Posted on 10/25/2020 12:02:23 PM PDT by RandFan
The race for the South Carolina first congressional district is far more competitive than Democrats would have you believe. In fact, according to new polling released on Monday morning by Republican challenger Nancy Mace – she has taken the lead in her battle to unseat first-term Democrat Joe Cunningham.
According to a Monday morning news release from Mace’s campaign, the second-term state representative from Daniel Island, S.C. is drawing the support of 47 percent of likely first district voters in her bid to reclaim this Lowcountry coastal district – which was held by the GOP for nearly four decades prior to Cunningham’s upset win in 2018.
Cunningham was backed by 45 percent of likely voters in the survey – which was conducted between October 14-16, 2020 via live calling to 400 likely voters in the district.
Three weeks ago, Mace’s internal polling showed her trailing Cunningham by six percentage points.
“It is a two-week toss-up race to November 3,” one Mace advisor told us, referring to the latest data.
The Mace poll had U.S. president Donald Trump beating Democratic nominee Joe Biden by a 47-44 percent margin in the district – while U.S. senator Lindsey Graham narrowly led Democratic challenger Jaime Harrison by a 47-46 percent margin.
Those numbers jived with cross-tab data released last week in the Palmetto State by a New York Times/ Siena College survey – providing “validation (of) the Mace campaign’s numbers,” one strategist following the race told us.
According to a memo accompanying the results, “Mace is now getting the support of 90 percent of Republicans, up from 80 percent last month, as more Republicans see her message and see Joe Cunningham’s record of voting 90 percent of the time with Nancy Pelosi.”
Meanwhile, Cunningham’s support among Republicans and Independents has “dropped in successive surveys,” according to the memo.
Needless to say, this data is dramatically divergent from internal polling conducted by Democrats …
Last week, a Democratic poll showed Cunningham ahead by a whopping 13 percentage points – drawing 55 percent of the vote compared to just 42 percent for Mace.
Mace backers disputed the accuracy of that survey, which was conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner (GQR) – the research arm of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC).
“It smells wrong for (the) district,” one Mace strategist told us, referring to the fact Trump beat Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton by 13 percentage points four years ago.
The positive polling data touted by the Mace campaign was the latest good news for her candidacy as it enters the final sixteen days of the election.
Last week, Mace reported bringing in an impressive $2.5 million between July and September – a quarterly bonanza that easily eclipsed the $1.8 million raised by Cunningham. Outspent for months by her incumbent rival, Mace reported having $1.7 million cash-on-hand as of October 1, 2020 compared to Cunningham’s $1.2 million.
“Mace momentum is REAL,” Mace tweeted in response to the fundraising numbers.
In 2018, Cunningham defeated former state representative Katie Arrington by a wafer-thin 1.4 percent margin. One big contributing factor to his upset? The refusal of the outgoing GOP lawmaker – former governor Mark Sanford – to support Arrington’s candidacy after she defeated him in the June 2018 primary.
Sanford has also refused to back Mace, although she did receive the endorsement of his successor – former governor and ex-U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley. As we have frequently noted, Mace draws from a broad base of Republican support – including Trump backers and more libertarian-leaning GOP voters who support candidates like former U.S. congressman Ron Paul.
Still, few have given Mace much of a chance to defeat Cunningham this fall – citing the unexpected GOP and conservative support he has received since taking office.
In early September, Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics shifted this race from “toss-up” to “leans Democratic.” Toward the end of September, the Cook Political Report followed suit and moved the race from “toss-up” to “lean Democratic” as well.
Will these numbers compel them to move the race back into the “toss-up” category?
We shall see …
I pray she makes it.
Quite a bit of good fundraising news for GOP challengers to incumbent Dems sitting in Trump House districts.
This is target #1 for the GOP ... Get rid of this Democrat!
It is tough to unseat incumbents, unless they wimp out and retire like the GOPe did in 2018.
I do pray that she makes it. We need to retire Nancy.
It certainly is. But it can happen, especially when 30 incumbents are sitting in districts Trump won four years ago.
In the 2010 midterms 52 Dem House incumbents lost during that wipeout.
A looker-those things count.
Good for her!
Doesn’t the GOP need a net gain of at least 19 House seats to take back the majority?
She’s got the confident Amy Coney Barrett vibe.
Funny story. In our community, there is this whacky liberal activist group called the “indivisibles”, my hyphenated neighbor across the street is their nutty leader. So they had arranged to have Joe Cunningham come and speak to the group, which he committed to. They rented a hall, had appetizers, did advertising for the meet and greet etc. Just hours before, his office called and said he couldn’t make it but a staffer would bring some materials for the event. When the person showed up, they brought a full size cardboard cutout of Joe, dropped it off and left.
In 2018 when Cunningham took the seat, his Republican opponent, Katie Arrington was ahead going into Election Day. In fact, they manufactured votes the next several days to get him the win. He is horrible.
The media keep saying Cunningham is “popular” within the district and has a following/brand.
Mace keeps pointing out that he votes with Pelosi 90% of the time.
This disingenuous conman made it in thanks to the endorsements of RHINOS, including the mayor Isle of Palms who has since demonstrated he himself is not the Republican he said he was. Sadly for Cunningham , he didn’t win during an election year. I think he loses this round due to the overboard and party-line voting.
Hope so... Mace is the real deal.
Sadly, our Charleston newspaper, the Post and Courier, has endorsed Joe Cunningham over Nancy Mace.
Who gives a poop about newspapers? ;d
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