Sharice Davids has Rep. Kevin Yoder in the corner. The former MMA fighter has brought the hurt, doing enough of a number on the vulnerable Kansas Republican that recent polling gave her a slight lead. But Yoder has a chance to regain his footing with some help.
National Republicans think Davids made a mistake when she backed ending Immigration and Customs Enforcement. A super PAC aligned with Speaker Paul Ryan, the Congressional Leadership Fund, just dropped an ad on behalf of Yoder on exactly this point.
And with that Davids soundbite playing over the air in Kansas, Yoder has an opportunity to paint his opponent as “open borders.” He certainly won’t be the only one making this kind of attack.
Republicans have regularly railed that House Democrats would invite a flood of illegal immigration. The death of Mollie Tibbitts, a 20-year-old Iowa college student, reanimates that fear. The man suspected of her murder has no documentation according to Homeland Security and has no record of being here legally according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
“You heard about today with the illegal alien coming in very sadly from Mexico,” Trump told a supportive crowd in West Virginia while rallying for Senate candidate Patrick Morrisey Tuesday. “And you saw what happened to that incredible beautiful young woman.”
Whether or not the death of an innocent girl should be politicized before her funeral seems like a question settled by an increasingly amoral politics. The point is that clearly the crowd saw what Trump was saying and clearly some Kansans will compare themselves to Iowa.
Republicans are against the ropes as evidenced by the fact that a seat in a deep red state like Kansas is even competitive. They will take whatever open shots they can get.
