In 2020, Trump will force voters to pick a torch againIs it too soon to start thinking about the 2020 congressional cycle? Not for the Blue America team. We’re even starting to hope who our two first candidates will be to flip red seats blue. One district’s on Long Island-- yeah, we’re looking’ at you, Peter King-- and the other is deep in the heart of Tejas.Now is the beginning of recruitment time for us.
Many of the most egregious self-funders this cycle lost their primaries, like Democrats Herbert Lee (CA- $1,057,942), Alison Friedman (VA- $1,080,365), Hans Keirstead (CA- $1,080,400), David Kim (GA- $1,164,689), Jerome Segal (MD- $1,271,189), Tahir Javed (TX- $1,333,416), Sara Jacobs (CA- $2,117,987), Andy Thorburn (CA- $2,832,018) and Paul Kerr (CA- $5,912,728), as well as Republicans Troy Downing (MT- $1,100,000),
Politico: "The general consensus among Republicans is that they will lose the House, and end up in at least a five-seat minority-- that would correspond to a 28-seat loss. Senior Republicans tell us that even in a worst-case scenario, they do not expect to lose 40 seats.
How much damage is Trump doing to GOP candidates in red states like Montana?Sunday, I noted that when you examine flippable districts, the Democrats' ceiling for a net gain is 88 seats.
Trump has an historically low approval ranking among likely voters, particularly likely voters in battleground districts. (Who cares what people think of him in New York City or L.A. or in Alabama or Wyoming?) Last week's Quinnipiac poll shows him a heavy albatross around the necks of Republican candidates in swing districts.
As rumors fly that Trump will replace Sessions with Ted Cruz if Beto, who cleaned Cruz's clock in the debate Friday night, wins the Texas Senate race, Trump has shown his political tin ear once again. Every poll-- not some; all of them-- indicate that Trump is the albatross around the necks of Republican candidates from coast to coast.
Triage-- another one bites, another one bites, another one bites the dust. The NRCC, looking to toss dead-weight overboard, pulled all their remains broadcast ads for incumbent Keith Rothfus in PA-17. Under the newly drawn boundaries the district has an R+3 PVI and Obama would have lost it both times. Trump beat Hillary in those boundaries 49.4% to 46.8%. But district polling shows virtually no path to victory for incumbent Keith Rothfus, a Trump rubber-stamp and enabler at a time when it isn't viable to be a Trump rubber-stamp and enabler.
Trump loves it that the midterms are all about him and seems oblivious-- at least most of the time-- that he's going tp get the blame for the Republican apocalypse... and probably get impeached too boot. He'll finally get to truthfully boast that he's starring in a TV show with high ratings.
Mutiny by Nancy OhanianEarly in the cycle, I noticed that a reasonable theme to cover would be Trump as an albatross whose reverse coattails would pull down Republican candidates across the country-- particularly in districts with large numbers of independent covers. I asked Nancy Ohanian, the best of the political artists, what she thought about it.
