The path for D senate control is still clear. Lose Alabama, hold Michigan, gain Colorado, Arizona, Maine, North Carolina with additional states in reach of Montana and Iowa if one of those other races should turn in a bad direction.
You have Joe Kennedy, the grandson of RFK and grand-nephew of JFK and Ted, vacating his House seat to run for Senate. A Kennedy has never lost statewide in MA. Yet he’s running as an outsider, anti-establishment.
His opponent for the nomination is Ed Markey. A man who has been in office since 1976. Was in the House until 2013 before becoming a Senator. Someone who is the “progressive” left of the party’s favorite as he is a co-founder of the Green New Deal. Yet his voting record for much of his career is identical to … Joe Biden.
Votes and stances that the progressive wing chastised Biden for in the 1970s, 80s, 90s and 2000s like busing, Hyde amendment, Crime Bill, NAFTA, Patriot Act, Iraq were the exact same positions Markey held. One is despised by them and the other hailed a champion.
Kennedy naturally faces criticism of being opportunistic and only in this as a stepping stone for his career. If he loses the primary it’s hard to see where his future goes as one of the fall outs of having the most iconic surname in American politics is you’re on a pedestal.
It’s almost three months since the last poll. Kennedy was +16 in the first week of May. Since then there have been a few debates and it’s hard to see with essentially just one month to go where the state of the race is.
If you ask me whoever wins will just vote party lines. Kennedy is not this right-winger the progressives make him out to be and Markey is not this champion of the left unless they describe Biden that way too (spoiler: they won’t). It’s just fascinating from an outsider view as the ideological split that has been happening in the party for the last few years is operating in reverse for this race. It’s the left of the party desperately trying to keep a 70+ year old career politician in office and it’s the center who want to unseat him running on a call for new leadership.
Here’s all the SC polls (including some waaay back). I’m not fully buying that the Palmetto (bug) State is in play, but it may be interesting to keep an eye on it.
Since I suppose their policy views are very similar now, Boycott, and barring some scandal, is there something to be said for backing the younger candidate?
It’s a weird choice to make. Markey is rather unremarkable until his recent popularity among younger, left wing people for the Green New Deal alliance with AOC and “the squad”. Kennedy is rather unremarkable if it wasn’t for his last name. You can’t shake off the suspicion Kennedy is in this as part of the bigger ambition. I don’t understand why he couldn’t have waited and built a name for himself in Congress. He’s still young and the wait might have not been long if Warren vacates her Senate seat to join a Biden Administration in which he could have served along with Markey. For that reason I am tempted to stick with Markey.
You mention that Markey’s voting record is similar to Biden. Is there an easy way to look that comparison up? Not that I don’t believe you, but I’m interested to dig into that. Thanks in advance.
There’s not an easy way to compare unless you manually go through the congressional record. Those votes I mentioned that Biden got hammered for are things that are easy to look up because of their significance in being brought up in the Democratic primary. Markey did support them too.
However the best way to compare is by ratings conducted by special interest groups who monitor politicians voting and keep a scorecard. Unfortunately you can’t go back through their whole careers and certain years are outliers but generally you can see there is a lot of overlap:
Here’s about four months of tracking the PredictIt senate control market. Most of July has been pretty steady, but things were flipped the other way just a few months ago.
Here’s a current snapshot of competitive races. Note: Colorado and Arizona no longer qualify as competitive.
Correct. Colorado and Arizona look like they are both easy blue pick ups right now. Things can change of course, but that’s the current state of things.
Both states each have a single recent poll that is somewhat close. But neither McSally (R-AZ) or Gardner (R-CO) have led in a single poll recently.
I hope you’re right, but Kelly’s margin has diminished since the state was flooded with McConnell-paid ads claiming he was “in Communist China’s pocket!!1!!”
Look at your own list. The ‘D’ margin was bouncing around from 18 to 7 percent in the earlier polls but has dropped to 2% in the latest. I’ve seen the same trend in other polls not in your table. At least it’s still a lead but you know how fickle voters are.
You said, “I hope you’re right, but Kelly’s margin has diminished since the state was flooded with McConnell-paid ads claiming he was “in Communist China’s pocket!!1!!””
But the Kelly +2 poll was in the field the same time as a Kelly +16 poll. It’s not like one came before McConnell ads and the other after. Two of Kelly’s largest margin polls were released this week.
