Dave Weigel and Michael Scherer hyave a pretty good overview of candidate recruitment and big races at the Post. By the numbers, and in the details of the candidates, it is good news for Democrats:
[…]The surge is most apparent in contests for the House of Representatives, where, through the end of September, 455 Democratic challengers had already registered with the Federal Election Commission — more than twice as many than at any other point in the last 15 years, according to an analysis by the Campaign Finance Institute. By comparison, only 111 Republican challengers had filed to raise money.
[…] In New York’s 19th District, a competitive slice of the Hudson Valley held by Rep. John Faso (R-N.Y.), six Democrats are running, including two graduates of Harvard Law School, an Iraq War veteran who graduated from Georgetown and the U.S. Military Academy, a former CIA officer who became a schoolteacher, and a wealthy businessman who has loaned his campaign $500,000.Three of them boast of supporting Medicare for All on their campaign websites; two have raised more money than the incumbent.
Because this piece is in the “Power Post” savvy section, they do try to make it look like the Democratic establishment is concerned, mentioning at least one race (Illinois Governor) where a big money Democrat (Pritzker) was unable to clear the field. But, try as they might, there’s no disguising the fact that Democrats have a bunch of good candidates in the primaries who are fairly well aligned on a set of popular policies.
The real story here is the Republican primary shitshow, where Republican MAGAts are threatening to Roy Moore all over themselves. Here are a couple of examples:
A prime Senate pickup opportunity in Indiana, meanwhile, has turned into a Republican brawl, with the campaigns of Reps. Luke Messer and Todd Rokita exchanging epithets such as “unhinged,” attacks on the lucrative municipal legal consulting contract of one candidate’s wife, and mocking jabs over an eight-page memo with instructions about how to chauffeur the other candidate around the district, with tips about black coffee and avoiding “sudden acceleration.”
[…] In Florida, Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) won Trump’s backing in a gubernatorial primary against Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam. A race that Republicans hoped could serve as a coronation for Putnam has been scrambled as Las Vegas Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, hedge fund heiress Rebekah Mercer and Wyoming investor Foster Friess piled in behind DeSantis.
I can’t imagine that a candidate backed by that trio of rich idiots could be anything but hopeless.
One thing that isn’t mentioned in the piece is that some of the less viable primary challengers in these Democratic races could drop out and run for state or local offices, where we need good candidates to clean up the messes made by Republicans over the last couple of decades.
Baud
Excellent news, MM. Thanks.
ETA: ESMM.
MattF
I’d like to see Dems use the fact that one of Moore’s victims saw her house burn down. It’s bad enough that Moore is a thug in the guise of a Christian– the real scandal is that they all are.
mai naem mobile
I would think with all the Puerto Ricans moving to Florida, it would be a prime Democratic pick up. I know Betty Cracker has said the FL Dem Party is fucked up but jeezus there’s no South Fl Congressional Dem or pol that can run for governor? Especially a Puerto Rican.
rikyrah
Every Republican from a high tax state should be targeted for extinction,because of the GOP Tax Scam
Kay
I hope we get timely reporting on whether there’s Russia propaganda interference, unlike in 2016, where it occurred in congressional races but was not reported until after the election. It’s useless to voters after the election. It should have been reported. The Democratic candidates knew it was going on. Maybe they need to hold a joint press conference this time.
Voters have been given next to no information about this. Whatever the effects- large or small- shouldn’t VOTERS be told? How are they supposed to resist this if they are told nothing about it? Why would I accept these blanker assurances that election systems themselves weren’t breached? I have been given NO information to base that on.
The Senate investigation says elections in areas where there were clashes between police and police brutality protesters were specifically targeted. By whom? On behalf of which candidates? What does “targeted” mean?
Two years later we know absolutely nothing actionable or useful or specific. A billion dollar political reporting industry, 2 congressional committees and we have been told NOTHING. I don’t know what’s propaganda and what’s not. For all I know they are inciting conflicts in order to exploit them.
germy
Kay
@rikyrah:
I wonder how many rock-ribbed Republicans where I live got the same email I got from the accountant- that I should pre-pay taxes before Trump’s back-door tax increase goes in. It isn’t just “high tax” states. Ohio doesn’t have particularly high state and local taxes. It doesn’t take huge wealth to add it up and get to 10k. The median income in this county is 32k, and I’m not even in the top 10%, although I’m probably top 20%. Top 20% is 1600 voters here and they are VOTERS. Not non-voters. My precinct has 85% turnout. It’s the highest in the county.
Nicole
Thanks for highlighting this, ESMM. I’ve been thinking about the pendulum of politics, and how, over the past 40 years, the GOP stealthily took over state and local governments and that now, we are at the beginning, I hope, of a swing back, and it has to start at the local level. It makes me hopeful for the future.
Putting my tinfoil hat on, for a moment, I am also heartened by the thought that, even if the Russians are interfering in elections the way I fear they are (again, please note tinfoil hat seated at a jaunty angle on my head), they can’t manage to screw with that many elections. Our system is too disorganized. And local decisions have a bigger impact on people’s day-to-day lives.
Also, as a horseracing fan, I appreciate the meme circulating the intertoobz today- a picture of Bob Baffert (trainer of American Pharoah) with “Stable Genius” below it. Heh.
Nicole
@Kay: Thank you, Kay. Maybe my tinfoil hat isn’t quite as tinfoily as I keep getting told it is.
I just watched The American Experience episode from some years back on Truman. The section on him and Stalin was pretty interesting. A reminder that, to borrow from Charlie Pierce, Trump and his cabal are a bunch of minnows swimming in a tank full of sharks.
Another Scott
Laura Moser has a good story to tell, too:
She’s running for the Texas 7 congressional seat. More at her site.
(Via Cole’s Twitter feed)
Cheers,
Scott.
mai naem mobile
@Kay: Personally i think the Russian thing is too complicated for non political junkie Americans. I don’t know if the money laundering stuff is going to make enough of an impact on people because i think it kind of falls into an ‘all rich people do skeezy stuff to get rich.’ If there’s any solid evidence of the Russians actually messing around with voting machines then it’s a whole different ballgame. I think youre more likely to have people wh are going to get tired of Dolt45s train wreck administration and his garbage tweets.
Kay
@Nicole:
It isn’t at all “tinfoilly” to be told that there was interference in congressional elections the December after the interference occurred and then to get NO information for a year after the revelation, except “don’t worry about it”.
I’m not “worried about it”. I want some real information. I’m not in a position to collect it myself. Maybe someone who is could see their way clear to telling us what happened? WTF? Voters are going to be the last to know, again?
I want real information on exactly what happened in the 21 states where election systems were targeted. I’m not 6 years old. I don’t require protection from this information. What happened? WTF is the point of congressional investigations if we hear no testimony and transcripts are never released? Why bother holding hearings at all? Who is being protected here? Not me. Not voters. Mueller has to conduct his investigation under wraps because it is a criminal investigation – what’s the excuse for the secrecy around all the other investigations?
We didn’t know Trump was under criminal investigation the day of the 2016 election. We should have been told that. We were told it in Clinton’s case. I have NOTHING to go on, except the assurances of the same people who DIDN’T report the interference in 2016.
Betty Cracker
I wish Trump, Mercer, Freiss, etc., much success as they try to muck things up for Republican gubernatorial candidate Adam Putnam here in FL. Godspeed, assholes!
Kay
@mai naem mobile:
It pisses me off that the entire focus of the Russian investigation is politicians and reporters. What about VOTERS? The participants in these elections don’t need to know anything? Our entire focus is on the legitimacy and reputations of the political classes? It enrages me. This should be PUBLIC information. We need it. If we ignore it than that’s our choice but we don’t even GET information. This isn’t a hard question. “What happened?” They can’t and haven’t answered that question.
If we have the 2018 elections and then in December it’s reported that there was again interference, what then? Is there some point where we’re given information at a time it’s actually useful to us?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
We were, in fact, told pretty much the opposite
Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia.
Kay
I think Sherrod’s race will be different this time because he came in a D wave year and was re-elected in ’12, where he ran a “coordinated” campaign with Obama and those two were a good pair. I canvassed for both at the same time and the (white) Obama voters are also the Sherrod voters, so it was a good team to have at the top of the ticket.
People are amazingly disconnected. In 2012 I was canvassing not just registered Democrats but small Democratic Obama DONORS in a very nice neighborhood and more than a few of them didn’t know Sherrod was their senator. People are going to have to work harder at this self-government thing. They’re really fucking lazy.
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Right. I was screaming about that at the time because it was so CLEARLY planted, and the NYTimes reporting the following month contradicted it.
The infamous NY FBI agents. Pissed off that Obama made them follow due process in policing black people. Boo fucking hoo- he made them follow the law. Blue lives matter! Cry babies.
Matt McIrvin
I heard the Republicans are going hard to unseat Senator Tammy Baldwin in Wisconsin. Sounds like that’s their biggest money focus.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: And Trump specifically got votes by touting that Clinton was under FBI investigation and he wasn’t.
marcopolo
@Another Scott: She’s one of the Dem candidates I’ve already dropped some money on this year. Think her district is R+7 so doable in a wave with a good candidate and she appears to be the later.
The most interesting thing from that piece is that those were the numbers as of September 30 last year. I’d like to believe that they have only gone up since then. Not that anyone is still reading this thread, but for BJers in blue America, already represented by Democrats go to Swing Left, put in your ZIP code and find out where nearby you can help elect a Dem to Congress. I will be working next door in MO-2 and across the river in IL-12 this fall.
TriassicSands
That sounds like too much potential in one district. I didn’t include the businessman because wealthy business types are not my favorite candidates — see President of the United States.
marcopolo
@Kay: This may sound odd, but as of 2018 I’ve started gently reminding all my friends to put aside an hour or two each week to “be citizens.” It isn’t something our current society or culture promotes much. I actually put on my 2018 goals list to attend two school board meetings and two city council meetings this year. I don’t have kids and haven’t done the former since I was on a school bond committee back in 2009, and I haven’t done the later in a couple years since our local politics has been as insane as what goes on in DC since 2012 but over much much lower stakes. And I am very politically informed and involved. My friends tend to get all their political information from watching Trevor Noah and Stephen Colbert.
Doug R
@mai naem mobile:
Russians hacked several state voting websites. You don’t have to hack machines if you hack the totals, especially if there is no paper trail.
“It’s not important who votes. It’s important who COUNTS the votes”: Joseph Stalin.
Nicole
@Kay:
Because I can’t bear to watch televised news anymore (too aware of biases on the part of the people feeding it to me), I keep documentaries about American history going in the background while I work. Again and again, I relearn that the government hides information they fear will rile up the American people, or threaten the legitimacy of government. I think the refusal to address Russian ratfucking is part of that- what happens if elections are revealed to be illegitimate?
Of course, there have always been stolen elections (as the American Experience episode on Truman reminded me- he owed his first Senate win to Pendergast and a stuffed ballot box), but I think there is real terror about what happens if it’s revealed 2016 had a lot of illegitimate results. But by kicking it down the road, they’re making it so, so much worse.
Yarrow
@germy: All 36 congressional districts in Texas have a Dem challenger for the first time in something like 25 years. Some have several Dems who have declared and there will have to be primaries. This is a big change.
marcopolo
@Doug R: I think it is less hacking totals at the end of the process. It is more, you don’t have to hack the machines if you just screw around with people’s voter files so that when they actually show up to vote they aren’t listed and cannot. And because of big data (and our use of credit cards, Facebook, google, etc… there is pretty good information out there about for whom folks will probably vote between two candidates/parties.
Another Scott
@Doug R: You don’t have to mess with the totals (which can, after all, be checked) if you mess with the voter rolls.
Cheers,
Scott.
Vhh
@Kay: And the NYC crime rated continues downward even after stop and frisk is ended. De Blasio no longer can be attack as soft on crime. Looks like GOP courting extinction in another blue state, the California effect.
HypersphericalCow
In Illinois, Governor Bruce Rauner (R) is toast, regardless of who runs against him. He actually spoke out against the tax bill a few days ago (mostly about the SALT deductions), which only shows how desperate he is.