There’s a new poll out on the current standing in the Illinois 6th and 8th Congressional districts which I’ve written about before. These are both traditional Republican strongholds which are tightly contested.
In the 6th Congressional District race to succeed retiring Rep. Henry Hyde of Wood Dale, Republican state Sen. Peter Roskam led Democratic Iraq war veteran Tammy Duckworth 46 to 42 percent, a statistical tie with the poll’s 4-percentage-point error margin.
To the north, 8th District Democratic Rep. Melissa Bean of Barrington held a 42 percent to 39 percent lead over Republican investment banker David McSweeney of Barrington Hills, also putting that race within the poll’s error margin.
With the races in both of these districts too close to call turnout is going to be all-important. I’m guessing that the Republican candidate will win in both of these districts but that’s no more than a guess, based solely on what I know of the people who live in the districts.
One seat going Republican, one Democratic would maintain the status quo. The Democratic candidate winning in both of these races would be a notable win for the Democrats.
That poll was taken 10-18/24. Don’t know why it took them so long to publish it but it matches up with other week old polls. That was at the end of the dark period when Tammy was getting buried on TV with no response.
I’m a volunteer for Duckworth and I can tell ya it doesn’t reflect what me and my 4 people teams saw canvassing this weekend. Indies are starting to make up their minds and they’re falling Tammy’s way.
We hit a lot of mid to upper middle class homes during a blessed Bears blowout so people weren’t angry at being dragged away from the TV. Surprisingly enough I ran into a little resistance in one of the poorer neighborhoods. Low info casual voters tend to believe what they see on TV. They probably won’t vote. One woman told me she wasn’t voting for anybody period. As she closed the door I laughed and called her a communist. I got a “whatever”. Despite that we stay mostly positive, telling folks about the 4 major paper endorsements and saying Roskam’s been endorsed by his wife. I point out her website addy on the
flyer and tell them she has 14 issue papers there that spell out her real positions on immigration, taxes, Iraq you name it. I also point out that Roskam has 6 issue posts on his site but not one word about Iraq, Afghanistan, or Al Qaeda. I emphasize Not. One. Word. about the most important problem our nation faces today.
Tammy really needs cash to run her commercials plus phonebankers and canvassers. We had about 100 yesterday but the Repubs flew in about 80 staffers from Washington to lit drop. They are spending money like drunken sailors.
They’ve even been mailing out little packages about 7″ x 3″ x 1″ labelled “America’s start up kit”. Inside are just 3 pieces of attack lit slandering Duckworth. That’s a whole lot cash to spend fooling people into looking at that garbage.
The latest poll is still the Dem poll with us up 44-43. She can do this but she needs our help. We have an advantage in volunteers willing to phonebank and canvass but we need more to overcome their cash advantage. As she says we are her legs now. We’d prefer adults and vets are especially welcome. If Howard Dean in IA taught us anything adults don’t much listen to college kids when it comes to political advice. When I got to HQ yday she was sitting with about 10 vets discussing the VA and healthcare issues.
If you can come out to the Chicago suburbs or kick in a few bucks every little bit helps.
Thanks.
markg8
Knocking on people’s doors and calling them “communist” or other names when they don’t give you the answer you want is juvenile and rude.