By Jim Ellis — Friday, Sept. 13, 2024
President
Former President Donald Trump / Photo by Gage Skidmore
Post-debate, the ballot tests from the seven swing states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) found Trump leading Vice President Kamala Harris, 48-46 percent when minor party candidates were included and 50-47 percent from a head-to-head Trump vs. Harris question. The pre-debate data found the two tied at 46 percent apiece in the multi-candidate configuration and 48-48 percent from the head-to-head question.
Though these numbers certainly cut against the grain of stated post-debate perceptions, the full effect will be felt next week when we see the next round of publicly released polling.
House
Congressional Leadership Fund: Launches Series of Ads — The Congressional Leadership Fund, an outside Super PAC with ties to the House Republican leadership, unleashed a series of well researched and targeted ads in nine competitive congressional districts. Each ad is customized for the individual target and not what are commonly called “cookie cutter” messages where the target and verbiage are interchangeable. Democratic organizations use the latter technique to attack Republicans on the abortion issue.
The Democratic targets are: Kirsten Engel (AZ-6 against Rep. Juan Ciscomani), Rudy Salas (CA-22; Rep. David Valadao), Rep. Yadira Caraveo (CO-8; GOP candidate Gabe Evans), former Rep. Mondaire Jones (NY-17; Rep. Mike Lawler), Rep. Pat Ryan (NY-18; GOP candidate Alison Esposito), Josh Riley (NY-19; Rep. Marc Molinaro), Rep. Marcy Kaptur (OH-9; GOP candidate Derek Merrin), Janelle Bynum (OR-5; Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer), and Rep. Matt Cartwright (PA-8; GOP candidate Rob Bresnahan).
Governor
Alabama: A Potential Tuberville Gubernatorial Candidacy? — Speculation abounds that first-term Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R) may eschew running for re-election in 2026 and instead attempt to succeed GOP Gov. Kay Ivey who will be ineligible to seek a third term.
In response to a question about this possibility, Sen. Tuberville was non-committal but said that he is “tired of getting kicked in the teeth being in the [US Senate] minority.” His view of the Senate may change if the Republicans capture the majority in November, however.
Should Sen. Tuberville decide to enter the open race for governor, he would only have to clear what is expected to be a crowded GOP primary in strongly Republican Alabama. With his strong conservative record, his chances of winning the Republican nomination appear highly favorable.
Another possible scenario, should the senator decide to run for governor, is seeing a primary that isn’t as hotly contested since many of the credible contenders would then opt to run for Tuberville’s open Senate seat.
Polling
FiveThirtyEight: Releases New Pollster Rankings — The FiveThirtyEight data organization released their latest rankings of the nation’s political pollsters, and again paid compliments to the most accurate of the survey research firms.
The number one pollster is the New York Times/Siena College. ABC News/Washington Post was rated second, and Marquette University Law School third. The international online pollster YouGov occupies the fourth slot, which is just ahead of Monmouth University, which rounds out the top five. The first four received perfect 3.0 scores on the 538 scale, while Monmouth was close behind at 2.9.
