A prominent Republican super PAC is pulling around $8 million of advertising spending out of Arizona’s Senate race to redistribute it to other high-priority contests, a sign that Republicans are bearish on their prospects of winning the seat in November.
The Senate Leadership Fund, which is closely associated with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), said it would halve its commitment to Republican nominee Blake Masters’s bid against incumbent Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly.
Republicans need to net one seat to gain a majority in the Senate in the midterm elections, yet several GOP candidates in key battleground states are trailing Democrats, even as political headwinds should favor the party.
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“We’re leaving the door wide open in Arizona, but we want to move additional resources to other offensive opportunities that have become increasingly competitive, as well as an unexpected expense in Ohio,” SLF President Steven Law told Politico. “We think the fundamentals of this election strongly favor Republicans, we see multiple paths to winning the majority, and we are going to invest heavily and strategically to achieve that goal.”
The super PAC initially invested about $14.4 million into the Arizona Senate race, with its status as a swing state giving rise to GOP hopes that the party could flip the seat. The advertising campaign to boost Masters, who is trailing in the polls, was supposed to begin after Labor Day but will now be postponed until October.
With the move, McConnell may be signaling to Republican megadonor Peter Thiel, who spent millions backing Masters in the primary, that he’ll have to up his support to get the GOP candidate across the finish line.
The committee also pulled about $1.7 million, which translates to about two weeks of advertising, from Alaska in support of Sen. Lisa Murkowski. This move signals confidence in that race, where Murkowski is favored for reelection.
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A spokesman for the SLF argued that the reallocation is not a sign of financial trouble, telling Politico it is “ahead of where we were for the month of August at this point in 2020.”
