SC-SEN 2022: Could Joe Cunningham make this race competitive?

[Heebie Jeebie]

South Carolina is a difficult state for Democrats, but they've got to run someone for Senate and Joe Cunningham seems like a good candidate.  I'm struggling to think of any other potential quality nominees.  How well would Cunningham do against Tim Scott?  Are there better candidates Dems could turn to?

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

No, D's have a new pickup chance in FL due to Gaetz story, Grayson and CRIST can both win

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Did you see the St Pete poll, before the Gaetz story broke DeSantis was tied with Fried.

FL is always a swing state, it's an R 2 state but Rs don't have a monopoly on it, Grayson is a good candidate, Rubio was only leading by 6 in the last poll that was taken

It's wave insurance but as Ds we always think of blue waves, not close Elections, that's how we won GA

[SnowLabrador]

In order to win statewide, Democrats have to win SC-01 by double digits. In 2020, Cunningham lost SC-01. He can't. Get over it.

[Frenchrepublican]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

[VAR]

2022 freshmen (imo):

Sen. Abby Finkenauer of Iowa
Sen. Theresa Greenfield of Iowa (wins special election to replace Joni Ernst)
Sen. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin
Sen. Herschel Walker of Georgia
Sen. Joe Cunningham of South Carolina
Sen. Tim Ryan of Ohio
Sen. Larry Hogan of Maryland
Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania

Rep. David Perdue of Georgia 5 (inner Atlanta suburbs, black farmers)
Rep. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia 6 (Cherokee, Roswell, Sandy Springs)
Rep. Holly McCormack of Georgia 14 (Rome, Calhoun, Dalton)
Rep. Monica Vernon of Iowa 1 (populist Northeast Iowa)
Rep. Rita Hart of Iowa 2 (populist Southeast Iowa)
Rep. J.D. Scholten of Iowa 4 (battleground Sioux County, more populism)
Rep. John Vihstadt of Virginia 8 (Pentagon, neocon Arlington and McLean)
Rep. Laura Ingraham of Virginia 10 (Loudoun, Reston)
Rep. Carly Fiorina of Virginia 11 (East PWC, Manassas, Fairfax, Centreville)

[Frenchrepublican]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

[WD]

2022 freshmen (imo):

Sen. Abby Finkenauer of Iowa
Sen. Theresa Greenfield of Iowa (wins special election to replace Joni Ernst)
Sen. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin
Sen. Herschel Walker of Georgia
Sen. Joe Cunningham of South Carolina
Sen. Tim Ryan of Ohio
Sen. Larry Hogan of Maryland
Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania

Rep. David Perdue of Georgia 5 (inner Atlanta suburbs, black farmers)
Rep. Kelly Loeffler of Georgia 6 (Cherokee, Roswell, Sandy Springs)
Rep. Holly McCormack of Georgia 14 (Rome, Calhoun, Dalton)
Rep. Monica Vernon of Iowa 1 (populist Northeast Iowa)
Rep. Rita Hart of Iowa 2 (populist Southeast Iowa)
Rep. J.D. Scholten of Iowa 4 (battleground Sioux County, more populism)
Rep. John Vihstadt of Virginia 8 (Pentagon, neocon Arlington and McLean)
Rep. Laura Ingraham of Virginia 10 (Loudoun, Reston)
Rep. Carly Fiorina of Virginia 11 (East PWC, Manassas, Fairfax, Centreville)

Also:

Sen. Phil Scott of Vermont, wins 55-42 imo (although Biden’s approval on Election day will be 63-30)

[Heebie Jeebie]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

Note that I never suggested I think Cunningham could beat Scott.  I don't think it's productive to entertain fantasies about the electoral odds in a state like South Carolina.  At the same time, I think the quality of an underdog is important.  Making a race competitive is better than resigning to an uncontested blowout.  Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party.  From a zero-sum perspective, 2020 was a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!  And 2022 will also probably be a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!   But in some important ways I think Harrison's loss was preferable to what would have been "generic-Dem's" loss.  And that's what I'm really asking about:  Not which SC Democrat can win, but which SC Democrat would likely be the best candidate.

Alternatively, I guess we can do what you're suggesting and talk about the same four or five Senate races exclusively until election day.  Why bother showing an interest in the rest of the country if the results are already overdetermined?  Even better, let's all just stop the "unserious" stuff and roboticly report economic data and poll numbers.  What we already know is all that matters, right?

[Hope For A New Era]

If Jaime Harrison couldn't win it, no D can.

[gerritcole]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

... Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party. 

SC dems lost seats in both state house chambers, lost 1 of their 2 house seats and got blown out in the senate race. that's not building up the state party at all

[UWS]

Did you see the St Pete poll, before the Gaetz story broke DeSantis was tied with Fried.

FL is always a swing state, it's an R 2 state but Rs don't have a monopoly on it, Grayson is a good candidate, Rubio was only leading by 6 in the last poll that was taken

It's wave insurance but as Ds we always think of blue waves, not close Elections, that's how we won GA

First, FL-01 is not a statewide race and the Gates story only concerns the constituents of FL-01, so this race and the senate races are both different stories.

And Election Day is 19 months away and people won’t care about that story on Election Day.

[Tiger08]

It looks like he will run for Governor

[Tekken_Guy]

It looks like he will run for Governor

That’s a terrible idea. He’s more likely to win his house seat back than any statewide race in SC.

[UWS]

Scott won the Charleston County by 15 percentage points last time around. And that county composes an important part of SC-01 where Nancy Mace defeated Cunningham. If Cunningham can’t even win it, he can’t beat Scott.

[Frenchrepublican]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

Note that I never suggested I think Cunningham could beat Scott.  I don't think it's productive to entertain fantasies about the electoral odds in a state like South Carolina.  At the same time, I think the quality of an underdog is important.  Making a race competitive is better than resigning to an uncontested blowout.  Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party. From a zero-sum perspective, 2020 was a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!  And 2022 will also probably be a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!   But in some important ways I think Harrison's loss was preferable to what would have been "generic-Dem's" loss.  And that's what I'm really asking about:  Not which SC Democrat can win, but which SC Democrat would likely be the best candidate.

Alternatively, I guess we can do what you're suggesting and talk about the same four or five Senate races exclusively until election day.  Why bother showing an interest in the rest of the country if the results are already overdetermined?  Even better, let's all just stop the "unserious" stuff and roboticly report economic data and poll numbers.  What we already know is all that matters, right?

I hope it is a joke ?





Also, you know there is no difference between losing a race by 16 points (with Cunningham) and by 20 points, a loss is a loss, your party would be smarter to target the few states where they have a real chance of flipping the seat.

[7,052,770]

Probably not, but I don't really have a better suggestion for them. Trevor Lawrence could probably win it once he's old enough, but that won't be until 2029, and he'll probably still be playing then.

[ChiefFireWaterMike]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

Note that I never suggested I think Cunningham could beat Scott.  I don't think it's productive to entertain fantasies about the electoral odds in a state like South Carolina.  At the same time, I think the quality of an underdog is important.  Making a race competitive is better than resigning to an uncontested blowout.  Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party.  From a zero-sum perspective, 2020 was a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!  And 2022 will also probably be a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!   But in some important ways I think Harrison's loss was preferable to what would have been "generic-Dem's" loss.  And that's what I'm really asking about:  Not which SC Democrat can win, but which SC Democrat would likely be the best candidate.

Alternatively, I guess we can do what you're suggesting and talk about the same four or five Senate races exclusively until election day.  Why bother showing an interest in the rest of the country if the results are already overdetermined?  Even better, let's all just stop the "unserious" stuff and roboticly report economic data and poll numbers.  What we already know is all that matters, right?

The resources to help the state party that lost seats? How is wasting hundreds of millions worth it?

[Calthrina950]

The best Cunningham could do would be to lose to Scott by "only" 10%-the same margin that Jaime Harrison lost by to Lindsey Graham. More realistically, I think he would lose to Scott by closer to 15-20%, as Scott still has a significant amount of crossover appeal in Charleston, Greenville, and Richland Counties, and tends to do marginally better with black voters. Regardless of whether the margin is 10% or 20%, this race is Safe R.

[Born to Slay. Forced to Work.]

No.

[Stuart98]

Scott's no Lindsey Graham. The only way this race could possibly be winnable is if Scott somehow loses a primary or has a horrific scandal.

[GM Team Member and Senator WB]

No.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

Note that I never suggested I think Cunningham could beat Scott.  I don't think it's productive to entertain fantasies about the electoral odds in a state like South Carolina.  At the same time, I think the quality of an underdog is important.  Making a race competitive is better than resigning to an uncontested blowout.  Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party.  From a zero-sum perspective, 2020 was a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!  And 2022 will also probably be a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!   But in some important ways I think Harrison's loss was preferable to what would have been "generic-Dem's" loss.  And that's what I'm really asking about:  Not which SC Democrat can win, but which SC Democrat would likely be the best candidate.

Alternatively, I guess we can do what you're suggesting and talk about the same four or five Senate races exclusively until election day.  Why bother showing an interest in the rest of the country if the results are already overdetermined?  Even better, let's all just stop the "unserious" stuff and roboticly report economic data and poll numbers.  What we already know is all that matters, right?

The resources to help the state party that lost seats? How is wasting hundreds of millions worth it?

It wasn't wasted--it was a long term investment. It's not like the money was needed urgently elsewhere, since Democrats were plenty awash in cash all across the map (Cal Cunningham didn't lose because of money problems, for instance.).  Trump on the ballot juiced Republican turnout much more that a lot of people assumed it would, especially in exurban areas, and that obscures a lot of what SC Democrats accomplished in party building, but it's possible that in a different national environment those statewide efforts might produce results.

[ChiefFireWaterMike]

Seriously dude, are you going to create many other stupid/hackish posts/threads until November 2022 ?

MO/SC/IN senate races are not competitive, no matter what you want to believe. And the FL/OH/IA races are very unlikely to flip too.

At the best, if they are very lucky, democrats will be able to flip PA/WI/NC and hold all their vulnerable seats, GA/AZ/NV/NH, but that's it.

Chill out.  This is a discussion forum where we're supposed to discuss Congressional elections, so that's what I'm doing.  I'm not being "hackish" by asking people more knowledgeable than me for insight into some states' politics I know little about.  And nobody is making you read or reply to anything.  If you don't want to discuss Congressional elections, why are you even here?

It's true, the aim of this forum is to talk about elections... but in a serious way, and that's not what you are doing.

Cunningham was voted out last year in a district which leans to the left of the state as whole and democrats failed miserably in their quest to defeat Graham so it is very hard to see how this same person could defeat the far more popular Scott, especially considering that the climate is likely to be less favourable to them. SC-Sen 2022 is Safe R and this is not even debatable.

So please stop inundating the forum with unserious stuff.

Note that I never suggested I think Cunningham could beat Scott.  I don't think it's productive to entertain fantasies about the electoral odds in a state like South Carolina.  At the same time, I think the quality of an underdog is important.  Making a race competitive is better than resigning to an uncontested blowout.  Yeah, Harrison lost to Graham in 2020, but for a while there that race was interesting, and accordingly a ton of resources flowed into SC that helped build up the state party.  From a zero-sum perspective, 2020 was a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!  And 2022 will also probably be a loss for Democrats.  Obviously!   But in some important ways I think Harrison's loss was preferable to what would have been "generic-Dem's" loss.  And that's what I'm really asking about:  Not which SC Democrat can win, but which SC Democrat would likely be the best candidate.

Alternatively, I guess we can do what you're suggesting and talk about the same four or five Senate races exclusively until election day.  Why bother showing an interest in the rest of the country if the results are already overdetermined?  Even better, let's all just stop the "unserious" stuff and roboticly report economic data and poll numbers.  What we already know is all that matters, right?

The resources to help the state party that lost seats? How is wasting hundreds of millions worth it?

It wasn't wasted--it was a long term investment. It's not like the money was needed urgently elsewhere, since Democrats were plenty awash in cash all across the map (Cal Cunningham didn't lose because of money problems, for instance.).  Trump on the ballot juiced Republican turnout much more that a lot of people assumed it would, especially in exurban areas, and that obscures a lot of what SC Democrats accomplished in party building, but it's possible that in a different national environment those statewide efforts might produce results.

No, it was wasted money.