Campaign committees

The Tea Party is expected to announce that former Rep. JD Hayworth (R-Ariz.) will become national spokesman for the movement. 

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich credited Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Sarah Palin (R) with helping conservative candidates storm the election scene this year.

The former House speaker called Christine O'Donnell the "candidate of paychecks" running against the "candidate of food stamps."

The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) has elevated another 18 GOP congressional hopefuls to the top tier of its candidate program.

The new "Young Guns" include former Rep. Charlie Bass (N.H.), who just emerged from a competitive primary Tuesday and will face Anne McLane Kuster (D) in the fall, and Randy Altschuler, who is trying to knock off Rep. Tim Bishop (D-N.Y.) this fall.

The committee also elevated a handful of candidates in races that were considered long shots earlier in the season, including Vicky Hartzler, who's running against Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), the longtime congressman and chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

The NRCC's candidate program has three tiers, with "Young Guns" gaining the most attention from the committee. Here's the full list of candidates the NRCC elevated:

Randy Altschuler (N.Y.-01), Charlie Bass (N.H.-02), Randy Demmer (Minn.-01), Ryan Frazier (Colo.-07), Bob Gibbs (Ohio-18), Frank Guinta (N.H.-01), Vicky Hartzler (Mo.-04), Harold Johnson (N.C.-08), Dan Kapanke (Wis.-03), Mike Keown (Ga.-02), Spike Maynard (W.Va.-03), Jeff Miller (N.C.-11), Ilario Pantano (N.C.-07), Reid Ribble (Wis.-08), Bobby Schilling (Ill.-17), Austin Scott (Ga.-08), Scott Tipton (Colo.-03), Van Tran (Calif.-47).

Matt Kibbe, the president of FreedomWorks, told reporters on Monday that Tea Party activists need to focus on policy after 2010.

Delaware GOP Senate candidate Christine O'Donnell said Wednesday she can win her race without national Republican support, and needs only $1 million to do so.

O'Donnell, fresh off a conservative upset over Rep. Mike Castle (R), dismissed talk that the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) might not support her.

"That's a shame, but they never thought I could win this race, and I believe that we can win without them," O'Donnell said of the NRSC on ABC'S "Good Morning America."

"They also said that Ronald Reagan wasn't electable," she later added.

Fox News had reported Tuesday evening that the NRSC would give no support to O'Donnell, though a senior GOP aide didn't shut the door to adding support, saying that the committee would be "watching" the race.

But O'Donnell's win caused projection services to immediately shift their predictions in the race to favor Democrat Chris Coons, since O'Donnell, a two-time Senate candidate, had failed badly in her previous bids.

O'Donnell said she was confident that money would take care of itself, though, and that she wouldn't need that much to win.

"I don't know if we'll get money from the national Republican Party, but I know we're going to get the money that we need," she said on NBC's "Today" show.

"We need about a million dollars to finish this last month and a half," she added.

She'll need the support. A pre-primary report with the Federal Election Commission showed that, through Aug. 25, O'Donnell had just over $20,000 in cash on hand and had raised just about $260,000 for the cycle.

Sarah Palin on Thursday will be in Kentucky to help raise money for Republican Senate candidate Rand Paul.

Palin was already set to be in Louisville for a speech at the National Quartet Convention but added the lunchtime fundraiser, according to the Paul camp. Details have yet to be released.



Palin endorsed the Tea Party-backed Paul in May and has donated to his campaign, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader.

Meanwhile, Democrats are citing Paul in their own fundraising plea.

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) identified Paul and Nevada Republican Sharron Angle as "real threats to everything we've come to count on in this country, from Social Security to civil rights."

Soliciting contributions to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Schumer wrote in an e-mail to supporters, "We've got to hit our goal of raising $290,524 by midnight Saturday so we don't have to cede an inch to those from the hard right who want to destroy all that we've worked so hard to accomplish — like expanding health care and reforming Wall Street.

"This moment is so critical because this is when we figure out how much we can devote to each race."

House Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio) appears to have no hard feelings toward Rep. Dan Lungren despite the California Republican's 2008 bid to usurp his job. 

Boehner will be in Sacramento on Friday night to headline a fundraiser for the eight-term congressman.

"Lungren's targeted, so we appreciate the leader taking the time to come through and help with the fundraising," Rob Stutzman, a Lungren spokesman, told The Sacramento Bee. "Obviously, we're getting outraised."

Lungren had $800,000 in cash on hand at the end of June, compared to $1.14 million for Ami Bera, his Democratic challenger.
 The congressman spent more than $1.3 million on his reelection in 2008.

Bera, as a member of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's Red to Blue program, is one of his party's top prospects this cycle. He's also received financial support from the Democratic leadership, with House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (Md.) headlining an event for him last week.

The DCCC has also reserved air time in the Sacramento media market, which could be used to support Bera.

Republicans are pressuring local TV stations not to air campaign ads for Democratic candidates or their allies.

There's been a "pattern of lies, distortions, and falsehoods being pushed by Democratic organizations, candidates, and allies," according to the National Republican Congressional Committee, which asked station managers to "exercise due diligence" when deciding to air campaign commercials this fall.

"As station manager, you are certainly in no way obligated to air these ads and we would encourage you to exercise due diligence in investigating claims and accusations made before airing any ads created by Democrat organizations, candidates, or allies," Jessica Furst, general counsel for the NRCC, wrote in a letter sent Thursday to station managers in media markets where Democrats have reserved air time.

Furst cites a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee ad aired against GOP Rep. Charles Djou before the May special-election vote in Hawaii. She also cites ads by Reps. Zack Space (D-Ohio) and Ben Chandler (D-Ky.) , the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees and other liberal groups.

"We request that you exercise your right, consistent with FCC regulations, to reject any attempt by a candidate, political party, or third-party group to purchase time for an advertisement that communicates misleading and blatantly false messages such as those discussed above," Furst wrote.
 
"In most cases, you can insist that false statements be corrected before your station runs the ad. We trust that you agree that advertisements containing material misstatements of fact intended to deceive voters have no place on your station's airwaves."

The Democratic base is "unhappy," but the party won't repeat the mistakes that cost it control of the House in 1994, according to a top party strategist.

"We Democrats were asleep at the switch in 1994," strategist Harold Ickes said Thursday at a forum in Washington organized by the Democratic Governors Association. "We were complacent, we were smug, to put it bluntly, we were arrogant and I think out of touch, in many cases, with what was going on back in the district.

"That is not the case today," Ickes added. "We clearly have been on red alert for a long, long time."

Despite the party leadership being aware of the tough environment it faces, many in the grass roots seem ambivalent about the Democrats' fortunes in November. 

"Our base is unhappy, it's pissed off, I think unrightfully so," said Ickes, who was President Clinton's deputy chief of staff and advised Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign. "I think in some sense they're fair weather on this issue. Politics is a long-term, tough business, and it's fine to be there when the tides are running with you, but you got to be there when the tides are running against you."

Ickes made a plea to party activists. 

"My exhortation to Democrats is the tides may be running against us, but you got to get out there and work. There are 55 days left, a lot of things can happen," he said.

The party also has to win over independent voters in order to be successful.

"We have got to be able to win enough independents to carry especially these marginal districts," Ickes said. "That goes for the governors, and it goes as well for the House and the Senate."