Leading Off:
• NE-02: On Friday, the GOP unveiled two new negative ads in this fiercely contested Omaha-area race that instantly achieved serious levels of notoriety. First up is the NRCC’s new throwback spot. A few candidates this year have revisited infamous hatchet-man Lee Atwater’s playbook and run ads hitting their opponents for supporting policies that have supposedly allowed dangerous criminals to get released from prison early—a tried-and-true fearmongering tactic.
Now national Republicans are now giving it a shot to bail out embattled GOP Rep. Lee Terry. The NRCC’s spot features footage of news reports about Nikko Jenkins, who was convicted of multiple murders. The narrator describes how Jenkins was able to leave jail early because of something known as the “Good Time Law,” which he goes on to accuse Democrat Brad Ashford of supporting.
This spot is drawing plenty of comparisons with George H.W. Bush’s infamous Willie Horton ad and it’s almost certainly going to get a lot of attention in Omaha. The Jenkins case was a high-profile story even before this ad came out and there has been a good deal of controversy over Jenkins’ release. However, it’s always hard to say how voters will respond to ads like this. It worked for Papa Bush but backfired for Alaska Democratic Sen. Mark Begich when he tried a similar approach after the victims’ family complained.
Terry himself is also going after Ashford with a similar line of attack. The ad begins with some very obvious fearmongering, with the narrator talking about “Killings on our streets, and beheading abroad,” complete with a gun pointed directly at the audience. The narrator then similarly accuses Ashford of fighting for the Good Time Law, arguing if he “won’t protect us from the bad guys here, how can we ever expect him to protect us from the bad guys over there?” This ad is also drawing plenty of criticism from Democrats, but again, the jury is still out on whether it’ll be effective.
It’s hard to see Terry or the NRCC taking these kinds of risks if they felt good about their chances. Romney won the 2nd District 53-46 but Terry barely scraped by in 2012 against an underfunded opponent. Terry also complicated his chances with some deeply clueless remarks about keeping his paycheck during last year’s government shutdown. Emily Cahn at Roll Call reports that both parties have private polls showing Terry losing, and she quotes one Republican strategist arguing that the incumbent has a “path to victory.” You normally don’t argue that someone has a “path to victory” if they’re expected to win.
Midterm turnout should help the GOP, but so far, early voting is actually looking great for Team Blue. Both parties are spending big here and it was clear even before these ads went out that Terry had a real race on his hands. The GOP can still win this contest, and the new spots introduce an unpredictable element here, but there isn’t much doubt that Terry is in trouble. As a result, Daily Kos Elections is changing our race rating from Lean Republican to Tossup.
Head below the fold for a roundup of ads from races across the country.
