Don't like these numbers from today's TN primary. Not like TN was in play, but Blackburn is terrible.

TN was definitely in play. Bredesen was beating Blackburn in head to head polls. How much does primary turnout matter for the general election?

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep...esen-6308.html

91.5% sounds like a lot of confidence. maybe 400k democrats knew it was in the bag?

I'll take Bredesen. You can have Beto.

Putting AZ or MT as 'either locks or safe enough to feel good about' is getting a little ahead of yourself I think.

Please god one time.
D: NV, TN, AZ, MT, MO, FL, ND
R: IN, TX

On one hand: sure, not super worried about Democrats not showing up en masse to support someone who had it on the bag
On the other hand: the most recent analogous race in Tennessee seems like 2006 - also a midterm year (and a wave for Ds), where Corker first won his seat in a very, very close race (won by 3) against Harold Ford Jr. In that year's R primary, which was much more contested than Blackburn's, under 500k Republicans showed up to vote, versus over 700k this year (population growth might account for ~50k of those).

So, uh, idk.

Perhaps in an open primary some general election Bredesen voters decided to vote against Blackburn? Or, Bredesen is crushing it with the voters who aren't dedicated enough to show up to vote in primaries.

No matter how much we spin it, it's not good news for Bredesen...

The most critical primary race in tennessee was the republican gubernatorial race. I think a lot of people who voted on the republican ticket will support bredeson including many republicans.

The TN primary results are fine. There was also a primary for governor. The Republican side had a large field with several viable candidates. The Democratic side was a lock for both governor and senate. Far more competitive for Republicans in most HoR districts as well. Also it should be noted that the favorite for Republican governor, a female US Representative who ran aligned with Trump (sound familiar?) got curb stomped by the underdog outsider candidate.

Sure they're still competitive but they're leaning D and trending in the same direction. The races I highlighted are closer to coinflips with indicators showing positive news for both sides.

That woman in TN is like the absolute nut low person/candidate. I get tilted just looking at her stupid face. After Ted Cruz, she is a clear #2 person I really want to see lose.

Rick Scott is way worse than she is (and probably Cruz too, tbh).

I think this is accurate. Bredesen is still relatively popular, he was a pretty decent governor and blackburn isn't exactly the most popular republican in the state.

The governor primary definitely surprised me. Both Dianne Black and Randy Boyd went HARD with 24/7 "I am the TRUMPiest" ads (Black basically showed clips of her and Trump shaking hands nonstop on repeat, Boyd LITERALLY said "I'm just like trump, only I tweet less" in his ads), and Bill Lee's campaign was mostly "I'm a 'moderate'" (relatively speaking). I really didn't think he had a chance but he pulled it out.

Blackburn is absolutely terrible for sure. Before the primary she hadn't spent a cent but now she's running ads constantly, and she literally spends 30 seconds talking without saying a single goddamn coherent thought.

Bill Nelson: The Russians have penetrated some Florida voter registration systems

Nelson, who is up for re-election in November, and Florida's other U.S. Senator, Republican Marco Rubio, wrote a July 2 letter to the 67 county election supervisors about potential threats. But that letter lacked the specificity Nelson has laid out.

"County election boards should not be expected to stand alone against a hostile foreign government," the lawmakers said in recommending "a wide range of services" from DHS to strengthen security.

"We were requested by the chairman and vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee to let supervisors of election in Florida know that the Russians are in their records," Nelson told the Times on Wednesday.

https://twitter.com/PoliticsReid/sta...58137094647808

Just saw a Beto for Texas shirt in Baltimore... Can't be a bad thing!

Republicans with the super-fragile crocodile tears. Feckless.

https://www.commercialappeal.com/sto...dge/953300002/

Nah, it’s the exact opposite. Texas is still a R+10 state. Most of those low info undecideds are gonna hate Beto even if they are pretty meh on Ted.

I hope they're running ads about how Cruz has no sack. There's a perfect ad waiting to be made. Donald Trump called his wife ugly and falsely suggested his dad was a criminal. There's a clip from April 2016 of Cruz at a press conference acting hard "When you go after my family, I'm not just gonna take it. Donald you're a sniveling coward." Run that clip, cut to four months later him phone banking for Trump, then sprinkle in some quotes from Cruz's fawning Time magazine blurb on the Dear Leader.

Do that, make sure everybody sees it, and Cruz can't win imo. Half his voter base are faux alpha male Texas tough guys. They jerk off to caging kids and denying poor people health care, but their guy looking like a straight up b*tch will depress turnout. Cenk Uygur came up with the perfect tag line for this kind of campaign: Beto Versus Beta.

That’s a terrible strategy for a state near the top of the country in straight party voting and where the republican governor has 60% approval. It sucks he’s not from Florida or some other swingy state where being a +7 over replacement dem makes you a lock even against an incumbent with a national profile. But the fact of the matter is he is running in a state where a dem hasn’t won state wide in 20+ years. He needs an unprecedented turnout shift and just convincing everyone that Ted is a little ***** probably won’t do that.

Didn't know TX gov was up this year. ****ing bummer. Still gotta run that ad anyway, prolly cost him a couple points. Could see it costing him among women too. Pretty offensive to women of traditional values to see a husband roll over for a guy who called his wife ugly.

Possibly. Beto overall has done really well and is a really good candidate, so I’m not sure he should be doing anything differently. But I think there is a lot of kool aid being drunk about his chances by people who’ve never lived in Texas. There are some structural reasons why it’s a tougher not to crack than you otherwise might think.

That add shouldn't come from Beto's campaign but from a PAC.

How the special elections could predict the midterms

interactive graphic for the house not senate

cliffs: if the midterms reflect the special elections, republicans would likely lose 100 seats

A decent but frustrating look into the Indiana Senate race: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...b0bdd06208c45a