Mediaboss Marketing

On average, middle class families earning less than $86,000 would see a tax increase under the Republican tax reform plan. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), in a tweet, Oct. 27

The average tax increase on families nationwide earning up to $86,100 would be $794.00 Sen. Robert P. Casey Jr. (D-Pa.), in a tweet, Oct. 24

Under GOP plan, U.S. families making ~$86k see avg tax increase of $794. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), in a tweet, Oct. 24

A reader asked whether Harriss tweet was accurate. But when we looked into it, it turns out that many Democrats were tweeting the same talking point that middle-class families would face an average tax increase under the GOP plan. The three tweets below are just a sampling.

It turns out this Twitterblizzard is the result of a bad game of telephone.

We traced the talking point to a document put out by the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, essentially the communications arm of Senate Democrats. That document laid out a series of statistics, tailored for each individual state, that purported to show how damaging the evolving Republican tax plan would be for middle-class Americans.

That document had this line on each state page: The average tax increase on families nationwide earning up to $86,100 would be $794, a significant burden for middle-class families.

This factoid in turn was sourced to a report by Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee. So we tracked that down.

That report had this line: If enacted, the Republican tax reform proposal would saddle 8 million households that earn up to $86,100 with an average tax increase of $794 a substantial expense for working families.

Note the difference. The original report referred to 8 million households receiving a $794 tax increase. Somehow, when it got communicated down the line, that nuance was lost and it was translated into a talking point referring to all working-class families.

Latoya Veal, spokeswoman for the JEC Democrats, explained how the number was calculated. The staff took an estimate by the Tax Policy Center, based on the GOPs Unified Framework released in September.The staff then focused on the households (technically tax units in the TPC document) making under $86,100 the bottom three quintiles of taxpayers that would face a tax increase. Weighting the tax increase by the number of people in each quintile, the staff came up with an averagetax hike of $794 for the people receiving a tax increase.

But notice the funny thing about this calculation: Only a small percentage (6.5 percent) of the nearly 122 million households in the bottom three quintiles will actually face a tax increase.

Meanwhile, more than 97 million (80 percent) will receive a tax cut. Doing the math the same way the JEC staff did, we come up with an average tax cut of about $450 for those 97 million households.

Indeed, at the far end of the chart, you will see that every quintile on average receives a tax cut not a tax increase.

In any tax bill, there are going to be winners and losers. The top quintile receives the biggest average tax cut, both in dollars and change in after-tax income but also has the largest percentage (32.3 percent) of households that will face a tax increase.

There are different ways to approach the TPC estimates, Veal said. Key Republicans have been asked whether they could guarantee that no middle-class family will get a tax increase under their plan. Our calculation shows that some households 8 million making under $86,100 will receive an increase based on TPCs estimates.

By the time we contacted the DPCC about the error, The Fact Checkers questions must have circulated.

Once we realized that the original report could have been clearer, we updated it immediately, a spokesman said. Now the updated report makes clearer that 8 million households could face a tax increase though again it fails to acknowledge that most people would have a tax cut.

The inaccurate tweets remain.

In their haste to condemn the GOP tax plan, Democrats have spread far and wide the false claim that families making less than $86,100 on average will face a hefty tax hike. Actually, its the opposite. Most families in that income range would get a tax cut.Any Democrat who spread this claim should delete their tweets and make clear they were in error.

(About our rating scale)

Send us facts to check by filling out this form

Keep tabs on Trumps promises with our Trump Promise Tracker

Sign up for The Fact Checker weekly newsletter

Do you rate this claim as true or false? More Pinocchios for false, fewer based on your opinion of the statement's truthfulness. (The check mark means you think the statement is true, not that you agree with the rating.)

We need to verify that you are an actual person.

This is a non-scientific user poll. Results are not statistically valid and cannot be assumed to reflect the views of Washington Post users as a group or the general population.

Share the Facts

2017-11-02 11:10:18 UTC

1

1

5

Four Pinocchios

On average, middle class families earning less than $86,000 would see a tax increase under the Republican tax reform plan.

Kamala Harris

Senator (D-Calif.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamala_Harris

in a tweet

Friday, October 27, 2017

2017-10-27

Share the Facts

2017-11-02 11:13:03 UTC

1

1

5

Four Pinocchios

Under GOP plan, U.S. families making ~$86k see avg tax increase of $794.

Jeff Merkley

Senator (D-Ore.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Merkley

in a tweet

Tuesday, October 24, 2017

2017-10-24

Share the Facts

2017-11-02 11:16:09 UTC

1

1

5

Four Pinocchios

The average tax increase on families nationwide earning up to $86,100 would be $794.00

Bob Casey

Senator (D-Pa.)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Casey_Jr.

in a tweet

Tuesday, October 24, 2017

2017-10-24

Read the original:
Senate Democrats falsely claim GOP tax plan will raise taxes ...

I havent seen much evidence that the party and its crop of potential presidential candidates are up for it. I was disappointed, for example, that after the far-right rally in Charlottesville, Va., while Democrats duly denounced President Trumps reaction and the rallys white supremacism and the rights defense of Confederate statuary (tough calls!), no one who purports to want to lead the party and country out of this darkness stepped forward to offer broader reflections on that grim episode.

Bah! Its too early for that, some will say. The Democrats are an opposition party right now, and their main job is to oppose. And under the leadership of Senator Charles Schumer and Representative Nancy Pelosi, theyre doing that quite well. But I dont think Democratic reluctance here is just a matter of timing.

The Democrats are undergoing a historic transformation, from being the party that embraced neoliberalism in the early 1990s to one that is rejecting that centrist posture and moving left. Theres plenty about this to cheer the neoliberal Democratic Party didnt do nearly enough to try to arrest growing income inequality, among other shortcomings.

There will be necessary internecine fights, and they boil down to loyalty tests on particular positions demanded by the vanguard. Consider the debate within the party on Senator Bernie Sanderss Medicare for All bill, which most (though not all) 2020 contenders rushed to attach themselves to. To fail to sign on to that legislation is to open oneself to criticism, even abuse, although its less a piece of legislation than a goal.

Forget about whos right and wrong in these debates. Time will sort that out. My point is that they tend to consume a party experiencing a shift. The Democratic Party, because it is an amalgam of interest groups in a way the Republican Party is not, has always had a tendency to elevate the candidate who can check the most boxes. The current internal dynamics exacerbate that. Its also worth remembering that no one besides party activists cares.

So when the partys leaders tussle over this or that policy, they also need to take a step back, to see the direction the country the West itself is heading, and take a stand on it. This isnt just a matter of high-minded idealism; its what separates great politicians from merely good ones.

History tells us that the transformative politicians, the ones who can change the countrys direction and will really matter in the history books, are the ones who can do both. I think there have been four of them in the past century: Franklin Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

Why Roosevelt and Reagan should be obvious. I know some would dispute my choice of Mr. Clinton, but he rescued a party that had lost three presidential elections in a row and was being read last rites by some pundits in 1991 (the extent to which he changed the countrys fundamental direction is debatable). Mr. Obama made history and redrew the electoral map. All four were able to speak both to their base and beyond it by identifying the challenge of the moment and persuading majorities that they had some answers.

The future of the Western democratic project is the fundamental issue of our era. Its under attack from Vladimir Putin and Steve Bannon and many people in between (and to the extent that he backs Mr. Bannons purge of the Republican Party, from the president himself; think about that).

Democrats cant duck this question and expect the broader electorate to see them as prepared to lead. To his credit, Mr. Sanders did talk a bit about all this in a foreign-policy speech in late September at the same Missouri college where Winston Churchill gave his Iron Curtain speech, noting an international order that is under great strain.

The Democrats were the party that created this order after World War II. They must now be the party that fixes and saves it.

See the rest here:
The Silence of the Democrats - The New York Times

In 1939, Winston Churchill famously described Russia as a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma, which is proving an apt description of the scandal playing out nearly eight decades later about Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections.

As it turns out, our very own Democratic Party was doing some meddling of its own using some of the Russians own tactics while using Russians as a foil. Thats the latest twist in a plot line that makes a John le Carr novel look like a kids coloring book.

The story started, as you recall, in late July of 2016, during the Republican nominating convention in Cleveland, when the international whistleblowing outfit WikiLeaks published thousands of purloined emails from the Democratic National Committee. Their content was somewhat embarrassing to the Democratic establishment, inasmuch as it bolstered the suspicions of the Bernie Sanders faithful, who believed that under party Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz the DNC had engaged in various subterfuges to help Hillary Clinton quell the Sanders insurrection.

These efforts included dispatching moles to his campaign events, and paying Hillary supporters to troll Bernie on social media. Although Wasserman Schultz was forced out, the DNC hierarchy and the Clinton campaign needed to respond. They could have simply told the truth and apologized, the truth being that of course party regulars favored Clinton over Sanders: Bernie hadnt even called himself a Democrat until he began running for the partys nomination while Hillary Clinton was Mrs. Democrat. That admission could have been accompanied by expression of regret for their excesses.

But repentance is not in the Clintons playbook. In this case, neither was candor. Instead, the campaigns top officials formulated their lines of attack. First, they cast aspersions on the veracity of the WikiLeaks emails. Second, they insisted this was all a Russian plot to help Donald Trump. It was a calculated one-two punch. By calling into question the authenticity of the emails, Clinton didnt have to respond to their contents the sabotaging of Sanders campaign. In boxing vernacular, that was the left jab setting up the right cross, which was the Russia angle. The jab was a lie: They knew the emails were accurate. Playing the Russia card was, at best, disingenuous. Thanks to the Washington Post, we now know that the Clinton organization had been plotting a preemptive strike against Trump for months when it hired an anti-Republican opposition research outfit called Fusion GPS to go to Russia and dig up dirt on him.

What emerged from those efforts was the salacious anti-Trump dossier produced by ex-British spy Christopher Steele and shopped around to liberal media outlets until BuzzFeed, an online site so hostile to Donald Trump that it refused to accept Republican ads in 2016, took the bait. Virtually everything Clinton and her surrogates have said about Russia and Trump from that day to this has been either a direct falsehood, or a lie of omission. Following up on a tip that Clinton and the DNC were paying Fusion GPS, New York Times reporters were told vigorously by Marc Elias, counsel to both the DNC and the Clinton campaign, that there was nothing to it. Yet, according to the Post expose, there was a lot to it Elias was the one who hired Fusion GPS.

Elias, now representing former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, also reportedly sat mute beside his client while Podesta told a Senate committee that he didnt know who financed Steeles efforts. Then theres Clinton herself. Shes played up the Steele dossier while on the book tour for What Happened, her post-election finger-pointing. In the book itself, she wrote:

In the summer of 2016, according to the Washington Post, the FBI began investigating a dossier prepared by a well-respected former British spy that contained explosive and salacious allegations about compromising information the Russians had on Trump. The intelligence community took the dossier seriously enough that it briefed both President Obama and President-elect Trump on its contents before the inauguration.

Heres whats missing from that account: Clintons campaign paid this well-respected former British spy, setting in the motion the entire affair. Lets stop and consider what that means for a moment. Nobody has revealed how much money was involved but Elias law firm was paid $12.4 million by the DNC and the campaign during the election. How much of that went to Steele? How much did Steele pay his former Russian contacts to spin their spicy tale of Trump cavorting with Russian prostitutes, masking real estate deals as bribes, and generally setting himself up to be blackmailed?

I dont want to cast aspersions on Michael Steele, whom many besides Hillary describe as respected, but theres something about spreading so much cash around as part of an investigation that makes the information suspect. Its why checkbook journalism is rarely considered investigative reporting at all: The money creates an incentive to make things up. Viewed through this prism, it all looks less like a genuine investigation and more like a sting operation orchestrated by the Democrats to win an election.

To this day, the only regret expressed by Clinton or her supporters is that they couldnt place the Steele dossier in the media before the election, though it wasnt for lack of trying. Even without it, nearly every prominent Democrat, including Clinton and President Obama warned of Russian meddling during the last two weeks of the campaign. In the end, it wasnt enough, so after the election, Team Clinton decided to keep using the Russian angle, both to excuse their failure and undermine the candidate who actually won.

Less than 24 hours after Hillarys concession speech, Podesta and Campaign Manager Robby Mook convened a staff meeting at Clintons Brooklyn headquarters to formalize this attack. The effort was described by authors Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes in a book that explains what happened more insightfully than Mrs. Clintons memoir.

For a couple of hours, with Shake Shack containers littering the room, they went over the script they would pitch to the press and the public, they wrote. Already, Russian hacking was the centerpiece of the argument.

But heres the problem. The Russian government was interfering in the U.S. election. Among other scams, Russian internet trolls spread anti-Hillary rumors and fake news. Yes, the DNC trolled Bernie Sanders, but this was a vastly more sophisticated effort. And while Russians are no more monolithic than Americans, if any part of the Steele dossier is accurate, Russia was playing both sides of the fence. But why?

It was while trying to discern Russias motives and future course of action that Winston Churchill invoked his riddle wrapped in mystery inside an enigma line. Thats the famous part of the quote. There was more, however. But perhaps there is a key, Churchill added. That key is Russian national interest.

In the end we may learn that Vladimir Putins goal is simply setting Americans at one anothers throats. If so, he seems to have succeeded. Yet, one wonders: to what aim? Is Russia such a basket case that Putin and his minions can only feel superior by watching us hammer away at each other? If so, perhaps Republicans and Democrats can be induced not to cooperate.

Correction:Christopher Steele is theex-British spy thatproduced theanti-Trump dossier.

Carl M. Cannon is executive editor and Washington Bureau chief of RealClearPolitics.

Read the original here:
How Hillary and the Democrats played Russia card

It took nearly a week, but leading Democrats hope theyve done enough to wash their hands of politically uncomfortable ties to Harvey Weinstein. But Republicans arent letting go just yet.

The Democratic Partys recent days have been punctuated by a flurry of statements condemning the Hollywood fixture for years a high-profile fundraiser for leading Democrats and a flood of promises to send years worth of donations to charity from nearly every prominent lawmaker to receive Weinsteins backing in the past. By Wednesday, each high-profile Democrat to receive money from Weinstein had made plans to direct it elsewhere, aside from recent retirees like former President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton who still denounced him.

Story Continued Below

But even as top Democratic lawmakers pledged to donate the cash theyd gotten from Weinstein, the Democratic National Committee itself stopped short of promising a full giveaway. The committee pledged "over $30,000" of Weinstein donations to political groups that work to elect women.

The only problem? The DNC had raised over $300,000 from Weinstein, a fact Republicans have been quick to exploit.

"They're keeping 90 percent of his donations; I don't understand, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel told CNN. "If you stand for treating women well and you stand for the respect of women, you shouldn't take money from somebody who treated women with the absolute highest level of disrespect.

Sign up for POLITICO Playbook and get the latest news, every morning in your inbox.

By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time.

The DNC, which has struggled to raise money recently, has not responded to a request for comment.

Still, after a few days of excruciating silence in response to the initial New York Times report and subsequent investigations from the Times and The New Yorker detailing countless accusations of sexual assaults or advances, the frustrated outpouring from elected Democrats reflected the partys discomfort. It was a situation to which Democrats have not recently been accustomed, after all: They found themselves under unrelenting fire from Republicans for ties to Weinstein that were deep and undeniable.

Michelle and I have been disgusted by the recent reports about Harvey Weinstein. Any man who demeans and degrades women in such fashion needs to be condemned and held accountable, regardless of wealth or status, Obama said Tuesday, after five days of pressure to condemn Weinstein, who had bundled over $600,000 for him in 2012, according to federal campaign reports.

I was shocked and appalled by the revelations about Harvey Weinstein. The behavior described by women coming forward cannot be tolerated, Clinton added in a statement of her own, distancing herself from the man who brought her 2016 presidential campaign over $1.4 million. On Wednesday, Clinton appeared on CNN and pledged to donate the money received from Weinstein to charity.

At a time that Democrats were hoping to be pushing back against President Donald Trumps tax push and enflaming tensions between Republican senators and the White House, the partys leaders instead were forced to fend off repeated questions about their relationships with the man each was quick to condemn.

While the retired Clinton and Obama took until Tuesday to weigh in, it didnt take as long for active Democrats to speak out against Weinstein. Leading Republicans were nonetheless even quicker to tie the onetime California power broker to the partys leading lawmakers.

During three decades worth of sexual harassment allegations, Harvey Weinstein lined the pockets of Democrats to the tune of three-quarters of a million dollars, the RNCs McDaniel said in a statement last week. If Democrats and the DNC truly stand up for women like they say they do, then returning this dirty money should be a no brainer.

Donald Trump Jr. tweeted repeatedly about Weinstein after the first story broke, urging Democrats to disavow their donor.

It took Hillary abt 5 minutes to blame NRA for madmans rampage, but 5 days to sorta-kinda blame Harvey Weinstein 4 his sexually [sic] assaults, chimed in White House adviser Kellyanne Conway on Twitter on Tuesday.

The questions didnt let up for Democrats after the holiday weekend.

Any leader should condemn this, Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, Clintons 2016 running mate, told CNN on Tuesday morning in response to questions about Weinstein. These allegations are low-life behavior."

All the while, many in the party privately fumed as GOP officials amped up the pressure on them to return campaign cash from the former studio head, furious that Republicans would make this an issue considering the multiple sexual harassment allegations against Trump himself.

By the middle of this week, however, leading Democrats and party groups said they would donate as much money as they had received from Weinstein to charities, many dealing with sexual and domestic violence. That included senators such as Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Sens. Al Franken of Minnesota, Martin Heinrich of New Mexico and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.

But the Democratic National Committee itself said it would give a portion of the money it had received to political groups that work to elect women, raising further GOP eyebrows and hardly putting the story to rest.

Weinstein had positioned himself as close to a number of party leaders Malia Obama interned at The Weinstein Co. in 2016 and at least six of the recipients of his money are potential 2020 presidential candidates.

But by Wednesday each member of that group But by Wednesday five members of that group Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Kamala Harris of California, and Gov. Terry McAuliffe of Virginia had pledged to send the money to charity. The campaign of the sixth, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York, said it would donate $50,000 to an unspecified womens charity. Cuomo, who had raised $110,400 from Weinstein or his company since 1999, will hang on to the remainder of the money, a decision criticized by Republicans.

Cristiano Lima contributed to this report.

Missing out on the latest scoops? Sign up for POLITICO Playbook and get the latest news, every morning in your inbox.

The rest is here:
Democrats dogged by Weinstein cash - POLITICO

Democratic candidates are reporting historic early fundraising totals, alarming GOP strategists and raising the prospect that 2018 could feature the most expansive House battlefield in years.

Animated by opposition to President Donald Trump and the Republican congressional majorities, at least 162 Democratic candidates in 82 GOP-held districts have raised over $100,000 so far this year, according to a POLITICO analysis of the latest FEC data. Thats about four times as many candidates as House Democrats had at this point before the 2016 or 2014 elections, and its more than twice as many as Republicans had running at this point eight years ago, on the eve of capturing the House in the 2010 wave election.

Story Continued Below

Nearly three dozen Republican incumbents were outraised by Democratic challengers in the third quarter of this year a stunning figure. Nine GOP incumbents already trail a Democratic opponent in cash on hand, increasing the likelihood that many veteran incumbents will face tough opposition for the first time in years.

The Democrats fundraising success, especially from a glut of candidates who have never run for office before, is unsettling to those charged with protecting the GOP majority.

Thats something that should get every Republicans attention in Washington, said Jason Roe, a Republican strategist who works on House races. These first-timers are printing money."

Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-N.J.), who has never gotten less than 58 percent of the vote in 12 terms in Congress, is among those suddenly facing cash-flush opposition. Three Democratic opponents outraised Frelinghuysen in the third quarter, and each has already brought in more money than any challenger Frelinghuysen has faced in a quarter-century.

Your guide to the permanent campaign weekday mornings, in your inbox.

By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time.

In Texas, GOP Rep. John Culberson, whose Houston-area district attracted little attention from either party before Hillary Clinton carried it in 2016, finished the summer with less campaign cash than two different Democratic opponents.

The long slate of well-funded Democratic candidates, coupled with a favorable political environment and poor polling numbers for Trump, is raising Democratic hopes of erasing the GOPs 24-seat majority.

The Democrats in 2017 are starting to very much resemble the Republicans in 2009, said former Rep. Steve Israel, who chaired the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2012 and 2014. People are talking about a wave developing, but in order to even begin to think about a wave, you have to be in a position to take advantage in [case of] a wave. And Democrats are clearly in that position.

Many Republican representatives, especially ones battle-hardened from past campaigns, are already preparing hard for 2018 by shoring up their positions. Reps. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) and Barbara Comstock (R-Va.), for example, vastly outraised all of their Democratic challengers in the last quarter as they ready for reelection campaigns in districts Trump lost in 2016.

The fact that the environment is so intense so early is ultimately a good thing, as it makes sure more members will be prepared, said Mike DuHaime, a Republican operative. They can see it coming.

Republican groups are also raising tens of millions of dollars to help bolster their party. The Republican National Committee in particular has outstripped the Democratic National Committee, raising over $100 million and building up cash reserves of over $44 million this year, ahead of the 2018 elections. House Speaker Paul Ryan has also raised record-setting amounts of money for House Republicans.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised $8.9 million in September, beating its Republican counterpart for the fifth month in a row. But the National Republican Congressional Committee still has more than $10 million more in its bank account money that will come in handy across the sprawling battleground, especially if more incumbents retire.

Democrats and Republicans each have a handful of costly, open battleground seats to defend, from Rep. Dave Reicherts (R-Wash.) suburban district outside Seattle to Democratic Rep. Tim Walzs rural seat in southern Minnesota.

Resources will be spread thin because no incumbent in the primary or in the general can afford to not take this seriously, said Roe, the Republican consultant. Were just spread thin. Thats our vulnerability, the strain on resources."

That strain was apparent in recent comments by Rep. Glenn Grothman, who represents a solidly Republican block of eastern Wisconsin, easily won reelection in 2016, and has not typically made lists of GOP incumbents vulnerable to a 2018 challenge. Grothman told a local radio program earlier this month that hes very apprehensive about the future, because the fundraising is not going as well as Id like.

Were not raising as much money as we should, Grothman added.

A week later, his Democratic opponent, Dan Kohl, filed a campaign finance disclosure showing him outpacing the Republican incumbent.

Clearly there is an intensity among the Democratic base that is similar to what Republicans had in 2009, but its hard to tell what its going to be like a year from now, said DuHaime. But you cant deny the enthusiasm.

Stung by over-optimistic projections in past years, Democratic operatives have been careful to avoid declaring a wave on the horizon. With so many candidates piling into crowded Democratic primaries, they worry about their own resources being drained and fear nominees could be pulled too far to the left before difficult general election battles next year.

Its way too early to start measuring the drapes, said former DCCC executive director Kelly Ward, now a top staffer at the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, adding that under the current congressional map, you need a tsunami, not just a wave, to overcome how badly the [district] lines are broken."

The partys first order of business in 2018 will be to navigate an unusual number of expensive primaries looming due to the free-flowing money and the opportunity Democrats smell in dozens of districts. In southern California, two of the biggest Democratic self-funders in the country Andy Thorburn, who loaned his campaign $2 million, and Gil Cisneros, who gave his campaign over half a million dollars are both running against GOP Rep. Ed Royce, along with a handful of other candidates. Three other districts in Orange County alone are similarly crowded, and drenched in campaign money.

In some primaries, local Democrats are pushing back on national party leaders anointment of candidates, as in the fight to take on Rep. Mike Coffman in Colorado. Democrats also expect issues like Sen. Bernie Sanders Medicare-for-all plan to divide candidates, and Republicans are ready to pounce on statements that may play well in Democratic primaries but could be damaging in swing-district general elections.

Nothing beats watching candidates blow their cash trying to explain how progressive they are and how they are still on the fence about Nancy Pelosis place in their party, said Jesse Hunt, the press secretary for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Israel acknowledged the debates within his party but said he does not believe they will weaken Democratic candidates next November.

To the extent that there are differences, they are certainly not sapping Democrats fundraising abilities, not sapping Democratic recruitment and certainly not sapping Democratic energy, Israel said. There may be fissures, but they are not swallowing up our party. The Republicans have fissures that are swallowing up their party.

Missing out on the latest scoops? Sign up for POLITICO Playbook and get the latest news, every morning in your inbox.

Original post:
Democrats early money haul stuns GOP - POLITICO