ME-02: Poliquin in denial

[I’m not Stu]

An NRCC report in Maine indicates Bruce Poliquin is fairly unpopular. Would this be a good seat for Democrats to target?

[I’m not Stu]

R: Maine. A friend of mine at NRCC says Poliquin is in real trouble and that Trump is not popular in the 2nd district.

I found it.

[I’m not Stu]

I call this race tilt R for now.

[I’m not Stu]

Poliquin's seat is one of those seats that Dems NEED to pick-up if they have ANY shot at winning the house.

Not really.   It's very rural and extremely white.   I wouldn't call this a prime pickup opportunity.  

It's only R+2. It takes at least 24 seats to take the House. Long shot bids are necessary. An NRCC report indicates he's not too popular. Go after seats with a fairly even PVI, it can be successful with the right candidate. Maybe go after SC-5 (which was surprisingly competitive) and and AK-AL (perhaps with Berkowitz) as well.

[I’m not Stu]

Jared Golden seems to be a good candidate. Susan Collins is a popular Senator.

[I’m not Stu]

Poliquin's seat is one of those seats that Dems NEED to pick-up if they have ANY shot at winning the house.

Not really.   It's very rural and extremely white.   I wouldn't call this a prime pickup opportunity. 

It's a quintessential swing district. We'll need a good number of those.

And maybe some long shot but possibly winnable districts too.

[I’m not Stu]

Maybe Jared Golden or Troy Jackson.

[I’m not Stu]

Poliquin's seat is one of those seats that Dems NEED to pick-up if they have ANY shot at winning the house.

Not really.   It's very rural and extremely white.   I wouldn't call this a prime pickup opportunity. 

Rural New England whites =/= other rural whites.  Come on man.

Rural whites in Maine are far more elastic and more Democratic than rural whites in West Virginia (where the GOP has every House seat).

[I’m not Stu]

Poliquin's seat is one of those seats that Dems NEED to pick-up if they have ANY shot at winning the house.

Not really.   It's very rural and extremely white.   I wouldn't call this a prime pickup opportunity.  

Rural New England whites =/= other rural whites.  Come on man.

And still Northern Maine, Northern New Hampshire, and most eastern county of Vermont (Essex) swung rater heavily to Trump. So, i wouldn't call them "liberal heaven"... Some other areas - yes..

They're not extremely liberal at all, but they are elastic. They could flip. The NRCC thinks Poliquin is vulnerable.

This indicates Trump's approval rating in ME-02 might have dropped since he won the presidency and the district.

I guess it kinda falls in line with Trump being -14 in Maine in Gallup. That can't be just ME-1. He'd have to be at 75% disapproval there for the statewide numbers to align like that

[I’m not Stu]

Jared Golden is a strong contender. ME-02 could be flip in 2018 with the right candidate.

[I’m not Stu]

Libertarian candidate Brian Kresge is in. Might he be a spoiler?

[I’m not Stu]

Actual policy that produces results with a strong candidate is the best strategy, by winning new places that trend D while attempting to broaden the coalition by trying to regain lost votes, especially with actual pro-working class policies. Hostile elitist attitudes toward working class voters is a problem in the Democratic party right now.

[I’m not Stu]

Losing Waterville to ME-01 after redistricting also helped ME-02 trend GOP.

[I’m not Stu]

I don't know if the GOP trend in ME-02 will continue or reverse. It's hard to say at this point. ME-02 is fairly elastic.

[I’m not Stu]

Uh, if Democrats just concede the voters in northern Maine and lose them 2-1 while only winning ME-1 by 60-40, that's a loss statewide. It'd be malpractice to essentially cede the people of northern Maine without a fight. And while ME-1 is growing, that doesn't mean that the people in Northern Maine can't get to a point where they feel so ignored that they start voting like southern whites. If that DOES happen, Maine will become a Republican-leaning state.

Fortunately, the Democratic Party isn't so inept as to write off these voters as ignorant Republican rednecks, and it looks like they found someone who can win.

Democrats should contest ME-02. Republicans always challenge Grace Napolitano in CA-32 even though they have no chance in this heavily Democratic district. ME-02 is far more Democratic than CA-32 is Republican. Republicans don't concede these heavily Democratic districts, so Democrats should definitely not concede ME-02.

[I’m not Stu]

If you want brevity, just call it ME-02 or whatever. "Northern Maine" is a small region that's not nearly big enough to be its own district, and a lot of the district's swing is due to places like Bangor, Waterville, and Lewiston, and the small towns in between.

Waterville is now in ME-01.

[I’m not Stu]

Golden is ahead now.

[I’m not Stu]

I know this is pretty late and I was (and still am) rooting for Golden before this primary, but why was St. Clair not a good choice? I wasn't very familiar with him.

What Hindsight is 2020 said, but it’s worse.

St. Clair is a carpetbagger, extraordinarily wealthy and his mother bought a bunch of rural land I try to turn it into a National Park but prohibited hunting and fishing on it, put up fences, and forced people from their cabins.

St. Clair lives in ME-01?

[I’m not Stu]

man, demcorats have so many good candidates this cycle. golden, ojeda, rouda, levin, mccready!

Keirstead currently is leading by 370 votes.

[I’m not Stu]

What's taking so long to count the primary votes?

[I’m not Stu]

If ME-02 flips, Poliquin gets a shower.

[I’m not Stu]

If ME-02 flips, Poliquin gets a shower.

I see what you did there.

I wonder if that Trump video gets released.

[I’m not Stu]

Does Poliquin get a shower in November?