tristan.p.a.reynolds [8:48 PM] (Tristan Reynolds, Editor-in-Chief)
It’s about 8:45 eastern, and both KET and the New York Times have called the 6th for Andy Barr. While we’re probably going to have to wait for results from out west to get a sense of the overall congressional results, what do you think it says that a major pickup opportunity for Democrats tried to tack to the center and came up short?

William Easley [8:55 PM] (Rambler Contributor)
Considering that this district is typically R+6 I would not consider that to be the case just yet. With President Trump campaigning in Richmond and Donald Trump Jr. visiting Montgomery County, we can see that this was a seat that garnered a lot of attention. With how the midwestern states went for Trump in 2016 but by a narrow margin, I would again expect those states to be the deciding factor.

Rebecca Blankenship [9:19 PM] (News Editor)
I don’t know, I think this race was winnable. Barr has only represented this district since 2012, when he unseated Ben Chandler, who held the seat since Ernie Fletcher was elected governor in 2003. The supposed trend right is relatively new.

I think it’s extremely notable that McGrath lost Madison County, which contains both Richmond (including EKU) and Berea. That’s one of the counties I predicted she would win, and historically has trended left. I think her loss there probably shows that the message Trump has offered of radical change has resulted in serious realignment in lots of rural areas, and that Democrats won’t win those regions back until they offer an equally powerful new vision. Milquetoast moderation isn’t going to win the hearts or minds of people living in poverty, as much of Madison County is.

Let’s see what happens with Conor Lamb in Pennsylvania. I’m not ready to say that Democrats have to tack left to win, but trying to appease both sides across a vast cultural divide is not a vision. It’s a strategy. Centrism can work if projected with strength and seriousness, not with folksy earnestness.

Ben Chandler was a Democrat, let’s note.

Reinforcing that point is the fall of Joe Donnelly in Indiana.

William Easley [9:38 PM]
Also of note tonight is that Amendment 4 to the Florida State Constitution has passed, which restores voting rights to felons who have not been convicted of first degree murder or sex crimes. According to NBC, this makes 1.5 million people eligible to vote, which could have a large impact on future races in the state.

Rebecca Blankenship [9:46 PM]
Which is SO interesting. Will be good to see what happens in future restoration efforts.

tristan.p.a.reynolds [9:47 PM]
It’s especially interesting, given how close the races for the Governor’s mansion and Senate seat look currently.

To complicate the losing centrists narrative, Manchin has won handily in WV. This is the second time he’s managed to buck national trends for Democratic Senators in red states. Partially, this has been a result of his low-caliber and easily-demonized opponents (for example, Patrick Morrissey, who ran against him this time, was literally a lobbyist for opioid manufacturers). Still, it’s notable that it seems to be Manchin’s electoral skill that’s the standout story of the night for red state Dems.

William Easley [9:59 PM]
Something that makes Manchin stand out is that he got his start in state level politics. Because of this, he is going to have the name recognition that it takes to get voters to break from a straight party ticket and vote for him. This could be the recipe that Democrats would need to win in Kentucky, although with the State House apparently shifting more to the favor of the Republicans, Manchin may just be the exception that proves the rule.

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:00 PM]
#ReggieThomaswould’vewon?

Rebecca Blankenship [10:01 PM]
I’m reading that Donnelly decided last week that he wouldn’t rule out ending birthright citizenship. Wondering if this cut seriously into his liberal support. Often it seems that “centrist” Semocrats aren’t running as centrists at all, but as FAR right.

@tristan.p.a.reynolds let’s solicit a hot take to that effect. Maybe from… Bristan Breynolds?

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:03 PM]

I’m out of the take game. Too hot for me

Also: Kansas Gubernatorial candidate Kris Kobach goes down, after spending several years attempting to suppress huge numbers of votes both in his home state of Kansas and nationwide. That, along with Amendment 4, means that tonight is shaping up to be a good night for small-d democratic legitimacy—although the GA governor’s race still has the real potential to be essentially stolen by GOP candidate and Secretary of State Brian Kemp.

Rebecca Blankenship [10:06 PM]
Maybe people just hate bullshit. Maybe that’s the takeaway. Fighter planes in advertisements, chainsaws to stumps, conspiracy theories to airwaves.
Weird that the President seems still to defy that particular gravity.

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:07 PM]
Well, the very unpopular President is pretty associates with the idea of bullshit, right?

Rebecca Blankenship [10:07 PM]
I don’t know that he’s “very” unpopular

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:07 PM]
At least he’s underwater. 4 years is a longer time in political terms than academic, I suppose. Right, Will?

William Easley [10:15 PM]
I feel like that is a fair statement. As of right now the Democrats have gained 9 seats in the House and NYT gives them over a 95% chance of taking control of the House. It seems that from the Congressional perspective, tonight may shape up about as it was expected as far as seats go.
Just now ABC has called the Texas Senate race for incumbent Ted Cruz

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:18 PM]
That was always an outside shot, though. I’m not sure how much we read into that. (Although it probably means no Beto 2020, I guess)
But it’s looking like Democrats are performing on the lower end of their expected outcomes in the Senate, right?

William Easley [10:25 PM]
At this point the Democrats have lost one seat in the Senate. The Democrats had many more seats to defend today so I wouldn’t find this surprising. I would consider a Beto 2020 run more likely now as one of his campaign points was how Cruz neglected his Senate seat in running for president in 2016

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:27 PM]
Maybe it was all reverse psychology to boost his national profile—ha!

Rebecca Blankenship [10:30 PM]
Heitkamp’s defeat is projected in North Dakota. I’d say Democrats are underperforming their best case scenario, but Will’s right, this is well within what could reasonably have been expected. I think this morning 538’s model projected a probable R+2 Senate swing.

William Easley [10:38 PM]
Exactly. Odds of a swing happening in both chambers was extremely low. I would argue that this is the result of smart spending on the part of the Democrats by focusing on the House and the Republicans focusing on some key Senate seats to widen the gap while they had a good opportunity to do so

tristan.p.a.reynolds [10:42 PM]
That means that the next couple Senate cycles will have tough maps for Republicans, though, right?

William Easley [10:48 PM]
I believe so. It is possible for only one of these to have a majority Republicans though. This would make 2020 very interesting because it would benefit the Republicans to have to defend a large amount of seats in a midterm as they tend to do better when there is lower voter turnout

tristan.p.a.reynolds [11:13 PM]
I think that’s a good note to end on. The New York Times is forecasting that the Democrats will take control of the House, and Republicans will add a seat or two to their majority in the Senate. It’s also worth noting that Elijah Cummings, who would be the chairman of the House Oversight committee of Dems gain a majority, has already told CNN he’ll be requesting President Trump’s tax returns. So it looks like we’re in for an eventful few years in Washington.

The 2018 midterm election is today. Naturally, The Rambler’s staff has some thoughts about the state of the election in general, and Kentucky and Lexington politics in particular. So we hopped on Slack to chat about it.

This is the first part of our discussion. We’ll reconvene later tonight, when we have official results for most of the races we’re focusing on. 

tristan.p.a.reynolds (Tristan Reynolds, Editor-in-Chief)
Okay folks, the polls have been open for a couple hours now, so let’s talk about our expectations for the results of the day. We’ve got Will Easley here, who’s been focusing on our city races here in Lexington; he’s going to be our expert who’ll explain the major issues facing the city, and what the city council and mayoral elections really mean for Lexington and Transy. We’ve also got our news Editor, Rebecca Blankenship, who’ll be talking with us about some of the most hotly contested races in the country, and what some of those results will mean for the Kentucky political environment. She’s also been working on a major documentary about the Poor People’s Campaign, and she’ll be bringing those policy and movement politics insights to her coverage today and tonight. Meantime, I’ll be focused on the national political environment, and on interpreting what a few key races mean for the health of American democracy and our political system.
Will, can you give us an outline of the state of Lexington politics headed into this election?

William Easley (Rambler Contributor)
Lexington is in an interesting place politically at the moment as current Mayor Jim Gray is not seeking reelection. Gray ran in the Democratic primary for the KY 6th District House seat where he lost to Amy McGrath While the mayoral election is nonpartisan, controversy has found its way into the race as former Police Chief Ronnie Bastin sent a mailer out to Lexington residents stating that another leading candidate in the race, Linda Gorton was a registered Republican. This attack seems to be an almost last ditch effort by Bastin to make this race competitive as Gorton won the May primary with 42% of the vote compared to Bastin’s 26%. Gorton is a retired nurse who previously served as vice mayor of Lexington under Jim Gray. Both candidates see similar issues being present within the city such as crime, infrastructure, and the city budget. Gorton seems to have a more holistic approach to solving these issues while it appears Bastin believes that he can strongly attack these issues out of the gate. On the issue of crime, Gorton believes that by addressing the opiate addiction issue, the City of Lexington can lower the murder rate. Bastin’s crime focus is centered more around more community policing as well as increasing school safety. The backlash from Bastin’s attempt to make this race partisan might be the nail in the coffin for his hopes of winning

Rebecca Blankenship (Rambler News Editor)
I wonder how much people really resent partisanship right now. Folks seem to talk about it negatively, but actually behave more tribally than ever. What seems odd is that Bastin’s most natural constituency is probably Republican – he’s the law & order candidate, and since the two are generally the same policy-wise, folks will probably vote to some extent on culture-war lines. So he may have risked alienating conservatives. Without a coherent coalition, I think Gorton, who’s better-funded and better-known, will defeat him.

McGrath, of course, is running as John McCain. She’ll definitely win Fayette and Madison Counties, which are both higher in population and (generally) historically bluer than the rest of the Sixth District. But Barr will destroy her in the East Kentucky counties of Bath, Fleming, Menifee, and Powell, among others. McGrath won the Democratic nomination this year largely from support outside Lexington, though—Jim Gray won Fayette County handily—so maybe she’ll have enough rural swing voter and urban liberal support to win.

Barr is not charismatic and brings neither federal funding nor national attention to our district, so if he wins in a high turnout environment, it’ll be interpreted as mainly a result of massive outside spending in tandem with the President’s “base” strategy, with which Barr is overtly aligned.

tristan.p.a.reynolds
That’s an n retesting point that Rebecca makes about outside spending. Isn’t it true that a lot of McGrath’s advantage headed into voting today is based on donations from outside the 6th district? And more broadly, Will, what can you tell us about spending on city races?

William Easley
While Gorton was able to raise more than Bastin in the month of September, Bastin has raised more total money and had more money remaining to spend going into the final month leading up to the race. Most of the money that has come into the race in the past moth has come from varying real estate interests, likely in an effort to influence opinions on how to deal with housing within the city. A majority of the spending on the council at large race has also come from real estate interests as it seems that the main focus on that race has become wether the boundaries for development should be expanded in an effort to increase the amount of affordable housing

Rebecca Blankenship
McGrath raised 60% more than Barr did for their actual campaigns – a 3 million dollar difference. Barr benefited from about 3.5 million in outside spending, while McGrath had about 1.5 million. So it wouldn’t be technically correct to say that McGrath had more in outside spending, though it’s possible that either candidate is receiving lots of donations to their campaign funds from outside the district.
(Herald-Leader is the source on those numbers.)

tristan.p.a.reynolds
And FEC reporting rules are pretty lax, so it’s hard to track spending by outside groups, right?

Rebecca Blankenship
Yeah, these numbers are from the five groups we know for sure have been backing the two, including the Congressional Leadership Fund (Republican House PAC) and the House Majority PAC (Democratic House PAC). But there probably is more dark money that we don’t know about, given how close this race is.

tristan.p.a.reynolds
And that opacity is a direct result of decisions like Citizens United and McConnell v. FEC, yes?

Rebecca Blankenship
Those decisions allowed political spending by a legal class of groups up to then usually used by charity groups that had some “education” outreach. Groups like Americans for Prosperity are able to claim to “educate” citizens about candidates and issues with their advertisements.
(AFP is backed by the Koch brothers.)

Rebecca Blankenship
To be clear, this about “education” applies only to 501(c)4 groups, or “dark money” groups that aren’t required to disclose their donors. The SCOTUS decisions you referenced also enabled the creation of “Super PACs,” which can accept unlimited corporate contributions but _are_ required to disclose their donors.

tristan.p.a.reynolds
Yeah, that’s an important distinction to keep in mind when looking at some of these races—and that’s true nationally as well.
So creating those kinds of dark money groups, and giving them space to operate without a lot of transparency, has been a major goal of Sen. McConnell since at least he took McConnell v. FEC to the Supreme Court in 2003. If McGrath wins today, and we think some of that victory margin is due to spending by outside groups, will the strategy have backfired in the 6th district?

Rebecca Blankenship
Very possible. Two of the groups backing McGrath are dedicated to electing veterans. Obviously she thinks her service plays well is the district, since it’s a centerpiece of her campaign. Your thoughts, Will & Tristan?

William Easley
Her running on her military service is what helps to make this race very competitive. Her military service is what makes her a strong candidate in counties which tend to lean red. It also helps to make her more memorable in comparison to Barr, who has not done much to get his name out there

tristan.p.a.reynolds
It certainly makes for a compelling biography, which is what attracted a lot of national interest. I’m not sure whether it’ll help in the general, but it probably gave her what she needed in terms of campaign staff talent and fundraising advantage to make it out of the primary.

To broaden the scope a bit: whether or not McGrath wins her race, Democrats are expected to pick up enough seats to retake control of the house. What do you think the policy priorities should be for a Democratic House, assuming the forecasts have it right?

William Easley
For better or worse I believe the House will focus on reopening the investigation into Russian involvement in the 2016 election. I believe that may be the most effective prospect as well because of how partisan the White House and Congress have become. It seems unlikely that President Trump would sign any piece of legislation that were to originate from a Democrat controlled House

tristan.p.a.reynolds
That’s a fair point. So is this election just one that will establish a holding pattern until 2020? Do you think the country will accept another two years that have been like the last two?

William Easley
I believe that will depend on on how the energy of the public does after this election. If the public remains motivated there may be some legislation passed but it will likely be inconsequential. There was very little legislation passed in the final 6 years of the Obama Presidency and there seemed to be very little outcry because of that so I don’t know that this cycle will be much different in that regard

tristan.p.a.reynolds
That sounds like a good note to end this part of our chat on. Make sure to check back around 9 PM tonight for our thoughts on the initial election results.

Two years of Sturm und Drang will conclude (or grow wilder! Who knows!) today with an election—one we seemingly began talking about the day the headlines first read “President Trump.” You’ve heard the hot takes, but have you read The Rambler’s local coverage?

Congress: Andy Barr (R) defends against Amy McGrath (D)

McGrath, a retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel and former fighter pilot, is running as a centrist to try to unseat incumbent Congressman Andy Barr in the right-leaning 6th District. Barr has claimed bipartisan credentials in his mailers, but has voted with President Trump’s position 96.8% of the time. This race has gotten lots of national attention—and donations.

• The last poll of the race, by The Upshot-Siena, shows McGrath and Barr in a statistical tie.
• McGrath visited Transy last month for an open forum hosted by Hey Kentucky.
• She also gave an interview to our Editor-in-Chief, Tristan Reynolds, to discuss some issues especially germane to college students.

Lexington Mayor: Nonpartisan, but vitriolic

Former Vice Mayor Linda Gorton and former Chief of Police Ronnie Bastin attacked each other professionally and personally in a debate on Transy’s campus, despite offering largely similar visions for the city. Rambler staff contributed five questions, three of which WKYT’s Bill Bryant altered and asked.

District 1 Council Seat: A progressive challenges a progressive incumbent

Will Easley interviewed incumbent Councilman James Brown and his challenger, Anita Rowe Franklin, who offered similar platforms but different backgrounds and levels of experience.

At-Large Candidates: People everyone can vote for

Will Easley and Aissata Sackho respectively interviewed the at-large candidates Richard Moloney and Adrian Wallace. Voters registered in Lexington will vote for any three of six at-large City Council candidates. The top three vote-getters will join the City Council.

Voter guides: Read the candidates in their own words, then find your precinct

• News Editor Rebecca Blankenship wrote this story on Kentuckians for the Commonwealth’s annual voter guide, where candidates respond to survey questions in their own, unedited words.
• Allison Spivey wrote this primer for first-time and confused voters who need help figuring out how to vote.

Tonight, Rambler Editor-in-Chief Tristan Reynolds will host News Editor Rebecca Blankenship and reporter Will Easley for a set Slack chats on election expectations & results.

Tomorrow, we’ll start our coverage of the 2020 election. (Just kidding. But click here to subscribe to our newsletter for more great coverage.)

Over the past month, The Rambler has published a set of stories and profiles on several candidates for the Lexington City Council. As you get ready to vote tomorrow, be sure to read our coverage to make an informed decision!

District 1

Read Will Easley’s story on Councilman James Brown, who is seeking re-election to the District 1 City Council seat, which includes the Transylvania University campus.

Read Will Easley’s story on Anita Rowe Franklin, who is running a campaign for the District 1 City Council seat focused on public safety.

At-Large Council Seats

Read Aissata Sackho’s story on Adrian Wallace, who is running on a platform of increased college access and youth services.

Read Will Easley’s story on Richard Moloney, who is running for an at-large seat after previously holding the City Council seat for District 11. He is running on a platform of affordable housing and increased development.

Adrian Wallace, a first-time candidate running for an at-large seat on City Council, says that after serving in the Iraq War from 2006 to 2008, he is “ready to serve his country again.”

Wallace attended Kentucky State University starting in 2004, majoring in Pre-Law, but left to serve in the war. He later studied at Asbury University from 2012-2014, pursuing a bachelor’s in Leadership and Ministry.

Wallace is a community development professional and minister, and says that his local roots and community connections make him a great candidate for the seat. Emphasizing his ministry at Broadway Christian Church, Wallace says he knows, from interacting with people, what issues to tackle. He says that these include lowering the poverty rate, ending policies that only benefit the wealthy, and facilitating youth development.

Wallace said that he wants to make the first two years of higher education free for students, because college is not for everybody. He said that that would mean students could take time to see what they want to do without having a lot of debt, in case they decide that college is not for them anymore.

Wallace is the first millennial to run for an at-large city council seat, and if elected, would be the first black person to serve in that office.

The 2018 election will be held on November 6. All voters registered in the city of Lexington will be eligible to select candidates in the race for at-large seats. The top three vote-getters will serve on City Council.

Richard Moloney is one of six candidates for three Council-at-large seats in Tuesday’s election. All Lexington residents vote on candidates for the at-large seats, while the other twelve City Council seats are filled by representatives from each district.

Moloney said his experience sets him apart from the other candidates for the seat. He has previously served as the representative of District 11.

He also worked in the state government on the issue of affordable housing, which he believes is a very important issue for Lexington. “We need to work with federal and state programs to help get low interest-rate mortgages for baby boomers who are trying to downsize and for millennials who are looking for a home,” he said.

“Mixed income housing allows us to keep the culture of communities intact,” he added.

Moloney attributes the city’s budget woes, another of his top issues, to “the state government using pension surpluses to fund projects and not fully funding the pension of civil service jobs.”

“In order to deal with the budget cuts, we need to work to bring in new businesses in order to have more tax revenue,” Moloney said.

The influx of business that Moloney hopes to create would not just benefit the city government, he says. “It would provide skilled trade jobs to areas in the community that face high rates of unemployment.” Moloney believes that by bringing in these jobs, “young people will see opportunities to earn a good living that don’t require going into debt for school.”

“We have so much unused land near the interstates,” Moloney said of where these new companies could locate. “We are not taking advantage of our interstate connections.” He also believes that the low cost of land in these areas can be used to attract businesses to the area.

A major problem that Moloney foresees with the budget stagnation is the funding of police and fire departments. “Every new police officer that is hired requires us to set aside more money for their pension, so not only must we pay their salary, we have to fund their pension. This creates problems because we don’t have the funds to create new police precincts to serve newer suburbs that are becoming larger.”

Moloney says that to create future economic growth, the city and the state need to focus on hemp. “Kentucky has the best conditions for growing hemp. Lexington can serve as a major processing location for hemp that is grown in surrounding counties. We need to process the crops that are grown here locally in order to keep the profits in the state of Kentucky.”

The 2018 election will be held on November 6. Polls will be open from 6:00 AM to 6:00 PM.

Disclosure: Richard Moloney is the cousin of Transylvania’s VP for Marketing and Communications, Megan Moloney. 

Amy McGrath and Andy Barr are in a statistical tie in their race for the Kentucky 6^th Congressional District House seat, a new poll from The Upshot-Siena finds. The poll, which was conducted over the past several days, is likely to be the last snapshot we get of the state of the race before voting begins tomorrow morning.

The poll has McGrath and Barr tied at 44% of the vote each. But with 10% of the electorate undecided and with a 4.9% margin of error, those percentages are almost certainly not going to be reflected in the final vote tally.

This poll carries a large degree of uncertainty. The pollsters spoke to only 438 people, so they had to make a large number of statistical adjustments to more closely reflect the expected demographic composition of the voters on Election Day. These adjustments, called “weighting,” mean that the actual electorate could look quite different than the sample polled. This is especially true for the 6^th District, which is composed of 19 counties, since most of the calls made were to the Lexington area.

The large number of self-reported undecided voters is another possible source of ‘error’ in the poll. If most of those undecided voters break in the same direction, the result of the election could look very lopsided compared to the results of this poll.

When looking at a poll like this one, it’s best to put it into a wider context. For example, Nate Silver’s fivethirtyeight.com has rated the 6^th District race as one that Leans Republican. But most other expert agencies, like the Cook Political Report and the Center for Politics, rate the race as a tossup, which puts this Upshot-Siena poll well in line with the conventional wisdom.

In both of the past two Presidential elections, the 6^th District has voted for the Republican candidate by double digits, and Barr won his seat by 22% of the vote when he ran for a third term in 2016. However, there are more registered Democratic voters than Republican voters, so the demographic data likewise points to a mix of conflicting factors that could all prove influential tomorrow.

Polls will be open from 6:00 AM until 6:00 PM on November 6.

Election Day is just around the corner, and it’s important that everyone knows what to do. Although this round of voting will not determine the President, this race is still very important and everyone able should cast their votes. If you are voting for the first time, or even if you have already voted before, it can be a bit confusing.

First things first, read a voter guide or go to this aggregator to access candidates’ websites and positions on a variety of issues. It may seem complicated to decide whom to vote for, but a little reading makes it simple.

After that, you should figure out where your polling place is. Everyone in Kentucky has a set polling place – find yours here.

CivicLex has partnered with LexTran and Spin Bikes to make sure that everyone is able to get to their voting stations. LexTran will be free, and Spin Bikes will cost only two dollars if you use the code “SPINTOTHEPOLLS.”

In Kentucky, if a voter shows up to their polling place without a state-approved ID they will have to sign an oath that they meet all of the qualifications to vote. However, poll workers prefer that everyone brings their identification. A photo is not required – a Social Security card or credit card are considered valid forms of ID.

After that, the process is simple. Just vote for whoever you think will do the best at the job they are running for. Then wait a while, and sit on the edge of your seat to see if your vote helped your candidate win.

No matter what, your vote counts! So get to the polls on November 6th, then wear your “I voted” sticker proudly.

Polls will be open from 6:00 AM to 6:00 PM.