More Sad; More Triage

Paul Ryan's corporately-funded SuperPAC, the Congressional Leadership Fund has poured $1.8 million into WI-01 to defeat Randy Bryce with a campaign of vicious personal smears-- please help us respond here at IronStache Fund-- but because they are so obsessed with @IronStache and a handful of other progressives they want to keep out of Congress-- they no longer have the funds to help some of their own most vulnerable incumbents. As we pointed out in recent weeks, they've been practicing the art of triage on walking dead incumbents Keith Rothfus (PA), Chris Collins (NY), Barbara Comstock (VA), Erik Paulsen (MN), Jason Lewis (MN), and Rod Blum (IA), among others.

Late Friday, Alex Isenstadt added two more to the growing list of GOP incumbents Ryan is writing off as goners: Mike Coffman (CO) and Mike Bishop (MI). Bishop was a bit of a surprise, since Trump beat Hillary in his district 50.6% to 43.9% and the PVI is a fairly comfortable R+4. Bishop has been a loyal Trump rubber-stamp and the 538 forecaster still shows a 49.3-47.6% race.

Coffman is a different story, of course. He's in a blue district (PVI D+2) that Trump lost by 9 points. Coffman's only hope is that the Democratic nominee, Jason Crow is so terrible that Coffman could weather the wave. As bad a candidate as Crow is, polling shows him being swept into Congress by the wave anyway. Coffman is forecasted to have just a 1 in 5 shot to win. Maybe he shouldn't have been a devoted Trump ass-kisser.

Istenstadt reported that Ryan's PAC "will cancel its planned TV advertising for both members, a move that comes as the party refocuses its funds on races that leaders feel confident they can win-- and away from those it sees as out of reach. The organization had $1 million in TV advertising reserved for Coffman and $2.1 million for Bishop, dollars that will now be redistributed elsewhere. Party officials say both incumbents are trailing Democratic challengers ahead of the midterm elections, and both are expected to be significantly outspent during the final weeks of their campaigns."

Among the seats that the party feels increasingly pessimistic about are those held by Minnesota Reps. Erik Paulsen and Jason Lewis, Virginia Rep. Barbara Comstock, and Iowa Rep. Rod Blum.

Party officials say additional incumbents will likely need to be cut off in the weeks to come.

The decision to cut off Bishop in particular, however, caught some by surprise. The second-term lawmaker represents an exurban Detroit-area district that was carried by Donald Trump in 2016 and Mitt Romney four years earlier. Bishop, a former leader in the Michigan state legislature, won reelection in 2016 by 17 percentage points. This year, he is running against Democrat Elissa Slotkin, who was a defense official in the Obama administration.

Bishop aides pushed back on the notion their race was lost. On Friday afternoon, following the super PAC’s announcement that it was withdrawing, Bishop’s campaign released a memo claiming that recent polling showed the incumbent with a small lead over his Democratic opponent. The internal poll conducted last week showed Bishop with a slim 2-point edge over Slotkin, 45 percent to 43 percent.

“Our internals show us leading and we feel confident Mike Bishop will be re-elected," said Stu Sandler, a Bishop adviser.

A poll conducted for Slotkin's campaign the same week showed her with a 4-point advantage over Bishop, 47 percent to 43 percent.

Democrats appear especially confident in their prospects of defeating Coffman, a fifth-term political survivor who represents a Denver-area swing district. Earlier this week, the Democratic super PAC House Majority PAC canceled nearly $800,000 in planned TV advertising in the district.

CLF's move is the latest Republican move to pull money out of districts that are starting to look unwinnable. Last week, the National Republican Congressional Committee canceled all of its ad reservations in Rep. Keith Rothfus' (R-Pa.) district, as he faces an uphill battle for reelection against Democratic Rep. Conor Lamb.

The Ryan's PAC and the NRCC have also started going back on promises which were made when luring Republicans into House races. They recently wrote off Diane Harkey (CA-49), Janice Arnold-Jones (NM), Jay Webber (NJ), Pearl Kim (PA), Greg McCauley (PA), Marty Nothstein (PA), Lena Epstein (MI), Steve Watkins (KS) and Lea Marquez-Peterson (AZ) for dead. Trump had promised support, for example, to Danny Tarkanian in a Las Vegas-metro district but the GOP has now jettisoned him and left him to die out in the desert... alone.

Incumbents on the next round triage watch-list include Drunken Hunter (CA), Dana Rohrabacher (CA), Jeff Denham (CA), Carlos Curbelo (FL), Claudia Tenney (NY) and Leonard Lance (NJ).