Campaign Report — Alaska upset boosts Democrats

Welcome to The Hill’s Campaign Report, tracking all things related to the 2022 midterm elections. Starting next week, you can expect this newsletter in your inbox every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday leading up to November’s election.   

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Alaska gives Democrats another shot in the arm

The political landscape just keeps getting better for Democrats. 

Mary Peltola, a Democratic former state lawmaker, on Wednesday was declared the winner of the special election to finish out the remainder of the late Rep. Don Young’s (R-Alaska) term in the House, scoring an upset victory over two Republicans in a reliably red state that former President Trump carried by 10 points less than two years ago. 

Peltola, who will be the first Alaska Native to serve in Congress as well as the first woman to serve as the state’s lone representative in the House, defeated Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor and 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee, and Nick Begich III, a staunch conservative from Alaska’s most prominent Democratic family, in a race that tested the state’s new ranked-choice voting system, in which voters rank the candidates in order of preference. 

Any conclusions drawn from the results come with some caveats. Peltola will be on the ballot once again in November when she’ll seek a full term in the House. And special elections are hardly seen as reliable predictors of a party’s chances in regularly scheduled general elections.  

There’s also the open question of whether Peltola’s win was more a vote of confidence in Democrats or simply a rejection of Palin, a former Republican political star who irked many Alaskans when she resigned as governor after she and the late Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) lost the 2008 presidential election. 

But Peltola’s victory in the special election is the latest sign that Democrats are gaining momentum heading into the final stretch before the 2022 midterm elections, a little more than a week after Democrats notched another key victory in the special election in New York’s 19th Congressional District.  

Those two wins, combined with a series of solid performances by Democrats in other recent special elections, are among a growing list of signs that the political environment may be improving for the party that has spent much of the past year bracing for an electoral thrashing in 2022.  

Recent polling shows Democrats in their strongest position in months on the generic ballot, a question that asks voters which party they would rather see win control of Congress. A Wall Street Journal poll released on Thursday found Democrats regaining an edge over Republicans on that question after the same survey in March found them trailing the GOP by 5 points.  

Also on Thursday, The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan handicapper, shifted five more House races toward Democrats, including Peltola’s race, which moved from a “Likely” Republican win to a toss-up. 

Let’s be clear: Democrats are still facing a tough political landscape this year. President Biden’s approval rating is still underwater and the party in power almost always loses ground in Congress in midterm elections. Democrats are also defending an already-narrow majority and Republicans appear likely to pick up a handful of seats thanks to the redistricting process alone.  

In other words, Democrats are in a better position than they were even a month ago, but that alone is far from a guarantee that their majorities in the House and Senate will be spared. 

Republicans eager to recalibrate Senate prospects

Republicans are looking to hit the reset button on their Senate strategy going into the midterms as several of their candidates in contested states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and Georgia show signs of losing momentum, trailing their Democratic opponents in polling or getting out-fundraised. 

But there are signs of Republicans breathing new life into races that could pose decisive over which party controls the upper chamber next term, including tweaking rhetoric on issues like abortion and the election and funneling in money into races, as our Mychael Schnell writes.  

Hedging bets: McConnell said on Monday he thinks Republican Senate candidates Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania, Herschel Walker in Georgia and Rep. Ted Budd in North Carolina have a “good chance of winning,” also saying this week “I think Oz has a great shot at winning.” 

But the state of play comes against the backdrop of what has become a more public disagreement between Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), chairman of the Senate Republicans’ campaign arm, over their views on the GOP Senate landscape. 

Remember what McConnell said last month? “I think there’s probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate. Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome.” 

Scott claps back in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner: “We have great candidates with incredible backgrounds and ideas to make our country better. Do I wish they had more money than their Democratic opponent? Of course. But we have great candidates, chosen by the voters in their states, and our job is to help each one of them win.” 

Trump heads to Pennsylvania for Oz, Mastriano 

Former President Trump is heading back to Pennsylvania on Saturday to give a boost to three of his endorsed candidates just over two months out from the midterms. Trump is set to hold a rally in Wilkes-Barre for Senate candidate Mehmet Oz, gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano and House candidate Jim Bognet.  

The trip comes as Democratic candidates John Fetterman and Josh Shapiro lead their Republican rivals in the races for Senate and governor, respectively. And in a sign of the changing political landscape, the nonpartisan election handicapper Cook Political Report shifted its rating of the Senate race earlier this month from “toss up” to “lean Democrat.” 

Against the backdrop of all of this is apprehensions among some, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) about the Republican Party’s ability to flip the Senate as GOP candidates see themselves getting out-fundraised by their Democratic peers. Some are also continuing to be dogged by scandals.  

POLL WATCH

To add to the recent good fortune Democrats are seeing, a poll released on Thursday by The Wall Street Journal shows President Biden leading former President Trump 50 percent to 44 percent in a hypothetical matchup if the 2024 election for president was held today. Last time respondents were asked this question in March, Biden and Trump were tied at 45 percent each. Though the White House has said Biden is intending to seek reelection, Trump has not formally declared candidacy, though he has at times teased out the possibility.  

AD WATCH

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) is out with a new ad today hitting Arizona Senate candidate Blake Masters (R) over abortion. The 30-second ad, named “Jennifer,” targets Masters over his stance on abortion, claiming he supports banning all abortions with no exceptions.  

The Arizona Senate candidate previously had a line on his website that said he backed “a federal personhood law (ideally a Constitutional amendment) that recognizes that unborn babies are human beings that may not be killed,” according to NBC News, though the network said it wasn’t clear from his website when that rule should become applicable. Masters has changed his abortion messaging on his website that shows his support for “a law or a Constitutional amendment that bans late term (third trimester) abortion and partial-birth abortion at the federal level.” 

That’s it for today. Thanks for reading and check out The Hill’s Campaign page for the latest news and coverage. See you next week. 

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