Posted on 08/28/2014 10:15:28 AM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
The Republican National Committee is on track to spend more than $100 million in the midterm campaign, with virtually every dime plowed into the party’s new digital voter-turnout program.
If the program is effective, Republican campaigns will have access to a modern get-out-the-vote operation that has been the hallmark of the Democrats’ success in recent election cycles.
But if it fails to deliver as advertised, Republican candidates will be stuck with another subpar voter turnout program and without the resources the GOP traditionally sent to their campaigns in midterm years.
The RNC is set this week to announce the deployment of yet additional re-enforcements to states with targeted Senate races. Republicans need to flip six Democratic-held seats to win control of the chamber. The effort will include money for personnel, direct mail and phone banks, and will focus on absentee voting and the early vote. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, expressed confidence that the RNC would come through.
“We’ve been good partners and I feel as though we’ll have resources to execute our plan,” Portman, the vice chairman at the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told the Washington Examiner on Wednesday. “It’s an aggressive plan and it’s a broader playing field than we anticipated a year ago.”
In previous two-year election cycles, the RNC would amass a deep cash war chest. Then, about 100 days before Election Day, the committee would begin spending the money on television ads, a hastily deployed national voter turnout program and, in midterm years, large cash transfers to the NRSC and it House counterpart, the National Republican Congressional Committee.
For example, in the 2006 midterm campaign, the RNC transferred $18 million to the NRCC.
This cycle, the RNC has raised more than $130 million, a healthy figure, while maintaining a modest $10 million to $15 million in cash on hand. The RNC reported holding $13.9 million as of July 31. Party officials enthusiastically concede the high cash “burn rate,” explaining that the money the committee raised was spent to build a permanent digital and field campaign, almost from scratch.
“It’s a very unusual burn rate that [RNC Chairman Reince Priebus] has chosen to take us on because it’s the right path for us to optimally engage voters right now,” said Chuck DeFeo, who holds the titles of RNC deputy chief of staff and chief technology officer.
DeFeo expects the ongoing investment to pay dividends for Republicans this fall. He dismissed suggestions by Democratic digital strategists, and even some on the GOP side, that the RNC’s program is not advanced enough to have an effect in November.
DeFeo said several mirco-targeting data products — or smartphone apps — developed by an RNC digital staff of about 50 that are based jointly in Washington, D.C., and a Silicon Valley annex, have been in the field for months. He said these apps in use in some form by nearly every major Republican campaign in the country.
In an interview with the Washington Examiner, DeFeo discussed the capabilities of RNC’s digital voter turnout program.
• Data: The RNC has for two decades maintained a voter file. But it’s enhanced file includes voting and consumer data on every registered voter in America. The committee has integrated email and social media contacts with its file and is constantly updating the data it keeps on the nation’s 190 million registered voters.
• Insight: Every voter in the file has a multi-level score that allows GOP campaigns to build highly granular predictive turnout models. The fancy term for this “data analytics.” DeFeo said the voter file will be constantly updated between now and Election Day, enabling GOP campaigns to adjust their turnout models and messaging on a daily basis, according to real-time feedback from the field.
• Access: The RNC’s data is available in multiple platforms and applications, which DeFeo said allows campaigns to customize what kind of data they access and how they access it. He took a shot at NGP VAN, the leading Democratic data firm, saying the announcement they made last week about customized apps is something the RNC has offered for months.
• Voter Contact: The RNC has developed multiple “walk apps” for campaign operatives and volunteers. These apps can be purchased through the iTunes store and loaded onto a smartphone. They report data to the main hub in real time. DeFeo stressed that the RNC began putting boots on the ground for the 2014 elections a year ago or more. In his view, the RNC GOTV effort for 2014 has been in the field longer than any of the Democratic campaigns and therefore is more likely to deliver the votes the GOP needs to win key races.
“I’m never satisfied with where we’re at,” DeFeo said. “I have confidence in the products we’ve put out.”
I’m an optimist. I think the Michigan GOP has a great online GOTV effort despite some flawed candidates. They aren’t letting the democrats set the narrative and are taking the fight to the democrats exactly as the democrats would like to fight republicans.
Its very youth driven which normally worries me but they are listening and seem to be holding together a fairly wide demographic bloc.
The RNC may have taken me off their mailing list after receiving many ass-chewings in their prepaid envelopes.
The RNC may have taken me off their mailing list after receiving many ass-chewings in their prepaid envelopes.
If the RNC really wants to make some headway they need to explain to democrats in detail why the DNC is not the party that is “for the people.”
The RNC is almost at the point of drunk dialing me at 2 AM and asking why I ever left ‘cuz we were soooooo good together.
Yup, sounds like Orca to me.
Hopefully they’ll stress test this one a little bit before election day. This kind of system is critical to GOTV in this day and age. Had ORCA worked properly (as well as Obama’s NARWHAL did) Romney would be President today.
What’s Karl’s Cut?
What this means is that you will get more phone calls from the RNC than you do from Rachel from Credit Card services.
Both working a con.
They - the RNC, most Republicans in office - talk the talk.
They *never* fight the fight. They *always* say “this isn’t the right time”.
For cowards, it’s never the right time to fight. And when someone wanders off on their own and DOES fight the RNC and most Republicans mock that person and spend their time saying how it won’t change anything.
The RNC and most republicans are the worst of the worst. At least the Dems tell you who they are and stand behind it. The driving platform for Democrats seems to be “grow the state”
The driving platform for Republicans seems to be “get elected”
Doom & gloom? All spending originates in the House. They could stop the nonsense right now. $17T deficit, immigration, Social Security liquidity, Medicare, politicised IRS, EPA mandates, ACA & healthcare public rape,University tuition and student loans, etc., etc.. Tell me what the GOP has done for you lately.
The GOP could have had the Senate in 08 if they cared to support Sharoh Angle & Christine O’Donnell. Didn’t support Joe Miller in AK either. Dream on for a conservitive revival once they control the Senate along with the House.
Locally, we dumped Cantor. Think the Big Tent GOP cared for that one?
In Angle's defense, it is super tough to beat an incumbent Senator who happens to be majority leader. And to be fair, Delaware is a very blue state, too, but that state was winnable with a candidate the voters deemed qualified. If the voters in Delaware judged her unqualified (which they did), blame her. It is her responsibility to communicate and develop a rapport with the voters - good candidates do exactly that.
The money and support that the RNC provides helps around the margins - it does not help make up huge vote deficits. It is alot of money to spend to help around the edges, but in close races they make a difference.
Are you proposing another government shutdown? Because that worked great the last time/s
Sing it Travis!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLG2jaVdUMo
Call someone who'll listen and might give a damn
Maybe one of your sorted affairs
But don't you come 'round here handin' me none of your lines
Here's a quarter, call someone who cares
This proves how absolutely retarded the GOPe truly is.
The Tea Party (in all it’s forms) brought out more new voters in 2010 than the RNC will get for $100 million.
And how much of that money goes to piss off Tea Party folks?
Two names to the NRCC.
Mitt Romney.
Jeb Bush.
If *either* of those names are mentioned, you might as well get money exclusively from your Chamber of Commerce buddies, because conservatives will not give you a thin dime to support either of them.
Those two candidates are anathema. (n. “detested persons”)
Dumb asses; all they would have to do is make it clear and believable that they are not going to do amnesty now or ever and they could save themselves about 90% of that pot.
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