All statewide campaigns go about a process of identifying key volunteers in each county to name a “county coordinator”. Especially early in a campaign, such people are the building block of a field effort before the campaign can organize and fund a paid field staff operation. They are usually leaders within the local county party who support the candidate, and are listed as “coordinators” for anyone who wants to volunteer locally.
They are almost never paid. That is, until Lee Fisher starting running for US Senate.
I haven’t been able to find out what Lee paid these “coordinators”, but my understanding is that they were cut a one time check from Lee Fisher’s campaign in exchange for being a “coordinator”. Not a paycheck, mind you. These weren’t jobs, in the sense that the campaign now had staff. Just a check, I guess a kind of “thank you”.
Apparently, once the check was written, that was the last time many of the “coordinators” heard from the Lee Fisher campaign. We’re talking months. How do we know this? Because on at least two occasions, such “coordinators” became so frustrated with never, ever hearing from Lee Fisher’s campaign, that they simply switched sides and are now supporters of Jennifer Brunner’s run for US Senate.
Sure sounds like a campaign ODP should endorse, doesn’t it! Meanwhile, Amy Groya, who in response to the deluge from Brunner supporters, has claimed to not be on the Executive Committee, nor on Lee’s paid staff, despite announcing precisely that to several commenters, ….Amy Groya has now protected her Twitter feed, from which she was whining yesterday about Brunner’s campaign to prevent an ODP endorsement.
Next episode of Lee Fisher UNBLOGGED!….the robocalls!
This is just sublime. Bill Demora, who is the only person on earth who could stomach driving Lee Fisher around for more than 45 seconds, which he did for years, is outed as the guy who is now so enraged by the hundreds of emails from Brunner supporters, he’s getting pissy.
Can anyone imagine this much email going out for Lee Fisher, ever, for any reason? We’re down to Bill Demoura getting Lee’s back, and according to Potts, whiny ODP Exec Comm voter Amy Groya, who is on Lee’s campaign staff [UPDATE: Groya is now claiming she is neither on the ODP Exec Comm, nor Fisher's campaign. Flee!]. Which means Lee’s not down to much at all.
And ODP is about to endorse that level of patheticness. Awesome.
Multiple reports of ODP excutive committee email accounts being shut down by the volume of emails from Jennifer Brunner supporters demanding no endorsement in the Senate primary. Perhaps ODP Executive Committee member Amy Groya’s email account is one of them.
Multiple sources are confirming that within the first hour of Brunner’s email to her supporters, ODP Executive Committee members’ email inboxes are being hammered with not dozens, but hundreds of emails asking them to stay out of the US Senate primary in Ohio. By the time this thing finishes rolling out, I would not be surprised if some email accounts literally get shut down.
Ted Strickland needs to step in right now and bring this endorsement process to a halt.
Ted’s about to lose half of his political party right before a tough re-election battle. That’s the short term. Medium term, if Lee Fisher gets this blatantly stitched up ODP endorsement, and wins this primary, that half of the party will lift precisely zero fingers for this ticket. The long term effects of Lee’s little game will stick around for years. Jennifer Garrison’s saga last year is a direct result of this exact endorsement process in the 2006 AG race – the 2006 ODP endorsement for Marc Dann not only gave us Marc Dann and pineapple pizzas, it resulted in Subodh Chandra spending 3 years telling everyone within ear shot how Garrison declared no one where she came from would vote for someone “who looks like you”. ODP paid for the Rob Burch endorsement in 1994 for more than a decade. These battles do not disappear.
I’m getting conflicting reports about where Chris Redfern and his votes on the executive committee stand in all this, but I am confident that if this endorsement happens for Lee Fisher, Chris Redfern’s days as chairman of ODP are numbered. Whether or not Redfern tried stave off this endorsement and is only being forced to go there now, or kept it in the pocket until this point for some bizarre reason, an endorsement now is just ODP suicide.
And Lee Fisher? Sir, you are a fool. You have conducted your primary campaign as if you had won it already, and now you are telling the world that you really haven’t won it, that ODP’s postage rate has to come to your rescue, and that you are so desperate you feel the need to split ODP deep and long to pull your ass out of the fire. If in fact you were on your way to winning anyway, Lee, that just changed. Because of your actions.
Go to HandsOffOurPrimary.com, sign the petition, and click “next”. You will then be able to email a letter to every single member of the ODP executive committee for whom the Brunner campaign has an email address. Browse the list – you can even decide who you want to get your email, and who you don’t want to get your email. I, of course, emailed all of them. So should you – tell them in no uncertain terms, an ODP endorsement in the US Senate primary, this late in the game, is a very bad idea.
Stay tuned! While the world thought that the Ohio Democratic Primary for US Senate in 2010 would be a nice quiet tip toe through the tulips of democracy, a lot of stories about the Lee Fisher campaign have gone unblogged. Now that Lee Fisher is trying to throw a stink bomb into our tulip patch, by forcing ODP to endorse him, well, that’s over.
Today, I announce the Lee Fisher UNBLOGGED! series. Stories Lee Fisher probably doesn’t want to see blogged, and wouldn’t have seen blogged if he’d just act like an adult, but will now see blogged because he insists on getting ODP to endorse his campaign of epic fail.
First episode tomorrow….the paid “coordinators”! It’s a tale of daring do, thrills and spills around every corner, and of course, the Lee Fisher FAIL TRAIN makes its inevitable appearance.
Lee Fisher proves once again he is all about himself. I’ve got good sourcing telling me that Fisher sent a letter to ODP chair Chris Redfern requesting the ODP endorsement. Twelve days before early voting starts, and about 6 weeks before the primary. If that’s not a sign of a pathetic campaign in big trouble, I don’t know what is.
If ODP knows what’s good for it, the executive committee which meets on March 24 to decide this issue will refuse that request. If not on principle, then there are plenty of reasons to avoid what would be a blood letting for the next 6 weeks. It is way too late in the game for a statewide candidate who hasn’t even gotten the endorsement of his own county party to come begging for help. This party was cruising to a quiet primary allowing the voters to decide who our US Senate candidate would be, united for a tough general election against a Republican Party well on its way toward its own collapse.
Now Lee Fisher wants to have a blood bath. Well, he’s gonna get it. I will refer you to Jennifer Garrison, Lee. We are in the process of getting the lists of every member of the executive committee, and if that committee votes on March 24 to create a screening committee, we’ll get that list too.
Yesterday was a bad day for the Lee Fisher campaign. Their first mailer hilariously hit mailboxes including Jennifer Brunner’s Rosie the Riveter logo. But that wasn’t the big news. I attended and voted in the Cleveland Stonewall Democrats May 4 primary endorsement meeting for Jennifer Brunner last night. At least 60% (the threshold for endorsements) of the rest of the Stonewall Democrats present did too. Which means Jennifer gets a major endorsement in Lee’s home county.
The US Senate race last night was the most hotly debated race on the May 4 ballot, but in the end, there was a real sentiment that Lee Fisher can’t win in the fall against Rob Portman, among the people who know Lee best. In Lee Fisher’s home county, the largest bloc of Democratic primary voters in the state, there is at least one significant constituency willing to put its credibility behind that sentiment, and fight to get Democrats a winning candidate.
Jennifer was there, and Peggy Zone Fisher attended for Lee, which I think made a difference, particularly given something that Peggy noted about Lee’s record. Strangely, Peggy touted a hate crimes bill which Lee claims to have helped pass back in the early 90’s in response to a cross burning incident in Collinwood. Peggy said that back then, LGBT rights weren’t in the bill, but if it were introduced today, LGBT rights would be in it. The confusion in the room was palpable – it was as if Peggy wanted to point out that no one has ever heard Lee Fisher utter a single word about gay rights until he got into this primary.
It’s one thing to show up at gay events your whole career and tell people what they want to hear, quite another to put gay rights on your public agenda, draw a line, and defend that line against all comers. Tellingly, despite Don’t Ask Don’t Tell being debated at the federal level in public hearings in the Senate in which Lee Fisher wants to sit as I write this, not one word on DADT is in Lee Fisher’s first mailer. Should there be? Um….yeah. Or at least his surrogate could have mentioned it while asking for Stonewall’s endorsement last night.
This endorsement was not taken lightly by the voting members present, or the board. The best news for me from this meeting is that the LGBT community in Ohio is really beginning to flex its muscle in the Ohio Democratic Party, and locally in Cuyahoga County, where gay votes really matter on election day. We can thank Jennifer Garrison for that. There is a sense of confidence which I have not seen before, a recognition of the power LGBT unity can bring to bear on major decisions about our party’s ticket and direction, and a weighty understanding of the responsibility that comes with it. Rob Rivera, president of Cleveland Stonewall Democrats, noted that CSD will be putting this influence to work as the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party begins to pick up the pieces and rebuild. Good.
Jennifer Brunner has that endorsement behind her. Now go make us proud, Jennifer, and win this primary. We got your back.
So Lee Fisher has raised all this money. It’s less than 2.5 months to election day. Every poll has him within the margin of error or tied with Brunner.
I bounced between airports and being locked in a hotel room shooting video most of last week, so I watched from afar as Lee Fisher plant TJ Johnson, who no one has ever heard of, made it to the ballot for the US Senate primary. And if you don’t believe TJ Johnson is a Lee Fisher plant, you’re just a damn fool.
I’m hearing that TJ Johnson is quite close with former Lee Fisher campaign manager Marc Gaunce, current Progress Ohio board member. You’ll remember Gaunce from his recent check bouncing. TJ Johnson used to work for Lee Fisher, Gaunce has been on every Lee Fisher campaign anyone can remember, right up until this year’s primary, and no one ever heard of TJ Johnson before filing day. Call me crazy.
Dayton Daily news picked up an AP story which sniffs it, and basically declares it doesn’t pass the smell test. It is no small task to file the required 1,000 signatures to run for US Senate. Lee couldn’t do it himself with volunteers – he has been paying staff to do it, right up to the filing deadline. Johnson could not have done this on her own. Here’s Johnson’s pathetic Youtube announcement, and her equally ridiculous campaign website….you tell me if this looks like a campaign capable of collecting 1,000 signatures statewide without significant help from another interested party.
But here’s the thing. If the Brunner victory dynamic takes hold, which it will, this race isn’t going to be that close – it certainly won’t be close enough for a few dozen votes peeling off to some random female name on the ballot to cost Brunner the race. Women are not voting for Jennifer because she’s a woman – they are voting for Jennifer because she is a hero who is also a woman.
Before you say, “wait, TJ Johnson is black, too!” May I remind you that Brunner is just as much of a hero to the black community, in fact, moreso. Brunner’s appeal is a message driven dynamic. This TJ Johnson joke of a candidacy is a tactical dynamic. Message beats tactic, every time. The two demographic groups who may peel off for a random black woman ain’t gonna peel off of Jennifer Brunner.
I’m quite certain this is not the last we’ll hear about this.
At some point, the dollar signs which Lee incessantly throws in everyone’s face will start to dwindle. Lee came out with a bang, and in the next quarter, his numbers dropped. Next quarter, they’ll drop some more. And then the next. By the end of 2009, Lee will be on a precipitous glide path. The proverbial wad has been shot.
Brunner, however, because of her performance in 2008, has a message that has already taken hold in the national blogosphere. She is a hero for national progressives. They’ve already got her back. My guess is that by December, national progressives online will take a long hard look at what a Fisher loss to Portman in 2010 will mean for Barack Obama in 2012, and Brunner’s online haul will ignite. There is no worse story line for Barack out of Ohio in 2010 than that a BUSH ADMINISTRATION TRADE OFFICIAL won the Ohio Senate seat. Once national progressives take their look, they will start pushing Brunner. Hard.
That December “long hard look” happened, and now, it’s taking hold. The problem with a campaign relying on viral online mojo is that this viral nature is unpredictable. At the risk of patting myself on the back too hard, you can’t predict it any better than I did in July. But it wasn’t that hard to predict – Brunner’s campaign is on the launch pad in February precisely as anyone with a brain would expect it to be, and precisely as it needs to be for Brunner to win.
In the meantime, Lee Fisher has spent about $1 million, and has gone nowhere. This is how Lee Fisher always campaigns – he raises a lot of money, then proceeds to flush it down the toilet. Lee hasn’t even filed yet – a lot of his money is being spent on paid staff to collect those signatures. Where the rest of the money has gone, who knows, but it hasn’t led to any traction on the ground, or movement in the polls. Lee is either treading water or going backward.
So here’s another prediction. If this momentum online continues for Brunner, and there’s no reason to think it won’t, by the end of March, she will be at fundraising parity with Fisher. To continue the momentum, Jennifer needs to keep pushing online, and start taking visible shots at Republicans.
Sarah Palin is teed up for Jennifer – I can imagine Jennifer on MSNBC saying that Palin is putting the cause of women in politics back a generation by embodying every stereotype imaginable by using a cheat sheet written on her hand like she’s a cheerleader needing to be reminded of the word “spirit”, cue the school cheer. It’s laughable, and perfect for Jennifer to punch.
Thank God Jennifer Brunner filed for this US Senate seat.
Which must make Jennifer Brunner’s campaign jump for joy. Here’s Anthony’s take on the firing of Geri Prado.
Furthermore, the move was less about the primary and more about the larger picture, specifically focusing more energy, focus, and resources to a battle with Rob Portman in the fall. There will be skeptics who claim Fisher is worried that Brunner is polling too close and the move of Prado to Howser is out of panic that the race is slipping away. I’m not sure I agree with that interpretation, only because I don’t think Team Fisher is overly concerned about Brunner at this point.
Here’s how I think this Geri Prado thing went down. Lee told Prado he wanted to focus on Portman, we’re losing ground to Portman, not raising enough money, blah blah blah. Prado told Lee, dude, you have a primary on May 5 against Jennifer Brunner. Lee showed Prado the door. Prado happily walked through it, knowing that if Lee is this deluded, he’s a dead man walking anyway.
What planet is Lee Fisher on? There is plenty of polling showing Lee has a race, there may even be polling showing Lee behind Brunner. Jennifer Brunner filed weeks ago, Lee has yet to file. ODP is not going to endorse. The Cuyahoga County Democratic Party didn’t endorse, Lee’s own home county party. Brunner’s field operation is running across the state, and Lee doesn’t even have a field operation. Tomorrow, Jennifer Brunner is going to be welcomed with open arms by one of Cleveland’s legendary African American institutions, in the heart of Lee Fisher’s base. Huge chunks of Lee’s former fundraising base in Northeast Ohio are now Jennifer Brunner’s fundraising base. Brunner is starting to get traction in the national netroots. If this isn’t a primary, I don’t know what is.
Looks like Lee is ignoring Bill Clinton’s sage advice, which Bill repeats like a mantra, regarding what happens when you look past your next election. You lose your next election. Lee’s next election is in 3 months, against Jennifer Brunner. Lee is completely ignoring that.
Thank God Jennifer Brunner filed for this US Senate seat.
That’s the scuttlebutt among the press corps covering the US Senate campaign, regarding the departure of campaign manager Geri Prado from Lee Fisher’s campaign. Awesome.
As everyone in Cuyahoga County politics knows, The Lancer, the legendary African American community hot spot in Cleveland for decades, burned down recently. George Dixon is re-opening The Lancer in a space across the street with a big event tomorrow, and Jennifer Brunner will be a guest of honor. I’ll be attending.
Thursday, February 4, 2010 5:30 to 6:30 p.m.
The Lancer Restaurant 7804 Carnegie Avenue Cleveland, Ohio 44103
This event is filled with symbolism. The Lancer has been at the center of African American politics in Cleveland for decades. Its destruction was mourned throughout the state. That George Dixon is making a herculean effort to re-open this quickly says a lot about the resilience of this city and the black community in Cleveland.
Jennifer Brunner is a hero among African Americans in Cleveland for her work as Secretary of State. No segment of the Democratic Party more appreciates her efforts to clean up Ohio elections, and specifically Cuyahoga County elections, than Cleveland’s black community. Brunner is well on her way to locking up this segment of the Cuyahoga County Democratic primary electorate.
That Lee Fisher will not be at this event, in his home county, at a location which he likely passes almost daily on his way home to Shaker Hts., says a great deal about Lee Fisher’s campaign. The black community in Cleveland has a long memory, especially within the Democratic Party. To this day, you will hear people repeat their shock at watching Bill Mason and Pat O’Malley shout down Stephanie Tubbs Jones at the ODP chair election in December, 2005. That’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Lee Fisher is tied to all of that, not just through his endorsement of Issue 6 last fall, taking sides with Bill Mason against practically every black elected official in Cuyahoga County, but through Lee’s own relationship with ODP, the perception that Lee is an ODP darling, and the reality that Lee Fisher’s career is defined by disengagement with his own home county Democratic Party.
