So with about three months to go, with Ted Stevens' indictment dominating the Senate news, it's time for another look at all the 2008 Senate races. There are 35 seats up for election because of a scenario in Wyoming and Mississippi where both seats are up, due to the passing of Craig Thomas and the resignation of Trent Lott, respectively. Now obviously, quite a few of the races are considered "safe" for the incumbent. So what are the competitive races?
I'll rank these in terms of tiers. The top tier will be the races where the party holding the seat has a real shot of switching (but I ain't guaranteeing anything). The second tier are races that could become top tier races, but are not at this point. Tier III are ones where a major event would need to happen for the seat to come into play. And the safe seats? Well, Mike Gravel has a better shot at winning the presidency than those incumbents have of losing their races.
This is meant to be a primer for both newcomers and political junkies alike, so some of the information may seem repetitive for you junkies out there. Also see my previous May diary to see what things have changed since my last update.
New Jersey Senate, 89% reporting
Lautenberg: 62%
Andrews: 32%
Cresitello: 6%
Update 13--Boswell wins IA-03: Leonard Boswell is finally declared the winner in the IA-03 Democratic primary. Looks like he will win by about 20%. While that isn't a total disaster, it also isn't the single-digit loss I was hoping for. He felt pressure, but will it be enough? Either way, progressives need to keep challenging.
Update 12--Wave of Superdelegates Endorses Obama: 26.5 superdelegates just endorsed Obama. He has now passed the magic number, even with Michigan and Florida given full voting rights, and even with her four delegates given back in Michigan. Barack Obama will be the next President of the United States.
Update 11 [from Matt]: Boswell is up by 12 points, it looks like he'll take it. That's an extremely tight margin for a primary.
Update 10--Obama wins Montana and national popular vote: In one positive development tonight, Barack Obama wins Montana big. The exit poll indicates it will be a huge victory, too: 55.7%--38.2%, according to the gender crosstabs. So, Obama will win the popular vote. Will he reach the 24,000 threshold that moves him outside the margin of error? Hopefully.
Update 9--Clinton doesn't conceede: Well, Clinton clearly didn't conceede in her speech. Hell, before her speech, McAuliffe introduced her as "the next President of hte United States of America." Then, in case the point hadn't been driven home, she said "I'm not deciding anything tonight." A lot of denail happening, but no concession or suspension. Perhaps one would have come if Obama had tried harder in South Dakota, and actually won the state. Then again, considering the way the Clinton campaign has acted for the last three months, probably not.
Update 8--Hey Obama, a 50-state strategy means campaign in all 50 states: I'm actually kind of angry at Obama for not campaigning harder in Montana and South Dakota. He could have won South if he made a bigger play for it. Also, even if he still lost, these are both important states for Democrats. If Obama had made a bigger push in Montana, he could have put the state in play in the general, and helped the local party solidfy its many recent gains downticket. If he campaigned harder in South Dakota, he could have helped build the party for 2010, when we can take down Thune. Pretty friggin' lame that he didn't campaign harder in those two states. Even though he won the nomination tonight, I'm not very happy with him right now. We need to campaign everywhere in order to build the party everywhere. Obama didn't do that in Montana and South Dakota.
Update 7--Clinton wins South Dakota: Hillary Clinton has won South Dakota. It is really, really important for Obama to win Montana now. Winning the nomination on a night of a double loss would be terrible, especially since he has only won Guam, Oregon, and North Carolina since March. If Obama doesn't win Montana by more than Clinton won South Dakota, Clinton can still win the popular vote, too. It would really suck to have a nominee who didn't win the popular vote.
Update 6--McCain at only 65% in South Dakota: Wow--McCain is only at 65% in South Dakota. That is pretty friggin' heinous. He hasn't had an opponent for three months.
Update 5--Exit poll indicates Clinton South Dakota victory: The South Dakota exit poll shows Clinton ahead 53.8%--46.2%, according to the gender crosstabs. Hopefully, Obama will win Montana by more than Clinton wins South Dakota. Not exactly the sort of result I would have hoped for the night Obama clinches.
Updte 4--Lautenberg crushes Andrews in New Jersey Senate primary: Frank Lautenberg comfortably defeats corproate challenger Rob Andrews in the New Jersey Seenate primary. With 17% reporting, Lautenberg leads by a 2-1 margin. Good. This result will now be moved to the bottom, and updates will be infrequent.
Update 3--Explaining my delegate math: Obama now has 360.5 superdelegates according to their last email on Bob Brady (the campaign just hasn't updated its results website yet). Democratic Convention Watch shows Obama at 1749.5 pledged delegates. Exit polls indicate at least exactly 7 delegates for Obama in South Dakota. With a magic number of 2,117 (not 2,118), Obama is now 0.0 delegates from the nomination. Or, at least he will be, when South Dakota polls close.
Update 2--Obama to win Democratic nomination at 9 p.m.: Rep. Bob Brady endroses Barack Obama, putting Obama over the top in my count. Preliminary exit polls from South Dakota indicate Clinton will receive less than 60% of the vote, meaning that Obama will win at least 7 delegates in the state. As such, Barack Obama will become the Democratic nominee when South Dakota polls close at 9 p.m..
Update--Obama's Victory Speech? Drudge has supposedly obtained a copy of Obama's victory speech. You can read it here.
Several elections tonight. In the Iowa 3rd, we have Bush Dog incumbent Boswell vs. progressive challenger Ed Fallon. In New Jersey, we have Incumbent, machine-bakced, but generally progressive Frank Lautenberg vs. corporate challenger Andrews. And, of course, we have the final presidential primaries in Montana and South Dakota. I will begin live-blogging returns here at Open Left at 8 p.m., when the first polls close in South Dakota and all polls close in New Jersey. All polls close in Montana and South Dakota at 9 p.m. eastern. Polls close in the Iowa 3rd at 10 p.m., eastern.
What Is At Stake Tonight
Momentum. Currently, Barack Obama is precisely tied with John McCain in national polls, and effectively tied with McCain at the state, electoral college level. The ideal scenario for Obama to pick up momentum this week is to win both primaries tonight, reach the magic number tomorrow, and for Clinton to give her "acknowledging reality" speech on Thursday. That would give Obama three consecutive positive days of press coverage, and allow the nomination campaign to end on a positive note for the nominee.
The nightmare scenario for Obama is if he actually loses one of the two primaries tonight. As unlikely as it seems, this is actually possible. Poblano predicts Obama to win South Dakota by only 5%, and ARG predicts Obama to only win Montana by 4%. (Granted, Poblano predicts a Montana blowout while ARG predicts a South Dakota blowout.) Given that the Clinton's have been campaigning in the two states much harder than the Obama's, it is not out of the realm of the possible for Clinton to sneak out a victory tonight. This would be terrible for Obama, since wrapping up the nomination after a loss is exactly the sort of "stumbling across the line" scenario that has hurt Democrats, such as Walter Mondale and Jimmy Carter, in the past. So, a double victory for Obama tonight, while not important in terms of winning the nomination, is important in terms of positioning for the general election.
More of what is at stake, along with my personal predictions, tonight in the extended entry.
(Since much of Chris' analysis of late (No Future, Spend Early etc) hinges on winning a senate supermajority, seeing additional senate analyses is useful. - promoted by Daniel De Groot)
So with less than half a year to go, it's time for another look at all the 2008 Senate races. There are 35 seats up for election because of a scenario in Wyoming and Mississippi where both seats are up, due to the passing of Craig Thomas and the resignation of Trent Lott, respectively. Now obviously, quite a few of the races are considered "safe" for the incumbent. So I'll rank these in terms of tiers. The top tier will be the races where the party holding the seat has a real shot of switching. The second tier are races that could become top tier races, but are not at this point. Tier III are ones where a major event would need to happen for the seat to come into play. And the safe seats? Well, Mike Gravel has a better shot at winning the presidency than those incumbents have of losing their races.
Follow me below the fold for all the races. This is meant to be a primer for both newcomers and political junkies alike, so some of the information may seem repetitive for you junkies out there. Also see my previous March diary to see what things have changed since my last update.
(This was a weird fight. - promoted by Matt Stoller)
New Jersey Congressman Rob Andrews's strategy to defeat incumbent US Senator Frank Lautenberg in the Democratic primary is simple. First, he must carry carry massive pluralities in South Jersey, where he has both machine support and very high popularity. Second, he must garner endorsements, and thus favorable ballot position, from at least two of the large, Democratic-voting counties in North Jersey: Essex, Hudson, Bergen, Middlesex and Union.
When he publicly announced his intention to run for Senate yesterday, Andrews figured he had at least one of these endorsements, namely Bergen County Democratic Chairman Joe Ferriero, in the bag. But before Ferriero could announce his support for Andrews, Bergen County Congressman Steven Rothman (NJ-09) answered Ferriero's small bet on Andrews with a big raise. Rothman, who has made no secret of his own desire to eventually sit in Lautenberg's Senate seat, reportedly threatened to run for re-election to his own House seat off of the county line and alongside Lautenberg and a full slate of County Democratic Committee candidates recruited by progressive State Senator Loretta Weinberg.
Rothman's aggressive move presents Ferriero with a dilemma. Ferriero can cautiously preserve his political power and patronage machine by folding to Rothman. By giving his line to Lautenberg and Rothman, Ferriero would raise a very high hurdle in front of any challengers seeking to unseat his county committee members and freeholders. However, should Ferriero call Rothman's raise, he will provoke a nine-week civil war in the Bergen County party that he may not survive.
Needless to say, Ferriero did not follow through with an Andrews endorsement on Tuesday, and this afternoon, sources close to the Bergen boss are telling New Jersey media that Ferriero will endorse Lautenberg. As of Wednesday afternoon, none of Andrews's other promised North Jersey endorsements have panned out. While Andrews hasn't decided whether or not to challenge Lautenberg yet, Rothman's deftly timed threat has made an Andrews run a lot less likely than it was just 24 hours ago.
You can read more about this story and the New Jersey US Senate race at Blue Jersey.
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