $117,000, according to June 30 Federal Election Commission reports.

Still, loyal commonwealth Republicans who have joined Gilmore in Minneapolis this week said polling and FEC numbers don’t paint the entire picture of a campaign that they said is constantly evolving.

“I think things are starting to happen,” Republican Party of Virginia Chairman Jeff Frederick said after Wednesday’s delegation breakfast.

“Gilmore’s fundraising has quadrupled in the last month,” Frederick said, and while he acknowledged that Gilmore will never be able to match Warner on a dollar-for-dollar basis — Warner is a multimillionaire, in addition to being a strong fundraiser — he said a cash influx is already helping get the word out.

“We’re going up on TV here soon,” Frederick said. And, he said, “a lot of these business groups that had decided a long time ago that they are supporting Mark Warner are starting to learn more about this guy.”

Gilmore agreed that a number of economic issues are starting to turn in his favor, including expanded domestic oil drilling and the “card check” bill, known as the Employee Free Choice Act to Democrats.

“The business community in Virginia has not noticed [card check]. Now, they’re calling me,” Gilmore said. “Mark Warner will support card check. I’ll oppose it.”

Virginia delegate Tim Hugo added that with several major tax cuts from the past decade set to expire in 2010 and 2011, the next Senator will be in an important position to help keep them from being put on the chopping block, as many leading Democrats have indicated is their preference. With that in mind, Hugo said, “the business community has now taken a second good look at Gilmore.”

But several Virginia GOP delegates acknowledged that time is on Warner’s side and that it will be up to party activists and Gilmore himself to bring the fight to Warner, rather than simply letting the Democrat sit back and run out the clock.

And in that effort, Frederick said the party has to deal with the added pressure of not getting any help from local and national media.

“The press has had this love affair with Mark Warner and have failed to do their due diligence about who this guy really is,” Frederick said.

One GOP delegate described Warner as a “rock star” who is more glitz and cash than substance. It’s a similar line of attack to the one McCain’s camp has used to turn Obama’s much-publicized popularity into a negative.

“We need to knock it into people’s heads that the press has obviously chosen their candidate and are not a reliable source for information on this race,” Frederick said.

Also in attendance on the convention floor Tuesday night were former Virginia Sen. George Allen (R), who lost re-election last cycle, and former Virginia Attorney General Jerry Kilgore (R), who lost the 2005 gubernatorial race to Tim Kaine (D).

This story first appeared in Roll Call on September 4, 2008. 2008 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

TimKaine.com Owned by Conservative Activist

Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine (D) brings a number of attractive qualities to the ticket as vice president, but Sen. Barack Obama's tech savvy campaign team will have to work to rescue a valuable URL if Kaine is chosen as the senator's running mate.

Right now, visitors to TimKaine.com are automatically redirected to the official website of Republican Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling.

As reported by the Washington Post in 2005, the domain name TimKaine.com was registered in April 2001 by Matt Chancey, a young, self-described conservative Christian activist who lived in Harrisonburg, Virginia at the time.

While there were initial fears that he would use the Web site to tarnish Kaine's image, they were laid to rest when the Chancey chose to redirect visitors to Kaine's official lieutenant governor's web page. The Web site didn't become an issue and the Kaine campaign utilized Kaine2005.org, which is no longer active.

But it appears that Chancey never updated the redirect, and so visitors to TimKaine.com are now directed to the official Web site of Republican Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling. If Kaine ends up being chosen as Obama's running mate and the pair wins the election, Bolling would succeed Kaine as governor of Virginia.

Most importantly, if Kaine is chosen, the Obama campaign will likely do everything they can to obtain the coveted URL. Chancey just lost a July 15 runoff for the GOP nomination for Public Service Commission president in Alabama.

The first draft of this item first appeared on Political Wire on July 29, 2008.

For House Races Now, It’s All a Question of Money

By Stuart Rothenberg

It’s no longer the time for mere scenarios or fundraising polling memos. Now is the time for serious candidates to show they have the fundraising energy and prowess to run top-shelf campaigns.

The latest round of fundraising numbers shows that some Congressional hopefuls have established themselves as credible candidates, while others need to find an explanation for their weak totals.

The weakest showings? How about three of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “emerging races,” all of which might be migrating to a new DCCC submerging races category?

Kentucky 2nd district hopeful David Boswell was promoted by some Democrats as a strong contender for retiring Rep. Ron Lewis’ (R) open seat. Yes, said Democrats about the Owensboro-Bowling Green district, it’s conservative, but the Democratic state Senator is a good fit for it.

Well, Boswell’s June 30 cash-on-hand total of $45,000 should end that talk. Republican nominee Brett Guthrie’s $661,000 in the bank means that, barring a total turnaround of finances, this race is over.

A few weeks ago, I wrote favorably about Kathy Dahlkemper (D), who is taking on veteran incumbent Rep. Phil English (R) in Pennsylvania’s 3rd district. Dahlkemper had plenty of time and reason to haul in cash after her April 22 primary win, but instead she raised $203,000 in the quarter and ended June with a disappointing $128,000. English had $787,000 in the bank.

Dahlkemper has some personal money, and polling suggests that she’s very much still in the race. But her fundraising numbers are disappointing.

I’ve heard a bit of a buzz recently about Democrat Steve Sarvi’s challenge to Rep. John Kline in Minnesota’s 2nd district. After seeing that Sarvi raised $147,000 in the second quarter and ended June with $98,000 in the bank, I have to figure that buzz is the winding down of the battery in the Democrat’s electric razor rather than excitement about his prospects.

Incredibly, Sarvi’s campaign is bragging about the numbers. Here’s what the candidate’s Web site said: “The campaign’s 2nd Quarter numbers represent nearly a two-and-a-half fold increase on its previous quarter and a three-fold increase on its 4th Quarter 2007 results.” Translation: The campaign’s unimpressive second-quarter numbers weren’t as bad as its pathetic first-quarter numbers and its even worse fourth-quarter of 2007 numbers.

If there was any doubt about New York’s open 25th district, the June 30 numbers should end it. Republican Dale Sweetland is his party’s likely nominee, but with an anemic campaign bank account of $108,000 against Democrat Dan Maffei’s $962,000, this seat looks comfortably Democratic.

Elsewhere, El Tinklenberg (D) in Minnesota’s 6th district showed $225,000 in the bank to Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann’s $1.3 million.

Then there is the case of Larry Kissell in North Carolina’s 8th district, who is rapidly getting the reputation of being the Democrats’ John Hostettler. Hostettler, you may remember, is the former Republican Congressman who didn’t like raising money — so he didn’t. Every two years, the National Republican Congressional Committee had to bail out Hostettler by spending its cash on his re-election. Finally, in 2006, he lost. Some Republicans were less than upset.

Kissell, who lost narrowly last time and complained that he received little support from the DCCC in 2006 (which is true), promised to raise more money this time. The DCCC showed early interest in the race, no doubt to make up for its inactivity last time. But Kissell’s fundraising this time has been stunningly inadequate. He may still win, but not because of anything he has done in fundraising.

Not all poor June 30 cash-on-hand numbers are as bad as they seem. New Jersey Republicans Chris Myers (3rd district) and Leonard Lance (7th district) have bank accounts that are scary. But they both had to spend heavily to win primaries that took place in early June, and their general election fundraising has only now begun. Give them a full quarter to see what their cash looks like.

I’ve also heard some talk that state Sen. Don Cravins Jr. (D) might give Rep. Charles Boustany (R) a fight in Louisiana’s 7th district, but Cravins just decided he wanted to run, and his $104,000 in cash on hand isn’t enough to make the Republican give a second look to the challenger quite yet.

If some candidates merit identification for their weak fundraising, others deserve attention for their strong efforts.

Rep. Mark Kirk (R) showed more than $2.8 million in the bank on June 30, and his opponent in Illinois’ 10th district, Dan Seals (D), had $1.17 million on hand. Two New Jersey Democrats running for open seats, John Adler (3rd) and Linda Stender (7th) each had more than $1.2 million in the bank.

In Florida’s 21st district, incumbent Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart (R) had more than $1.7 million on hand, while challenger Raul Martinez (D) showed more than $1 million in the bank. Washington 8th district Democratic challenger Darcy Burner had almost $1.25 million in the bank, and Virginia’s 11th district Republican Keith Fimian had $1 million on hand on June 30. And Pennsylvania Democratic Rep. Paul Kanjorski showed more than $2.1 million on hand.

Of course, these are just a few of the strong fundraisers. There are many others. But in a year where there seems to be so much money, it is the underperformers who are the real story.

This column first appeared in Roll Call on July 21, 2008. 2008 © Roll Call Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.