06 Race Update - Democrats In Full Swing

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------ Original Message --------
Subject: Race Update - Democrats In Full Swing
Date: Thu, 04 May 2006 14:40:58 -0500
From: Karin Johanson, DCCC Executive Director <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
To: xxx

Dear xxx,

We're winning. The first quarter filings have come in, and the fundraising numbers show that even the Republican special interest money men can't keep up with the Democratic grassroots. Our Democratic challengers are outpacing their Republican incumbents at an unprecedented rate. The results of the Ohio primaries came in Tuesday night and it is clear the Democrats are 100 percent on the offensive and the Republicans are forced to play defense in districts across the state.

We've got them on the ropes. It isn't any wonder that, with less than 1,000 days left for the Bush Administration, Karl Rove is being taken off of the policy beat so he can go back to being a full-time political hatchet man. They're scared, and they're desperate. Their dirty tactics are coming and we are ready.

In fact, we have already started fighting back. When the NRCC, our Republican counterpart, dumped over a half million dollars in two primaries, one to try to defeat Francine Busby (CA-5O) and another in the race to replace Rep. Ted Strickland's (OH-6) seat, we were there with our own hard-hitting ads. As a result, Francine got more than three times as many votes as her closest Republican competitor, and Charlie Wilson won the Democratic nomination in an unprecedented write-in campaign.

DCCC Chairman Rahm Emanuel said last night of the primary results, "From Charlie Wilson to Betty Sutton to Zack Space, the results in Ohio present a strong slate of Democratic candidates for change. These Democrats join Mary Jo Kilroy and John Cranley as part of a winning team in Ohio that will help launch Democratic victories all over the country in November."

We could not have done this without all of your support. We are seeing progress every day and I want to make sure we are keeping you up-to-date on all our activities:

Candidate Fundraising Success

With campaign finance reports out, it is clear that Democratic candidates for Congress have momentum going into the 2nd quarter of 2006. The American people are hungry for change and these numbers show they are also willing to do something about it:

The Democratic Advantage in the First Quarter: Democratic challengers outpace Republican incumbents: (CT-02) Joe Courtney outraises Rob Simmons by $52,000 (CT-04) Diane Farrell outraises Chris Shays by $160,000 (FL-16) Tim Mahoney outraises Mark Foley by $37,000 (IL-10) Dan Seals outraises Mark Kirk by $26,000 (IN-08) Brad Ellsworth outraises John Hostettler by $192,000 (MI-08) James Marcinkowski outraises Mike Rogers by $10,000 (MN-01) Tim Walz outraises Gil Gutknetcht by $22,000 (NC-11) Heath Shuler outraises Charles Taylor by $164,000 (NE-01) Maxine Moul outraises Jeff Fortenberry by $124,000 (NH-01) Jim Craig outraises Jeb Bradley by $52,000 (NH-02) Paul Hodes outraises Charlie Bass $44,000 (NJ-05) Paul Aronsohn outraises Scott Garrett by $75,000 (OH-06) Charlie Wilson outraises Chuck Blasdel by $16,000 (OH-13) Betty Sutton outraises Craig Foltin by $187,000 (PA-06) Lois Murphy outraises Jim Gerlach by $233,000 (PA-08) Patrick Murphy outraises Mike Fitzpatrick by $17,000 (VA-10) Judy Feder outraises Frank Wolf by $159,000 (WA-08) Darcy Burner outraises Dave Reichert by $95,000


In open seats, Democratic candidates hold the advantage:
By and large, Democrats in open seats dominated the first quarter fundraising period and are strongly positioned for success in these seats. In Democratically held seats, virtually no Republican challenger has more cash on hand than the sitting Democrat.

You know what all of that means: the Republican slime machine is ready to hit our candidates with every smear and dirty trick in their book. But as the New York Times noted in a front-page story recently, we'll be ready to fight back...

The DCCC Surges

"Aggressiveness", "early organization", and "change in approach" - these are just some of the words used to describe the hard work of the DCCC in a recent New York Times article:

Democrats in Full Swing
New York Times - April 8, 2006

"...All this early activity is widely credited to one man: Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, who heads the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. He has experience as a veteran of the Clinton campaigns and White House and an intensity that political observers said they have seen before in Republicans, but not Democrats.

"'There is an aggressiveness coming out of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee that I haven't seen in the past,' said Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the Rothenberg Political Report. He has included Mr. Simmons and Mr. Shays among his top-10 most vulnerable members of Congress.

"'Republicans have been going by a playbook that has served them really well - putting a focus on raising lots of money for candidates, a lot of opposition research early, getting a lot of polling data and, after Labor Day, just overwhelming their opponents,' Mr. Rothenberg said.

"But this time, he said, the Democrats' early organization in places like Connecticut may be signaling an overall change in approach. 'I sense their fund-raising is going well and I think they're going to go for the jugular come the fall,' he said.

"Mr. Emanuel began recruiting candidates in January 2005, when he took the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee position."


And yes, we're already engaged hand to hand with the Republicans in key races across the country...
DCCC Playing in Hot Races

We are less than six months out from the election and the DCCC is already playing a role in battlegrounds nationwide:

California's 50th: Francine Busby's outstanding performance and continued strength in this heavily Republican district has made all of us proud. At the DCCC we have been proud to play a role in her success. Early on we invested as heavily as we could to make sure she had the best field team in the country. When the Republicans attacked her in a panic, we were there to strike back, pointing out that their attacks were funded by the NRCC war chest that Tom DeLay and Duke Cunningham had helped build for years. The race now hurtles towards the June 6th runoff, and our ads holding the Republican candidate accountable for his lobbying career are on the air right now.

Ohio's 6th: In this district, Republicans threw everything they had into defeating Democrat Charlie Wilson early, pulling every sort of attack you can imagine. But we kept hitting back - on the radio, on TV, in the press. We even brought in President Bill Clinton to rally the troops. We won't be intimidated, and with Charlie Wilson fending off their attacks and winning the Democratic primary, we can all be happy to see that the Republicans wasted hundreds of thousands of dollars on smears that went nowhere.

California's 11th: The billboard we put up against arch anti-environmentalist Richard Pombo - paid for by online supporters like you and designed by online supporter Ryan Lewis out of Georgia. The billboard literally rolled into town two weeks ago. After the original billboard company declined the ad because it was "too political," we decided that a mobile billboard would do the job. And as it happened, several other environmental groups had the same feeling. So right now, as Richard Pombo tries to keep a low profile, all of his "dirty deeds" are being exposed.

That's just a taste of what we have been busy doing here and how your generous contributions are being spent. No Republican smear will be allowed to stand - no matter what Karl Rove's job title happens to be.

Much more to come!

Sincerely,


Karin Johanson
Executive Director, DCCC



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