MS-01 VACANT (Wicker) - Toss Up
If it is true that “time heals all wounds,” Republicans would not be panicking over next week’s north Mississippi special election. Yet, two weeks after Greg Davis (R) finished in second behind Travis Childers (D) in the initial round of balloting, private polls suggest that the needle has not moved and that the party’s chances of holding the seat in the runoff are 50/50 at best.
Davis’s near miss on April 22nd put a scare into many Republicans in both MS and DC. But logically, the passage of time since then was supposed to work to the party’s advantage. The “stay” of an extra three weeks effectively doubled the amount of time in which Republicans could close ranks behind Davis after a bitter early April primary. Furthermore, more noise from the NRCC and Freedom’s Watch in the runoff phase was supposed to draw the district’s Republican base out of hibernation.
Today, insiders attribute Davis’s dire position in the runoff to three factors. First, Democrats have flexed their financial muscle in a major way here:
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