So far, there are 10 districts slated to be open seats because the member is running for higher office or retiring in 2014. Either President Barack Obama or Mitt Romney won all of them with at least 55 percent last year.

On Election Day in 2012, eight of the 68 most competitive House seats were open — not counting another half-dozen open seats that were newly created during the redistricting process.

There is more than enough time for Members to announce their retirement or decide to run for another office, but there is very little chance there will be as many competitive open seats as last cycle.

Of the current open seats, President Obama did well in Hawaii’s 1st (70 percent), Iowa’s 1st (56 percent), Michigan’s 14th (81 percent) and Pennsylvania’s 13th (66 percent). Romney swept Georgia’s 1st (56 percent), 10th (63 percent) and 11th (67 percent) districts as well as Louisiana’s 6th (66 percent), Minnesota’s 6th (57 percent) and West Virginia’s 2nd (60 percent).

Since Rep. Michele Bachmann’s retirement made her Minnesota seat safe for Republicans, just one of the 49 races listed as competitive by The Rothenberg Political Report/Roll Call is an open seat.

The immediate future for competitive open seats isn’t much brighter.

Obama nominated Melvin Watt to a post in his administration, but North Carolina’s 12th went for the president with a mere 79 percent. And if Democrat Edward J. Markey is elected to the Senate from Massachusetts at the end of the month, as he is expected to, his district went 66 percent for Obama.

Rep. Jo Bonner, R-Ala., is expected to resign in August, but he would leave behind a 62 percent Romney district. And if Rep. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., runs for the Senate, his district went for the former Massachusetts governor with almost 62 percent as well.

The lack of competitive open seats is one reason why House turnover could be relatively low in 2014 — and why Democrats are underdogs to win back the majority next year.

Democrats started the cycle hoping that Florida Reps. C.W. Bill Young (50 percent Obama district) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (53 percent Obama district) would retire, and Michigan Rep. Mike Rogers (51 percent Romney district) would run for the Senate. But Rogers just announced that he won’t give up his House seat, and Ros-Lehtinen has made it clear that she will seek re-election next year. Young has not announced his plans, but GOP strategists believe he will seek a 23rd term next year.

Republicans had hoped Rep. John Barrow, D-Ga., would jump into an open seat Senate race, figuring that his 12th District (55 percent Romney district) would have been a likely Republican takeover. But he decided against a statewide bid. Now, House Democratic strategists hope Rep. Collin C. Peterson, D-Minn., is angry enough with GOP attempts to pressure him into retirement that he runs for another term. Romney won his district with 54 percent.

The most (and maybe only) competitive open seat could be in Maine’s 2nd District. On Thursday, Rep. Michael H. Michaud announced an exploratory committee for governor. If he follows through with a statewide bid, he would leave behind a seat that Obama won twice, but with 53 percent and 54 percent, and John Kerry won with 52 percent in 2004.

It looks like time for strategists on both sides to dust off their copies of How to Defeat an Incumbent.

In 2012, Democrat Joe Garcia defeated incumbent David Rivera in the 26th District, in large part because the Republican congressman was dogged by ethical questions about his time in the state legislature, as well as his alleged role in meddling in last year’s Democratic primary.

Garcia won handily with 54 percent and didn’t look to be particularly vulnerable for re-election next year – until he started to face his own troubles.

The Congressman recently dismissed his chief of staff, Jeffrey Garcia (no relation), for concocting a phony absentee ballot scam during the same primary last year. In addition, Joe Garcia’s communications director was placed on unpaid administrative leave as the investigation continues.

President Barack Obama won the south Florida-based 26th District with 53 percent in 2012, but he lost it narrowly in 2008, and President George W. Bush won it with almost 55 percent in 2004. Republicans have an opportunity to defeat Garcia with a strong challenger.

Miami-Dade School Board Member Carlos Curbelo and former Miami-Dade City Commission Chair/mayoral candidate Joe Martinez look like the initial frontrunners on the Republican side. Other potential candidates include state Rep. Jose Felix Diaz, Cutler Bay Mayor Ed MacDougall, and former state Senate candidate John Couriel. Former state House Majority Leader Carlos Lopez-Cantera is mentioned but unlikely to give up his position as Property Appraiser of Miami-Dade County to run.

The Rothenberg Political Report currently rates the race as Toss-Up/Tilt Democrat.

Further north in the 9th District, U.S. Navy Veteran Jorge Bonilla (R) is challenging incumbent Rep. Alan Grayson and announced his candidacy in videos in English, as well as in Spanish.

The Democratic Congressman is regarded as one of the most polarizing members of Congress, but he now represents a Democratic district, which makes it difficult for any Republican candidate to defeat him.

Bonilla is the son of Puerto Rican immigrants, enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves and served on active duty with the U.S. Navy until 1993. Subsequently, Bonilla worked in “different fields such as retail, financial services, and mortgage banking.” His bio also lists his work as a professional court interpreter and a writer for The Shark Tank, a Florida-based conservative blog and Politics in Stereo contributor.

The partisanship of the 9th District will be a challenge for Bonilla, since President Obama won the district with 62 percent of the vote in 2012. But fundraising will be another key hurdle. The district is covered by the expensive Orlando media market, so candidates have to raise substantial money for television ads. Grayson spent over $5 million on his race in 2012. It can be very difficult for a first-time candidate such as Bonilla to raise millions of dollars for a campaign.

Grayson won his race last year with 63 percent but focused his effort on the Republican primary. Grayson and outside Democratic groups spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on television ads and mailers attacking Osceola County Commissioner John Quinones in order to make sure he didn’t make it to the general election.

Quinones, who also served in the Florida House, was regarded as the strongest challenger to Grayson in the Orlando-based district, which has a growing Puerto Rican population. Quinones lost the primary, and the Democrat defeated Todd Long in the general election.

Bonilla doesn’t start the race with the same reputation as Quinones, and The Rothenberg Political Report rates the 9th District race as Currently Safe for the Democrats.

Two Hispanic members of Congress in Florida, Republicans Mario Diaz-Balart and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, appear to be in good position for re-election at this stage in the election cycle.

Democratic strategists are waiting for Ros-Lehtinen to retire, since Obama won her 27th District with 53 percent, but the congresswoman has indicated she will run again next year. President Obama won Diaz-Balart’s 25th District with 51 percent, but there is no talk of Democrats trying to defeat him.
 

Elizabeth Colbert Busch’s underwhelming showing in a South Carolina special election showed how difficult it will be to pry GOP voters away from their party’s nominees (even damaged ones), and recent controversies that have engulfed the Administration and/or the federal government have put the president and his party more on the defensive than they have been since 2010.

None of this means that 2014 automatically will be…

This is paid content. Subscribers can read the full article on the website.

Former American Spectator senior editor Quin Hillyer (who has support from Rick Santorum), businessman Dean Young (who has support from 10 Commandments judge Roy Moore), state Rep. Chad Fincher and former school board candidate/Realtor Jessica James of Mobile are in the GOP contest, while…

This is paid content. Subscribers can read the full article on the website.

This is paid content. Subscribers can read the full article on the website.

OR 5 (Schrader, D). Republicans are looking for a candidate against Kurt Schrader, who received just 53 percent of the vote against an underfunded candidate in a race…

This is paid content. Subscribers can read the full article on the website.

Conservatives outside of Congress — including Heritage Action for America, the Club for Growth, Phyllis Schlafly, L. Brent Bozell, the Tea Party Express, Morton Blackwell, Richard Viguerie, Citizens United and the Traditional Values Coalition — have signed a letter in support of a rule that would bind the House Republican Conference to bring legislation to the floor only if a majority of House Republicans support it (the so-called Hastert Rule).

The effort is simply the latest attempt by elements of the right to emasculate Speaker John A. Boehner and his colleagues in the House leadership.

Unable to defeat him in his bid for another term as speaker after the 2012 elections, some conservatives are seeking to do whatever they can to undermine him. Apparently, they figure it would make their party stronger and more politically in tune with voters, even though all evidence is to the contrary.

Boehner and his lieutenants have “violated” the Hastert Rule (which isn’t a formal rule at all) only a handful of times, primarily on issues where party bomb-throwers were digging themselves — and the entire GOP — into a deep hole (e.g., aid after Superstorm Sandy and the Violence Against Women Act).

But not always. The most recent “violation” was on a vote concerning “the acquisition and protection of nationally significant battlefields and associated sites of the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 under the American Battlefield Protection Program.”

In most recent sessions of Congress, somewhere between a couple and a handful of motions have passed the House without the support of a majority of the majority (see a list here), so it isn’t as if Boehner is doing anything all that different from what has been done over the past decade.

But conservatives who want to straitjacket Boehner don’t care about that. They just want to flex their muscles — muscles that are not as big as they think are. Some of the individuals and outside groups calling on House Republicans to institutionalize the so-called Hastert Rule have influence, but many have been kicking around the conservative movement for decades without having much impact at all.

Boehner is plenty smart. He knows that he can’t get too far out front of his members, so he doesn’t push much legislation forward without a majority of his caucus unless he knows that it is vital for his party’s long-term health to do so. He has learned the limits of leadership in the current political environment.

Sometimes, even House Republicans who oppose a measure are quite content to have Boehner use Democrats to pass it. The fiscal cliff deal is a good example. More than a few House Republicans knew that while they couldn’t support the measure for their own political reasons, it was important for their party that the bill passed.

On immigration, Boehner wants to rally Republicans around a House measure and then go to conference with the Senate, rather than trying to jam a Senate immigration measure down House Republicans’ throats, which wouldn’t work.

Luckily for the GOP, Boehner has a pretty good idea of what is good for his party and what is not so good. He is politically savvy. And luckily for national Republican strategists, the move to limit Boehner’s freedom looks like yet more conservative posturing rather than a serious threat to his leadership. 

Rauner released two television ads on Tuesday in his bid to become the next governor in the Prairie State. In “Back to Work,” the wealthy venture capitalist dons a barn jacket and declares, “I’m a citizen, not a politician.”

But Rauner is just the latest politician to deploy the barn jacket as a campaign fashion accessory in an effort to appeal to the common folk. As candidates budget their multimillion-dollar campaigns, $95 on a Men’s Sandstone Chore Coat by Carhartt may be the best investment they will ever make.

Former Sen. Scott P. Brown, R-Mass., may have the most famous use of the jacket during his 2010 special-election victory to take over the late-Sen. Ted Kennedy’s seat. Brown’s adviser even suggested that the jacket hang in the Smithsonian next to the Spirit of St. Louis.

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Michael Bennet of Colorado used the barn jacket successfully in his initial run in 2010 after he was appointed.

For other candidates, the jacket hasn’t provide the insulation they needed from other attacks.

In 2004, Sen. John Kerry wore a barn jacket while hunting in his failed presidential bid. And in 2008, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin wore the female version, but it wasn’t enough to make independent voters warm up to the GOP ticket.

In late 2011, Texas Gov. Rick Perry unleashed the barn jacket on potential Iowa caucus-goers. He finished fifth with 10 percent.

In 2010, the barn jacket wasn’t enough to get Republican Buz Mills to the gubernatorial primary in Arizona.

Rounds is the front-runner for the GOP nomination. He’s also the only Republican running for Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson’s open seat.

But some Republicans in Washington, D.C., doubt Rounds’ conservative credentials. And some Republicans in the Mount Rushmore State have never viewed him as a political heavyweight, after he squeaked through his initial gubernatorial primary.

The Democratic scenario to hold this seat seems to rely on a three-pronged scenario: a messy Republican primary, an unelectable GOP nominee and a quality Democratic candidate. But it’s possible that none of those scenarios comes to fruition.

At-Large Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., was immediately and consistently mentioned as the anti-Rounds because it was assume that she was acceptably conservative, because she was elected in 2010. But Club for Growth spokesman Barney Keller threw some cold water on her hypothetical candidacy.

“Neither Mike Rounds nor Kristi Noem are fiscal conservatives, and the Club for Growth PAC will not support either candidate,” Keller said. “We are watching South Dakota’s Senate race to see if a pro-growth candidate emerges.”

Senate Conservatives Fund’s Matt Hoskins sang out of the same hymnal.

“Mike Rounds has a very liberal record and he doesn’t represent the values of most South Dakotans,” Hoskins told CQ Roll Call. “Our grass-roots members in the state have asked us to help them find a conservative alternative, and that’s what we’re working to do.

“We’ve looked at Kristi Noem’s record but, unfortunately, we won’t be able to support her if she decides to run. Her votes to raise the debt limit and to increase taxes as part of the fiscal cliff deal make it all but impossible for our members to back her campaign,” added Hoskins, who said Noem’s vote for the farm bill was the final straw.

That doesn’t mean she couldn't win, particularly because she remains popular in the state. But she announced on Tuesday that she would seek re-election and pass on a Senate race.

One potential candidate, Dr. Annette Bosworth, emerged last week when South Dakota War College, a conservative blog in the state, noticed some unusual online activity. But her clumsy rollout strategy (which apparently involved her intern changing her Wikipedia page) demonstrates that she might not be the dream candidate conservatives are looking for (via South Dakota Politics in Stereo).

“Annette Bosworth is a complete unknown. She’s coming off the bleachers and running as an outsider with no infrastructure,” Hoskins said. “She has a very steep hill to climb, but voters are looking for new faces and stranger things have happened.” Bosworth has yet to meet with officials at the Club for Growth or the Senate Conservatives Fund.

According to SDWC, state Rep. Stace Nelson has deferred to another conservative potentially in the race: former state Rep. Mark Venner. The blog found that someone registered VennerforSenate.com on May 28. Other candidates could still surface.

Meanwhile, Rounds is raising money and building his campaign team. His first quarter fundraising ($183,000 raised) and March 31 total ($369,000 in cash on hand) might be good by South Dakota standards, but those figures are slightly underwhelming for a former governor in an open seat Senate race.

Even though Rounds will have at least a six month head-start on a potential opponent, his detractors are encouraged by the fact that television advertising in South Dakota is cheap. And Sen. Ted Cruz’s GOP nomination in Texas last year against a wealthy establishment candidate in a very expensive state provides inspiration for conservatives.

But Cruz started his campaign earlier (in January 2011) and had the advantage of a runoff. Cruz finished second, 44 percent to 34 percent, in the initial May 29 primary and prevailed, 57 percent to 43 percent, in the July 31 runoff. The 2014 GOP primary in South Dakota is likely to be held next June.

It looks like Democrats won’t have a primary but could be left with former House candidate Rick Weiland, who has the support of former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle but who Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said was “not my choice.”

The Rothenberg Political Report currently rates the race as Lean Republican.
 

The answer depends, in part, on your (political) point of view. But it’s also true that every bit of good news — rising home prices, rising stock prices and an increase in federal tax revenues that improves Medicare’s short-term outlook — seems to be followed by a warning, a disappointment or tragedy, some of them weather-related, that brings gloom and doom.

The U.S. economy is expanding, but at a disappointingly slow pace. Jobs are being created, but not enough to make a real dent in the nation’s unemployment and underemployment rates.

The Obama health care plan is about to kick into high gear, but polls suggest that the public isn’t enamored with it. Republicans believe that dissatisfaction with the plan will fuel anger toward the president and his party as the months roll by.

Everyone seems to agree that we need an immigration policy rewrite, and a comprehensive bill with at least some bipartisan support looked likely to come out of the Senate. But the road looks rockier today than it did a couple of months ago, and the outlook in the House remains iffy.

Republicans have the Obama administration on the defensive over the IRS and Associated Press controversies, but their party has not been able to rebrand itself in any meaningful way.

And while the president hasn’t been hurt by the controversies (scandals, if you prefer) that have hit his administration and the front pages of the nation’s newspapers, the combination of high levels of distrust of important institutions, pessimism about the future and Republican control of the House after the midterm elections seem to preclude truly successful final years for the Obama presidency.

We’ve gone through periods of anger, fear, sadness and even hopefulness over the past five or six years. But more than anything else, the country seems to be in a national funk. Economic catastrophe isn’t lurking around the corner, but neither is economic resurgence or vibrancy.

It’s not like President Barack Obama has been a complete bust as a leader, though some will say that’s exactly what he has been. But even if you give him credit for things that liberals applaud — health care, disengaging from Iraq and Afghanistan, growing support for same-sex marriage and higher taxes on the wealthy — it’s impossible to conclude that he changed the tone in Washington or brought Americans together, as he (and President George W. Bush before him) promised.

Yes, of course, Republicans didn’t exactly make it easy for him to do that. But after five years, blaming the other party for all the nation’s ills goes only so far.

Current polling shows a nation split on Obama’s performance, but it also shows a large majority of Americans agreeing that the future does not look all that bright.

Asked to think about “our system of government and how well it works,” fewer than 1 in 3 respondents in a May 30-June 2 NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll were “generally optimistic” about the future. When asked how much confidence they had in the federal government, only 17 percent said “a great deal” or “quite a bit,’ while 42 percent said “very little” or “none at all.”

The same survey found only 36 percent of respondents saying that they were “very” or “somewhat” satisfied with the economy, while 64 percent were “very” or “somewhat” dissatisfied with it. Fewer than a third said they expected the economy to get better during the next year, while just under half said that they expected it to remain about the same and 18 percent said they expected it to get worse.

A large majority, 58 percent, said the economy was in recession, while only 38 percent said it was not. And while only 33 percent said they were “quite” or “extremely” confident that the president has “the right set of goals of policies to improve the economy,” 36 percent said they were not at all confident.

The May 31-June 4 CBS News/New York Times poll found that 6 in 10 respondents believed the national economy was in “fairly bad” or “very bad” shape these days and a slight majority, 51 percent, described the job market in their area as “fairly bad” or “very bad.”

This is not a pretty picture, for politicians or for the country.

Growing concerns about Big Brother and Big Government won’t hurt the president with his core liberal and Democratic supporters, who still view him as a historic figure whose values and political views reflect theirs. And there isn’t much Obama can do now to placate conservatives and Republicans suspicious about his agenda for remaking the country.

But for the folks in the middle, the blahs could produce either political apathy or a feeling of frustration that will lead them to send another message of dissatisfaction, as they did in 2010. That message might not be as loud, but it could have the effect of, for all practical purposes, marking the end of the Obama presidency.

Mills is seriously considering challenging Democratic Rep. Rick Nolan in Minnesota’s 8th District, a large geographic district that includes The Iron Range. If he decides to run, as most observers expect, Mills will be a stark contrast to the 69-year-old congressman who is serving his first term after his first tenure in Congress in the late 1970s.

According to one local Democratic source, Mills has “Brad Pitt kind of appeal” but shouldn’t be dismissed because of his looks. He also has the potential to raise money from conservatives across the country. His YouTube video, “Duck Hunting Shotgun Proven to Be more Dangerous Than a Huldra AR-15,” has more than 270,000 views. The video was an open letter to Nolan and both Minnesota senators, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken.

His profile could resonate well with the district. Mills, 40, worked his way up in the family business, Mills Fleet Farm, and is now CEO of the company, which includes more than 30 retail stores with wide-ranging offerings including farm supplies, sporting goods, home and garden supplies, and in some cases a gas station and an indoor shooting and archery range.

Unseating Nolan won’t be easy. He defeated GOP Rep. Chip Cravaack by almost 10 points in a district that President Barack Obama won twice and John Kerry won with about 52 percent in presidential elections. But Cravaack was consistently plagued by stories about his family’s move to New Hampshire, and he didn’t have the same local ties as Mills.

It remains to be seen how Mills performs as a candidate, but this looks like a district Democrats may not be able to take for granted.

The Rothenberg Political Report currently rates the race as Safe for the Democrats — pending a final decision from Mills.

Now that GOP Gov. Dave Heineman has declined to run to replace retiring Sen. Mike Johanns, a handful of Republicans are weighing their options for a seat that should stay in GOP hands. Former state Treasurer Shane Osborn didn’t waste any time announcing his candidacy, but he won’t have the field all to himself. Wealthy former state party chairman/2006 nominee Pete Ricketts will apparently decide on a bid within the next month.

According to Leavenworth Street, a conservative blog in Nebraska, millionaire cattle rancher Charles Herbster is a potential candidate for Senate or governor. Herbster owns Herbster Angus Farms and Conklin, and has personal money and inroads in the evangelical Christian community that could boost his candidacy (via Nebraska Politics in Stereo).

But it looks like Herbster is leaning more toward a gubernatorial bid, according to local sources; Heineman isn’t running again because of term limits.

Meanwhile, Midland University President Ben Sasse is considered a likely Senate candidate and is currently on a listening tour. Leavenworth Street profiled Sasse and a potential Senate run back in February:

Former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services during the last 2 years of the George W. Bush Administration, and current President of Fremont’s Midland University, Dr. (Ph.D.) Ben Sasse. THAT’s who.

Sasse is a 40 year old graduate of Harvard University, studied at Oxford, has a master’s degree from St. John’s University, and doctorate from Yale University. (Though we are fairly sure the Scott Kleeb comparisons end there.)

Sasse became the 15th President of Midland in 2009. Before that, as noted, he was unanimously confirmed by the Democratic Senate to the fourth-ranking position in the government’s largest-budget agency, where Sasse led policy, planning, and research functions across the department’s 11 operating divisions, with a special focus on Medicare, Medicaid, and the Food and Drug Administration.

Sasse could be a serious Senate candidate. He’s a former chief of staff to Rep. Jeff Fortenberry, who announced he wouldn’t run, and is very close to former Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt. According to Republican sources, the two families are very close and Leavitt is likely to help Sasse raise money — at a minimum.

According to GOP sources, it appears at least two statewide polls have been conducted recently, which is likely a sign that candidates are testing the waters.

Rothenberg Political Report rates the race as Currently Safe Republican.

I raise that question after reading a May 18 memo from Celinda Lake and four other members of her firm, Lake Research Partners, that sought to discredit a May 14-16 USC Price/Los Angeles Times survey of the Los Angeles mayoral race.

The memo complained that the Times poll understated Los Angeles Controller Wendy Greuel’s vote and overstated City Councilman Eric Garcetti’s. It took exception to the Times’ methodology and proceeded to make a series of arguments why Greuel — Lake Research Partners’ client — was in a position to beat her better-funded opponent. In fact, Greuel wasn’t all that well-positioned (certainly not financially), and she lost.

But I was surprised that the memo referred twice to the fact that the Times editorial page had endorsed Garcetti. The second reference read as follows:

“With just three days until voters decide the next Mayor of LA, it is disappointing that an otherwise well-respected publication like the LA Times would put out a flawed poll in favor of their endorsed candidate, despite no other polls reporting anything remotely similar.”

Clearly, the five Lake Research members were implying that the Times poll was little more than a thinly veiled effort to help the candidate preferred by the newspaper’s editorial page. Accusing the Times of being involved in a conspiracy to use a bogus poll to help Garcetti was nothing short of a rash, unsubstantiated accusation of bias and fraud.

Mind you, the survey in question was conducted for the Times by a reputable, bipartisan polling team: Benenson Strategy Group, a Democratic firm, and M4 Strategies, a GOP firm. And the LA Times piece in question was written by Michael Finnegan, a well-regarded political reporter who was described to me by a veteran journalist as “one of the most honest and conscientious reporters I have ever worked with.”

The charge — and the entire memo — was all the more head-scratching because Lake Research Partners never referred to its own survey. It cited other polls, but never its own data, which seemed like an obvious omission.

If it had the data to contradict the Times survey, why didn’t Lake present it? That’s normally what campaigns and pollsters do. In fact, the firm didn’t have recent polling.

I called Lake Research and spoke with Bob Meadow, who had a distinguished career in academia before joining Lake Research in 2005. He is a partner in the firm.

First, Meadow pointed out that the memo I’ve cited was not distributed to the media but was meant primarily for Greuel’s supporters and contributors, both of whom might be deflated by the news of the LA Times poll. It sought to remind supporters that “polls come and go” and reassure them that “they shouldn’t panic.”

Second, he criticized the timing of the newspaper’s survey, arguing that the Times was both “making news” and reporting it just a few days before the election. That’s a reasonable point, but you can bet that Lake Research would have been crowing about the numbers if they had shown Greuel leading.

And third, he argued that while the first responsibility of Lake Research Partners is to provide its campaigns with the best data from which to create a successful message, it should also support its campaigns “where possible.”

It’s that “where possible” that opens up a potential can of worms. I have no problems with the part of the Lake Research memo challenging the Times’ sample and turnout model. But suggesting collusion between the editorial page and the news gathering side to help one candidate and damage the other?

The problem for the folks over at Lake Research, of course, is that the Times’ poll probably was correct. It showed Garcetti up by 7 points, and he beat Greuel by just less than 8 points. (A SurveyUSA poll completed two days after the LA Times survey also showed Garcetti opening up a 5-point lead. The previous SurveyUSA, completed 10 days earlier, had shown the race tied.)

Of course, the folks at Lake Research didn’t publicly apologize to the LA Times. They could always respond that reports of the poll moved voters or that Garcetti’s late advertising blew the race open. As far as I know, they never acknowledged that the Times’ poll numbers were right.

While I agree with Meadow that consultants can try to help their campaigns “where possible,” I would argue that pollsters have an obligation to make certain that campaigns don’t misuse their survey data and that they, themselves, don’t become little more than spin doctors for their campaigns.

Professional pollsters ought to protect their reputations first, even ahead of promoting their candidates.

In 2012, Democrats had a math problem. Two Republicans and four Democrats ran in the same June primary, after which, the top two, regardless of party, moved on to the general election. It was the first cycle for the system in California and no one was quite sure how it would play out.

In the 31st District, Miller finished first with 26.7 percent and Republican state Sen. Bob Dutton finished second with 24.8 percent, leaving four Democrats on the outside looking in. Redlands Mayor Pete Aguilar finished third (22.6 percent), attorney Justin Kim was fourth (13.5 percent), Renea Wickman was fifth (6.7 percent), and Rita Ramirez-Dean was sixth (5.7 percent).

This cycle, Democrats were determined not to let history repeat itself — especially in a district where President Barack Obama won with 57 percent.

Aguilar got into the 2014 race early and had the support of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. A one-on-one race with Miller would strongly favor the Democrat.

But now three other Democrats, including former Rep. Joe Baca and EMILY’s List-endorsed Eloise Gomez Reyes, have gotten into the race and could complicate the math. Baca’s entry has already been dramatic, as reported by CQ Roll Call’s Emily Cahn here, here and here.

In 2012, the two Republicans combined for 51.5 percent of the primary vote in an electorate that skewed conservative. Since the primary system is still new, there are no trend lines, but let’s assume half of next year’s primary electorate goes Republican once again.

That leaves the other half of the vote for the four Democratic candidates.

San Bernardino City Unified School District Board Member Danny Tillman has filed for the race. He is likely to receive at least 6 percent of the vote, which appears to be the base African-American vote in the district. That’s slightly less than Wickman received last year after not running much of a campaign.

That leaves about 44 percent of the vote to be divided among the other three candidates. Aguilar, Baca and Reyes are credible in their own way and should all be competitive. Assuming they divide the vote roughly evenly, the strongest of the three could still be in the high teens.

So if Republicans were able to get another GOP candidate in the race, and that candidate could get just 20 percent, that could be enough to leave Democrats out of the general election for a second straight cycle.

Recruiting a second Republican into the race would be a messy proposition and probably couldn’t be done by the National Republican Congressional Committee. But if keeping the seat in Republican hands is a priority, GOP strategists might have to think outside the box.

Obviously, if Democratic voters coalesce behind one of their hopefuls, that would close the window of opportunity for a second Republican. But there is also a chance that the primary electorate skews Republican once again and there is less vote available in June for the Democrats to divide. It’s also possible, but not probable, that the primary electorate could be more Democratic and make it easy to get a Democrat into the top two.

But one thing is for sure, the race in California’s 31st District looks like one of the most complicated and competitive primaries next year.

New York City Councilman Domenic Recchia is off and running in a Staten Island/Brooklyn district against two-term GOP Rep. Michael G. Grimm, who can’t afford to take this challenger lightly.

And in the Florida Panhandle, attorney Gwen Graham, daughter of former Florida Gov. and former Sen. Bob Graham, is mounting what looks to be a potentially serious challenge to two-term GOP Rep. Steve Southerland II.

In their interviews, both Democrats talked about their desire to work with Republicans in Congress and their local roots, though there is no reason to believe that either would stray very far from his or her party.

Recchia, who says that he is pro-abortion rights without exceptions and supports marriage equality, is an attorney who specializes in personal injury and medical malpractice cases. He is critical of House Republicans for delaying Congress’ response after Hurricane Sandy.

Graham, who spent years raising her children before becoming the in-house attorney for her school district, criticizes Southerland for failing to work across the aisle. She has been put “On the List,” by EMILY’s List, which limits its support to Democratic women who support abortion rights.

Stylistically, Recchia and Graham appear to come from different planets.

Recchia oozes Brooklyn, a part of which he represents on the city council, and he has an accent to match. Personable and down-to-earth, he is a throwback to the ethnic politicians of the 1950s and 1960s. (Read more about Recchia in Roll Call’s interview with him for our politics blog, At the Races.)

Graham looks and sounds more like the current crop of political candidates. She is poised, polished and ideal for TV — not your typical first-time office-seeker. (Read more about Graham in Roll Call’s interview with her for our politics blog, At the Races.)

Recchia, who is term-limited on the city council, started to run for Congress in 2008 against then-Rep. Vito Fossella, R-N.Y. But he suspended his campaign after his wife was mugged. He ultimately dropped his bid.

Grimm won the seat in 2010, when he defeated freshman Rep. Michael McMahon, D-N.Y., by just 3 points. The Republican was re-elected easily two years later.

Recchia raised just more than $411,000 through March 31, a strong first quarter that can be explained, in part, by the large number of “double max” (primary and general election) contributions. All of the challenger’s contributions came from individuals.

Grimm, on the other hand, raised about $320,000 in the first quarter of 2013, a little more than half of it coming from political action committees. He ended the quarter with just more than $300,000 in the bank, about $100,000 less than Recchia.

Recchia will have to show that he can solve a geographic problem if he is going to oust Grimm.

While Grimm was born in Brooklyn and raised in Queens, he lives in Staten Island. Recchia lives in and represents part of Brooklyn. That may seem like a small difference west of the Hudson River, but it’s an important one to the residents of Staten Island, the most conservative borough of New York City.

Grimm lost the Brooklyn portion of the district in 2010 to incumbent McMahon, who hailed from Staten Island and represented the borough on the New York City Council. Two years later, Grimm lost Brooklyn again, this time to Democratic challenger Mark Murphy. But the Republican carried the Staten Island part of the district comfortably both times.

Given the GOP’s strength in Staten Island, and the fact that Staten Island voters constituted 72 percent of all votes in 2012 and 75 percent of district voters in 2010, Recchia obviously has an arithmetic problem.

Graham could face a challenge winning her party’s nomination, since 2012 nominee Al Lawson, an African-American former state senator, is considering running again.

Last year, Lawson defeated a white Democratic primary opponent who was preferred by many Democratic insiders, and since the district’s electorate is between one-fifth and one-quarter black, African-Americans make up a large percentage of any Democratic primary. That means Lawson can’t be discounted if he runs again.

Graham believes that she has strength in the black community, and that could help her in a primary against Lawson. And there is no doubt in my mind that Graham would be the far stronger Democratic nominee against Southerland in November.

The 2nd District is already extremely polarized along partisan lines. Lawson carried the district’s largest county, Leon (Tallahassee), easily, but he lost 11 of the district’s remaining 13 counties. Leon is home to two large state universities and state government, and it is reliably Democratic. But the second-largest county, Bay (Panama City), is as Republican as Leon is Democratic, and most of the vote outside Leon County is conservative.

Moderate white Democrats (such as former Rep. Allen Boyd) have carried the 2nd District, but African-American and liberal nominees have problems reaching the 50 percent mark. Mitt Romney, John McCain and George W. Bush (2004) each carried the district narrowly, and Southerland won re-election in 2012 with 52.7 percent.

Given that Southerland has been one of the most conservative members of the House, Graham might be able to appeal to Republican and swing voters who are uncomfortable both with national Democrats and the current congressman, though the polarized nature of the district and the midterm dynamic with President Barack Obama in the White House creates a tough political environment for her.

Recchia and Graham start off as credible recruits who have challenges to overcome. They must hope that the national political environment doesn’t make their jobs harder between now and November 2014.

But unless New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, pulls a rabbit out of the hat, it’s likely that Republicans will have the seat only briefly — from six months to as long as a year and a half, depending on what Christie does and how the state law is interpreted.

The death of Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg, D-N.J., marks the end of an era and starts a series of political events over the next 17 months. Christie will choose a senator to serve until this November or next November, depending on what the governor and courts decide.

Christie could choose a moderate Republican and narrow the Democrats’ Senate majority to 54-46. He could even choose a Democratic or political independent, in theory, which could strengthen Christie’s image in the Garden State.

But that kind of a selection would open up Christie to strong attacks from the right should he run for president, giving himself something else to worry about in Republican presidential primaries. And yet, it seems unlikely that he would appoint someone conservative enough to satisfy conservatives in the state or around the country.

Handicapping any appointment is almost pointless since the decision is made by such a small group of people, in this case Christie and small group of close advisers. But because of Christie’s re-election race this fall and his potential 2016 presidential run, his choice becomes significantly more important for him. It will receive considerable scrutiny.

The early list of public names includes 2006 nominee Tom Kean Jr., 2012 nominee Joe Kyrillos, Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, biotechnology executive Joe Crowley (who almost ran in 2008), investor Lew Eisenberg and attorney/Christie advisor Bill Palatucci.

Regardless of whether it is a special election or regular election, Republicans remain long shots to hold the seat after an appointment. Republicans haven’t won a Senate race in New Jersey since Clifford Case was re-elected to a fourth term in 1972. Christie’s likely re-election notwithstanding, New Jersey is a blue state, not a purple state.

Since Lautenberg had already decided not to seek re-election, the Democratic dynamic doesn’t change all that match. Newark Mayor Cory Booker is already raising money and all but officially announced his candidacy. Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. could run as well.

The race is obviously very fluid, but we are keeping our rating of the race as Currently Safe for the Democrats until there is significant evidence that Republicans have a shot of holding the seat in an election.

Chafee was first elected to the U.S. Senate in 1998 appointed to the Senate in 1999 after the death of his senator father. In 2000, he was elected as a Republican, lost re-election to Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse in 2006, became an Independent, and was elected governor of the Ocean State in 2010. He faces an uncertain re-election race next year.

As Ted Nesi of WPRI (via Rhode Island Politics in Stereo) points out, the switch is not particularly surprising:

Politically, Chafee has been a Democrat in all but name for a long time now – in 2012 he not only co-chaired President Obama’s re-election campaign and spoke at the Democratic National Convention, he even endorsed Sheldon Whitehouse’s bid for the very U.S. Senate seat he took from Chafee in 2006.

But since Chafee had been an Independent, two formidable Democrats — State General Treasurer Gina Raimondo and Providence Mayor Angel Taveras — were already jockeying for the Democratic nomination. The governor’s decision could make for one of the most competitive primaries anywhere in the country.

Scott MacKay of Rhode Island Public Radio (via Rhode Island Politics in Stereo) believes Taveras could have the edge:

Taveras has also proven that he can organize a winning ground game to get to polls working class Democrats who vote in big numbers in presidential elections but too often skip the off-year elections. By contrast, Raimondo has never been in a tough election and Chafee largely outsourced his voter turnout effort in 2010 to organized labor, which isn’t a sure ally this time around. Chafee and Raimondo’s support for cutting public employee pensions two years ago has soured union leaders on both.

No matter how the primary plays out, the Democratic nominee should start the general election with the advantage. But as Nesi wrote, it might be messy:

With Ken Block taking perhaps 5% to 10% of the vote for his nascent Moderate Party, Fung or the Democratic nominee will need less than 50% to win. A primary could leave the Democrat battered, with [likely GOP nominee/Cranston Mayor Allan] Fung waiting in the wings after husbanding money for the final two months. If Chafee manages to win the primary, he will need to prove he can get his support above 40%; if one of the other two Democrats emerges the winner, Fung can fight them on the Republican-friendly turf of fiscal conservatism and good management.

Prior to Chafee’s decision, the Rothenberg Political Report/Roll Call rating of the race was Toss-Up/Tilt Democrat, since the governor looked unlikely to get enough support as an Independent with credible Republican and Democratic nominees.

But in a two-person race (and without a formidable Independent), the state’s Democratic bent will almost certainly give the eventual Democratic nominee a considerable advantage. Because of Chafee’s switch, Democrats look more likely to “hold” the governorship, even though they have only technically had it for a few days.

We’re moving the race to Democrat Favored even though we don’t know which Democrat it might be.