If there’s one place where the election has taken a surprising turn, it’s Ohio. Donald Trump is likely to win the state tomorrow, but the Senate race has taken a strange turn. Once considered a competitive race, with Democrats salivating over the prospect of taking on incumbent Republican Rob Portman, they’ve chosen former Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland as their front-runner. Democrats have poured $20 million into the effort — and it’s become a complete and utter disaster. Part of that is due to Portman’s excellent campaign, including his commitment and extensive network of high school volunteers, which has reportedly become the envy of Republican senators up for reelection this year. The downside is that while Portman is finding “reluctant Republicans” who come out for him, they’re not voting for Trump in the general election. After the Access Hollywood piece, in which Trump made scathing comments about women, Portman withdrew her support, but the backlash won’t be huge: she has a double-digit lead over Strickland.
Sasha Issenberg he had a good review Operation Portman:
Even before Trump announced his candidacy, Portman was looking to build his own constituency outside the Republican base. Strickland would certainly do well in places no other Democrat could—his geographic base was in the Appalachian backwater of southeastern Ohio—which meant Portman would have to make up ground everywhere. “The goal of our targeting is not just to identify the people in the middle, but to identify the issue that each person cares about, and then how to have a meaningful conversation with them about it,” said Corry Bliss, who became Portman’s campaign manager in January 2015.
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But Portman’s path to victory would depend on support from outside the Republican coalition, from voters who might vote for Democrats elsewhere on the ballot and would not be targeted by the victory program. “Portman is making a much more concerted effort to try to appeal to crossover voters,” said Kevin DeWine, a former state party chairman who is close to Portman. “He’s basically running 35 different mayoral races, but he’s not doing it in conjunction with the top of the ticket.”
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Portman had always been a vigorous activist, but the staid former trade negotiator and budget expert was no magnet for newborn activists. But Bliss focused more on labor supply than demand. He had always viewed high school students as an “untapped resource” for the campaign.
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The campaign made it a priority to nurture those volunteers. Portman called them individually to thank them for their door-knocking, and when George W. Bush came to Cincinnati for a fundraiser, the campaign scheduled the former president to meet not only with large donors but with grassroots activists as well. “It’s never easy to get volunteers knocking on doors and making phone calls in the off-campaign year,” Bliss said.
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Beginning in the summer of 2015, Portman volunteers visited voters with scripts to identify supporters and explore the priorities of others, while also raising awareness of the senator among his constituents. The data they collected was fed into statistical models the campaign commissioned from i360, a data warehouse within the political network affiliated with Charles and David Koch. The i360 models divided the electorate into 22 segments, many of which focused on local issues, allowing Portman to cut loose from national Republican politics and weed out undecided voters.
Issenberg added that Portman eventually mobilized an army of 500 high school students to conduct phone banks and neighborhood canvassing. The amount he donated to victory operations in the state exceeded the amount he gave to the RNC, meaning Portman could issue orders about get-out-the-vote operations in Ohio.
Debates also appear to be an area where Strickland has not been effective in narrowing Portman’s lead. their second fight, Portman slammed Strickland for leaving the state in a terrible state of disrepair. While trade has been a contentious issue this year — and Strickland has slammed Portman for supporting free trade deals — Portman has been able to secure the support of trade unionswhich further increased his base of support and his advantage over Strickland. But getting back to the split ticket dilemma that the GOP faces, the other side (and Issenberg also mentioned this) is the unionists splitting for Clinton and Portman.
Real Clear Politics currently averages Portman with 18 points advantage over Strickland. Even Strickland has apparently admitted that he will go down tomorrow, while noting that outside money has destroyed his campaign. That is debatable. Maybe Portman was simply the better candidate. In fact, it seems that way. If you are a Democrat and you cannot convince union members to support you, your problem is not outside money (via Canton Repository):
Now, even Strickland admits he may not win. In two campaign speeches Thursday, he began sentences with the phrase, “I don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Asked Thursday what he would do if he wasn’t elected, he listed his options: He can’t go back to
psychology, because he lost his license. Maybe he’ll teach. He’s 75, but he doesn’t rule out running for office again.
“I don’t know what I can do,” he said. “I’m not going to close the door on anything.”
Largely ostracized by the national party, he holds no grudge against it and his contempt for Portman.
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He largely blames outside spending in the race, saying that if it were Portman and his $19 million raised competing with Strickland and his $10 million raised, “I would have destroyed him.”
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Jennifer Duffy, Senate editor at the Cook Political Report, disputes the notion that outside spending was the political nail in Strickland’s coffin.
“The fact that he didn’t raise money attracted outside spending on his efforts,” she said. “He never set fundraising goals, didn’t campaign too aggressively, didn’t go out early and didn’t try to define himself. If he had done what he needed to do, the outside money would have been there for him.”
Strickland added that if he wakes up on November 9 and Clinton is president (and the Senate goes Democratic), he’ll be a content man. That will be one of the first races called tomorrow night — and it looks like Portman will win the Buckeye Beatdown in a landslide.
