Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Early voting will begin today in Georgia, home to a very competitive gubernatorial race where Secretary of State Brian Kemp (R), the Republican nominee, has been accused of tilting the playing field in his favor through ugly voter-suppression tactics.
* In the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, released over the weekend, Democrats lead Republicans on the generic ballot by 13 points among likely voters, 55% to 42%. As the accompanying article explained, “Historically, that kind of gap foreshadows gains, possibly substantial, for the Democrats.”
* At Georgia Tech over the weekend, a student member of the Young Democratic Socialists of America asked Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) about Brian Kemp’s voter-suppression tactics against Stacey Abrams (D). The Republican responded by grabbing the student’s cellphone away while the interaction was filmed. Perdue’s office later said there’d been a misunderstanding.
* Virginia’s 5th congressional district isn’t generally seen as one of the commonwealth’s in-play seats, but the Republican Party of Virginia is apparently worried enough about Leslie Cockburn’s (D) campaign that the state GOP declared that she “hates America.” It struck me as a rather desperate move in a district Republicans are supposed to win.
* Ronna Romney McDaniel has been a relatively low-profile chair of the Republican National Committee, which appears to suit Donald Trump just fine: the president has asked her to remain at her post for another two years. * It remains a little ironic to have Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine)) complain about dark-money groups airing attack ads during the Brett Kavanaugh fight, only to have dark-money groups then run ads thanking Collins for supporting the controversial Supreme Court nominee. * And in Pennsylvania’s gubernatorial race, Republican Scott Wagner finally found a way to generate some attention for his struggling campaign: he released a video in which he said, in comments directed at Gov. Tom Wolf (D), “Between now and Nov. 6, you better put a catcher’s mask on your face, because I’m going to stomp all over your face with golf spikes.”
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
