Dems Form Circular Firing Squad Ahead of Midterms

We’re a month away from the midterm election that could hand control of the Senate to Republicans. As with any election, there are lots of moving parts and no one is absolutely sure what’s going to happen.

Even so, Alexander Bolton of The Hill is reporting that panicked Democrats are already blaming each other for an expected loss:

Democrats start to point fingersDemocrats are starting to play the blame game as they face the possibility of losing the Senate in November.Tempers are running high a month out from Election Day, with polls showing Democratic candidates trailing in the crucial battleground states that will decide whether control of Congress flips to Republicans.The behind-the-scenes tension broke into the open last week when former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) questioned Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) decision not to endorse Democrat Rick Weiland in South Dakota’s Senate race.Pro-immigrant advocacy groups, meanwhile, are saying Democrats should not blame them if Latino voters don’t turn up to the polls on Election Day. They say President Obama made a tactical blunder by postponing an executive order easing deportations.And grassroots organizers are grumbling about Alison Lundergan Grimes’s (D-Ky.) bid to take down Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), arguing her campaign has been disorganized.“Yes, you’ve seen pre-emptive finger pointing in the last couple of weeks,” said Gerald Warburg, a former Senate Democratic leadership aide and assistant dean at the University of Virginia’s Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy.”I used to work in the Democratic caucus and some of the toughest shootouts we ever engaged in were when we stood in a circle and fired at each other. I think you see a little bit of that now,” he said.

Alex Isenstadt of Politico notes a change in strategy for Democrats in the House:

House Democrats shift from offense to defenseHouse Democrats, facing strong political headwinds, are shifting millions of dollars of TV advertising away from 2014 challengers in order to prop up some of their most vulnerable incumbents.The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is scaling back on planned commercial airtime in 11 Republican-held districts, the group said Monday. Those resources will be used to help four Democratic lawmakers facing treacherous reelection campaigns and two other candidates in districts that Democrats are trying to win from Republicans.The spending decisions come four weeks before a midterm election that is proving perilous to Democrats, who are 17 seats deep into the House minority and are almost certain to see their delegation shrink further.

All that being said, the GOP should take nothing for granted and neither should we.

Tags: 2014 Election, Democrats

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