Former Rep. Debbie Halvorson (D) is conceding defeat tonight to Robin Kelly (D) in the special Democratic primary election to replace disgraced former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. in Congress, the Chicago Tribune reports.
The AP notes Kelly emerged from the pack early “as a leader on gun-control issues…. During the campaign, Bloomberg’s super PAC, Independence USA, poured more than $2 million into the race by airing anti-gun ads in her favor.”
A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finds justt 29% of respondents say they agree “with most” of what Republicans in Congress have proposed versus 45% for Obama and 40% for congressional Democrats.
An identical 29% have a favorable view of the Republican Party (compared with 49% for Obama and 41% for the Democratic Party.
The public also believes the GOP is more partisan: 48% say Obama wants to unifying the country in a bipartisan way, while 43% say he’s taking a partisan approach. By comparison, 64% say Republicans are taking a partisan approach, versus 22% who say it’s focused on unity.
Roll Call: “The class of senators swept into office riding Barack Obama’s coattails in 2008 — giving Democrats a supermajority in the process — now stands to be the party’s majority firewall when it faces voters in 2014.”
“This cycle, there are more than enough seats in play for Senate Democrats to lose the majority. But party aides remain confident in their eight first-term Democrats up for re-election — all of whom won GOP seats six years ago.”
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“I was very proud of the fact that I didn’t get anything wrong that I said during the course of the debates. I didn’t get anything wrong, and that’s a huge arena.”
— Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), quoted by Salon, on her performance in the 2012 GOP presidential debates.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) will expand the state’s Medicaid program to cover 300,000 uninsured residents, the Newark Star-Ledger reports.
Christie joins Republican governors from Ohio, Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, North Dakota, Florida and New Mexico as well as Gov. Lincoln Chaffee of Rhode Island, an Independent, in embracing the larger Medicaid program.
Politico notes Christie’s “status as a potential 2016 presidential contender adds
political intrigue. He’s already taken flak from fellow Republicans for
heaping praise on Obama after Hurricane Sandy at a critical time in the
2012 presidential campaign.”
Chuck Hagel cleared a 60-vote procedural hurdle to confirmation, setting up a final vote on his nomination as Defense secretary later today, Roll Call reports.
The Senate voted 71-27 in favor of invoking cloture on the nomination with 18 Republicans voting in favor of the motion.
Stu Rothenberg: “It’s far too early to know whether Democrats will have some, or even any, chance to win back the House next year; candidate recruitment has just begun, the number of retirements (and open seats) is uncertain and the president’s popularity more than 20 months from now is an open question. But we do know that history, as The New York Times‘ Nate Silver pointed out in a column last November, suggests that Democrats will have a very tough road to 218 seats.”
“Going back to the election of 1862, the only time the president’s party gained as many as 10 seats was, well, never. Even in 1934, the best showing by the president’s party in House elections since the Civil War, the president’s party gained only nine seats.”
Mark Halperin: “In the internal divisions over how to handle the end of the endgame on the sequester PR fight, the GOP is oh-so divided on what kind of legislation to offer. Lindsey Graham and a few others are suddenly born-again tax raisers. John McCain is affronted by the notion of turning spending decisions fully over to the President. And there remains a deep, subterranean fear that the White House would win the hearts-and-mind battle (big) if the current cuts kick in.”
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) tells TMZ that his favorite songs of all-time are NWA’s Straight Outta Compton, Eminem’s Lose Yourself, and Tupac’s Killuminati.
“We have moved a bill in the House twice. We should not have to move a third bill before the Senate gets off their ass and begins to do something.”
— Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), quoted by The Hill, on avoiding the sequester.
Charlie Cook: “Now that budget sequestration seems inevitable, the remaining question is, who gets hurt? The White House and Democrats seem supremely confident that the public will cast blame on congressional Republicans. To be sure, the GOP, in its weakened condition, is blamed for virtually everything short of the weather and the flu…”
“Having said that, assuming that sequestration kicks in, with $85 billion in mandatory budget cuts pretty much across the board–exempting only Social Security, Medicaid, and, to a lesser extent, Medicare, and disproportionately hitting defense–many Americans will begin to feel some inconvenience after a few days, and a few will feel real pain. It’s only when, or if, it persists for a week or more and affects more people that impatience and annoyance will turn into anger, then rage. At that point, it becomes difficult to know whether voters will still vent these emotions exclusively at Republicans.”
A new Pew Research survey finds that 62% of Americans says the Republican party is out of touch with the American people, 56% think it is not open to change and 52% say the party is too extreme.
Opinions about the Democratic Party are mixed, but the party is viewed more positively than the GOP in every dimension tested except one. Somewhat more say the Republican Party than the Democratic Party has strong principles (63% vs. 57%).
First Read: “By the way, there are NO talks scheduled before Friday’s sequester kicks in. Just a lot of media events designed to lay the groundwork for the negotiations in March. That said, don’t be surprised, if simply for appearances sake, there is a last minute meeting at the White House before Friday — simply because both sides need to be seen as pretending to try to stop the sequester, even if there aren’t any serious proposals right now to do so.”
Rep. Allyson Schwartz (D-PA) tells the Philadelphia Daily News that she will challenge Gov. Tom Corbett (R) in next year’s gubernatorial race.
Said Schwartz: “It is my intention.”
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) is not one of almost 40 featured speakers at next month’s Conservative Political Action Conference because he is “not being invited,” ABC News reports.
“The source would not answer why Christie, who is widely thought to be interested in the 2016 presidential race, would not be invited to the confab of conservative activists.”
Police have arrested a Colorado man for sending racially and sexually offensive e-mails to state Rep. Rhonda Fields (D), “including one that said he hoped she would meet the same fate as a congresswoman who was shot in the head,” the Denver Post reports.
One of the e-mails called Fields “pathetic” and also mentioned state Rep. Beth McCann (D). It said, “Hopefully somebody Giffords both of your asses with a gun…”
The man told police he was “just voicing some frustrations” about efforts to tighten state gun laws.
Teddy Turner (R) released an amusing ad in South Carolina’s special election in the 1st congressional district urging voters against choosing a career politician such as his main rival, former Gov. Mark Sanford (R)
An actor looks directly into the camera while drinking a glass of wine and pleads for voters to take him back and concludes, “I’m sorry for all the mistakes I’ve made. Sugar, would you give me one more chance?”
Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson sued a Wall Street Journal reporter for libel over an article from December in which the Republican mega-donor was described as “foul-mouthed,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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