Sep 25, 2024 - Politics & Policy
Schumer's October gift for embattled Senate Democrats
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For the second cycle in a row, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has ensured his incumbents will have plenty of time to campaign for their re-election.
Why it matters: Running as incumbent has plenty of advantages. Being stuck in Washington in the days before the election isn't one of them.
- Schumer knows that to bring his vulnerable members back next year, he needs to get them home pronto.
- With Wednesday's Senate vote on government funding, incumbents can head to the airport — and smell those jet fumes — on their way home.
- That gives embattled senators like Jon Tester (D-Mont.) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) nearly six weeks to hit the campaign trail.
Zoom out: In 2020, then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) kept senators in town until late October to vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett.
That gave his incumbents just eight days between the last Senate vote and Election Day, according to an Axios review.
- Four of his members went down to defeat.
- In 2000, then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) only gave his members six days to campaign. He lost five incumbents that year. Democrats lost one.
Zoom in: In 2022, senators had a long runway to campaign back home, a full 40 days.
- Every incumbent that was on the ballot won re-election.
- For Schumer, that meant the four incumbents he was most worried about all won.
- But so did four of McConnell's most endangered incumbents.
