Reality bites Johnson and Jeffries PACs
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House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (left) and House Speaker Mike Johnson during a ceremony at the Capitol on Sept. 24. Photo: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Super PACs tied to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) are paring back their plans to spend in some of their long-shot targets as Election Day draws near.
Why it matters: Both leaders would love to pad their potential majorities and avoid the nightmares of a narrow vote margin — but they appear to be coming to grips with the unrealistic prospect of a landslide in either direction.
- That is in line with what election observers and analysts see as a shrinking House battleground in which only a few dozen districts have plausible odds of changing hands.
Driving the news: Congressional Leadership Fund, a PAC closely linked to Johnson, is pulling its $600,000 in ad reservations in Connecticut's 5th District, according to ad tracking firm AdImpact.
- Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-Conn.) has been something of a white whale for Republicans, and her GOP challenger, state Rep. George Logan, has often been held up as one of the party's star recruits.
- But the district voted for President Biden by 11 percentage points in 2020 and is rated as "lean Democrat" by Cook Political Report.
The other side: Democrats' House Majority PAC, meanwhile, is pulling about $1 million in ad reservations in Wisconsin's 1st District, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported.
- This is former House Speaker Paul Ryan's old district, now held by Rep. Bryan Steil (R-Wis.). It only really came on Democrats' radar after it voted for former President Trump by just 2 percentage points in 2020.
- Steil is the chair of the House Administration Committee and is a relatively strong candidate. The district is rated "likely Republican" by Cook.
The bottom line: Neither PAC is abandoning all of their reach targets — in fact, they are shifting resources to other, newly promising parts of the map.
- CLF has begun spending in Virginia's 7th District, where they see the replacement of retiring Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) with Eugene Vindman as an opportunity to take another of their white whales.
- And HMP is finally coming to the aid of Democrat Sue Altman in New Jersey's 7th District, where she is trying to take down freshman Rep. Tom Kean Jr.
- Still, this represents something of a tightening of the map: Virginia's 7th is rated a toss-up by Cook, while New Jersey's 7th is rated "lean Republican."
