Subject: POLITICO's Morning Score: House Democrats push to win back blue-collar voters — ESAFund hits the air in Louisiana runoff — Senate Democrats eye daunting 2018 map
From: "Morning Score" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2016 09:06:12 -0600
List-Id: <1376319_6065755.xt.local>

By Theodoric Meyer | 11/17/2016 10:00 AM EDT

With Elena Schneider

The following newsletter is an abridged version of Campaign Pro's Morning Score. For an earlier morning read on exponentially more races - and for a more comprehensive aggregation of the day's most important campaign news - sign up for Campaign Pro today. (http://www.politicopro.com/proinfo)

HOUSE RENOVATIONS - "House Democrats worry blue-collar voters slipping away," by Campaign Pro's Maggie Severns and Theodoric Meyer: "Democrats' shrinking ranks of House members from blue-collar districts watched glumly as President-elect Donald Trump ran up the score in their backyards last week, fearing their party is forfeiting wide swaths of America - and with it, any prospect of taking the House for years to come. Democrats made modest House gains by netting a half-dozen Republican seats, but they lost all of the 12 GOP districts they targeted with the highest shares of whites without college degrees, mostly by double-digit margins. The party nearly suffered surprise losses in several
 of their own districts with the most blue-collar whites. And while some glass-half-full Democratic representatives are already hoping a backlash against Trump lifts their fortunes in these districts in 2018, others fear that the party's move toward urban and suburban voters will eventually shut Democrats out of former working-class strongholds, where many districts were redrawn after 2010 to be tougher for Democrats and have only gotten more forbidding since." Full story. 

BACK ON THE AIR - ESAFund to start TV ads in Louisiana Senate runoff: ESAFund, the super PAC founded by the Ricketts family, is starting a statewide TV buy backing Republican John Kennedy in his Louisiana Senate runoff race against Democrat Foster Campbell. "Now that America has a new president, Louisiana has a choice," the ad's narrator says, over images of Donald Trump. "Kennedy will work with Trump to repeal Obamacare and build the border wall." The ad will air statewide on broadcast and cable stations, coupled with radio and digital ads. Full story.

LOOKING FORWARD - "Reeling Democrats confront brutal 2018 Senate map," by POLITICO's Burgess Everett: "Still nursing their wounds after last week's thrashing, Democrats are already grappling with how to defend 10 senators up for reelection in 2018 in states that Donald Trump carried, some resoundingly. ... [Incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer will need to mine his fellow leaders to accommodate vulnerable Democrats with profoundly different ideologies and political circumstances - from Wisconsin's Tammy Baldwin, who was also tapped for a leadership spot, to West Virginia's Manchin, who has gone out of his way to align himself with Trump voters this week. That means appealing to
 the white working class in some states - and stoking minority and liberal turnout in others." Full story.

Days until the 2017 election: 354.

Days until the 2018 election: 719. 

Thanks for joining us. You can email tips to the whole Campaign Pro team at [email-masked], [email-masked], [email-masked], [email-masked] and [email-masked].

You can also follow us on Twitter, where we continue to tweet about politics and men's style: @politicoscott, @ec_schneider, @politicokevin, @theodoricmeyer and @maggieseverns.

CALIFORNIA UPDATE - Bera increases lead in uncalled CA-07 race: Democratic Rep. Ami Bera has pulled slightly further ahead of Republican Scott Jones in one of two California races that remain uncalled. Bera now leads Jones 51 percent to 49 percent, by a margin of 4,802 votes.

- Issa increases CA-49 lead to 4,632 votes: GOP Rep. Darrell Issa's 51 percent to 49 percent lead over Democrat Doug Applegate now stands at 123,096 to 118,464 after new ballots were counted in Orange and San Diego counties.

IT'S 2018 ALREADY - McMullin mulls Utah Senate run: GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah "says he's seriously considering a run for re-election in 2018 - and he could face a challenge from Evan McMullin, a former Republican congressional staffer who made a last-minute independent push for the White House this year. ... McMullin told The Salt Lake Tribune he and Hatch had a "friendly discussion about a variety of challenges facing the country,'" The Salt Lake Tribune's Thomas Burr and Matt Canham report. "'He's a nice man and has served our country for decades,' McMullin said of Hatch. 'I haven't decided if I'll run for Senate or another office in 2018. I'll make that decision based on what is best
 for the future of Utah and our nation.'" Full story.

PRESCIENT POLLSTERS - "Trade secrets from the predictors who called a Trump victory," by POLITICO's Katelyn Fossett and Steven Shepard: Almost no one predicted Donald Trump was going to win. Who got it right? "One is Helmut Norpoth, a Stony Brook political science professor whose model suggested, all the way back in March, that Donald Trump had between an 87 and 99 percent chance at the presidency.Another is the team behind the USC-Dornsife/LA Times Daybreak poll, which followed a fixed pool of 3,200 respondents every week over the course of the campaign; their final forecast on Election Day had Trump leading 46.8 percent to 43.6 percent. Another was the Trafalgar Group, a Republican
 consulting firm that conducted surveys using automated phone calls to landline numbers in battleground states. They got Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida and North Carolina right - an achievement few others can claim." Full story.

PRESIDENTIAL SPEED READ - "Bankers celebrate dawn of Trump era," by POLITICO's Ben White: "Christmas has arrived early for Wall Street in the early days of the Donald Trump era. ... Former Goldman Sachs banker Steven Mnuchin has been seen at Trump Tower amid rumors that he's the leading candidate for Treasury secretary. Billionaire investor Wilbur Ross appears headed to the Commerce Department. Steve Bannon, another Goldman alum, will work steps from the Oval Office. If Mnuchin drops out, as some rumors suggest he may, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon remains a possibility as Treasury secretary, and will serve as an outside adviser if he doesn't get the job." Full story. 

- Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, could get key White House role," by The Wall Street Journal's Monica Langley: "Donald Trump's son-in-law, who became a close adviser in the presidential campaign, is likely to take a top White House job, people familiar with the presidential transition say. Jared Kushner, who has emerged as a lightning rod as departures have mounted in recent days from the team vetting possible appointees, is being pushed to join the president's inner circle by new White House chief of staff Reince Priebus and presidential counselor Steve Bannon, these people say. ... It isn't clear whether a federal anti-nepotism law that bans appointing a relative to a job in an
 "agency" applies to the White House, and Mr. Kushner has indicated he would avoid the issue by not taking pay for any White House work." Full story.

- "Trump team announces tough lobbying ban," by POLITICO's Isaac Arnsdorf: "President-elect Donald Trump's transition team on Wednesday announced that it will require incoming officials to terminate their lobbying registrations, and agree not to lobby again for five years after leaving the administration. ... But the sweeping post-employment restrictions could make it difficult for Trump, whose transition team has struggled to get off the ground, to attract experienced professionals in policy circles where lobbying is a common revenue stream." Full story.

- "GOP learning wrong lessons from Trump win, Republicans fear," by POLITICO's Katie Glueck: Republican operatives spent four years warning that the party needed to diversify - or risk a blow-out at the ballot box. Donald Trump spent the campaign trafficking in divisive racial rhetoric - and he won anyway. Now, those who pushed for a more inclusive GOP fear that their party will absorb the wrong takeaways from Trump's win, and that the momentum behind efforts to expand the Republican tent to include more minorities and young people has evaporated. 'I am very concerned we will take the wrong lessons from this,' said Whit Ayres, a veteran GOP pollster. 'Trump showed Republicans could squeeze
 out one more presidential victory by appealing primarily to white voters, especially against a historically unpopular Democratic nominee. But counting on winning the Electoral College while losing the popular vote is not a strategy for long-term success in the new America.'" Full story.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I'm here to raise money and for people to vet me. I'm meeting with people who need to shake my hand and look into my eyes and into my heart." - LA-03 Republican Clay Higgins, via The News Star.

To view online:
http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=37ffc9d13efcce37a1d2ae20ba0b2a120017761b82643b251e77e409914eff34
 To change your alert settings, please go to http://go.politicoemail.com/?qs=37ffc9d13efcce37010d7d64fb8e332f600518b4d81704871b80a32b9a7c5e3c or http://click.politicoemail.com/profile_center.aspx?qs=c1c81b2ef644fde1dd3c1f6178ef6a8ea3ee660992025bd43cd27791ac97dd08f24e60dc2e8efd7c866df408947b316df35251ba19cda769
This email was sent to [email-masked] by: POLITICO, LLC 1000 Wilson Blvd. Arlington, VA, 22209, USA

To unsubscribe,http://www.politico.com/_unsubscribe?e=00000158-72cd-d918-a37a-f7fd62de0000&u=0000014e-f0fe-dd93-ad7f-f8fffbc40000&s=e87396ae7ebfc91399885e0abe6c2a1dd34fe345e6eb8761e48b8e236cc99329f421d22cccd150b0b50792d2f008fdfa6954af2f10dd528cceb43cf85236edb6