The Tolbert Report

Republican Congressional candidate Beth Anne Rankin flew to New York last week to appear on “The Huckabee Show.” This is the new daily talk show hosted by Mike Huckabee not his weekend show on Fox News.  The show does not air in the fourth Congressional district where Rankin in challenging incumbent Democratic Rep. Mike Ross or anywhere in Arkansas for that matter, so I am not sure what the strategy is of appearing on a show that almost none of your potential voters will ever see.

Anyway, Rankin appeared with two other women running for Congress including Republican candidate for CA-37  Star Parker and Democratic candidate for NY-14 Reshma Saujani, which is in New York City where “The Huckabee Show” is both taped and airs.  Huckabee said he would vote for all three including the Democrat.

Rankin says she did not realize she was a part of a larger movement of women running for office but instead she was inspired by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.

The last we looked at “The Huckabee Show,” Mike Huckabee was busy interviewing the founders of a website that helps people have affairs.  Lots of free media for a horrible website from the king of free media. Anyway, the last of the six week trial run aired today and indications are this will be the end.

This is interesting. Republican gubernatorial candidate Jim Keet has press conference scheduled for 2 this afternoon at his state headquarters.  He has not announced a topic but instead says he will “issue a brief statement and then take questions from the press.”

Keet has a practice of scheduling a press conference about once a week or so but he will usually put out at least a general idea of what he will be talking about. But the campaign is tight lipped on this one. And inviting questions from the Arkansas media is pretty daring.

It might be a boring one but it could be interesting. I will let you know.

UPDATE - I was able to listen in via the live feed from Gerard Matthews of the Arkansas Times. Thanks for supplying.

Keet challenged Gov. Beebe to a debate in all four Congressional district and complained about Beebe avoided him at the Hot Springs Arkanas Economic Developers forum (hearing the gumbles from Sen. Lincoln’s campaign echoing in the distance.)

The question and answer focused largely on the Arkansas Democrat Gazette’s story on his tax issues. Keet took issue with the story’s claim that he was blaming his wife for the tax mistake and confronted ADG reporter Seth Blomeley directly over the characterization.  He insisted all his tax liability is now paid up.

After about 15 minutes of question on the tax issue, Keet cut off questions and ended the press conference.

UPDATE II – Okay, I hate doing this but apparently the most recent press release I posted was sent to me in error. I was asked to remove it and as a courtsey to the campaign - I did.

Roby Brock wraps up his polling of the four Arkansas Congressional districts with the race between incumbent Democrat Rep. Mike Ross and Republican challenger Beth Anne Rankin.  This race is unique in that it is the only Arkansas Congressional race with an incumbent seeking re-election and is also the only one where the Democrat has a lead.  Here is how the polling came out…

Rep. Mike Ross (D) 49%
Beth Anne Rankin (R) 31%
Joshua Drake (G) 4%
Undecided 16%

The comfortable lead is perhaps reflective of two things. First, Ross has worked hard to remain in touch with his district. He comes home and travels the district as frequently as possible holding townhall meetings several times in almost every county in his very spread out district.

Because of this, he was one of the first Democratic representatives to pick up on the unrest over the federal health care reform bill and over Washington in general and quickly modified his message veering hard to the right. And these two points are already the focus of his ads in his re-election campaign.

If there is a bright spot for Rankin, it’s that Ross did poll just under 50 percent.  This affords her the opportunity to make the case to the undecided voters as to why she should replace Ross as their representative.  To do this, she will need to put some serious money and effort behind her campaign and introduce herself to the voters for the next two months as at this point she is still largely unknown with almost 40% of the district having no opinion of her yet.

The latest Talk Business poll shows Republican Mayor Steve Womack with a large 24 point led over Democrat David Whitaker.  This is no surprise as this is one of the safest Republican seats in the country.  However what is someone interesting is that it seems even Whitaker with 31 percent support in third is overperforming Sen. Lincoln who only had 27 percent in the latest poll.

Here are the results…

Mayor Steve Womack (R) – 55%
David Whitaker (D) – 31%
Undecided – 14%

The Chad Causey for Congress campaign responded to a poll released last night by content partner Talk Business showing them down by 16 points by releasing a couple internal polls and more significantly by attacking their opponent Rick Crawford directly as well as Republicans in general.

First, their internal polls still show Causey trailing in one poll but by a closer margin.  A poll in August has a one point race with Causey at 40 percent and Crawford at 41 percent.  Another internal poll in July shows Causey with a slight lead with 42 percent to Crawford’s 40 percent.

Then, they go on the attack.  First, against Republicans in the First Congressional District saying that Democrats are always elected “due to the hard work of the winning candidate and the lack of a quality Republican candidate.”

This mirrors criticism from Rep. Marion Berry a few month back when he said that Democrats win because “we out work them (Republicans)  and we are smarter than they are too.”

The Causey Campaign then when on the attack directly at Causey on a buffet of issues from where he graduated high school to his 16 year old bankruptcy.

It is amusing what people will say when they get desperate.

Full memo on the jump.

UPDATE – The Crawford Campaign was swift to respond calling the attacks from Causey a “desperate…hit veterans and military families.” According to them, Causey polled if it would influence voters to know that Crawford was an “Air Force Brat.”

“This is truly sad and Chad Causey needs to apologize to veterans and their families everywhere. Rick’s father spent his career protecting this country and now Chad Causey thinks that because his son was part of a military family that should be used as some sort of political attack,” said Crawford Campaign spokesman Jonah Shumate. “That is the kind of cynical and wanton disrespect that only a Washington insider would show to military families. This is a sad development, but at the end of the day the voters of this district will understand the difference between someone who wants to serve their interests and serve this country as opposed to continuing Chad’s record of serving Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama”.

(more…)

Content partner Roby Brock with Talk Business released a poll this evening that offers further evidence that Republicans in Arkansas may see the best election years in modern history. In the race for the open First Congressional District in eastern Arkansas, Republican business Rick Crawford has a comfortable sixteen point lead over Democrat Chad Causey, who is Chief of Staff to the incumbent representative. Here are the results…

Rick Crawford (R) 48%
Chad Causey (D) 32%
Ken Adler (G) 4%
Unsure 16%

On top of this, Republican Party Executive Director Chase Duggar indicated this weekend that in their internal polling Republican state legislative candidates are leading in every single race. So far the only two Democrats that have not been behind in the polls I have seen are Rep. Mike Ross and Gov. Mike Beebe.

The first general election Congressional debate of the election season is set for this coming Tuesday in Hot Springs where incumbent Democratic Rep. Mike Ross will square of against Republican challenger Beth Anne Rankin.  The political forum is sponsored by the Arkansas Economic Developers and will be moderated by Roby Brock.

The forum is set for Tuesday, August 24 at 4:30 pm at Hot Springs Convention Center.

Rankin is also scheduled to appear later this week on “The Huckabee Show” and will travel to New York Thursday for the taping.

UPDATE - I have been told the Hot Springs event will be more of a forum and less of a debate.  Candidates cannot address one another directly and will answer pre-submitted questions. Think the “Blah in the Spa” with Rep. Boozman and Sen. Lincoln a couple weeks ago.

Also, I have learned that two actual debates are planned for October.  One will be an in-studio debate broadcast on AETN on October 13 and another one will be a live debate in El Dorado on October 14.

I did not think it was possible but the latest poll show Republican Rep. John Boozman up by an even wider margin than before over incumbent Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln.  In July, Rasmussen had Boozman with a 25 point lead but today they released a poll showing him with a 38 point lead. They have it…

Rep. John Boozman (R) 65%
Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D) 27%
Other Candidate 4%
Undecided 3%

“Lincoln is viewed as a liberal by 55% of Arkansas voters, while 74% regard Boozman as a conservative,” says Rasmussen. “Conservative appears to play well with voters in the state since 55% see Boozman’s views as mainstream. Just 23% say they’re extreme. By contrast, only 37% see Lincoln’s views as politically mainstream, while 46% view them as extreme.”

UPDATE – Roby Brock points me to two new Lincoln ads where she will try to stop the bleeding. In first, she mischaracterizes Boozman’s support for Social Security reform and for the FairTax plan.  In the second, she complains that her position on health care reform has been mischaracterized and that she is firmly in the middle.

A couple internal polls shows good news for Republican candidates David Sanders and Jeremy Hutchinson.

Republican Jeremy Hutchinson is running against Democratic Rep. Dawn Creekmore for state senate district 22, which is being vacated by Democratic Sen. Shane Broadway due to term limits.  This district includes west Pulaski and most of Saline County. Here are his internal results…

Jeremy Hutchinson (R)  57.7%
Dawn Creekmore (D) 26.0%

Republican David Sanders is running against Democrat Debbie Murphy for state representative district 31, which is opened up as Rep. Dan Greenberg did not run for re-election. This district mainly includes west Pulaski and northern Saline Counties. It is roughly the northern portion of state senate district 22. Here are his internal results…

David Sanders (R) 61.6%
Debbie Murphy (D) 23.9%

I always put a caution on internal polls but so far the numbers I have seen from Diamond Consulting Group which conducted this and most Republican internal polls have been consistent with independent polling results.

Content partner Roby Brock just wrapped up the first independent poll of the general election on the Arkansas Congressional race.  First up is central Arkansas’ second district race between Republican Tim Griffin and Democrat Joyce Elliott.  The poll show Griffin with a commanding 17 point lead and is consistent with the results of the internal polls we have seen.

Tim Griffin (R) 52%
Joyce Elliott (D) 35%
Lance Levi (I) 3%
Lewis Kennedy (G) 1%
Undecided 9%

The poll also shows that Griffin has a +32 point favorable name id ( 53 fav/21 unfav) while Elliott has a -13 point unfavorable (32 fav/ 45 unfav).  With the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee already committing $693,000 on this race, I would expect the attack ads to begin soon on Griffin to try and drive down his favorables.  But it will be difficult for the DCCC to do enough damage to close this wide of a gap.

More analysis from Brock on his post this morning.

Also of note, Griffin leads in all eight counties including Pulaski where it was expected Elliott would do well.  Conventional wisdom was that Elliott would win the population center in Pulaski County while Griffin would win the other seven counties by wide margins.  Reportedly, Elliott’s strategy had been to campaign in the other seven counties to hold down Griffin’s margins enough for Pulaski to put her over the top.  This poll indicates she still has work to do in Pulaski County and may need to revisit her plan.

And also…I just saw that the Club for Growth endorsed Griffin today.  This will mean no shortage of attack ads on both sides.