Our Jewish House Prediction page has been updated, and the number of projected Jewish legislators in the House following the November 2012 election has dropped.
A couple of races are worthy of further attention. The first is Randy Altschuler’s NY-01 race – the one we decided to include in our projection only after some deliberation. Smart decision. This race is one of the most interesting we’ve been following – the drive to put a second Jewish Republican in the House. It is also a race about which there are more questions than answers at this stage, with contradictory polls from both Democratic (Tim Bishop) and Republican campaigns. Stuart Rothenberg wrote about it last week:
There is one obvious way the 2012 contest differs significantly from the 2010 race, but it benefits Altschuler. Bishop was the Independence Party nominee in 2010, and he earned 7,370 votes on its line. But this year, Altschuler is the Independence Party nominee, and that development alters the 2010 baseline vote for the two candidates and changes the arithmetic of the 2012 race. Certainly a presidential year electorate is different from a midterm electorate, especially a Republican wave midterm electorate. But, considering the weakness of the national economy, will the different electorate benefit Bishop or Altschuler? While Obama won the 1st district narrowly in 2008, he isn’t likely to do as well this year. The bottom line? Obama carried the district with 51 percent four years ago. Bishop won by 593 votes last time. Altschuler locked up the GOP nomination earlier this time than he did two years ago. In other words, no matter what various polls now show, you don’t have to go far out on a limb to expect a close race in New York’s 1st district in November.
We had to remove candidate Laura Ruderman (WA-01), following her loss in the Democratic primary. Signs of Ruderman’s probable defeat came in recent polls, and she came third yesterday in the Democratic primary. Thus, the number of possible House additions went down to a projected +3 to +4.
CA-47 is still listed by Cook as “likely Democratic”. But candidate Alan Lowenthal is being out-financed by Republican opponent Gary DeLong. The two will be meeting on Thursday for a debate, or something of the sort. Polling is tricky: a GOP-sponsored poll showed a close race, but an automated Democratic poll showed Lowenthal was leading by more than ten percent.
Brad Schneider (IL-10) is running a close race against incumbent Robert Dold.
Rabbi Shmuley Boteach (NJ-09) doesn’t seem to have much chance against Bill Pascrell.
We’ve covered AZ-09 quite extensively in recent days and weeks. But no matter what one might think about Kyrsten Sinema’s Israel policies – her fundraising is in great shape, and she’s the front-runner according to various reports:
The Democratic field is crowded with three up-and-coming stars, while the universal description of the GOP field is “weak” and enthusiasm lags. Both parties have much at stake in the Aug. 28 primary - and early voting begins Thursday. On the Democratic side, former state Sen. Kyrsten Sinema has emerged as the frontrunner. Democrats cannot agree, however, on which other candidate poses the strongest threat to her in the primary - former state party Chairman Andrei Cherny or state Senate Minority Leader David Schapira.
It means that this race, in which two Jewish candidates are running, is more than likely to end up being a race with no Jewish candidate (and no, we do not mean to suggest that there’s a problem with that – not at all).
A Jewish candidate will certainly emerge victorious in FL-22, as both the Republican and Democratic candidates are Jewish. The race ranking of the Cook Report has changed though, from “Toss Up” to “Lean Dem”, making Lois Frankel the most likely new Jewish House member from this district.
David Cicilline (RI-01), however, may be in trouble. Of all the incumbent Jewish House members he seems the least likely to come back next year. He is spending a lot, the polls aren’t pretty, and pundits are asking why Washington Democrats “apparently made no effort to push Congressman David Cicilline to retire and allow a more popular candidate to run in the 1st District”.
Our new Jewish House Projection: 20-22 legislators. For the detailed report, click here.
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