I’ve been keeping a close eye on the latest independent expenditure reports over the past week or so to track the action in unresolved races like LA-02 and TX-23. In the Texas run-off race, independent expenditures are especially critical if Democrat Ciro Rodriguez is to have any kind of a shot at knocking off Henry Bonilla: as of November 22, Bonilla enjoyed a 10-to-1 cash-on-hand advantage over Ciro. Here’s a chronological rundown of the DCCC’s intervention in the 23rd District runoff election:
11/29: $163k (media buy and ad production)
12/01: $43k (direct mail), $9k (media buy and ad production)
12/02: $16k (phonebanking)
12/04: $42k (direct mail), $9k (ad production)
12/06: $497k (media buy), $785 (phonebanking), $91k (direct mail)
This amounts to an $871,000 investment in the district over the past week by the DCCC. That’s a very decent show of support for Ciro, but unlike most party committee IEs, the DCCC is doing the heavy lifting for a cash-strapped candidate here. Supposedly, Democratic sources have been leaking the news that Ciro is within three points of Bonilla in the latest internal polling. Can the DCCC help close the gap here? I wouldn’t care to wager, especially given Bonilla’s superior organization and financial base, but I think we can interpret tonight’s expenditures as a signal that victory is not undoable here.
turnout. If Ciro can get his supporters, predominately hispanic people, to the polls, then he has it. This is a hard task of course, but who knows? He could do it.
There is movement in the outlying counties to boost turnout. We are in a case where border turnout could be higher in the runoff than election day, which would be great, and is actually possibly. These are places where they can be more turnout in a primary than on election day.
the district with their phoney Robocalls and if this happens, that the DCCC has a plan to get the word out to voters that these phoney/annoying calls are not coming from them. Other than that, Bonilla’s chances may have decreased significantly given the fact that the Democratic Party has taken the House, benefitting Ciro. Hopefully events over the last month have generated momentum to Ciro’s advantage.