Lisa Blunt Rochester loans herself $225K to keep pace with Barney’s planned airwar.
She has loaned herself an additional $225,000 on top of the $178,900 she already loaned herself. Just how rich is Ms. Blunt Rochester?
In her latest FEC fundraising filing (which is a separate report filed on Thursday, with the new loans not being included in that report), she raised $171,646.94 since July 1, and she has $107,225.10 cash on hand. Well, now she has $332,225 cash on hand. Sean Barney raised $217,624.61 during the same pre-primary period, and has $353,580.61 cash on hand. Bryan Townsend raised $116,980.80, and has $199,252.34 cash on hand.
The loans are obviously meant to help LBR keep pace with Barney. I suppose Barney is going to blanket the airwaves with his TV ad and LBR wants to do the same. But Delaware is won on the ground by going door to door. So it will be interesting to see if this is the first Delaware campaign won on TV.
The first campaign won on TV? How about Carper 00′ or Markell 08′ even both of Minner’s campaigns. I get Delaware is a state of neighbors etc… But this blog’s obsession with the grassroots is king thing is laughable. Ground games are crucial, ask any respectable campaign professional and they will tell you that field is part of a strong campaign, not the entirety of a campaign.
Carper ’00 was won when Roth passed out. Markell won in ’08 because people despised Minner and Carney was tied to her, but I’l concede that if you spend $4 million on ads they just might reach people. Minner won because she was an unknown outside of downstate and people thought it was time for a woman to be chief executive; I know hard-core GOP women who voted for her on that basis. Markell’s is the only example that was a primary.
Any respectable campaign professional would not have much experience in a market like Delaware, one without a dedicated TV market.
I don’t share the management’s view on the importance of a ground game — I think it’s important but not everything — but the fact that people get excited by a smattering of cable-TV ads shows how little TV has traditionally mattered in Delaware elections.
Well, the race is an interesting contrast in campaign approaches.
I’ve always felt that breaking through the ‘white noise’ means not just the number of contacts, but the quality and diversity of the contacts as well.
All three campaigns are doing media, but Sean and Lisa are doing more commercial media than I’ve seen in awhile. I have yet to get any lit from Lisa, and it’s been awhile since I got any from Sean. Bryan’s targeted lit is pretty damn impressive, IMHO, but I admit I’m biased. Still, I think it’s been effectively targeted whereas, TV ads, by definition, are more broadstroke.
So, I agree that it’s not a matter of either/or. However, I see next to no field operation from Sean and Lisa. Voter contact/voter ID and GOTV are integral. You mention Markell vs. Carney, but it was clear to me, especially on Election Day, that Markell’s field operation was superior and likely won the election on election day itself. While I was a small cog in a well-run phone bank operation, Carney’s labor supporters were waving signs out in front of polling places. A total waste of resources.
I think Bryan’s field operation will make the difference, but I am not prescient by any means. We’ll know in less than two weeks.
TV campaigns are effective in Primaries like Delaware’s. This is a state where the Democratic Primary turnout statewide has been as low as 20,000 voters and is usually in the low 40’s. Most potential voters this year are very aware of the presidential election but sadly very unaware of the races for Congress, Lt Governor and Insurance Commissioner. My conversations with even likely Primary voters have revealed that many do not know who John Carney is; do not know that Jack Markell is not running again cannot name other elected officials. When I speak about Trini Navarro, a frequent response has been “oh, is he running against that woman?”. I ask if they have received mailings and they may recall mailings but not from whom or for what office (though a surprising number recall the mailing with Sean Barney holding an assault rifle-but not his name or office sought).
Trying to predict who will vote in an election where 10% of the potential voters will turnout is difficult. Mailings receive an average view time of .6 second. That brings us to TV.
An effective and repeated TV campaign is designed to reach those voters who are uninformed or undecided. It can reach those voters who are not on target lists and not even receiving mailings. It is better than a ground game because the reality is that 90% of the door knocks are unanswered-so the voter contact is the mail piece without the postage. The hope of the candidate who can afford to go up on TV is that voters who do not have their minds made up will go to the polls on September 13th and when they see the list for Congress will recognize the name of someone they saw on TV.
Not to mention make people aware there is an election.
There are no known entities in any of these races. If a voter realizes there is an election because of a candidate’s ad… They’ll likely vote for them.
The word the TV lovers keep bringing up is repetition. None of the campaigns here has the money to provide it. Markell, BTW, had enough money to advertise on Action News out of Philly. It reached a lot of eyeballs in NCCo because it’s a highly rated broadcast program, but it took millions that none of these candidates has.
“Mailings receive an average view time of .6 second.”
Do you have a link for that? Because I find no source that says that. Most research I found shows a 3-4 second view time. Of course, even 0.6 seconds is enough to register a name. Repeat that over the weeks and soon people are familiar with the name Sean Barney. I have received several of his mailers (two of them use the same photo, one of them reversed so his watch is on the wrong wrist) and seen no TV ads for him (and only one for Lisa Blunt Rochester).
Further, mailers are designed to target likely voters. With television, even on a niche cable channel on Delaware’s cable systems, your message is falling mostly upon uninterested and uninvolved ears.
Downstate is a bit different, as the Salisbury TV station is local and affordable. But Democrats don’t win statewide elections on downstate turnout. In a typical Democratic primary Wilmington turns out nearly as many Democratic voters as Kent and Sussex combined — and NCCo outside the city turns out as many as the city and downstate combined.
You, Mitch, of all people should know better. You beat KWS in Sussex by a 2-1 ratio and lost by same ratio in Wilmington. You lost the election in NCCo by about the same amount you lost overall.
In short, your roots in DelCo PA and downstate give you an inaccurate picture of the NCCo media market, which is the most important in Delaware politics. TV is of minimal use.
The most important function of advertising in a primary is to get people to the polls. The best way to do that is repetition. Unless you have lots of money, the best way to achieve than for the least amount of money is direct mail. And I have no vested interest in saying so.
I thought at one point in the campaign she was touting that she was still paying off her daughters tuition…..that was nonsense I guess. Typical politician!!
Well in 2008 Sussex more than doubled Wilmington’s turnout. This seems to have helped Markell, and he has his beach friends to thank.
Nobody doubts Wilmington’s impact… but I haven’t heard about Townsend spending a great deal of time in Wilmington. Has he conceded it to Lisa?
Not following Chris?… how does this mean that she is not paying her daughters tuition?
live in Wilmington…nice young man from Townsend’s people knocked on my door a few weeks ago…still not sure who I will be supporting but he is in Wilmington!!
A couple of thoughts. I’m a Townsend supporter, but I sure don’t like some ginning up of whether Lisa is paying for her daughter’s tuition. Hate stuff like that, regardless of the source or target. I am certain that she is not short-changing her daughter in order to throw $$’s into the campaign.
Townsend’s campaign has targeted Wilmington, and he has a field operation there that knocks on doors every day in the city. Lisa may be known in Wilmington, but it’s not as if the entire city is hers for the taking. She likely has some strong areas, but there are other areas that are up for grabs. The city is not a monolith.
You misunderstood my point. I don’t think she is short changing anyone. I just seem to recall Lisa offering a statement at some point on the campaign trail on the big issue of student debt that she felt peoples pain because she was still paying off loans for her daughters tuition. A lot of parents are in that boat given the state of the economy. Disregard the comment , not meant to be harsh. I do like Lisa and I think she may win this thing. She is investing in herself. Better that than to be financed by Wall Street and hedge funds like others in this race.
“Well in 2008 Sussex more than doubled Wilmington’s turnout. This seems to have helped Markell, and he has his beach friends to thank.”
And those people voted only in the governor’s race. Check the other races — no doubling of turnout for those. Not much more than Wilmington in the insurance commissioner’s race.
That’s why I didn’t use 2008. That year there was a primary for governor and an incumbent in the mayor’s race, so naturally Sussex had a good turnout relative to Wilmington. Those are not the conditions for this year’s primaries. As in 2012, we have a competitive mayor’s race and nothing at the top of the ticket to excite anyone.
Lisa’s got at least $5.5 million in assets: http://delawarestatenews.net/news/congressional-candidates-file-financial-disclosures/