Katie McGinty has replaced her campaign manager.
According to Chris Brennan and Jonathan Tamari of the Inquirer, Mike Mikus is being moved from his position of campaign manager to chief strategist. Jordan Marks will take over as campaign manager.
Despite the fact that McGinty won the Democratic primary over Joe Sestak (a man the party was desperate to beat), apparently national party officials are unhappy.
“National Democrats were unimpressed with the campaign’s early effort, according to one Washington source,” Brennan and Tamari report.
The McGinty campaign, though, downplayed any suggestion of upheaval.
“We are very excited that we are bringing on more capacity,” spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said. “Mike will continue to work with the campaign and serve as the chief strategist and Jordan will serve as campaign manager.”
It’s is unclear whether this was a planned move or one that was forced upon Mikus.
While shakeups like this are not exactly uncommon, they usually occur in campaigns that are struggling. Yet a Quinnipiac Poll released this week shows the Democratic nominee just one point behind Republican incumbent Sen. Pat Toomey.
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Alfons is a pedpohile pervert. He posts here as “SpongeBob” and many other names. Do not respond to him. He is SICK.
Any yet you are the one that can’t offer any proof to the contrary.
Forget about 50 votes, the public option and a lot of the bill was catered for Joe Lieberman, yes and independent because he was so establishment he didn’t win the Dem primary. Your idea that it doesn’t matter what kind of dems are in congress is ludicrous and without logic.
You’re looking for a tie breaking vote, that’s stupid, a nazi could be in the senate and he wouldn’t be the tie breaking vote, Also, public option would be passed without all the establishment dems, it only needed 50 votes cause it was budget issue, and then all the dems who said they were for it for lying so they rallied votes against it because sanders said he would bring it to vote.
And just to make clear on three wrong answers you’ve posted so far:
— Keystone pipeline: even though this passed the Senate (with 62 votes, so a single vote changing would not have made a difference), it was vetoed by Obama. So it’s a moot point anyway.
— Tax cuts: there was never a bill that needed an extra vote in either direction. What bill do you mean?
— Public option: this never came up for a vote in the Senate. It died in Committee, and having an extra vote there would not have saved it.
You can’t name any Senate vote where establishment vs. anti-establishment Dems makes any difference at all, because this is a complete non-issue. It simply doesn’t exist.
I’ll try one more time and this time I’ll type reallly slow so you can understand, Steve — name any single US Senate vote during the Obama administration where having an “anti-establishment Democrat” instead of an “establishment Democrat” casting the vote would have made a difference.
You can’t because there isn’t a single case where this matters.
I named 3, & there are many more.
Of course there are differences. That’s not what I asked. I asked you to cite even one case where the vote of an “anti-establishment Democrat” in the Senate would have made a difference.
You can’t. There aren’t any.
-Montco
Tax cuts, public option, keystone pipeline
Plenty of differences between progressive democrats and other democrats
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SO SO — You’re joking, right?
Toomey seems to have run a well thought out campaign so far with all the right moves. Perhaps, the change in staff for McGinty is an effort to keep up with Toomey’s solidly run campaign.
Steve-
1) A monkey who could count bananas (ie Dem-votes) and vote with the Dem majority on every vote would be a tremendous improvement for PA.
2) Rewiring the Yes/No buttons on Toomey’s desk would be a vast improvement in his voting record.
3) A monkey randomly flipping a coin would be improvement over Toomey who votes wrong nearly 100% of the time.
4) Having a rock or dead cat making no votes would be an improvement as well, since it wouldn’t make any bad votes.
McGinty easily is better than #3 and #4. She can match #2 with a “What would Toomey do?”, and do the opposite. Finally, she really doesn’t have to do any better than #1 (though she is welcome to).
For all of you touting this supposed “establishment vs. independent” difference in Democratic Senators, please name me one instance during the Obama administration when a Democrat standing up against the so-called “establishment” would have made one iota of difference.
No, I didn’t think you could.
David-
You are right, She COULD vote her own way, but she won’t want to, she will agree with the establishment/corporate position, that’s why they spent money on her and endorsed her.
Elizabeth Warren has been winning against Trump so far.
Elizabeth Warren so SMART to take on Trump publicly.
So cool that she hired a hack dude instead of a new face. sarcasm.lame.
What do you mean “if” it is Clinton vs Trump? Of course it will be. And Clinton at the top of the D ticket will mean a McGinty victory.
Are you seriously suggesting that Toomey, the Wall Street incumbent, is the “outsider?”
GET A CLUE.
New puppeteer, same defective, corporate-owned puppet. She doesn’t have a chance if it is Trump v. Clinton – outsiders win.
I love it!! Everyone shunning Johnny Doc and his people.
Charlie-
Once she’s elected, she can vote however she wants.
Sure, Chuck can pressure her with committee assignments and/or support for legislation, but the Dems are going to need every vote, and Katie could well be the tipping point vote for legislation. She can dig in herself and stand up to Schumer.
Think for a moment how “successful” they would be in intimidating a vote out of someone like me. Katie has that same power.
But, you know what, if we win a lot of seats, especially women, Elizabeth Warren might be in charge and not Chuck.
You can still the house that order came from that ego maniac New Yorker chuck schumer! If she were to be successful she would be marching log step to schumer tunes!
Prometheus
The narrative from the Sestak camp is a lot more lies than spin.
Montco PA Dem-
I consider them lemmings more than diehards.
If McGinty wins, they’ll still claim Sestak would have won by more. They just don’t get how unpopular (creepy and phony) Joe is.
Joe finished his Defeat Tour 2.0 yesterday, so now he can focus on getting a real estate agent and more importantly, returning the $400-$500 thousand in general election donations back to donors.
David Diano,
Thanks for the heads up, but I don’t need to be “clued in”. I’m perfectly capable of examining facts and drawing a conclusion and I stand by my comments.
BTW, I’m also capable of recognizing when someone spins and twists those same facts to meet a long presupposed conclusion.
David, it will take awhile for the Sestak diehards to quit moaning about their man’s loss, but (except for a few suspected Repub rabble rousers who keep fanning the fire) they will eventually quiet down. We have the strongest candidate for November and I think nearly all Dems who are paying attention understand that.
And I also believe Toomey is now very, very pissed that his efforts to boost Sestak and torpedo McGinty failed.
Observer-
In the Gov primary, established politicos like McCord and Schwartz didn’t even get 18%, and Wolf spend millions of dollar to get 57%. That was an unusual election, and Katie really came in 4th out of about 9 or 8 who originally started.
But, this time, she came in 1st out of 4 in a statewide primary, with about twice as many voters, defeating a guy who had won last time and been running the past years. She beat Sestak DECISIVELY, by 10-points (156,000 votes), despite also having the 4th ballot position.
So, this is a win for Mikus too.
Steve-
This is such a cock-and-bull story about “Democrats want an obedient candidate who follows orders, they would rather lose with that candidate then win with someone who wasn’t.”
Once you are elected, you can vote any damn way you please for 6 years, and it’s very rare for the party to oppose an incumbent, even if they don’t like you.
Sestak’s “progressive” voting record including continued funding of the Iraq War, without timetables for withdrawal. This was a complete betrayal of his campaign promises during 2006. Sestak also voted for warrantless wiretaps and telecom immunity. He had to be pushed into supporting DADT (after he got blowback for his Iraq vote).
Was Sestak “progressive” in paying his staff less than minimum hourly wage? Was he “progressive” in abusing his staff and berating the women?
Joe’s a republican at his heart, and running to be a one-term senator, he would have been unchecked without having to face Dem voters again. Also, the guy just has a screw loose in his head and needs professional psychiatric care. Look up some studies on the long term mental effects of lack of sleep.
Read the Alan Grayson/Harry Reid argument reported by Politico the other day, Grayson’s charges against Reid are basically proven by this PA primary. Democrats want an obedient canidate who follows orders, they would rather lose with that canidate then win with someone who wasn’t. Personally just the way Sestak speaks irritates me, but he has a progressive record and ran a progressive campaign, not many dems running for office in 2010 were willing to say the stimulus should have been bigger. I voted for specter and fetterman in the primaries but I would take Sestak over Mcginty by a mile. In a season where voters are sick of establishment/corrupt politicians we have no good options. Sestak is easily more electable running in a presidential year, he’ll he would have even picked up trump voters who don’t like his ties to business, but now with Mcginty there is no reason to cross party lines.
Looks like McGinty is on the right track to being a senator demoting Mike Mikus. Eventually wins and losses catch up to you. I cant figure out why she had him in the first place. She finished dead last in the governors primary with him so the grass is definitely greener for her.
Prometheus-
He “bowed out” when they asked him to run against Specter. He declined and lost his seat at the table. They did even better, filling that seat with Specter, his Dem votes, and his war chest.
Then, Sestak in a hissy-fit, threw it all away and cried that the Dems didn’t want him. This was despite having actually asked him first, and having to seek an alternative. Had Sestak said “yes” in the beginning, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
The “anger” went beyond Sestak pissing away Specter’s $10 million and losing the 7th, because Sestak lied and blamed them for his own failures. The party (and former Specter supporters) offered to help Sestak and HE TURNED THEM AWAY. His attitude was: “I beat you, therefore you are a bunch of losers. Working with you would slow me down. I am the greatest. Kiss my ring/ass.”
Sestak’s view of a coordinated campaign was basically: “wasting resources on lesser candidates” (ie everyone else on the ticket)
Let me clue you in:
The money spent on McGinty in the primary didn’t go to waste.
1) It raised her profile and allowed her to build infrastructure and support around the state for the Fall.
2) Beating Sestak raised her stature even more.
3) It nullified all of Toomey’s anti-Sestak plans, research, positioning, etc.
4) McGinty is a better match to Hillary for the topics/issues that will decide the election.
5) Sestak was so old, that he’d only be a one-term Senator, even if he won, and we’d have to do this again in 2022 with an open seat. So, if McGinty wins, we have an incumbent which is a lot cheaper to win with. It’s called long-term-strategy
6) Toomey is the one panicking.
Sestak showed no teamwork in 2010 and removed the word “Dem” from his campaign ads, shirts, literature. But, in the primary he said he ran “to lead the party/ticket”, but abandoned the party immediately. Why didn’t his election day GOTV door-hangers include the full ticket? The ones the under-manned Lentz campaign made had the whole ticket.
Sestak’s been a fraud since day one. It’s always been “All about Joe” and not working with the party or building up the Dems. In Delco, Joe effectively created a separate “Sestak party” that treated the Delco Dems like dirt and cheap labor, but didn’t lift a finger to help down-ticket candidates or odd-year elections.
As far as team work in 2010 being the key to a Sestak victory. Yes because Onorato’s performance against Corbett shows how much he brought to the table. The facts are that Sestak did as well as he did because he didn’t hang that anchor around his neck and any team work with Rendell and the establishment was a no go as soon as he didn’t forgo the race in favor of Specter.
So, opposition to Sestak had nothing to do with petty anger over his not having bowed out in favor of Specter? Really? Thats news to a lot of people. Fetterman was not in to drag her over the line, but in effect he contributed to the piling on that stopped Sestak. In the end, her closing the gap was due to the millions, which cannot now be spent against Toomey, thrown into disingenuous commercials and a panicked, and inappropriate, presidential endorsement.
It looks like Callywampus is as good a defense lawyer as he is a campaign manager. His defendant was found guilty of first and second degree murder and all he talked about were shoelaces. I hope Rothfus doesn’t give Erin the electric chair. She should dump the chump, he’s a loser.
Prometheus-
Fetterman was not in it to drag her across the finish line. They felt that Sestak was a drag on them, and one-on-one they could beat McGinty. They were not there to do her any favors.
Joe could have won in 2010, if he hadn’t been a complete pr*ck and put his ego and arrogance over teamwork. Sestak lost because he sunk his own ship, and has tried to take the party down with him ever since over his bruised ego by blaming them for his own mistakes.
Sestak had a huge lead over McGinty who was less well known. Once McGinty was able to get her name out there, and equalize the name recognition, she won by a big margin. McGinty kicked Sestak’s ass, and all the whiny and moaning about her being a “weak candidate” just means that Sestak was even weaker with his 6 year head start.
Paired with Hillary, she’s a better choice to run against Toomey than the guy who lost last time.
Whistleblower-
That is interesting theory. Beyond his being McGinty’s campaign manager, I really don’t know much else about Mikus.
But, all this FBI stuff seems to be a lot of old sh*t. The stuff with the textbook recycling and even Farnese’s (alleged) payoff for ward endorsement was like 5 years ago. The Allentown mayor stuff is more recent. We haven’t gotten anything about McCord’s wiretap stuff yet.
Another way of looking at it is that it took the combined efforts of Obama, Biden, Rendell, Wolfe, Groen, Schumer, Reid, the DSC, Fetterman, Emily’s List and others to drag her across the finish line against a candidate who came within two percent of actually beating Toomey six years ago, in a year when the other state wide Democratic candidate flamed out against Corbett by 10 percent, with a plurality of the vote.
Given Mikus’ anemic performance for her in her last attempt to gain state wide office, fourth place in a four way race, and his self destruction last year when he failed miserably in his effort to take out every Democratic incumbent in Allegheny County and Pittsburgh, it’s no wonder that there is a lack of confidence in his abilities and judgment.
So we’re supposed to believe this has nothing to do with Rendell hack John Esteys recent FBI probe and guilty plea. Or Mikus association with Johnny Doc lol
http://www.phillyrecord.com/2015/05/john-dougherty-is-master-of-political-action-committees/
Mikus and McGinty all over that report
HAS JOHNNY DOC BEEN ARRESTED YET?
Talkin Dauphin-
Depending upon where the money is coming from, I guess DC or PA can run it.
But, ultimately, McGinty’s name is on the ballot and if the new CM, or Mikus or DC has a conflict, she should be the one making the final decisions and telling Chuck, Ed, Reid or whomever where to stick it.
Too many candidates let themselves get pushed around by CM’s and outsiders whose names aren’t on the ballot. It’s a real leadership test for them (to prove they can make independent decisions of conscience once elected) that they can stand up for themselves.
When I ask a candidate a question and he/she says “I don’t know, ask my campaign manager” for something that is their decision/purview, I don’t have a lot of respect.
Katie won’t get any respect from the DC people if she doesn’t show them that she can make final decisions.
my guess is that Chuck Schumer saw enough during the Primary that they told them a change had to be made. But if that was the case, you would think they would bring in one of theirs from DC rather than a Rendell hand. My guess is the campaign will still be run from DC
Unsanctioned R2 says:
May 12, 2016 at 3:34 pm
Unsanctioned R2 says:
May 12, 2016 at 9:36 am
Diano I noticed what you wrote about having a IP address and the fact that you reported it to a Government Agency. Clearly, you have no information that would tie this person to your frivolous allegation. Since this person has been a champion of the rights of mentally handicapped children and you have spent your time ridiculing them in many ways under many names I thought it only right to explore a complaint against you with the EEOC. Here’s the applicable section.
Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA)
This law makes it illegal to discriminate against a qualified person with a disability in the private sector and in state and local governments. The law also makes it illegal to retaliate against a person because the person complained about discrimination, filed a charge of discrimination, or participated in an employment discrimination investigation or lawsuit. The law also requires that employers reasonably accommodate the known physical or mental limitations of an otherwise qualified individual with a disability who is an applicant or employee, unless doing so would impose an undue hardship on the operation of the employer’s business.
You retaliated by your complaint against a person who complained about discrimination. Employment is not an issue in this section just the statement is enough.
Diano that’s you. Remember all those R words statements made by you. They were captured along with a program that captures IP addresses (which come back to you)
You be well Diano Oh this whole thing came from one of those meetings you claim we never had.Maybe we’ll read about you soon.
It is just over two weeks since the primary, and just under six months out from Election Day. A bit early for stories about struggling campaigns, I think. Katie has a summer full of county fairs, parades, and community days ahead of her. Let’s see how things look in September before anybody starts clutching their pearls.
“National Democrats were unimpressed with the campaign’s early effort” ???
Katie had to defeat a Dwarf and a Giant. How is that not impressive.
I don’t really see how “Chief Strategist” is really any different than “Campaign Manager”? If anything, it sounds like a promotion over the day-to-day management BS.
Moderate Mel-
That’s why they had to take him off the chessboard
Mike was not her problem, SKD is… They are terrible. They do media like it is 1997. They were just lucky that good old Sestak decided to go it alone and make the media decisions himself!
Who is the ‘Washington Source’ and how are they connected to the Toomey campaign? How can anyone be unimpressed after 16 days?
Apparently none of the previous writers has ever met Katie McGinty in person. She is a great communicator one on one . Katie does something most politicians don’t do anymore. She listens to people. Instead of charging into a room and just talking about herself Katie takes the time to listen to voters. Anyone who thinks Katie won because of money spent is completely wrong. McGinty is engaging and energetic in public events. I hope Toomey and the Party of No take McGinty for granted. Pat Toomey will be a one term Senator. Toomey can go back to The Club for Growth or back to controlling derivatives for Chinese Billionaires. Katie McGinty will be the new Senator from Pennsylvania in November.
She has a history of poor campaign management. Remember the Gov primary race? Horrible.
I’m not sure if her campaign manager was the problem. McGinty is about as inspiring as a dishrag. That was what kept her down for awhile in the beginning, not strategy/groundgame, and certainly not lack of fundraising.
“National Democrats were unimpressed with the campaign’s early effort, according to one Washington source. A spokeswoman for Democrats’ national Senate campaign arm, however, said McGinty’s campaign had hit all the required benchmarks for their endorsement.”
Those benchmarks being agree to run and not-be-named Joe Sestak? Can this woman get ANY high-level position without kissing the right rings and having the path cleared for her by the powers that be???