XPost: talk.politics.guns, alt.politics.elections, alt.politics.trump   
   XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh   
   From: awest@gmail_.com   
      
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   > Republicans not being smart about their advantage.   
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   On Monday, the Sentinel Action Fund announced $5 million to   
   support Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters.   
      
   An independent super PAC aligned with Heritage Action for   
   America, the political arm of the conservative Heritage   
   Foundation, is pumping money into the Arizona Senate race amid   
   near-total abandonment by Republican leadership in this highly   
   competitive race amid a currently 50-50 Senate..   
      
   On Monday, the Sentinel Action Fund announced $5 million to   
   support Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters in the form of   
   voter outreach efforts and television ad buys after Minority   
   Leader Mitch McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund (SLF) pulled $8   
   million from the contest.   
      
   “We wanted to be there from a conservative standpoint,” said   
   Jessica Anderson, the president of the Sentinel Action Fund,   
   highlighting the group’s spending in Arizona, and Masters in   
   particular, as a “clarion call for the conservative movement to   
   come and support this candidate.”   
      
   While the group has also announced efforts to get involved with   
   pivotal Senate races in Nevada and Georgia, Anderson emphasized   
   “$5 million is so far our largest single expenditure that we   
   have planned.”   
      
   In the final week of August, McConnell’s super PAC canceled   
   nearly $8 million in ad buys for Arizona and demanded private   
   entrepreneur and megadonor Peter Thiel step in to replace the   
   lost funding. The money initially set aside for Masters will   
   instead go to support J.D. Vance in Ohio.   
      
   Both Masters and Vance, who worked for Thiel prior to jumping   
   into crowded Senate primaries, were backed by the billionaire   
   venture capitalist with $15 million each during the party   
   contests. McConnell is now demanding more money from Thiel, who   
   has yet to spend on either in the general, to push the   
   candidates across the November finish line.   
      
   The McConnell super PAC is driving more money from the Arizona   
   Senate race, where Masters is down by 4 points in the   
   RealClearPolitics aggregate of polls, to Ohio, where polls show   
   Vance up by more than 2. In August, polling from the most   
   reliable pollster of recent election cycles, the Trafalgar   
   Group, showed Masters down by 4 points with Vance up by 5.   
      
   “McConnell told Thiel over the phone last week that Vance’s race   
   in Ohio was proving more costly for the Senate Leadership Fund   
   than anticipated,” the Washington Post reported on Aug. 31.   
   McConnell added “that money was not unlimited and that there was   
   a need for the billionaire to ‘come in, in a big way, in   
   Arizona,'” an anonymous “person familiar with the conversation”   
   reportedly told the Post.   
      
   Campaign finance data and recent electoral trends in each state,   
   however, cast doubt on McConnell’s claims that Vance was in more   
   desperate need of funds than Masters.   
      
   Former President Donald Trump carried Ohio comfortably by 8   
   points in both 2016 and 2020. Trump captured Arizona’s 11   
   electoral votes in 2016 by less than 4 points, and lost the   
   state in 2020. Arizona’s two Senate seats also became filled by   
   two Democrats for the first time since 1953 in 2020.   
      
   Data from OpenSecrets further shows Masters outraised by   
   incumbent Sen. Mark Kelly 10 to 1, compared to Vance who has   
   been outraised by Ohio Democrat Rep. Tim Ryan nearly 6 to 1.   
      
   McConnell’s decision to pull $8 million from Masters drew   
   criticism from Senate rivals who called out the Republican   
   leader for aiming to re-elect a minority the Kentucky lawmaker   
   can control as opposed to a fractured majority. Masters pledged   
   during the Arizona Republican Senate debate not to back   
   McConnell for another term at the top of GOP leadership. In   
   August, McConnell complained about candidate quality among his   
   own party going into the fall midterms.   
      
   “I think there’s probably a greater likelihood the House flips   
   than the Senate. Senate races are just different, they’re   
   statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,”   
   McConnell said on Fox News.   
      
   McConnell attempted to pre-emptively foil criticism over Arizona   
   spending by also taking an axe to planned ads for Alaska Sen.   
      
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