The Daily 202: Preexisting Conditions Take Center Stage In Democratic Attack Ads

THE HOUSE:

-- Democrats are confident they will regain control of the House, but politicians and pundits are hesitant to make definitive predictions after Trump’s huge 2016 upset. Matt Viser reports: “[D]ozens of key races across the country were toss-ups or close to it. … ‘There’s not the certainty that there normally is,’ said Dave Carney, a longtime Republican consultant. ‘No one knows what the Trump effect is. What the negativity and the yelling and screaming online are going to do.’ … Democrats also cast the impact of the election as existential as they pleaded with voters to deliver a resounding rejection to Trump and his brash brand of politics.”

-- Nancy Pelosi is poised to make a historic comeback as House speaker if Democrats can flip 23 seats. Mike DeBonis reports: “But to do so, Pelosi won’t only have to overcome Republicans. She’ll also have to outmaneuver Democrats like Rep. Seth Moulton (Mass.) and House candidate Amy McGrath, who talked about change in a hall full of rural Kentucky Democrats. …

As dozens of Democratic candidates have distanced themselves from Pelosi, adding uncertainty to any leadership bid next year, Pelosi has had one response: ‘Just win, baby.’ … [Pelosi said,] ‘I do think that I am best qualified to take us into the future, protect the Affordable Care Act, to do our infrastructure bill and the rest. Stepping down this path, I know the ropes.’”

-- Paul Ryan predicted the GOP would narrowly maintain control of the House. DeBonis reports: “But Ryan, speaking in a Fox News Channel interview, also acknowledged that his party could well lose their 23-seat majority and suggested, if so, historical forces would be to blame. ‘History is not our friend,’ he told host Bret Baier, noting that a first-term president’s party on average loses 32 seats. ‘A couple of our seats are already gone because of recent redistricting that was done in, say, Pennsylvania. So we already are standing against the historical trend that cuts against us.’”

-- If Democrats take the House and Republicans keep the Senate, as many expect, divided government could be unable to produce any major legislation. From Paul Kane:

“If Democrats seize the House majority, it will mark the third time in 12 years that the chamber switched control, a level of voter volatility not seen since just after World War II. ... Each House and Senate leader starts off a new Congress believing he or she can retain — or win over — the majority in their chamber and charts a course to do so. In modern politics that means, first things first, driving up the energy of liberal or conservative base voters, which by definition makes bipartisan compromise more difficult.”

-- Politico’s Charlie Mahtesian lists 10 places that could help determine control of the House (and play outsize roles in some gubernatorial and Senate races): Upstate New York, downstate Illinois, the Delaware Valley region, Orange County, Calif., metro Atlanta, Las Vegas, Maricopa County, Ariz., North Jersey, Oakland County, Mich., and greater Houston.

-- Control of the House may be determined by those who choose not to vote, particularly in critical suburban districts. Marc Fisher and Kristine Phillips report: “For Democrats to take control of either chamber of Congress, they must activate masses of voters — particularly young people and minorities — who in the past have not bothered to show up. … And since Republicans, too, need support from people who usually don’t vote — or vote only in presidential years — to maintain their majorities, both parties are spending millions to try to move the uninvolved into the fray, if only just this once.”

-- Bad weather is expected across the East Coast, which could hurt turnout and potentially aid Republicans. The New York Times’s Maggie Astor reports: “A strong cold front could cause rain and wind anywhere along the Eastern Seaboard, from the Florida Panhandle all the way up to Maine, said Tim Loftus, a data scientist and meteorologist at AccuWeather. There will most likely be severe thunderstorms from North Carolina up to South Jersey. … Multiple studies have shown that bad weather on Election Day can decrease turnout, which in turn tends to help Republicans, because the groups most likely to be deterred from voting are those that tend to vote Democratic.”

-- The Cook Political Report’s David Wasserman described the House battleground map as “wider and more lopsided than at any time since 2010.” He writes: “We rate 75 races as competitive, including 70 GOP-held seats and just five held by Democrats. A ‘Red Exodus’ is contributing to the potential ‘Blue Wave:’ of Republicans' 41 open seats, 15 are rated as Toss Ups or worse, and another five are only in Lean Republican. Just by winning all of the races at least ‘leaning’ their way, Democrats would net 16 of the 23 seats they need for a majority.”

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) speaks to the media before his candidate forum in Des Moines. (Bryon Houlgrave/Des Moines Register/AP)

-- Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) attracted even more controversy after he said he hopes Supreme Court Justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor “will elope to Cuba.” Felicia Sonmez reports: “At an appearance in Hampton, Iowa, King was discussing the Supreme Court and said that he was optimistic that ‘we’ll have a 7-2 court’ after Tuesday’s midterms, according to [The] Weekly Standard ... King added that perhaps ‘Kagan and Sotomayor will elope to Cuba,’ referring to President Barack Obama’s two Supreme Court appointments.” But many Republicans continue to support King — including Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who shot a video endorsement for the congressman.

-- A county in King’s district that has a large immigrant community will be monitored for compliance with federal voting laws. The Des Moines Register’s William Petroski and Barbara Rodriguez report: “Federal personnel will be sent to northwest Iowa's Buena Vista County, which has a large population of immigrants employed in agriculture and the meat packing industry in the Storm Lake area. … There are about 20,000 people in Buena Vista County. About 26 percent are identified as Hispanic or Latino, 9 percent Asian, 3 percent black or African-American, more than 1 percent native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and more than 1 percent two or more races, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Many of the immigrants are not native English speakers.”

-- Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) has tried to win reelection despite his recent indictment by running “one of the most brazenly anti-Muslim smear campaigns in recent history,” the Atlantic’s McKay Coppins writes. “In the final weeks of the election, Hunter has aired ominous ads warning that his Democratic opponent, Ammar Campa-Najjar, is ‘working to infiltrate Congress’ with the support of the Muslim Brotherhood. He has circulated campaign literature claiming the Democrat is a ‘national security threat’ who might reveal secret U.S. troop movements to enemies abroad if elected. While Hunter himself floats conspiracy theories from the stump about a wave of ‘radical Muslims’ running for office in America, his campaign is working overtime to cast Campa-Najjar as a nefarious figure reared and raised by terrorists. As multiple fact-checkers in the press have noted, these smears have no basis in reality.”

-- The next class of House Democrats is projected to become “younger, more female [and] more racially diverse,” Elise Viebeck reports. “The story might not be the same for Republicans. While female and minority lawmakers prepare to expand their influence within the opposition party, the House GOP is projected to become more white, male and conservative after its female and minority members face strong challengers at the ballot box on Tuesday. The result could be two parties whose image and ideology diverge in powerful ways ahead of the 2020 presidential race, when the increasingly white GOP could face an increasing demographic disadvantage even as the center and far left battle for control among far more multiethnic Democrats.”

-- House Democrats’ campaign arm has used a generous interpretation of campaign finance law to pay the rent for dozens of 2018 candidates’ campaign offices. Politico’s Scott Bland reports: “The spending on 52 offices around the country, known internally as DCCC ‘Battlestations,’ comes from a special fund established under a 2014 law that the DCCC can use only to maintain party headquarters buildings — not for other conventional campaign activities. … The move came with the blessing of the committee’s lead attorney, Marc Elias, who helped congressional leaders write the law that established the party building funds.”

Arizona Senate candidates Martha McSally and Kyrsten Sinema prepare their remarks in a television studio before a debate. (Matt York/AP)

THE SENATE:

-- Democrats believe they have the slimmest of chances at retaking the Senate by sweeping races in Texas, Nevada and Arizona. The New York Times’s Lisa Lerer and Jose A. Del Real report: “Nevada polls recently have shown (Dean) Heller and the Democratic nominee, Representative Jacky Rosen, trading off in the lead; Arizona polls have shown a neck-and-neck race between the Democrat, Representative Kyrsten Sinema, and the Republican, Representative Martha McSally. The mere fact that the Republican Senate candidates haven’t put away the race in those two states has been enough to lead some Democrats to think that Tuesday's election could lead to a very late night, with the East Coast waiting for the results out West to see who controls the Senate.”

-- The Atlantic’s Adam Serwer writes that Texas’s strict voting laws have suppressed Latino turnout in the state. “Republican dominance of Texas, which traces back at least as far as 1994, the last time a Democrat held statewide office, predates the party’s recent push to restrict the franchise. But if the party believed that dominance would continue unchallenged indefinitely, those restrictions wouldn’t have been necessary. Demographics aren’t destiny, but the Republican Party has approached its counter-majoritarian social engineering under the assumption that they are.”

-- Texas's ACLU criticized the timing of a Border Patrol “crowd control exercise” today near a Hispanic neighborhood in El Paso. An agency spokesman said there was “no link” to Election Day, but the executive director of the ACLU in Texas said, “The location, next to a totally Hispanic neighborhood, is suspicious. The timing of this — Election Day — is suspicious. This administration, and by extension the Abbott administration, have done quite enough to intimidate voters without staging military rehearsals on the day our nation exercises our most important democratic obligation: voting.” (Robert Moore)

-- Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, who is widely expected to lose her reelection bid in North Dakota, said she has felt a “surge” of support in the campaign’s final days. The Grand Forks Herald’s John Hageman reports: “Heitkamp rallied a couple hundred supporters in a Bismarck union hall and Kevin Cramer cast his ballot less than a mile away Monday morning, Nov. 5, as the race for U.S. Senate hurtled toward the finish line. Heitkamp, a Democratic senator seeking a second term in a reliably red state, was on the final leg of her 25-stop statewide bus tour ahead of Tuesday's midterm election.”

-- No matter who wins the Florida Senate race, the result could end the career of one of the state’s political heavyweights. The AP’s Gary Fineout reports: “Florida voters are choosing whether to keep three-term incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson or replace him with Republican Gov. Rick Scott. … Nelson has withstood years of GOP dominance to remain the only statewide Democrat, while Scott is a two-term governor who was urged by [Trump] to take on Nelson. A loss by the 76-year-old Nelson would likely end his political career and make it nearly impossible for Democrats to retake the Senate. If Scott loses, it could be a blow to his future political ambitions.”

Gubernatorial candidate Brian Kemp greets volunteers and staff at his campaign office in Atlanta. (Leah Millis/Reuters)

THE GOVERNORSHIPS:

-- Georgia officials rushed to fix security problems with the state’s voting system hours after the office of Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is also the Republican gubernatorial nominee, insisted they did not exist. Jack Gillum, Jessica Huseman, Mike Tigas, Jeff Kao and Stephen Fowler report for ProPublica: “ProPublica found the website was returning information in such a way that it revealed hidden locations on the file system. Computer security experts had said that revelation could give an intruder access to a range of information, including personal data about other voters and sensitive operating system details. ProPublica’s attempt to take the next step — to poke around the concealed files and the innards of the operating system — was blocked by software fixes made that evening. According to [a] tipster’s recipe, it was also possible to view a voter’s driver’s license, partial Social Security number and address.”

-- Georgia insiders increasingly believe the gubernatorial race will head to a December runoff. The New York Times’s Jonathan Martin and Matt Flegenheimer report: “The race is that close in [Republicans’] private polling and, while Mr. Kemp enjoys a slight advantage in the G.O.P. surveys, the libertarian on the ballot, Ted Metz, could take about 2 percent of the vote. (In Georgia’s 2014 gubernatorial race, the Libertarian nominee earned 2.36 percent of the vote.) That could keep either major candidate from reaching 50 percent on Election Day if the race remains neck-and-neck.”

-- Kemp tried to tie Democrat Stacey Abrams to the New Black Panther Party. Amy B Wang and Vanessa Williams report: “‘Abrams is TOO EXTREME for Georgia!’ Kemp tweeted Monday night, linking to an article that showed armed New Black Panther Party members posing with an Abrams campaign sign.In a Facebook post, the Atlanta chapter of the New Black Panther Party said it did not work for either campaign when it planned its ‘Armed Rally Against Voter Suppression.’ … The Southern Poverty Law Center has described the New Black Panther Party as ‘a virulently racist and anti-Semitic organization,’ and members of the original Black Panther Party have rejected the new group.”

-- Larry J. Sabato and Kyle Kondik at the University of Virginia's Center for Politics predict that Democrats will pick up 10 governorships. They write: “For all the focus on the House and the Senate, the real story of the night may be in the gubernatorial races, where we see the Democrats poised to make big gains. … More than half of the Democratic pickups could come in the Midwest. … Besides the national environment, there may just be a fatigue with eight years of conservative GOP rule in places like Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin, particularly in a time of conservative governance in Washington.”

-- Democratic gubernatorial nominee Andrew Gillum got some celebrity assistance in Florida as a Quinnipiac poll showed him leading Republican Ron DeSantis by seven points. Amy B Wang reports: “On Monday evening, DJ Khaled tweeted a photo of himself and the rapper Fat Joe arriving in Florida’s capital, where he was scheduled to appear at a ‘Bring It Home Midnight Rally’ for Gillum, headlined by Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs. Other guests include Tiffany Haddish, Will Packer and Monica. … The star-studded rally, scheduled to last until the early hours of Election Day, will come a day after Gillum received the endorsement of pop megastar Rihanna, who urged Florida voters to ‘make history this election.’” 

-- The Iowa governor’s race has become the most expensive in state history. The Des Moines Register’s Brianne Pfannenstiel reports: “After millions of dollars were raised, hours of television ads run and myriad candidate stops across the state, voters are deciding whether Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds should continue to control the state's highest office or whether it should be turned over to Democrat Fred Hubbell. Hubbell has waged a campaign focused on reversing many of the same policies Reynolds champions. The outcome has broad implications for a range of high-profile issues, including the state's privatization of its Medicaid program, funding levels for public education and state tax policy.”

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke testifies at a subcommittee hearing. (Yuri Gripas/Reuters)

ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN:

-- Newly released emails show Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke violated an ethics pledge he signed. Juliet Eilperin reports: “At issue is an August 2017 email exchange with David Taylor, the city planner for Whitefish, Mont. Zinke authorized him to access the property and explained that he was engaged in negotiations with a real estate developer over building a parking lot on his foundation’s land. But under an ethics pledge he signed Jan. 10, 2017, Zinke vowed to step down from his position as president of the Great Northern Veterans Peace Park Foundation after winning confirmation and refrain from participating in any matters concerning the group for one year. … Zinke’s involvement in a land development deal involving the park, backed by David J. Lesar, chairman of the oil services firm Halliburton, is under scrutiny from the Justice Department and the Interior Department’s Office of Inspector General.”

-- Trump said he was “going to look at any reports” that emerge about Zinke’s alleged ethical misconduct. Politico’s Zack Colman, Eliana Johnson and Ben Lefebvre report: “‘I'm going to look at any reports, I'll take a look,’ Trump told reporters when asked if he was troubled by recent news reports about Zinke … ‘Certainly, I would not be happy with that at all. But I will take a look. But he has done a very good job as secretary.’ Trump’s words fell short of the glowing tributes he offered last spring to a similarly troubled Cabinet member — Scott Pruitt … And they come amid growing signs that Zinke’s hold on his job may be as tenuous as it was for Pruitt[.]”

-- Trump allies fear Donald Trump Jr. and Roger Stone could be exposed to more legal danger if Bob Mueller releases a report on his investigation and Democrats win the House. Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman reports: “‘I’m very worried about Don Jr.,’ said another former West Wing official who testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee. The possible exposure would be that Mueller would demonstrate that Don Jr. perjured himself to investigators when he said he didn’t tell his father beforehand about the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting to gather ‘dirt’ on Hillary Clinton. One potential sign of how seriously Trumpworld is treating the Mueller threat has been the near total silence of Rudy Giuliani. A constant presence on cable news over the summer, Giuliani hasn’t been on television in weeks.”

-- Wilbur Ross has taken on a more prominent role in trade policy than any other commerce secretary in recent memory. Bloomberg Businessweek’s Devin Leonard and Jenny Leonard report: “He’s become the most high-profile Commerce secretary in decades. … When he tapped Ross in late 2016 for the position, the president-elect called him ‘a killer’ and promised Ross would be a key adviser in the crusade to throw over the chessboard when it comes to America’s trade relationships. ‘Wilbur’s at all the meetings,’ says Larry Kudlow, director of the White House National Economic Council. ‘All the meetings. He’s been a big player in the Trump administration.’”