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Leading Off:
• MA-Sen: Big Dog Alert! Bill Clinton is coming to Boston on Saturday to campaign for Rep. Ed Markey, giving the Democrat a highly unusual superfecta. Michelle Obama was in town last week, Joe Biden showed up at a DC event (with Al Gore!) on Tuesday, Barack Obama led a rally in Beantown on Wednesday, and now it'll be Bill's turn. All he needs is Bowzer from Sha Na Na, the king of special elections, to complete the ultra-rare uberfecta.
Markey's also relying on something else for fundraising: That garbagey McLaughlin & Associates poll showing Gabriel Gomez down just one point (which we shredded to pieces) has made at least one appearance in a Markey email blast. I guess it's pretty predictable that a campaign will always cite worst-case scenarios when trying to drum up dollars, even if they're dreamed up by the other side and almost certainly bogus. That's just politics... but politics is often pretty lame.
Meanwhile, Gomez has a new ad out that takes the very hackneyed "fake attacks" route, with a narrator intoning with faux horror: "Gabriel Gomez is a very bad man. He kills old people. He hates women. He even leaves the toilet seat up." Weak stuff, and there's no word on the size of the buy.
Gomez may finally getting some last-minute outside help, though. A new group with the (I'm sure deliberately) confusing name of Americans for Progressive Action will reportedly spend $700,000 on the airwaves on Gomez's behalf. Aaron Blake says that the organization itself hasn't even confirmed the buy, though, and also points out that their treasurer, Nancy Watkins, has been associated with a whole bunch of shadowy GOP money operations. The Markey campaign also noted that Watkins served as treasurer for none other that Bachmann for President.
Senate:
• NJ-Sen: Sigh. Two big unions, the New Jersey Education Association and the Communications Workers of America, will both reportedly withhold their endorsements in the Democratic primary for New Jersey's upcoming special Senate election. An NJEA official explains that both Reps. Frank Pallone and Rush Holt have strong pro-labor records and that the union doesn't want to choose between them. But that's a pretty broken calculus, if true, since a failure to unite behind either Pallone or Holt means handing a big win to Newark Mayor Cory Booker, who already has a dominant lead in the polls.
Of course, that dominant lead may also be a reason why these unions are expected to sit this one out. If Booker can't be stopped, then perhaps it's best not to antagonize him with a futile endorsement. Of course, unions aside, the biggest problem for the Anybody But Booker brigades is that there are just too many anybodies. I guess Holt and Pallone both figured they had a free shot at this race without having to give up their House seats, but unless one central non-Booker candidate emerges, he'll be almost impossible to stop. And indeed, he probably already is.
In the unlikely event that Pallone or Holt pulls off an upset, Roll Call's Emily Cahn takes a look at Democrats in both districts (NJ-06 and NJ-12, respectively) who could look to move up if there's a vacancy. Both seats are solidly blue.
• SD-Sen: Rep. Kristi Noem may have decided against a Senate bid of her own, but there's apparently no love lost between her and ex-Gov. Mike Rounds. Noem says she won't endorse Rounds in the GOP primary, even though he's unlikely to have substantial opposition. I'm guessing Noem is probably just trying to preserve her conservative credentials—remember how activists would not stop giving Rick Santorum crap during his presidential run over his endorsement of Arlen Specter in a primary eight years earlier? Not that I'd expect Rounds to ever be anything like the apostate Specter was, but with movement conservatives, it really doesn't take much to piss them off.
Gubernatorial:
• IL-Gov: What is Lisa Madigan waiting for? In the wake of former Obama chief of staff Bill Daley announcing his entry into the Democratic primary for governor, Illinois's attorney general saw fit to remind the world that she's "seriously considering" a bid of her own... but we already knew that. Madigan also added that she has no timetable for making a decision, which we also already knew. Bizarrely, she tried to make things appear as though the race was far off by pointing out that the "next governor won't be sworn in until January 2015," but the primary is in March of next year, just nine months away. (And as folks in comments point out, petitions are due before the end of this year.) Whatever, man. It's your choice.
House:
• PA-12: Ex-Rep. Mark Critz reportedly met with the DCCC last week to discuss a possible comeback bid, something Critz said he would not rule out shortly after losing last year. An unnamed source tells The Hill that Critz is supposedly "leaning toward" a rematch against GOP Rep. Keith Rothfus, though Critz's name has also come up recently in connection with a possible run for lieutenant governor.
• WV-03: Rep. Nick Rahall has dodged a bullet: The top GOP recruit to take him on, state Sen. Bill Cole, says he won't run for Congress this cycle. Still, someone will surely emerge to challenge Rahall, and in a district this red, even a generic Republican is capable of giving him a very tough race.
Other Races:
• Special Elections: Johnny recaps Tuesday night's pair of specials:
Connecticut HD-53: Republicans picked up this seat; Sam Belsito defeated Democrat Tony Horn by a 58-42 margin.
Florida HD-02: Republican Mike Hill held this seat for his party, defeating Democrat Jeremy Lau by a 58-42 margin.
Republicans apparently haven't held that Connecticut seat since 1973 (though undoubtedly the district lines have changed somewhat over time), a seat once held by Democratic Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman. The win also gives the GOP 53 members in the state House, the most they've had
in nine years, though Democrats still hold a huge majority with 98 seats. And once again, ProudNewEnglander goes deep—way deep—
with a full-length post on why Democrats managed to lose here. He concludes that Republicans were smart to nominate a candidate from Tolland, the town that forms the heart of the district, while Dems did not.
Grab Bag:
• WATN?: Republican ex-Rep. Rick Renzi, who represented Arizona's 1st Congressional District for three terms before retiring in 2008 after being indicted on corruption charges, was just found guilty on 17 of 32 felony counts by a federal jury. The charges include conspiracy, wire fraud, extortion, racketeering, money laundering, and making false statements to insurance regulators. Renzi will be sentenced in August (and the term he is looking at could be many years long), though he says he will appeal.