I appreciate you keeping us updated, I follow the news pretty closely but there were a couple nuggets I missed.

Not a problem, it's the beauty of technology.

And that goes as follows: The overall field of play is pretty similar to ~1 month ago. These are very tiny copy/paste updates that gloss over these races, so if there's any specific interest in a particular race feel free to ask.

• IL- Very boring race. Practically no outside money because GOP considers Kirk a goner. Duckworth's recent ads hit Kirk for his support for TPP, and for helping companies who move jobs overseas.
  
  
• WI- Boring here, too. Most GOP outside groups have not come back to the state since the NRSC and the Kochs triaged Johnson in July. One Super PAC backing Johnson did make a $500k buy that attacked Feingold at the start of the month but they're the exception; RoJo is still on his own.
  
  
• IN- Young launched a new 30-second ad, paired to a new website, that argues his opponent abandoned the state during the recession. Bayh's new ad describes how he worked with then-Senator Dick Lugar to save Indiana's auto jobs during the Great Recession, and notes how Young opposed that plan.
  
  
• PA- Lots of ads here. Mike Bloomberg's group has a spot praising Toomey for supporting background checks. Senate Majority PAC airs a clip of Toomey praising a trade agreement. Toomey's newest argues that while he fights corporate welfare, McGinty profited off the system. McGinty's newest argues Toomey voted against cloosing the "terror watch list" loophole. The League of Conservation Voters has got a $1.4 mil buy blasting Toomey for looking out for the interests of Big Oil companies.
  
  
• NH- McConnell's Super PAC announced back in June they'd spend an outrageous $15.8 here helping Ayotte, and their first ad accuses Hassan of supporting higher taxes and more spending. The NEA's $1.2 mil buy argies Ayotte has done nothing to halt the rise of student loan debt. Senate Majority PAC's been airing a similar message. The DSCC is hitting Ayotte on helping Big Oil profit from tax loopholes, while the NRSC argues that under Hassan, college tuition has spiked.
  
  
• FL- Murphy's first ad highlights Rubio's poor record in the Senate, votes against abortion, and votes to turn Medicare into a voucher program. The Kochs and other outside groups are combining to spend $5.9 mil on ads attacking Murphy's resume, and the Koch's are also spending $700k on English and Spanish-language ads that argue Murphy voted for laws that benefited his family. Murphy signed a "full term pledge," designed to show that he's committed to serving a full, 6-year term and offered Rubio the opportunity to sign the same thing, which he declined. They're now haggling over exactly how many debates they'll have.
  
  
• NV- The DCCC hits Heck for voting to defund Planned Parenthood. Senate Majority PAC attacks him over his votes on immigration and education, and draws parallels to Trump. The League of Conservation Voters argues Heck jeopardizes the state's clean energy jobs with his preference for Big Oil companies' interests. The Kochs have 4 separate political committees attacking Masto, and 3 offices in the state organizing to boost Heck. Rove's One Nation group is running a Spanish-language radio and TV ad to boost him.
  
  
• NC- The GOP's been worried about this seat slipping away from them for months, and McConnell's Super PAC made an $8.1 mil reservation that starts today. Karl Rove's group "One Nation" had previously been the only other outside group here, spending $2.5 mil to boost Burr. The Kochs signaled last week that they also plan to activate their large in-state infrastructure to try to bail out Burr, canvassing and phonebanking etc. and sending mail etc., while the Democrats just announced that they're finally ready to invest here: a $2.5 mil reservation from the DSCC.
  
  
• AZ- Kirkpatrick revived a concept ad from her successful 2014 reelection campaign, showing her wearing boots and arguing how she'll "put her foot down" in Washington and "put Arizona first." McCain got caught taking a page out of the Romney playbook: telling 2 different audiences 2 different things. His Spanish-language website selectively-highlights his work on the Gang of 8's immigration reform bill while the English-language website makes no mention of it, and emphasizes him as a champion of tougher border security.
  
  
• OH- The DSCC and Senate Majority PAC are canceling ads that were scheduled to run here from September 20th-October 10th. Strickland himself is moving $550k of his own ads from Cincinnati and Dayton markets into more base-heavy areas. Portman, the NRSC, and Republican outside groups continue to attack Strickland for the job losses that happened while he was governor, naturally with no mention of the Great Recession that causes them. Strickland's faced more negative advertising than any other candidate in the entire country (even Clinton), so you can see why he finds himself in such a difficult spot.
  
  
• MO- The NRA has parachuted into this race with a $641k buy attacking Kander. The outside group "Heartland Research" is attacking him for being a "liberal bureaucrat." Rove's group has been here since June and McConnell's Super PAC since August and Kander has held up through all of it, leading the DSCC to finally make a $1.5 mil reservation here.
  
  
• IA- Grassley's running his first negative ad in 18 years, showing how seriously he's taking his challenger. He's mixed it in with his positive ads touting wind energy and tax cuts but he's having to run a much different type of campaign this time. He's made a series of gaffes and as a result his campaign doesn't really let him do many public events, and after an interview with the Gazette went awry at the end of last month when Grassley got caught making up Senate customs that didn't exist, they promptly shoved him back in the broom closet again. He's made a large ad reservation in the Des Moines, Cedar Rapids, and Quad Cities markets covering 62 of Iowa's 99 counties, so even though he's not actually out campaigning there's going to be a significant period of time when he'll literally outspend his opponent 25:1.
  
  
• CO- The DSCC canceled the $5 mil reservation they made here back in August, showing that they're increasingly confident they can hold the seat on account of Glenn's weakness, the GOP leaving him to stand on his own, and Trump's floundering operation in the state.
  

The last few days has given a whole new meaning to the title 'the fall campaign'

The tv campaigns have been pitiful to watch, 5:1 at least ratio of Feingold to Johnson. and i fucking hate feingold, one of his dumb commercials boasts "what's my plan to defeat ISIS, (input everyone's plan to defeat ISIS)" barf....

Lol. The presidential race is getting a lot of breathless reporting right now but event-wise, it's actually been fairly boring over the past week. The press is predictably obsessing over Clinton becoming dehydrated and having pneumonia (Case in point: http://www.motherjones.com/files/blog_nyt_front_page_pneumonia_0.jpg and the two campaigns are volleying charges of "deplorable behavior" back and forth, but they're not actually moving and doing a whole lot. Trump had a rally last night where one of his supporters struck a protester and tried to attack another, yet was inexplicably allowed to still remain in the audience. Clinton has Obama on the trail today in Philadelphia. Trump will unveil a child care plan tonight and Bill Clinton will fill in for his wife at some fundraisers. The media broke the dial trying to turn the intensity up to 11, but honestly there's a lot of waiting.

Edit: Fixed link.



The product of the GOP thinking Johnson is a goner. He's certainly running a lot of ads (most of them amusingly pretending that HE'S the outsider and Feingold is the incumbent), but he's not getting much outside help at all. The only way that would change is if he started to poll better internally, because I don't think the GOP groups are coming back on their own. They're spending outrageous money in practically every other state, and can't afford not to.

This post was edited by Pollster on Sep 13 2016 11:37am

In wisconsin Johnson is the outsider, Feingold is the insider. Incumbent doesn't matter when its a 1 term senator versus a long serving senator. I've lived in Wisconsin damn near all my life, Feingold has name recognition even among those who don't follow politics, he's almost as much of an institution as Tommy Thompson Jim Doyle or Herb Kohl.

im not bothered who becomes president im just in it for the memes

Obviously I'm aware of the rationale, the problem is that it doesn't pass the smell test. An incumbent Senator can't be "an outsider." The labeling is silly in the first place and this just kicks it into overdrive. His deceit goes farther than the labeling in any event; his ads are deliberately cut to pretend that he hasn't spent the last 6 years in Congress. Johnson can at least claim that he didn't make this strategy up, because it was one that was sent out to a lot of Republicans (especially in the House) from the RNC/NRCC and there are plenty of them trying to fool voters into thinking that they haven't been serving in Congress for 2-6 years and getting absolutely nothing done there.



Well, everybody needs humor.

dude, your word salad is fucking dumb. Johnson is a single term senator who spent his life in manufacturing and came to government late. Feingold has been in and around politics for decades upon decades. Johnson is an outsider, who the fuck cares if he's been in senate for a single term? By your rationale people can only be an outside in washington until they are in Washington. Unless your suggesting that a single term in office is enough to ruin your soul, in which case i agree.

I just don't get why you have to spin everything, its pretty silly tbh. Can't even have a frank conversation about a guy who came into politics in his 60s without entering the spin zone. inb4 "obligatory thanks for the LOL its not spin its facts etc...."

P.s. if you're now shilling for Feingold too, i assume in an attempt to break congress, i've lost even more respect for anything you say.