Trump v Senate GOP

In Defying the Odds, we discuss state and congressional elections as well as the presidential race.   Our next book, title TBA, discusses the 2020 results.

Trump has not exactly been helpful to the Senate GOP in recent days.

Trump's call for $2000 checks, which top Dems quickly endorsed, provides a powerful weapon against Perdue/Loeffler. It wrecks McConnell's spin about the deal, and shows that the real obstacle to generous assistance is congressional Republicans. My latest:https://t.co/NHDodSMq3J

— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) December 23, 2020

Hannah Miao at CNBC:

In the crucial Georgia Senate runoff races, Democratic challengers Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock are using President Donald Trump’s latest push for larger stimulus checks to bash incumbent GOP Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler.

In video posted to Twitter Tuesday night, Trump called the $900 billion Covid relief bill passed by Congress an unsuitable “disgrace” and urged lawmakers to make a number of changes to the measure, including increasing the $600 stimulus checks to $2,000.

The two Democratic candidates, who have advocated for larger direct payments, wasted no time in responding to Trump’s move and criticizing their opponents.

 

Republicans in the Senate so quickly forget. Right now they would be down 8 seats without my backing them in the last Election. RINO John Thune, “Mitch’s boy”, should just let it play out. South Dakota doesn’t like weakness. He will be primaried in 2022, political career over!!!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2020

Crossroads GPS Ads Up in Florida, Montana, Ohio, and New Mexico

Crossroads GPS is on offense ...

Against Bill Nelson (D-FL) on Medicare:



 Against Sherrod Brown (D-OH) on Obamacare and jobs:

 

 Against Jon Tester (D-MT) on debt:

 

 Against Martin Heinrich (D-NM) on spending:

 

Crossroads GPS Is Busy

Crossroads GPS continues to hammer on the economy:

 

 A tough ad in Nevada focuses on ethics:



In North Dakota, an ad uses the Supreme Court health care decision:

 

 In New Mexico, the stimulus is the gift that keeps on giving:

 

Filling Gaps in the White House Website, Part 75

From Steve Kroft's interview with the president on "60 Minutes":

KROFT: I'm not saying this as fact, and hindsight is always 20-20. But there's [a] general perception that the stimulus was not enough. That it really didn't work. That...

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Let me stop you there, Steve. First of all, there's not general perception that the stimulus didn't work.

From a November Reuters-Ipsos poll:

On balance, a majority of Americans (62%) believe that the stimulus bills that Congress has approved in recent years have ‘just created debt’ (as opposed to helped the economy), but there is a strong division here by party:

• Democrats are equally divided on the issue, with 44% believing it has helped the economy, and 45% that it has created debts
• The vast majority of Republicans, on the other hand, believe the stimulus bills have created debt (82%).

Crossroads GPS v. Boswell

The Iowa Independent reports:

Crossroads GPS, a conservative policy and advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C., is building on its TV ads criticizing U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-Des Moines) with direct mailers in his district.

The mailer, reproduced below, is very similar to the TV ad. It attacks Boswell for supporting President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and says the American Jobs Act will mean “more big government spending and tax increases of $450 billion.”

Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies has so far spent $186,556 at the KCCI and WHO networks in Des Moines, the local CBS and NBC affiliates. The group has ties to former White House deputy chief Karl Rove.

It’s unclear how much Crossroads is spending on the mailing, or what communities are receiving it. The mailing below was received in Des Moines.

Filling Gaps in the White House Website, Part 4

On Sunday, Vice President Biden appeared on "Meet the Press." The transcript is not on the White House website, but is available here. One exchange involved earlier predictions about the effect of the stimulus package. (You may check out the report in question here. See Figure 1.)

DAVID GREGORY: this package was sold on the premise that it would in fact keep unemployment at 8 percent. It's exceeded that...
VICE PRES. BIDEN: No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
MR. GREGORY: ...with the recovery plan.
VICE PRES. BIDEN: It wasn't sold on that. It was sold on it would create...
MR. GREGORY: That's what the report said, Mr. Vice President.
VICE PRES. BIDEN: ...or--no, it said it would--what would happen was it would save or create jobs. It's doing that. It is doing that. Everyone guessed wrong, at the time the estimate was made, about what the state of the economy was at the moment this was passed. Now, we're going to recalibrate this in terms of what we've inherited, what in fact is going on out there.