Send Out the Clown🌴 ✡️🌻✡️🌻✡️ 🌴

One More Day:  One more day until the election but maybe many more before we know the outcome and then maybe months more because we all know that if he doesn’t like the outcome, Trump’s team of devious election bandits will fight tooth and nail to overturn the results. If you feel like you are on a rollercoaster named Déjà vu that’s either flying gently through cotton candy clouds or careening violently into a concrete wall, you are not alone. The election is either tied, in the hands of a few “undecided” voters in some corner of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia or Arizona; or it’s a lock for the increasingly crazy mentally diminished but effectively dictatorial 🤡 who wants to shoot his opponents, shut down media outlets not named Fox, ban vaccines and fluoride, and trash what the Wall Street Journal calls a remarkable economy; or it’s in the hands of the relatively normal Maya Rudolph doppelganger with a contagious, joyous laugh who has opened up her tent to everyone and anyone willing to step in, who prefers democracy over autocracy, abhors fascism, thinks that body autonomy is a right, and has a rational fear of evil 🤡 🤡 and their Nazis cohorts. As to those deadlocked polls, a number of experts believe it’s unlikely that all of the swing states are tied, saying instead that it’s just as likely that the pollsters are herding, making similar risk adverse decisions, because having been burned by their underestimation of Trump support during 2016 and 2020, they fear being burned again.  However, at least one reputable pollster is willing to go out on a limb. On Saturday, Des Moines Register’s well-respected pollster Ann Selzer, who historically has been right more often than not, released results showing Kamala Harris leading Trump by 3 points in Iowa. If she’s right, or even close to right, Trump is in bigly trouble, not just in Iowa, because her poll reflects a move in Harris’ direction.  Selzer, who stands by her “outlier” results attributes Iowa’s shift away from Trump towards Harris to a familiar theme, the state’s adoption of one of those really onerous abortion laws and the impact that has had on women voters, It’s not just the presidential race, Selzer’s poll also shows two of Iowa’s red House seats going blue. Right or wrong, Selzer’s poll launched my emotional rollercoaster into cloud nine for a few hours but then Sunday the newest bunch of polls showed Trump and Harris in a tie, leaving me feeling like that concrete wall was fast approaching and listening to Trump’s insane, incoherent rally speeches served as an accelerant. So, we are somewhere it’s just not clear where.  See you on the other side of Tuesday.            

Senate Scorecard: While so much attention is focused on the presidential race, both the Senate and House are on the line too. For no particular reason other than luck of the draw, this Senate cycle is more challenging for Democrats because, though they currently control the Senate with a 51-seat majority made up of 47 Democrats and 4 Independents, more of their swing state Senators are up for reelection and a number from their majority are retiring. Retiring Democratic Senators include Michigan’s Debbie Stabenow, Maryland’s Ben Cardin, and Delaware’s Tom Carper.  In addition, New Jersey’s Bob Menendez left early after he was found guilty of accepting bribes, California’s Dianne Feinstein has moved on to the Senate in the sky and, facing certain defeat, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin and Arizona’s Krysten Sinema, who caucused with the Democrats though they’d become Independents, aren’t seeking reelection.  Absent a miracle, the West Virginia seat is a goner and will end up in the hands of the state’s Governor Jim Justice, once a Democrat but now a Republican, who is expected to easily win his election. Democrats are expected to easily hold on to their seats in California, New Jersey, and Delaware, where Adam Schiff, Andy Kim, and Lisa Blunt Rochester are each expected to win their respective races easily. To maintain control, Democrats will need to either win the presidency and hold onto all their remaining seats or pick up one or more Republican seats to compensate for any losses, easier said than done especially since Montana’s incumbent Democratic Senator Jon Tester has been consistently polling behind his challenger in very red Montana.  It’s not just Tester who is at risk, Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, Wisconsin’s Tammy Baldwin, and Pennsylvania’s Bob Casey are also facing tough races.  The good news is that Michigan’s Elissa Slotkin appears to be holding her own, as is Maryland’s Alsobrooks and Arizona’s Ruben Gallego who is likely to beat avid Trumpster/election denier Kari Lake who still hasn’t conceded the Governor race that she lost two years ago but still those races bear watching.  Theoretically Democrats stand a small chance of picking up Ted Cruz’ Texas seat and an even smaller chance of knocking off Rick Scott in Florida, but don’t count on it, Texas hopes have been dashed before and Florida is Florida. Lastly, there’s the very strange race in Nebraska where independent Dan Osborn is challenging Republican incumbent Deb Fischer.  Osborn hasn’t said who he'll caucus with if he pulls off what would be an unprecedented victory but given his labor roots, it’s more likely than not that he’d mostly hang with the Democrats. In descending order of panic, these are the Senate races to watch:   

Montana                   Jon Tester v Tim Sheehy  
Ohio                          Sherrod Brown v Bernie Moreno                 

Wisconsin                 Tammy Baldwin v Eric Hovde
Pennsylvania             Bob Casey v David McCormick
Michigan                   Elissa Slotkin v Mike Rogers
Maryland                   Angela Alsobrooks v Larry Hogan
Arizona                      Ruben Gallego v Kari Lake
Nevada                      Jackie Rosen v Sam Brown      

Texas                         Ted Cruz v Colin Allred 
Florida                       Rick Scott v Debra Mucarsel-Powell
Nebraska                   Deb Fischer v Dan Osborn

The House:  Republicans currently hold a 220 to 212 edge over Democrats in the House where three seats are currently vacant.  Two of those vacant seats are due to deaths in safe Democratic districts and one is due to a retirement in a safe Republican district so the “starting point” before the election is really 221 to 214.  Somewhere around 27 districts are considered toss-ups, including a number in California and New York that Democrats lost in what turned out to be only a red hiccup rather than a red wave in 2020 but now hope to retake this time around. Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries needs some of those seats and more to wrest the Speakership from Republican Mike Johnson, or whomever the Republicans select as their leader this time around.  Retaking the House won’t be a cakewalk for Jeffries’ Democrats because there are also a number of seats that either through redistricting or just because they’ve always been competitive, like Jared Golden’s seat in Maine and Marie Glusenkamp Perez’s seat in Washington State, could shift into Republican hands. Keep an eye on the eastern time zone where polls close first because the outcome there will probably provide a clue as to how the House will go. In New York, races to watch include those for the seats currently held by Long Island Republican Congressmen Anthony D’Esposito and Nick LaLota and further upstate by Republicans Marc Molinaro, Mike Lawler and Brandon Williams who are also facing challenging races.  Not all of these seats will change hands, but some will.  Also, keep in mind that since a lot of Californians vote by mail and the deadline to receive those ballots is seven days after election day, the state’s close seat results can take weeks to be decided.  Moreover, it’s not just NY and California that could determine who controls the House, one of the Democrats most vulnerable seats is time zones away in Alaska where Mary Peltola is facing a tough battle against her Republican opponent and one of the Republican’s most vulnerable seats is in Nebraska where Republican Don Bacon could lose, in part because Republican’s failed effort to rid his Omaha area district of its one electoral vote alienated some swing voters.   

Keep breathing!

#BringThemAllHomeNow