The Democrats are coming for Senator Pat Toomey.
The party may not have a nominee yet, but progressives are readying to fight Pennsylvania’s junior Senator.
The Senate Majority PAC is an organization devoted solely to helping Democrats win Senate races. They’re about to launch a $1.5 million nationwide online ad campaign and Sen. Toomey will be the first target.
“The Republican agenda puts special interests and partisan ideology ahead of what’s best for everyday Americans and Pat Toomey is the poster boy for those misplaced priorities,” said Shripal Shah, a spokesman for Senate Majority PAC. “While Pat Toomey has been loyally voting for his party’s agenda in Washington these past 5 years, Pennsylvanians have been left behind. Our ad campaign will hold him accountable for putting his party before Pennsylvania.”
The goal of the group appears to be to paint Toomey as a consistent Republican and undercut any attempts the incumbent might make to show voters he is bipartisan.
Toomey was a conservative Congressman and ran at Sen. Arlen Specter from the right in 2004. He was also President of the Club for Growth, an anti-tax group. Once he was elected in 2010, though, the Senator made a concerted effort to move to the center. The most famous example was the background check bill he championed along with West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin in the aftermath of Sandy Hook.
The three Democrats running for their party’s nomination are former Congressman Joe Sestak, ex-Chief of Staff to Governor Wolf Katie McGinty and Braddock Mayor John Fetterman.
UPDATE: NRSC Press Secretary Alleigh Marre responded with the following statement:
“It’s no surprise that Harry Reid’s super PAC is already spending big money to prop up his chosen candidate, Katie McGinty. Whether it be Senate Majority PAC’s involvement in the Menedez corruption scandal or McGinty funneling millions of taxpayer dollars to firms that employed her husband — both Reid and McGinty share an affinity for pushing the ethical bounds.”
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10 Responses
Katie is an untrustworthy & incompetent candidate tied to Hillary,Obama,but not to Chester County & placed by an equally untrustworthy group who know nothing about Chester County or any of the suburbs in an attempt to smear a good man and a senior dedicated Senator for us. McGinty really sees us as “deplorables” from the suburbs as does Hillary.
Has Eakin resigned yet?
Marshak – That’s simply a lie:
“The fact is, that the CRP only shows disclosed and direct campaign contributions made by organizations, companies and individuals. On that level, the Kochs only show up as #59 overall for the past 25 years and contributed a total of $4.9 million in the previous election cycle. However, when you take into account all of the ‘dark’ money that the Kochs spent during the 2012 election, that figure balloons to a whopping $412 million. In comparison, the top ten labor unions combined spent a total of $153 million when counting all political contributions.”
And of course on a per capita basis, there is no contest. There are two Koch brothers; there are millions of union workers.
Toomey is going to get whipsawed like Corbett. There is no core constituency that is thrilled with him. Progressives and right-wingers alike don’t like or trust him. Independents? They’ll go out the window when the ads start flying about all the K Street money he takes, and everything he’s done to move jobs China.
Of course, it’s so unfair and corrupt that the Koch brothers spend money on candidates they like but they’re somewhere around 170th on the top donor list. But big labor? George Soros? The environmentalists? Just Fine!
Toomey is and always has been a rightwing ideolog. Never made any “concerted effort” to move to the center, unless you mean the center of the GOP. He needs to go away.
Technically, those former issues you mentioned can be defined as special interests as well. But yeah, Franklin didn’t really make a coherent point below.
Besides that, Super PACs really aren’t as powerful as people claim. They were largely ineffective in 2014 and the ones that were effective had been balanced out between the two parties. Republicans aren’t the only ones with rich donors (there’s a George Soros to every Koch brother).
Regardless, this will be an interesting race. Toomey has the advantage but any of the three contending Dems could pull off something impressive.
@Franklin, you have demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the details here and what exactly “special interest” means. You lump all interests in as special rather than just ones that pertain to a very small and specific portion of the population, hence the word “special” not “general”. Protecting the environment, raising wages, protecting the ability to organize, equal rights, etc. are not special interests. Low capital gains tax rates, tax loopholes, general deregulation, etc. all aim to benefit the most wealthy and the biggest corporations to the detriment of the average man.
Ironic that a SUPER PAC says a candidate is putting special interest ahead of candidates. The same super PAC benefiting from the Citizens United Case that lets corporations and super pacs spend millions. Democrats bought and sold just like Republicans. A liberal super pac seems like an oxymoron because last time I checked Dems where against conservative super pacs but not liberal ones. The only candidates without super pacs are Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. So this super pac also puts special interest ahead of people.
He made a concerted effort to SEEM to move to the center! hIs voting record is pure tea party.