How does a candidate get the attention of a prospective voter in the last few days of a long, hard-fought political campaign?
“You bug them until they want to kill you,” jokes Sam Youngman of the Lexington Herald-Leader.
He joined the panel on this weekend’s edition of Comment on Kentucky to discuss the latest on the U.S. Senate contest and state House races.
The final Bluegrass Poll of the season shows incumbent Sen. Mitch McConnell with a 5-point lead over his Democratic challenger, Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes. That’s where the last minute get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts by both candidates could either secure McConnell’s reelection or lead to a surprise victory for Grimes. Youngman says the campaigns are deploying sophisticated computer programs to target potential voters and motivate them to get to the polls.
“The technology is so advanced now,” Youngman explains. “They know exactly when to bug you, and they how know how to do it, and they know how many times to do it.”
Youngman says Republican voters are more dependable in midterm elections, so Grimes must activate Democrats who don’t normally vote in off years. Grimes has 50 local offices around the state and some 4,000 volunteers focusing on voter turnout. While he says that’s an impressive operation, Youngman contends McConnell’s camp was able to refine its GOTV strategy after the Republican primary race against Matt Bevin.
Clintons Return to Rally Democrats
Ronnie Ellis of CNHI News Service reports that a Grimes rally with former President Bill Clinton in Ashland on Thursday drew about 800 people. But he says the crowd didn’t seem as enthusiastic as previous audiences have been. (Clinton spoke at a Louisville rally earlier in the day, and Hillary Clinton appeared at rallies in Lexington and northern Kentucky on Saturday.)
If Grimes wanted to define herself as a Clinton Democrat, Ellis argues that she should have brought the family in more during the early days of the campaign. He contends that would have helped Grimes better define herself in the minds of voters while McConnell was busy with his primary election battle last spring. Ellis also says the Grimes camp may have erred in not hiring an outsider to manage her campaign.
GOP Prospects in the State House
Tom Loftus of the Louisville Courier-Journal says the poll numbers that show Sen. McConnell widening his lead in the Senate race have bolstered Republican hopes of taking control of the state House of Representatives. While McConnell’s momentum may carry into the down-ticket races, Loftus says it’s still an uphill battle for the GOP to overcome the 54 – 46 majority that Democrats hold in the House.
If Republicans can close the gap enough on Election Day, they could then entice several Democrats to switch their party affiliation. Loftus says he thinks House Republicans would offer some significant carrots in terms of committee chairmanships to lure Democrats to their side and help the GOP gain a majority that way.
If Republicans do gain control of both chambers, Loftus says there’s a backlog of legislation they will likely want to pass, including abortion restrictions, right-to-work and prevailing wage measures, charter schools, and a bill to allow the legislature to overturn executive branch regulations. Another likely priority would be the law change that would enable Sen. Rand Paul to simultaneously run for his Senate seat and the presidency.
