Beto Stagnant In Polls After ‘Hell Yeah’ Moment

It has been a week since Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke vowed, “Hell, yes, we're going to take your AR-15, your AK-47” in the Democratic primary debate in Houston. There has now been enough time for several polls to show trends from debate performances and it isn’t looking good for Beto.

Looking at the Real Clear Politics average, Beto was sitting at 2.8 percent on September 12, the day of the debate. The most recent average shows him at 2.7 percent, statistically unchanged from before his big moment.

In polling the week before the debate, O’Rourke had ranged as high as five percent and as low as one percent. In the week since the debate, he has surged to four percent and sank as low as one percent.

For all the hoopla and angst over his plan to confiscate guns from law-abiding Americans, Beto sits almost exactly at the same spot in the polls. There are a couple of things that we can take from this. The most important is that it takes more than a swearing and taking a hard line on guns to get Democratic votes. Even though most Democrats support the gun “buyback” idea, they aren’t flocking to Beto because of it. Democratic voters seem to think that there are more important factors than “wokeness” on guns.

Beto’s failure to launch also underscores the divide within the Democratic Party. The majority of the Democratic Party is made up of far-left progressives, but there is a sizable contingent of moderates. I estimate that moderates make up about a third of the party. The 25 percent of the party that opposes Beto’s “buyback” is roughly equivalent to the roughly 30 percent that support moderate candidates like Biden, Klobuchar, and Yang.

The Democrats would be much better off focusing on issues like background checks and red flag laws than controversial issues like gun confiscations. Multiple polls show that background checks and red flag laws are supported by more than 70 percent of Americans while opinion is split on “assault weapons” bans and mandatory “buybacks.”

Beto’s carefully staged moment of passion was his last-gasp attempt to pull himself out of the polling cellar, but it failed. O’Rourke’s campaign is going nowhere and has little hope of catching on. With a large campaign war chest, he can stay in the race for the foreseeable future but you can stick a fork in him. He’s done.

Originally published on The Resurgent

April 17th, 2019 Bernie Is The Big Winner In Democratic Fundraising

The fundraising reports are in for the first quarter of 2019. The big news was the $30 million raised by President Trump’s re-election campaign, but the fundraising stats from the plethora of Democratic candidates could shed some light on who donors consider to be a viable candidate. Fundraising numbers also provide access to an important platform for Democrats. Only candidates with at least 65,000 individual donors will qualify to participate in the first Democratic primary debate in June 2019.

Candidate reports from the first quarter, which are available on Open Secrets, show that Bernie Sanders is the undisputed money leader in the race so far. Sanders raised more than $18 million, not counting transfers from previous campaigns. More than $15 million of Sanders’ take was from small donors, reflecting his extensive grassroots network. This bodes well both for Bernie’s ability to continue to raise money and his ability to tap into his donor network to find volunteers to work his campaign.

Kamala Harris was in second place with a $12 million take, which also excludes transfers. In contrast with Sanders, Harris received more than half of her donations, $7.6 million, from large donors. Harris has shown a better ability to raise money than to garner support, averaging about eight percent in polling.

In third place was Beto O’Rourke with $9.3 million. As with Bernie, Beto raised more money from small donors, but about 40 percent of his donations also came from large donors. This shows a good mix of grassroots and wealthy backers.

Pete Buttigieg was the surprising fourth-place finisher with more than $7 million. Buttigieg, who averages about five percent in polling, also performed well with both small and large donors.

A quartet of congressional figures make up the next four finishers. The campaigns of Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar, Cory Booker, and Kirsten Gillibrand were boosted by transfers from prior campaign coffers but none seem to have gained traction either in the polls or with donors. Warren is the only candidate of the four to raise a significant amount ($4.2 million) from small donors. The others don’t seem to have much grassroots support.

When it comes to cash on hand, Bernie Sanders is the leader once again. The Sanders campaign has more than $15.6 million in the bank, which is significantly more than Elizabeth Warren, who was in second place with $11.2 million.

The next four on the list were boosted by transfers from previous campaigns. John Delaney, a former congressman from Maryland, has the third-largest war chest with $10.5 million. Gillibrand, Harris, and Klobuchar follow in order with accounts ranging from $10.1 to $6.9 million.

In the seventh and eighth positions are newcomers Beto O’Rourke and Pete Buttigieg. O’Rourke held $6.8 million while Buttigieg had $6.4 million. Both of these candidates have strong fundraising numbers and will likely see their bottom lines increase sharply in the coming months.

Rounding out the top-tier candidates is Cory Booker. The New Jersey senator had just over $6.1 million in his bank account at the end of the first quarter.

Obviously, the big winner in the fundraising race so far is Bernie Sanders. His strong fundraising among small donors reflects a veritable army of dedicated grassroots supporters that will present a formidable opponent for the other Democratic hopefuls.

Other winners include Beto O’Rourke and Pete Buttigieg. The newcomers both had surprisingly strong showings that will enable them to get their names and messages out to primary voters. Fox Business reported that average donation for the Buttigieg campaign was $36.35. Simple math shows that this would almost certainly give the recently unknown candidate a place in the first debate.

Kamala Harris was also a winner. As the second-place fundraiser, her campaign is bringing in enough cash to keep going for the foreseeable future despite a poor showing in the polls.

The big loser was Elizabeth Warren who had very disappointing fundraising numbers. Her previous frontrunner status stands in stark contrast to her current status as a has-been who has generated little interest. Warren has a large war chest, however, so don’t look for her to drop out any time soon.

Everyone else was also a loser. The group of Washington insiders, Klobuchar, Booker, and Gillibrand, also had disappointing results, in terms of both polling and fundraising. Large war chests will enable these candidates to stay in the race at least until the first debate.

The plethora of other candidates may not be so lucky. The numerous small and unknown candidates may start dropping out soon. If they don’t start to gain enough traction to get a seat at the debate, there will be little reason for them to stay in the race.

The wild card is Joe Biden. Biden is not reflected in the fundraising numbers despite leading in the polls because he does not have an active campaign yet. If Biden is serious about running, he is working to prepare potential donors to start giving as soon as he makes his announcement. The former vice president and senator is an experienced politician with an extensive network from his previous campaigns. He will hope to outraise the $6.1 million raised by Beto and the $5.9 million garnered by Bernie in the first 24 hours of their campaigns to affirm his status as the frontrunner.

Finally, Republicans should not feel too confident despite Donald Trump’s $30 million haul. While this is more than any Democrat, it should be noted that Democratic fundraising is splintered among a crowded field and many Democrat donors may be waiting for Joe Biden to enter the race. Despite Trump’s impressive number, it only takes two Democratic candidates, Bernie Sanders, and Kamala Harris, to eclipse the president’s haul. It may not be long before Democratic donors rally behind a presumed nominee and President Trump’s fundraising lead begins to quickly erode.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Beto Outraises Bernie Despite Missteps

In the four days since Beto O’Rourke announced his candidacy for president, his campaign has become embroiled in several controversies that may doom his chances even before he leaves the starting gate. Nevertheless, the level of donations that the campaign has received in its early hours indicate a high level of interest in the Texas candidate. It would be a mistake to write off the millennial presidential hopeful despite his campaign’s problems.

Beto’s campaign immediately suffered from a series of missteps as well as revelations about his past. One of the most shocking items is news of an article that he wrote as a teenager in which he fantasized about running over children with his car. The article was posted online for the Cult of the Dead Cow, a hacking group to which the candidate belonged.

“I'm mortified to read it now, incredibly embarrassed, but I have to take ownership of my words,” O’Rourke said of his teen writing in the Chicago Tribune. “Whatever my intention was as a teenager doesn't matter, I have to look long and hard at my actions, at the language I have used, and I have to constantly try to do better.”

O’Rourke also had a lesson on the easily-offended nature of modern Democrats with a seemingly innocuous joke in which he said that his wife, Amy, was raising their three children “sometimes with my help.” Politico notes that the joke disappeared from later speeches after it was pointed out that the reference could reinforce gender stereotypes and O’Rourke apologized, saying that he would be “much more thoughtful going forward in the way that I talk about our marriage, and also the way in which I acknowledge the truth of the criticism that I have enjoyed white privilege.”

The new candidate also faced down the media for what he called a misrepresentation of a statement to Vanity Fair. After telling the magazine that he was “just born to be in it,” Beto criticized the headline that quoted him as saying, “I’m just born to do this” and attempted to distance himself from the idea that he thinks he was born to be president.

“I saw the cover with that quote, ‘Born to run,’ or ‘Born to do this,’ and I was like, ‘Man, I hope I didn’t say that,’” O’Rourke told reporters in Wisconsin on Sunday. “I think the context of that, which makes sense, is the way that I feel, is that I’m born to serve, I’m born to try to help bring people together.”

He continued, “I don’t know that anyone is born for an office or a position, and I certainly am not. But I do think that I find my purpose and function in life in doing this kind of work.”

Aside from the gaffes and skeletons in the closet, the Beto campaign seems to rely more on style than substance. Just prior to his presidential announcement, O’Rourke apologized to a prominent Iowa Democrat for his lack of organization in the crucial early state and his campaign website rolled out with a complete inventory of Beto campaign gear but little in the way of policy positions.

“For all the fanfare, the band was playing a pretty flat tune,” Dave Nagle, Iowa state Democratic Party chairman and a former congressman, told Politico. “There’s just no substance to it.”

O’Rourke still does not have a campaign manager, but he does have experienced advisors. Norm Sterzenbach, a former executive director of the Iowa Democratic Party, and Paul Tewes, who ran Barack Obama’s 2008 effort in Iowa, are helping O’Rourke organize in the Hawkeye state.

“So [O’Rourke] made some missteps,” said another Democratic strategist. “What really matters is when are you putting people on the ground and giving Norm some money to go hire them.”

Despite the missteps, the O’Rourke campaign brought in $6.1 million in its first 24 hours. Beto’s haul eclipses the $5.9 million raised by Bernie Sanders after his announcement and dwarfs the contributions received by other Democrats. For example, Kamala Harris received only $1.5 million following her announcement.

Beto is off to a rocky start but don’t count him out yet. The Texan’s rock star image generated more than $80 million in the 2018 election cycle per the FEC. His ability to generate huge contributions almost cost Ted Cruz his Senate seat. With President Trump’s approval in Texas underwater, an O’Rourke candidacy could put the Lone Star State in play for the first time since 1976.

In many ways, O’Rourke is reminiscent of Barack Obama in 2008, a relatively blank slate with rock star popularity. To capitalize on that popularity, however, Beto must get his campaign organized and show backers that he has the depth to mount a serious national campaign. Against Donald Trump, who also has a reputation as a candidate with a shallow understanding of policy and who is not popular with young or minority voters, Beto could be a formidable candidate.

At this point, the greatest threat to Beto is a Joe Biden candidacy. The former vice president, who has consistently led polling, has hinted that he will soon enter the race. Without Biden in the race, the non-Bernie vote will splinter between the numerous other candidates and O’Rourke has a chance to come out on top. If Biden does decide to run, however, he will be the odds-on favorite for the nomination. In that case, Beto, with his Texas roots and youthful charisma, would be a logical vice-presidential pick.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Senate Polls Show Possible Dem Surge

Two days before the midterm elections, there are signs that Democratic Senate candidates might be gaining on their Republican opponents. A number of polls released over the first days of November show Beto O’Rourke in Texas, Kirsten Sinema in Arizona, and Phil Bredesen gaining ground.

In Texas, a Change Research poll found O’Rourke tied with Republican Senator Ted Cruz at 49 percent after weeks of Cruz holding a solid lead. In early October, Cruz held a solid lead averaging in the high single-digits, but polling over the last two weeks showed O’Rourke narrowing the race.

The Change Research poll of 1,211 likely voters showed Cruz with near unanimous support among Republicans, but with O’Rourke leading other groups. O’Rourke has “over 99% of Clinton 2016 voters, over 90% among Jill Stein voters, and double-digit leads with 2016 non-voters and Gary Johnson voters,” the organization posted on Twitter.

In Tennessee, another race that has been trending toward the Republican candidate, Marsha Blackburn, in recent weeks, a new poll suddenly put Democrat Phil Bredesen back in the race. The Targoz poll of 480 likely voters has a small sample size and comes after three consecutive polls showing Blackburn with a lead of more than five points.

In Arizona, the polling is erratic and swings wildly from one candidate to the other. Of the two polls taken in November, one favors Republican Martha McSally by 5.6 points and the other favors Democrat Sinema by three points. The Trafalgar poll favoring Sinema has a sample size of 2,166 likely voters, which is more than three times as large as the 600 voters sampled in the Harris poll that favored McSally.   

The state of the races in Florida and Missouri are also very close. Polling in Florida varies between showing leads for incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson and Republican challenger, Rick Scott. In Missouri, Democrat Senator Claire McCaskill and Republican Josh Hawley are locked in another margin of error race. The most recent poll there has the largest sample size, 1,424 voters, had the two candidates tied at 47 percent.

A possible explanation for the shakeup is President Trump’s concentration on illegal immigration and the migrant caravan moving through Mexico. The president’s rhetoric, including a statement that soldiers would shoot members of the caravan who throw rocks, may have inspired some moderates and independents to oppose Republican candidates. President Trump’s plan to issue an Executive Order to end birthright citizenship may also have inspired opposition among swing voters in addition to exciting his base.

While the polling appears to show a slight surge for Democrats in several races, it is too early to tell whether this represents a fluke or if there is a legitimate last-minute rally. It is very possible that the polls represent outliers that do not accurately report a change in the status of the race.

​Since three of these very close races are for Republican seats, if the polling is correct, Democrat hopes for a Senate majority remain alive. To make it a reality though, Democrats would have to sweep all five states since Heidi Heitkamp‘s seat in North Dakota will go red.

With only one day left before the election, the answer is likely to be found only when the official election results come in on Tuesday night. With at least five Senate races too close to call, it will come down to which side is able to better motivate their supporters to get to the polls.

Originally published on The Resurgent   

Update On Senate Tossups

If you’ve been following the runup to the midterm elections, you know that 2018 has been a bleak year for Republican congressional prospects. While Democrats remain the odds-on favorites to control the House next year, Republicans have high hopes that the Senate will be a firewall against a total loss of Congress.

Democrats began the campaign with a difficult election map, but as recently as last month their chances of winning the Senate seemed to be improving. Of 36 senate seats that are up for election this year, only nine are held by Republicans. That means that Democrats have only nine chances to flip the two seats that they need to win a majority. However, as the year progressed, seats that had seemed safe for Republicans began to look more and more shaky.

As of this writing, nine seats are considered to be tossups. Only four of these are Republican seats so Democrats remain at a disadvantage for winning control. As Resurgent reported last week, during the furor of the Brett Kavanaugh hearings, the momentum in three Senate races seems to have shifted towards the GOP.

Here is a rundown on the tossup Senate races, along with links to the Real Clear Politics polls and FiveThirtyEight’s forecasting model:

Arizona – Republican Martha McSally and Democrat Kyrsten Sinema are competing for incumbent Jeff Flake’s seat. Sinema has consistently outpolled McSally with the exception of two polls in early September. The Real Clear Politics average has Sinema ahead by about three points. FiveThirtyEight gives Sinema a 66 percent chance of winning.

Florida – Democrat incumbent Bill Nelson is defending his seat against Governor Rick Scott. Scott led the polls for most of the summer, giving Republicans hope of picking up the seat and causing Democrats to fret. Nelson surged in late September and has led four of the last five polls (with the fifth a tie). Nelson’s lead in most polls is within the margin of error, but his consistent lead gives him the advantage. FiveThirtyEight puts Nelson’s odds of winning at 60 percent.

Indiana – Another Democrat seat defended by incumbent Joe Donnelly against Mike Braun, a Republican state legislator. Polling has been scant and mixed. The RCP average has Donnelly up by four points, but this is due to two older polls from July and August. Nevertheless, FiveThirtyEight gives Donnelly a 77 percent chance of retaining his seat.  

Missouri – Democrat Claire McCaskill is defending her seat against Josh Hawley, the state’s Republican attorney general. Polling shows a dead heat with Hawley up by less than half a point in the RCP average. The FiveThirtyEight forecast basically shows a coin toss with McCaskill given a 58 percent of winning.

Montana – The race for Democrat Jon Tester’s seat was recently moved from “lean Democratic” to “tossup” by Cook Political Report. Matt Rosendale, the state auditor, still trails in the RCP average by three points, however. The FiveThirtyEight model gives Tester an 85 percent chance of retaining his seat.

Nevada – Dean Heller, the incumbent Republican, is facing a strong challenge from Jacky Rosen, a state legislator. Rosen has led in three of the past four polls giving her a slight edge in the RCP average that is within the margin of error. FiveThirtyEight considers this another coin toss race and gives Heller a 52 percent of winning.

North Dakota – This is yet another red state Democrat seat with the incumbent in serious trouble. Heidi Heitkamp was already trailing when she voted against Kavanaugh. Now North Dakota’s at-large congressman, Kevin Cramer, seems poised to flip the seat for Republicans. Cramer leads by double-digits in the two polls from September and FiveThirtyEight gives the GOP candidate a 68 percent chance of taking the seat.

Tennessee – Republican Bob Corker is retiring and two longtime political operatives, Republican Marsha Blackburn and Democrat Phil Bredesen are vying for his seat. Blackburn currently holds a 2.5-point advantage but has been steadily surging since the end of August. FiveThirtyEight gives Blackburn a 70 percent chance of winning, but Taylor Swift’s recent endorsement of Bredesen may upend the race. Vote.org reports that 65,000 people registered to vote in the 24 hours after Swift’s endorsement, more than 2,000 of them in Tennessee.

Texas – The election in the deep red state of Texas for the seat of Republican stalwart Ted Cruz was a surprise tossup. At the beginning of the year, few would have imagined that Cruz would be fighting for his political life. Polling was close over the summer, but no one really thought Texas would dump Cruz for Democrat Beto O’Rourke, did they? The RCP average now has Cruz up by six points. That’s closer than it should be, but FiveThirtyEight gives Cruz a 73 percent chance of hanging on.

If you’re keeping score, the current forecasts indicate that Democrats would pick up only one of the four Republican tossups and that Republicans would flip only one of the five Democrat seats at risk. When the dust settles, the balance of power in the Senate could remain unchanged. The nature of tossups is that they could go either way, however, and several of the races, particularly Nevada and Missouri are truly too close to call.

Overall, the Democrats have an uphill battle that requires them to win almost all the tossup races to win control of the Senate. FiveThirtyEight puts the odds of this at about 20 percent. These are long odds, but they are not insurmountable. In fact, it’s pretty close to the same odds that they gave Donald Trump.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Three Shocking Developments In the Cruz-O'Rourke Senate Race

The surprisingly hotly contested race between Texas Senator Ted Cruz and his Democratic challenger, Beto O’Rourke has been shaken up once again. A new poll, a sudden change of heart and an August surprise have upended the race that Cruz had once been assumed to win in a walk.

The first shock came with the release of a new poll on Monday that showed Cruz with only a one-point lead over O’Rourke. The Emerson College poll of 550 registered voters found Cruz with 38 percent and O’Rourke with 37 percent. The race is well within the poll’s margin of error of 4.4 points. It should be noted that the sample size of the poll is small and registered voter polls are less credible than polls of likely voters.

The poll found that voters disapprove of Cruz by 38 to 44 percent. Cruz has only 25 percent approval among independent voters (57 percent disapprove) and O’Rourke leads by 20 points among independents. Cruz is suffering from a generation gap. Younger voters overwhelmingly prefer O’Rourke while older voters favor Cruz by large margins.   

Shockingly, the poll found that 21 percent of voters were undecided. This is not good news for Ted Cruz since he is an incumbent with 99 percent name recognition. As pollster and pundit Dick Morris often points out, undecided voters often break for the challenger. Morris uses the analogy of marriage, saying that if you are undecided about whether to keep your spouse, that’s not a good thing. Being undecided on whether to rehire your senator also likely means that you have a problem with him.

The good news for Ted Cruz is that the other two shocks to the race are bad for Beto O’Rourke. First, O’Rourke announced on Monday that a proposed August 31 debate with Ted Cruz “is not going to happen.” In July, Cruz challenged O’Rourke to a series of debates. O’Rourke accepted the challenge, but proposed revisions to the Cruz schedule.

On Monday, O’Rourke told the Texas Tribune, “Friday in Dallas is not going to happen, but I'm convinced we will debate. I'm convinced there will be a number of debates.”

O’Rourke accused the Cruz campaign of attempting to micromanage the details of the debates, saying, “We're working through those differences, and we're trying to introduce more of a collaborative style to the negotiations than he may be used to. And so we're confident that out of that, we're going to come to something good.”

A spokesman for the Cruz campaign fired back, “[O'Rourke] begged for debates, but when Sen. Cruz invited him to five debates all across Texas, suddenly O’Rourke seemed to get scared” and added that "except for when he has to be in DC for his work in the Senate, Cruz is ready and excited to debate O’Rourke, including this Friday.”

It’s possible that O’Rourke’s reversal on the debate challenge is related to an August surprise published in the Houston Chronicle this morning. A Chronicle investigation confirmed that O’Rourke was arrested in the 1990s for DWI and burglary. O’Rourke was arrested on two separate occasions. The first was in 1995 for “attempted forcible entry” on the campus of the University of Texas at El Paso and in 1998 for DWI. The university decided not to press charges for the first incident and O’Rourke completed DWI school as a result of the second charge.

The O’Rourke campaign said that the candidate has acknowledged both arrests multiple times. In fact, the arrests have been public knowledge since 2005 when O’Rourke’s opponent in a race for the El Paso city council ran an ad describing the incidents. O’Rourke eventually won that race.

In 2005, The El Paso Times quoted O’Rourke’s description of the arrests. “I've been open about that since the very beginning,” O’Rourke said. “I have owned up to it and I have taken responsibility for it.”

With respect to the burglary arrest, O’Rourke said, “That happened while I was in college. I along with some friends were horsing around, and we snuck under the fence at the UTEP physical plant and set off an alarm. We were arrested by UTEP police. ... UTEP decided not to press charges. We weren't intending to do any harm.”

At a campaign stop in San Antonio, O’Rourke called his DWI  a “far more serious mistake,” saying, “I drove under the influence of alcohol. There’s no justifying that.”

In a close race, O’Rourke may regret his decision to bow out of his debate with Ted Cruz. The decision gives the Cruz campaign an opening to attack him and make him look weak and unprepared on the issues. At this point, O’Rourke may well feel that debating Cruz can only slow his momentum.

Likewise, O’Rourke’s arrests may be old news in El Paso, but they will be new to many Texas voters. Even though the arrests happened 20 years ago, they may lead voters to question O’Rourke’s character and fitness for office.

The bad news for O’Rourke at least partially offsets Ted Cruz’s negative approval rating. Polling over the past few months has shown O’Rourke closing slowing on the senator. The Cruz campaign and its surrogates will undoubtedly hope that the revelations about O’Rourke shift the momentum towards Cruz.

In any case, the race is certain to go down to the wire. Texas is still deep red and the race remains Cruz’s to lose. Nevertheless, if the senator returns to Washington for the next Congress, it won’t be because he cruised to reelection.   

Originally published on The Resurgent