2020 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread v2

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Rep. Elise Stefanik’s PAC devoted to electing Republican women to the House has made its first set of endorsements-

https://mobile.twitter.com/ElizLanders/status/1186614776962732032

Interesting, most of these districts will be difficult with Trump on the ballot, with the one notable exception of Malliotakis.

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Edwards is insurance incase the GOP nominates a Roy Moore-type figure. He is, though, the exact type of Dem retread who could lose the primary to an insurgent a la Ashford.

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

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Josh Hicks announces run against Andy Barr in KY-06. He wasn't their first choice, but has the support of the DCCC.

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Democratic Topkea Mayor Michelle De La Isla considering run for KS-02

Not the strongest possible recruit for this seat, but a good one. Against Watkins this seat could be competitive if Dems build out another strong operation in Kansas.

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The guy is considered Trump's brain. And boy, does he live up to his reputation.

He's some wannabe mountain man who thinks he is Karl Rove. He's no Karl Rove.

He's not even Steve Bannon (who was a laughably bad political strategist but one of the only ones to fully understand the modern Republican base).

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The guy is considered Trump's brain. And boy, does he live up to his reputation.

He's some wannabe mountain man who thinks he is Karl Rove. He's no Karl Rove.

He's not even Steve Bannon (who was a laughably bad political strategist but one of the only ones to fully understand the modern Republican base).

He was at least good enough to win the Republicans a decent trifecta and respectable EV win despite losing convincingly at the top of the ticket.

I credit Kellyanne Conway - who is and always has been for the most part a very good strategist despite what she is now known for - with that. I trust Bannon played a role, but his disastrous strategy skills I think have only ever been on full display in the 2017 Alabama special election.

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OK. Sure. Kellyanne is probably the closest thing then to a Karl Rove the GOP has right now. I mean, maybe she is at the caliber but she lacks the entire supervillian  vibe that Rove or Cheney had. She's just kind of a shill and a jackass.

I can't fathom what her domestic life is like. I mean her husband has now started dunking her publicly at twitter.

Imagine being gullible enough to believe that. George Conaway is anti-Trump, but the idea that he and his wife are actually feuding is kinda bs tbh.

Kellyanne is incredibly good, obviously, at being whatever she needs to be. I agree she's probably the best strategist the party has right now, yet still nothing compared to Rove (and therein lies the problem for the party, essentially). Jeff Roe definitely has Rove's cunning, but notably lacks his record of success. Corry Bliss is looking like a massive bust as well.

Dems are sort of in a strategist bind as well, many of the ones who thrived in the late Bush/early Obama years have seen their stars fade (many veterans of the field were infamously blacklisted by the national party in the aftermath of 2010) and they are notoriously slower than the GOP to prop up rising stars.

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New internals from the Congressional Leadership Fund, conducted by Remington.


TX-10:
McCaul 50
Hutcheson 41
Undecided 9

PA-01:
Fitzpatrick 50
Wachspress 36
Undecided 14

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Another day of Republicans releasing polls that look bad for them. Today the Trump camp released a poll that only showed them up by 3 points in 30 seats that Trump won in 2016.

https://twitter.com/kyledcheney/status/1207017842337624066?s=20

Only 38% say less likely to reelect because of impeachment in a series of districts where...38% of voters are already voting definitely Republican?

Impeachment is not the issue Republicans think it is. If I were the pollster, I'd be advising them to unify around a popular healthcare message, pronto.

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OK-05
Agree with Horn's vote to impeach Trump? 47% approve / 49% disapprove
Horn job approval: 45/42 (+3)
Vote to re-elect Horn: 40% yes, 45% R challenger

These are actually very good #s for OK-05, so if it's playing like this in a Trump +double digit district then this is nowhere near the calamity for Dems that pundits and the media are making it out to be.

https://oklahoman.com/article/5650629/poll-shows-even-split-over-horns-votes-to-impeach-trump

I don't know this district too well, but based on these numbers it looks fairly similar to Kansas, in which a majority of voters default to Republicans but a larger than average number of those voters can be persuaded to vote for Democrats under the right circumstances. Horn can probably narrowly win here.

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Republican internal shows Republican up by 9 in IL-06:

https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1209303101594841088?s=20

LOL Likely D.

Ives is possibly the worst fit for that district.

Think there is something funky going on with this poll though- it still has dems up 48-43 on the generic ballot.

I wonder if this is one of those polls where they ask about respondents' congressional preferences first, and then ask a series of (loaded) questions before getting into the horse race. It might explain why there is such a big discrepancy. They didn't release any of their full data, so it's hard to tell.

Not necessarily loaded questions - moreso a series of positive arguments in favor of the candidates, with no potential attacks from or positive arguments for the opponent presented. Also possible they tested attacks on the opponent as well. Pollsters do this, usually early in the campaign, to test what the candidate's highest possible ceiling is. If that's what we're seeing here, incredibly bad news for Ives.

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National security specialist Roger Polack announces run for WI-01 as Democrat

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In other news, we have a poll out of IA-01 showing Finkenauer up 4.
https://twitter.com/Politics_Polls/status/1225887074798252037?s=20

Has Biden down by 3 in a matchup, and general the memo looks like an R internal (they "message tested")

It would be something if Finkenauer won reelection at the same Trump is carrying her district. What would explain the motivations of any voter who would split their ticket between Trump and a House Democrat, especially after impeachment?

Its a very interesting phenomenon we're currently seeing in a lot of our polling. The 2018 freshmen class, especially the women, appear to have created unique bonds with the electorate, and many of them maintain a lot of personal popularity due to fond memories of their 2018 campaigns.

This can probably only help so much in the bigger, double-digit Trump 2016 districts that Dems are defending, but is a major boon for the Finkenauer's/Slotkin's/Porter's/Underwood's/Spanberger's of the world.

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Interesting piece on AR-02, which was just added to the red-to-blue list.

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Interesting piece on AR-02, which was just added to the red-to-blue list.

It was on the list in 2018, and they triaged it and dismissed it in like the fall and the Democrats had like 45% in there in 2018.

The piece addresses this, and explains why the trends are favorable. Learned quite a bit, myself, actually.

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Steve Watkins had a very poor fundraising quarter.

His likely Dem opponent outraised him, and his primary challenger has more COH.

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Steve Watkins had a very poor fundraising quarter.

His likely Dem opponent outraised him, and his primary challenger has more COH.

Why is LaTurner's fundraising so pathetic? The guy was supposed to be a senate contender.

He was recruited into this race essentially to help stop Kobach in the Senate race, and to have a viable alternative in case Watkins implodes further as well. Possible the party is abandoning him now that they've gotten what they needed from him.

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Dave Schweikert is burning campaign money on legal fees and is quickly accumulating debt.

Hiral Tipirneni outraised him as well, and has a huge COH lead.

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Steve Watkins had a very poor fundraising quarter.

His likely Dem opponent outraised him, and his primary challenger has more COH.

Why is LaTurner's fundraising so pathetic? The guy was supposed to be a senate contender.

He was recruited into this race essentially to help stop Kobach in the Senate race, and to have a viable alternative in case Watkins implodes further as well. Possible the party is abandoning him now that they've gotten what they needed from him.

That's a really scummy thing to do and will destroy their credibility. Then again looking how Virginia Republicans managed to become irrelevant in less than a decade...

Certainly scummy, but La Turner is young, already holds a statewide office that he doesn't have to give up by running this cycle, and is now viewed as a reliable team player. And given the sizable COH lead he's got plus Watkins' consistent legal troubles, it's not even a given that he'll lose.

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Monmouth:

https://www.insidernj.com/monmouth-poll-competitive-house-races-nj-districts-2-3-5-7-11/?fbclid=IwAR0_MG4LnKRLuGTN_f6k8mv3c7yNuD4pt7O29A07NeKXid0zVuSiqwE-DHY

Republicans are winning the aggregate ballot in NJ-02, NJ-03, NJ-05, NJ-07 and NJ-11 by 46-45. At this point in 2018, Democrats were leading 49-42. Wonder how much of the swing is from NJ-02 alone.

A lot is probably coming from NJ-11 as well, where generic R is probably still quite competitive with if not outright leading generic D. Of course, Sherrill is not generic D and is favored in the race.

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King up by 7 points (41% to 34%) in a Feenstra internal.

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NM-02 is quietly having one of the most explosive primaries of the cycle.

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https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/11/pelosi-super-pac-fall-ad-buys-248431

The House Majority PAC (D, Pelosi-aligned) is adding a second round of ad buys this fall (their first round of spending can be viewed here). This is the breakdown by market:

Spending Breakdown by Market:
Los Angeles: $3.25 million
New York City: $3.1 million
Las Vegas: $1 million
Binghamton, N.Y: $930,000
Albuquerque, N.M.: $920,000
Salt Lake City: $900,000
Atlanta: $860,000
Detroit: $775,000
Syracuse, N.Y: $730,000
Oklahoma City: $725,000
Fresno, Calif.: $675,000
Charleston, S.C.: $630,000
Champaign, Ill.: $510,000
Savannah, Ga.: $480,000
Bakersfield, Calif.: $410,000
El Paso, Texas: $350,000
Utica, N.Y.: $310,000
Pittsburgh: $300,000
Miami: $250,000
Philadelphia: $200,000
Odessa, Texas: $200,000
St. Louis: $165,000
La Crosse, Wis.: $120,000
Lansing, Mich.: $115,000
Phoenix: $100,000
Portland, Maine: $70,000
Bangor, Maine: $50,000
Presque Isle, Maine: $17,000

The Savannah buy seems quite large and disproportionate to the amount of SC-01 that is in it. I think we'll probably see that buy get scaled back, as I highly doubt they're targeting Carter or Allen.

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Dems are buying ads in Savannah but not Indianapolis?  WTF?

Why would you be surprised by prioritizing SC-1 over IN-5?

Didn't know that Savannah was in the SC-01 media market.  I thought they were trying to target an obscure Georgia seat.  Disregard then.

I was actually somewhat mistaken when I predicted this buy would be rolled back. Only Beaufort County in the district is in the Savannah market, and it was 54-46 Arrington in 2018 (was 55-41 Trump). Definitely an area where Dems seem to be slowly making gains and where Cunningham can improve.