Republican Mike Rounds, who is locked in a three-way battle for U.S. Senate, is poised to hit South Dakota television with sharp “contrast” advertisements targeting his two main opponents.
In an interview with the Washington Examiner Thursday evening, Rounds’ campaign manager, Rob Skjonsberg, said the former two-term governor recognized that the race has tightened and would “imminently” go on the air with ads tying independent Larry Pressler and Democrat Rick Weiland to President Obama and administration policies.
That Rounds is going on the air with contrast ads is Campaigning 101 and, normally, might hardly elicit interest. But Rounds made a point in his two victorious gubernatorial campaigns of refusing to run negative ads, and national Republicans worried that he might decline to target his opponents in this year’s contest.
Rounds still claims a lead of 11 to 14 percentage points, according to internal campaign polling. Although Pressler has risen most in recent polls, Skonsberg said the Rounds campaign would focus on Weiland in light of Democratic money that began flooding South Dakota this week.
“We’re going to focus on contrasts, and that’s always been our intention. That’s a completely different thing than personal attacks on character,” Skjonsberg said. “I don’t think you can say that someone supports Obamacare and call it an attack.”
The NRSC, the Senate GOP campaign arm formerly called the National Republican Senatorial Committee, is unlikely to rest easy until the ads are running and can be confirmed as sufficiently effective at arresting Rounds’ drop in the polls. Skjonsberg said the ads would contrast Rounds with Pressler and Weiland and where the three of them stand on Obama’s leadership, the Affordable Care Act, the Keystone XL pipeline, taxes, abortion and the Second Amendment.
That is potentially important because a significant portion of older GOP voters have abandoned Rounds in favor of Pressler, a former three-term Republican senator. These Republicans remember Pressler, who was ousted by retiring Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson in 1996, as a solid Republican. South Dakota GOP insiders say it is crucial that Rounds run ads showing Pressler as having drifted to the left and now supporting Obama, Obamacare and other liberal policies.
Skjonsberg said Rounds’ forthcoming campaign ads would make that case. Skjonsberg said the campaign would simultaneously contrast Rounds’ positions on the issues with those of Weiland. “It’s impossible not to connect the two together,” he said. “They’re aligned from an issue standpoint.”
Rounds has taken heat from some Republicans from running what they describe as a lackluster campaign. Skjonsberg rejected that assertion, explaining that Rounds always assumed he would be outspent, and that his strategy was to hold his fire until the campaign’s final month to make sure he had the resources to compete. Skjonsberg said the campaign always expected Democrats to compete for South Dakota’s open Senate seat.
With more competitive races attracting GOP money, Skjonsberg said Rounds had to navigate a unusual three-way race and be prepared to fund his campaign without much help from national Republicans. He said it didn’t help that most Republicans outside of South Dakota fail to appreciate how competitive the state can be in Senate races.
“We had to be conservative from a fiscal standpoint,” Skjonsberg said. “We had to prepare to be on our own.”
“We’re going to go, and go hard,” he added. “That’s how we’re going to finish.”
However, Democrats had all but written it off until a Survey USA poll hit this week showing Rounds with a narrow 35-percent-to-32-percent lead over Pressler, with Weiland at 28 percent. On Wednesday, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee announced that it would spend $1 million on the race through Election Day, although it’s possible it could pull out if Rounds’ position improves.
Republicans need to flip six Democrat-held seats to win Senate control, and South Dakota had long been considered one of three easy victories, the other two being Montana and West Virginia. The NRSC is monitoring the South Dakota race, and according to Republican sources is prepared to invest resources if it sees the contest slip further away from Rounds. But it was holding off for a few days, at least, to see how Rounds responded.
“This race didn’t catch anyone by surprise,” a Republican operative said.
