2020 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread v2

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Matt Gaetz's Dem challenger is generating interest on liberal twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilEhr/status/1181587062715244544?s=20

This will go about as well as the #resistance's efforts against Paul Gosar in 2018.

They might even got Gaetz to only win by 30 instead of 35!!!!

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Clearly IL-06 is competitive and IL-14 is a Pure Toss-Up.

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While those of us who dislike Trump are going to find Stefanik’s transformation into a hardcore Trumpist cringeworthy and shallow, it’s (unfortunately) not a bad electoral strategy in a district that is trending Republican and went pretty strongly Republican in 2016. Republicans seem to understand better than Democrats how important base turnout is these days, and that merely being “moderate” doesn’t woo hoards of swing voters.

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I do think WI is more likely to flip than GA, but that doesn't mean GA is anywhere near safe for Trump.

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Clearly Republicans will flip FL-26 and FL-27 back while losing MN-01 and MN-08 #PartyLikeIts2004

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Sabato makes some ratings changes:

NH-SEN: Lean D -> Likely D
VA-SEN: Likely D -> Safe D

VT-GOV: Likely R -> Lean R

CA-50: Likely R -> Safe R

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MN-7 numbers are interesting to say the least

https://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1221839224539877377?s=20

Representative Fischbach. People should get used to saying it.

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I don’t have a problem with Democrats spending a bit in IA as wave insurance, but it shouldn’t be instead of GA/GA-S, especially given the way GA has been trending.

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Morning Consult
July 17-19
1991 RV
MoE: 2%

Democratic 47%
Republican 37%
Undecided 16%

https://assets.morningconsult.com/wp-uploads/2020/07/22072029/200766_crosstabs_POLITICO_RVs_v2.pdf

So much for all those chicken littles who were worried that people will vote Republican downballot to put a check on president Biden.

I mean, hopefully that won’t happen like in 2016, but it’s a little soon to rule it out. Republicans really only starting using that strategy in October.

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Here I was giving Sabato the benefit of the doubt for not changing WA-08 because of the primary, and FL-26 is a Toss-Up while ME-02 is Lean D? Junk.

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Generic ballot - Monmouth

LV
Democrat 49%
Republican 45%

RV
Democrat 49%
Republican 43%

https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/documents/monmouthpoll_us_091020.pdf/

This is terrifying.

A +3/+4 lead is right around where the House flips. Not even kidding, this is getting way less attention than it needs to get. Before the summer the Democrats often did better in the generic ballot than Biden did in the presidential, now it seems to be the opposite in most polls. I would still bet on the House remaining Democratic of course but these kinds of margins suggest the Democrats will definitely net lose seats, not gain seats like I've seen so many times on this forum. It also suggests some of these Dem internals for CDs are completely out of line with reality, as I've pointed out recently (and people have gotten upset and tried to defend the polling which suggests 10-20 point Dem trends in multiple Republican leaning districts)

While I would normally agree, I do think that Republicans are targeting the wrong seats to have a real shot at the House if the PV is D+4. They'd gain seats, yes, but the fact that they're not paying much attention to seats like PA-08 or WI-03, while going heavily after seats like CA-21, CA-39, FL-26, TX-07, etc. suggests that they're too focused on gaining back seats that are probably lost for them in the current alignment while ignoring seats that they didn't win in 2016 but that are trending their way and could be winnable. They also haven't done a great job with recruitment this cycle, with a few notable exceptions.

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Cook just made an extremely bold rating change:

https://twitter.com/JessicaTaylor/status/1308743604249268224

I dunno man, this seems really risky, are they sure that they're factoring in Gardner's Incumbency™?

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Congressional Leadership Fund is launching a $2 million ad campaign against Ron Kind (D-WI-03).

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/24/gop-super-pac-campaign-ron-kind-420897

This is some VA-10 nonsense

Yes a district Trump carried by 5 points is the same as a double digit Clinton district

Yeah, while I doubt they'll win WI-03 this year, it makes more sense for them to target seats like this than Democratic-trending seats that Clinton won by 5-10% or more, even if the House margin was closer in 2018 (which is an apples to oranges comparison anyway.)

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CA-21 (D, Cox): Lean D to Tossup

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https://twitter.com/JessicaTaylor/status/1315784494742482945?s=20

Beat me to it!

Possibilities:
Texas to Lean R
Alaska to Lean R
Maine to Lean D
North Carolina to Lean D
Michigan to Tossup (they did move Jersey to a tossup in 2018...)

I’m guessing AK, ME, and MI move.

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Republican are a "check" on Biden in the same way that starvation is a "check" on overeating.

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My God!

https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1316748664837222400?s=20

Wow, how many tractors and cows can he buy with that money?

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I have a feeling ME-02 will be the MN-07 (2018) of this cycle. Polls show pie in the sky leads for Golden, and Republicans decide to concede the race, and while Golden ends up winning, it's by a very underwhelming margin, and it ends up closer than many races Republicans invested heavily in.

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This seems a little premature, especially given IA polling (though the experts don’t ever seem to factor that in.) I’d understand making this move when he gets rid of the Toss-Up column altogether, but I definitely don’t buy IA-SEN flipping before NC-SEN, and polling doesn’t really back that up, either.

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CNN has the GCB at D+12 (54-42), literally the same as the prez race (54-42). Not many ticket splitters or "check on Biden" voters here.

Perhaps people are rightfully too scared to do this after what happened in 2016.

Yeah, while I don't deny that there are some Biden/Republican downballot voters out there, I don't think we're going to see a significant overperformance by Congressional Republicans compared to Trump in part because of this.

A lack of ticket-splitters, however, wouldn't be great news for Democrats in AK, KS, MT, or SC.

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They've also just moved both Georgia Senate races from Lean R to Toss-up.

About time.

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Sabato needs to be fired. TX 21 and 22 are long gone
Don Bacon is not winning what is likely to be Biden +11
And don't get me started on MN 01

LOL OH-01 and MN-01 before like half a dozen TX seats more likely to flip

Yeah, that's a joke. OH-01 before seats like TX-22 is bad enough, but MN-01!? I think TX-22 would go Democratic by double digits before MN-01 flips.