There are many different aspects of this race. In 2020, we were in the thick of the COVID pandemic, and Joe Biden was seven points ahead of Donald Trump. It’s supposedly a dead heat between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris entering the final stretch. His own party has ousted Biden in a coup, and Kamala Harris is underwater with virtually every demographic she needs to maximize to win this election. Private polling has reportedly been brutal for Kamala, where she risks losing six swing states.
There could be some truth to the internal polling. The Wall Street Journal and others reported that Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s (D-WI) internals had Kamala trailing Trump by three points. Baldwin’s re-election bid also got reclassified as a toss-up, a shocking development for Democrats. Now, Baldwin and Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) are producing ads touting pro-Trump policies (via Axios):
Bob Casey thinks Donald Trump is going to win Pennsylvania.
— Tim Murtaugh (@TimMurtaugh) October 18, 2024
That’s the only way to explain Casey’s new ad, which ALIGNS HIM WITH TRUMP.
He bucks Biden by name, and does not mention Kamala Harris at all.
An endangered Dem is RUNNING AWAY FROM HARRIS AND WITH TRUMP.
Just huge. pic.twitter.com/AZfcVeM02E
ANOTHER ONE: Radical leftist Tammy Baldwin is also tying herself to President Trump in her latest ad — without mentioning Kamala at all.
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) October 18, 2024
She knows Wisconsin is TRUMP COUNTRY! pic.twitter.com/GHyzPo0UCb
Some of the most vulnerable Democratic senators in this election are using the closing stretch to boast about their ties to former President Trump.
Why it matters: Even candidates in presidential battlegrounds are now featuring Trump cameos in campaign ads — as Democrats up and down the ballot run to the middle.
The trend comes as split-ticket voting declines, making it more likely that a Senate candidate's fate will be tied to their state's presidential results.
It's a sign of just how close Rust Belt races could be this year.
Driving the news: Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.) and Bob Casey (D-Penn.) both released ads on Friday that include images of Trump — and not to bash him, according to an Axios analysis of ads in AdImpact.
"Casey bucked Biden to protect fracking and he sided with Trump to end NAFTA and put tariffs on China to stop them from cheating," the Casey campaign ad states.
"Tammy Baldwin got President Trump to sign her Made in America bill," says the narrator in Baldwin's ad.
Rep. Elissa Slotkin's (D-Mich.) campaign for Senate also spent more than a $1 million starting mid-August on an ad saying she "wrote a law signed by President Trump forcing drug companies to show their actual prices," according to AdImpact.
The GOP had a good response:
"These Senate Democrats all voted to impeach President Trump twice, so it is surprising that they are now running ads praising his work as President," NRSC communications director Mike Berg told Axios in a statement.
Casey pushing Trump initiatives in his ads is interesting. He’s a Democrat who rarely needs to do anything to win re-election, living off his family’s name. Mr. Casey is infamous for hiding in the woods for six years, remind Keystone State voters who his dad was, and then head back into the bunker. I’m guessing things aren’t looking too good for Kamala. One thing is certain: her campaign here is a total disaster.