Even with the DSCC’s withdrawal of their $1.8 million ad buy for Mary Landrieu, the bayou state continues to be inundated with campaign ads.
Greg Giroux of Bloomberg Politics highlighted two ads. The first, an ad by Freedom Partners Action Fund. Funded by the Koch brothers, Freedom Partners takes aim at Landrieu’s campaign contributions that have benefited the anti-energy crowd and worked against Louisiana’s economic intersts:
The second is an ad released Sunday by Landrieu’s campaign. Giroux explains:
Landrieu introduced an ad Sunday that makes Cassidy look bumbling as it accuses him of voting to “cut Social Security benefits.” It refers to Cassidy’s vote in April for a budget blueprint by the Republican Study Committee, a group of anti-spending lawmakers, that would balance the budget in four years rather than the 10 called for under a proposal by Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan. The RSC plan failed on a 133-291 vote.
Ironically, the ad that tries to portray Cassidy as “incoherent” is itself, incoherent. Take a look:
Landrieu has made her “clout” in the Senate a major part of her re-election bid. But after the balance of power shifted back to Republicans last week, whatever clout she had won’t be of much use to her.
It’s also unlikely that she’ll retain her chairmanship of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
To make matters worse, the Democratic base is not likely to be motivated to turn out for a runoff election. Had the midterms been closer and the balance of power in the Senate still up for grabs, that would’ve worked in Landrieu’s favor. Now she’ll be forced to rely on die-hard supporters to show up and cast their votes to re-elect her. She’s also contending with the fact that she barely scraped out more votes Cassidy last week (just over a point more.)
Turnout was slightly lower last week than in 2012 in the Democratic strongholds that help her most, like Orleans parish.
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