MO-SEN 2018: The Megathread

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Was just about to post it but McCaskill probably gets between 35 and 39% of the vote.

This is unnecessarily pessismistic. She has the votes to break 40%, maybe even 45%. It's just that she doesn't have the votes to win unless Hawley has an Akin moment.

[MT Treasurer]

MO AG Hawley was essentially forced by the MO GOP and the establishment. I don't know if Bannon will be on his side.

Apparently he has endorsed Hawley.

[Young Conservative]

MO AG Hawley was essentially forced by the MO GOP and the establishment. I don't know if Bannon will be on his side.

Apparently he has endorsed Hawley.

Hawley is very conservative. the nasty attempts by Petersen to brand him a RINO will fail.

[TheSaint250]

I think he's now officially entered the speculative list of potential presidential candidates for years from now.

[Fudotei]

I'm not entirely convinced that Hawley is as conservative as Bannon seems to think he is -- a lot of association with the Bush classes, the kind of business or old money Republicans that Bannon wants to get rid of.

But on policy, he seems to have his head straight. I'll vote for him, I just have a bad feeling.

[Kamala]

Hawley is exactly the sort of overly-ambitious, climbing, skeevy swamp creature that gets praised for seeking higher office that a female version of him would be criticized for doing.

[jamestroll]

I LOVE CLAIRE MCCASKILL

[Heisenberg]

I'm not entirely convinced that Hawley is as conservative as Bannon seems to think he is -- a lot of association with the Bush classes, the kind of business or old money Republicans that Bannon wants to get rid of.

But on policy, he seems to have his head straight. I'll vote for him, I just have a bad feeling.

Hawley is seen as a rising star, and has quickly united nearly all of the party behind him. If Bannon didn't back him, who else? He apparently tried to get Ed Martin in at one point, but he said no, and he sounds like another Tarkanian (as in perennial candidate who always loses). Rosendale and Mandel also seem to have coalesced both the establishment and grassroots around them.

[Fudotei]

I'm not entirely convinced that Hawley is as conservative as Bannon seems to think he is -- a lot of association with the Bush classes, the kind of business or old money Republicans that Bannon wants to get rid of.

But on policy, he seems to have his head straight. I'll vote for him, I just have a bad feeling.

Hawley is seen as a rising star, and has quickly united nearly all of the party behind him. If Bannon didn't back him, who else? He apparently tried to get Ed Martin in at one point, but he said no, and he sounds like another Tarkanian (as in perennial candidate who always loses). Rosendale and Mandel also seem to have coalesced both the establishment and grassroots around them.

It's mostly Hawley's credentials that are giving me the bad feeling. Bannon doesn't recruit star Ivy League lawyers and constitutional teachers, mentored by John Danforth, who argued before the Supreme Court for Sibelius, and then rapidly rises to the attorney general's office that fast.

Kelli Ward doesn't have that kind of past, and neither does Chris McDaniel. If Bannon wants to be recruiting a wide swath of potential candidates (Tarkanian's perennial candidacy + McDaniel's Tea Party credentials + Ward's nativism + Prince's emphasis on alternative strategies), that's fine, but Hawley really doesn't fit that mold.

The problem is the lack of strong statewide candidates that weren't just elected: Greitens, Parson, Ashcroft, Hawley, they're all new. But that usually means you throw a good state senator (Caleb Rowden?). Not a 37 year old who hasn't held elected office for a single year.

[Dr. Arch]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Important note. This is easy attack bait, and McCaskil is sure to squeeze it for all of its worth.

[user12345]

I LOVE CLAIRE MCCASKILL

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

Look in those eyes and tell me this isn't Safe R. Wow!

[Young Conservative]

Hayley is the rare candidate who is very conservative and palatable to the establishment. He will demolish McCaskill. #Hawley2018

[TheSaint250]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Rosen and Hawley doing this is extremely stupid (not trying to do a both sides thing here. i agree its ridiculous).  I wish there was a law where, unless in extreme cases, you can't run for an office if you have not completed at least one term of your first, but I feel like that would run into too many problems.

[Fudotei]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Rosen and Hawley doing this is extremely stupid (not trying to do a both sides thing here. i agree its ridiculous).  I wish there was a law where, unless in extreme cases, you can't run for an office if you have not completed at least one term of your first, but I feel like that would run into too many problems.

Missouri Legislature would probably be all over that -- they love ethics reform

[Rjjr77]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Rosen and Hawley doing this is extremely stupid (not trying to do a both sides thing here. i agree its ridiculous).  I wish there was a law where, unless in extreme cases, you can't run for an office if you have not completed at least one term of your first, but I feel like that would run into too many problems.

Kinda hard to enact that law... seems like it would violate some sort of free speech claim

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Rosen and Hawley doing this is extremely stupid (not trying to do a both sides thing here. i agree its ridiculous).  I wish there was a law where, unless in extreme cases, you can't run for an office if you have not completed at least one term of your first, but I feel like that would run into too many problems.

That would have made Obama ineligible to run for President in 2008, so I'll have to oppose it.

[TheSaint250]

I think people here are severely underestimating how bad it looks to be running for Senate nine months into the job you promised voters you wouldn't use as a launching pad. My Trump supporting parents who don't like McCaskill are even pissed at this and they didn't even vote for her in her 2012 landslide.

Rosen and Hawley doing this is extremely stupid (not trying to do a both sides thing here. i agree its ridiculous).  I wish there was a law where, unless in extreme cases, you can't run for an office if you have not completed at least one term of your first, but I feel like that would run into too many problems.

Kinda hard to enact that law... seems like it would violate some sort of free speech claim

Yeah exactly

[RogueBeaver]

Hurtman dropping down to Auditor.

[MarkD]

I'm surprised at Rep. Curtman dropping out of MO-Sen. Hawley has an important issue working against him, as mentioned above by PNM.
I'm also curious why that article did not mention that Rep. Richardson of Poplar Bluff is also considering running for Auditor.

[Heisenberg]

I'm surprised at Rep. Curtman dropping out of MO-Sen. Hawley has an important issue working against him, as mentioned above by PNM.
I'm also curious why that article did not mention that Rep. Richardson of Poplar Bluff is also considering running for Auditor.

Speaker Richardson said he's NOT running.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Because Bannon is not stupid. He realizes what happened in 2012 and that if someone other than Akin was the nominee, ACA repeal would have passed. All are also well aware of Claire's love to meddle in the GOP primary.


So that is why they are uniting behind Hawley and clearing the field.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I don't believe that McCaskill is as vulnerable as people think. 

[Holmes]

I don't believe that McCaskill is as vulnerable as people think.  

I think she's really putting in the work and it might not be showing yet, but I agree. She's not doing what many incumbents who end up going down have done. She's out there and she's talking to people. If Hawley just keeps talking to lobbyists and other Washington insiders, he'll be severely handicapping himself.

[Fudotei]

I'm at least 90% sure that the Breitbart narrative of "conservatives coalescing around Hawley" is bunk. The man's a 37 year old Ivy League lawyer, not the type of grassroots or tough populist the Missouri GOP (which is increasingly radicalizing thanks to white suburbanites in St Louis county learning race tension exists) is looking for.

If Greitens was in his second term as governor he'd have McCaskill's seat on a diamond platter, I'm sure of that.