It looks like the GOP plans to continue its efforts to damage down-ticket Dems by tying them to Barack Obama -- even though this strategy completely failed to defeat the Dem candidate who won a big upset victory in the Mississippi special election yesterday.

On a conference call with reporters today, NRCC chair Tom Cole confirmed that the party will continue using Obama to tar Dem House candidates, in much the way the GOP has historically used figures like Ted Kennedy and Nancy Pelosi to do the same.

The NRCC and the local GOP candidate in Mississippi ran ads tying Travis Childers to Obama and even to Jeremiah Wright, but Childers won yesterday by a comfortable eight-point margin.

But Cole is undaunted by yesterday's results, calling the anti-Obama strategy a "useful tool" for hitting Dems in conservative areas: "I think reminding people that we have a very liberal, and I think very inexperienced Democratic nominee, and that your opponent is likely to be supporting that individual, is interesting."

Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK), chairman of the NRCC, did something very interesting in his statement on tonight's result in Mississippi: He didn't even try to spin the loss of a seemingly safe GOP seat in a special election.

"We are disappointed in tonight's election results," Cole said. "Though the NRCC, RNC and Mississippi Republicans made a major effort to retain this seat, we came up short."

Full statement after the jump.

Read more »

We have witnessed tonight a momentous election with far-reaching implications for the country -- in Mississippi, where the Associated Press is projecting that Democrat Travis Childers has won the special election for the open GOP House seat.

With 90% reporting, Childers leads 52%-48% -- and with the strongholds for GOP candidate Greg Davis mostly in, and some of Childers' stomping grounds still out. And all of this happened in a district that went 62%-37% for President Bush in 2004.

This election tells us a few things:

• The Republican strategy to tie down-ballot Democrats like Childers to Barack Obama has failed. Even in a district that Obama is unlikely to win, it doesn't appear that an Obama-based attack can actually cause real damage for a relatively conservative Democrat.

• The GOP is in serious trouble overall. They have now lost three special elections in what should be safe seats: The Illinois seat of former Speaker Dennis Hastert, the Louisiana seat of former Rep. Richard Baker, and now this.

• Dick Cheney's visit to the district didn't help -- or at least didn't help enough.

• Republican morale is probably going to be even lower now as it was before, as they have been reduced to 199 House seats, down from 232 seats after the 2004 election.

The NRCC is complaining that a DCCC mailer, distributed at the last minute in today's Mississippi special election, makes a false accusation when it says GOP candidate Greg Davis offered to have his town provide a new home for a statue of Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, who later founded the Ku Klux Klan.

But contemporary news accounts appear to support the DCCC's claim.

The controversy dates back to 2005, when civil rights groups were demanding that Memphis get rid of statues of Forrest and Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

As it turns out, the New York Times reported in August 2005: "Last week, the mayor of Southaven, Miss., a fast-growing city where many white Memphians have moved over the years, said he would be happy to have the Forrest equestrian statue in Southaven." Davis was, and still is, the mayor of the Memphis suburb of Southaven.

In addition, Mayor Davis clarified his position to the Memphis Commercial Appeal in July 2005: "We weren't going to ask for the statues. We were just placing ourselves as an alternative for if the city wanted to move the statues."

Calls to the NRCC and the Davis campaign for comment were not immediately returned.

(Special thanks to TPM Reader AV.)

Late Update: NRCC spokesman Ken Spain disputed the report that Greg Davis had been open to accepting the Forrest statue, pointing to an article in which he offered to accept the Jefferson Davis statue. However, Spain was unable to offer any article refuting the Times report about the Forrest statue, but referred us to the Davis campaign. Multiple calls to the Davis campaign have not been returned.

Aside from today's West Virginia primary, there is another election going on that is being watched intensely by strategists from both parties: The special election for the House from Mississippi's First District, where the Democrat might just pull off a pickup in an area that shouldn't even be up for grabs.

The district, which voted 62%-37% for President Bush in 2004, was vacated when incumbent Republican Roger Wicker was appointed to the U.S. Senate. Then a curious thing happened three weeks ago, when Democratic nominee Travis Childers led Republican Greg Davis 49%-46% in the first round of voting, but just short of the 50% needed to avoid a runoff.

A Republican source explained that this has become something of a regional contest -- Davis is the mayor of a populous Memphis suburb, while Childers has commanded support in the district's rural areas: "This is all gonna come down to turnout. The geographic aspect of this campaign has made it even more competitive."

Both parties have given this race a lot of attention. FEC filings show that the DCCC has spent over $1.8 million on the race, while the NRCC -- which only had about $7 million on hand at the end of March -- has spent nearly $1.3 million.

Remember that the GOP has already lost two deep-red seats in special elections this year, one in Illinois and the other in Louisiana. It would be an understatement to say that a third loss would damage morale and future fundraising ability, if it looks like the cycle will be bad for Republicans all over the map.

The polls close at 8 p.m. ET.

The NRCC is crying foul over a Democratic mailer against Southaven Mayor Greg Davis, the Republican nominee in today's nationally-watched Mississippi special election, which accuse Davis of having offered up his suburban Memphis town as a new home for a statue of Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, the founder of the Ku Klux Klan:

(Click images to enlarge.)

Davis spokesman Ted Prill characterized the mailer as "11-hour gutter politics," and said the allegation isn't true. Prill explained that when Memphis was getting rid of Confederate statutes under pressure from civil rights groups three years ago, Davis had simply offered to accept the statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis -- but not the one of Forrest.

"False accusations and race-baiting politics have no place in our public discourse, and if Democrats want to continue to pursue this line of attack, then it will backfire in November," said NRCC spokesman Ken Spain.

Democratic House candidate Travis Childers -- whose special election tomorrow in Mississippi is being closely watched by national strategists in both parties as a test case for Dems trying to make headway in deep-read districts -- has come up with an interesting way to give some attention to high fuel prices: Holding a campaign event at a gas station, promising up to ten gallons at only $1.25 per gallon to the first 50 motorists to come by and talk with the candidate.

A similar trick was done in an Indiana House primary, with Republican candidate Luke Puckett giving out gasoline for free. Puckett won his primary with 48% in a three-way race.

The GOP effort to win House seats is so strapped for cash that its leader has now taken to scolding members to get them to cough up donations. In the wake of their defeat this past weekend in Louisiana, NRCC chair Tom Cole reportedly told a conference meeting today that anybody not donating for next week's Mississippi election "ought to be ashamed of themselves."

Very few of them have given to Mississippi GOP candidate Greg Davis, nor did many of them give to Woody Jenkins in Louisiana. By contrast, new Louisiana Congressman Don Cazayoux (D-LA) was able to raise over $160,000 in direct donations from the House Dems, and he and Mississippi candidate Travis Childers have both been helped immensely by the DCCC's financial advantages.

Although the Republican effort to use Barack Obama's name as a cudgel in red districts didn't work for the Louisiana House race this past weekend, the GOP candidate in the upcoming Mississippi special election thinks it's an issue he can still win on.

Check out this new attack ad against Dem nominee Travis Childers:

"Travis Childers, taking Obama's endorsement is wrong," the announcer says. "Lying about it is worse."

The newest FEC filings show the extent to which the Congressional Democrats have been able to throw their financial advantage around this cycle and expand the playing field, with the DCCC now making a major investment in the nationally-watched Mississippi special election.

The DCCC put in over $700,000 yesterday on behalf of Democrat Travis Childers, bringing their total spending so far to about $1.1 million. By comparison, the NRCC has only been able to spend about $590,000 to play defense in a deep-red Southern district.

Here's the new ad from the National Republican Congressional Committee for Mississippi special election, part of the new Republican media offensive against Barack Obama. The ad ties Democratic nominee Travis Childers, a social conservative, to such big-name liberals as John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, and Obama, too:

The latest FEC filings show an ad buy of over $260,000 -- meaning that the cash-strapped NRCC sees both a real need to spend money in this deep-red district, and also some real potential for using Barack Obama's name to poison down-ticket Dem chances.

Late Update: Here's the newest ad over in the contested Louisiana special election, tying Dem nominee Don Cazayoux to "the Obama-Pelosi team":

A new attack ad in the Mississippi special House election, which has become unexpectedly close, is an early GOP experiment in using Barack Obama as a negative name in red districts:

"Travis Childers: He took Obama's endorsement over our conservative values," the announcer says gravely. "Conservatives just can't trust Travis Childers."

Hitting Obama could be a safe bet in this district, even among Democratic-leaning voters -- even though Obama won the statewide Democratic primary in a landslide, he actually lost this area to Hillary Clinton in a racially-polarized result.

In a major upset that shows just how strong opposition to the Iraq War is in even very red states, the Democratic candidate came out on top in the first round of the special election to succeed Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) in his old House seat, in a district that by all rights should have had an outright win for the Republican candidate.

Democrat Travis Childers finished with 49% of the vote in last night's special election, Republican Greg Davis 46%, and the remainder going to the defeated candidates from the primaries for the regular election in November, plus third-party candidates. Without anybody getting 50% of the vote, this goes to a runoff in three weeks.

Read more »

An intriguing pattern has emerged in two special elections for the House in Louisiana and Mississippi: Both of the candidates backed by the National Republican Congressional Committee have had a bit of a, shall we say, white supremacy issue.

This is not to say that the two are white supremacists -- rather, they have both flirted with organizations and/or people who are known for, at a minimum, dabbling rather heavily in such sentiments.

The Mississippi case is fairly straightforward -- the GOP candidate is a mayor who had once agreed to accept a gift to his city from a white supremacist group, then backed off. The Louisiana example is a lot more complicated, involving attempts to cover up payments connected to the infamous Klansman/Neo-Nazi David Duke.

Read more »