Democrats get points for more-focused ads

WASHINGTON — With the battle for the U.S. Senate tilting toward Republicans and President Barack Obama’s approval ratings hovering near his all-time low, Democrats are more reliant than they have ever been on the very kind of big-money groups they have spent years trying to outlaw.

They are countering the Republican Party’s expansive and formidable outside spending network this fall with a smaller but more tightly knit alliance of groups that share donors, closely coordinate their advertising and hit harder than their conservative counterparts.

To hold the Senate, the Democratic outside spending network is working hand in hand with — and is funded by — the party’s traditional ideological allies, including abortion-rights organizations, environmentalists and labor unions. They have overlapping board memberships, use the same voter data and even share advertising content. Most of

their on-air money is being spent through a small cluster of “super-PACs,” which can explicitly advocate the election or defeat of specific candidates.

And they have rapidly narrowed the traditional financial gap with Republican groups, creating concern among Republican strategists.

“The Democrats — their coalition has been around a while, and it’s tried and true, and they all know how to tango together. And the Republicans are all kind of doing their own individual dances,” said John Feehery, a Republican strategist.

Coordination on the right has been hampered by competition for donors and lingering distrust between the party- allied groups — like the Crossroads organizations founded by Karl Rove and those seeking to challenge the party establishment, such as Americans for Prosperity and Freedom Partners, the lead players in the political network overseen by the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch. The two sides have jockeyed for cash and influence, while also grappling with a wave of ideologically tinged primary battles this spring and summer that sucked up time, money and good will.

To keep donors secret, most of the pro- Republican money is coursing not through super- PACs but through political nonprofits. Those groups do not have to disclose much about their finances but are more restricted than super-PACs in the types of advertising they can air. (In part to address the problem, the Koch network has pumped more cash into its sole super-PAC, Freedom Partners Action Fund.)

While Republicans have spent more overall on advertising during the midterm campaign, their cash has been spread among a larger array of groups. Many of them are newer organizations established or expanded by the Koch network this cycle. Others sprang up to cater to donors angry at the poor performance of Crossroads and other consultant-run groups in 2012.

“I think the problem for the Republicans is that all their big-money supporters are doing their own thing, and not really giving as much money to the party committees,” Feehery said. “There’s really very little coordination.”

The result has been stark: a message of discipline and unity on the left, and a profusion of messages and ideas on the right that in some races borders on cacophony. In Michigan, for example, 79 percent of issue mentions in ads by Democratic-leaning outside groups have focused on environmental and energy issues, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Wesleyan Media Project. Ads from Republican outside groups have mentioned a far wider variety of issues — the economy, foreign policy, energy, health care, abortion and more.

Similarly, in Colorado during the last 10 days of September, Democratic-sponsored ads attacked Rep. Cory Gardner, the Republican nominee for the Senate, on just two fronts: his votes on Medicare and his positions on birth control. In a third set of ads, NextGen Climate Action has sought to link the birth control attacks to Gardner’s environmental stance: “He’d like to make your most private choices for you, and some of your not-so-private ones, too,” a woman’s voice intones, “like the environment you live in.”

In some races, different Democratic groups have simply run the same ad — a rare but perfectly legal practice because outside groups can coordinate with one another.

In June, Emily’s List, which supports Democratic female candidates who advocate abortion rights, announced a $ 3 million campaign to support Sen. Kay Hagan, who is running for re-election in North Carolina. The campaign’s second ad, an equal-pay-themed spot titled “Groceries,” was developed to appeal to female voters and began running in August in Asheville, Charlotte and Greensboro. During the same period, the lead Democratic outside spender, Senate Majority PAC, spent $500,000 to run the same ad in the Raleigh market.

To keep donors secret, most of the pro-Republican money is coursing not through super-PACs but through political nonprofits. Those groups do not have to disclose much about their finances but are more restricted than super-PACs in the

types of advertising they can air.

“The advantage on the Democratic side is with a more top-down approach,” said Ken Goldstein, a professor of politics at the University of San Francisco who specializes in political advertising. “Not only does it mean you don’t waste resources in terms of targeting, but your message can be consistent.”

Some Republicans argue that their messaging is more diverse because their opponents are playing defense on a wider range of issues. And to some extent, the fragmentation on the right is a natural condition for parties when they are out of power.

“It’s always going to be easier to coordinate when you’ve got the White House, and you’ve got this command and control structure where there’s final authority,” said Will Feltus, the senior vice president for research and planning at National Media Inc., a Republican media-buying company.

The coordination of Democratic groups extends even to their office space. Susan McCue, a founder of Senate Majority PAC, shares a flat-screen-television-lined Washington office suite with American Bridge, the opposition-research hub that provides Democratic groups with the raw material of their campaign attacks. She also sits on the board of American Bridge.

Senate Majority’s campaigns director, Ty Matsdorf, hangs his hat at the Messina Group, the consulting firm founded by Jim Messina, the former campaign manager for Obama. Messina also oversees Organizing for Action, Obama’s issue advocacy organization, and Priorities USA Action, a super-PAC that has turned its energies to support a Hillary Rodham Clinton presidential bid in 2016. In the meantime, Priorities has kicked in $500,000 to help Senate Majority PAC keep Democrats in the Senate — and agreed to hold off major fundraising until the midterm election is over.

More than half of all the outside advertising supporting Democratic Senate candidates this cycle has poured through Senate Majority PAC or a set of affiliated super-PACs and nonprofit groups, according to the Campaign Media Analysis Group at Kantar Media. Much of the rest has come from environmental organizations, like NextGen Climate Action, and women’s-rights groups that donate money to Senate Majority PAC, closely coordinate their advertising with it or do both.

“When Senate Majority PAC started in 2011, it just seemed like the best and most efficient way to run everything was through one organization,” Matsdorf said. “A lot of the success we’re seeing this cycle, in fundraising and from our political donors, is because they realize their money was effectively used by us.”

Officials from Democratic super-PACs have attended meetings of the Democracy Alliance, a clearinghouse for liberal donors who fund an array of research, advocacy and political organizations. Contributions to the super PACs count toward the quota each alliance member must donate each year.

By contrast, the twice-yearly donor conferences run by the Kochs’ Freedom Partners network are typically limited to groups within the network, like Americans for Prosperity, Generation Opportunity and Concerned Veterans for America. Crossroads runs its own gatherings for donors — and competes aggressively with the Koch network for money.

Virtually all of the liberal outside spending groups sit in on weekly conference calls and “tables” that coordinate spending in each state. The system allows Democratic allies to not only coordinate advertising but link it with intensive get- out- the-vote efforts organized by unions and other interest groups. (Dennis Rivera, a senior official of the Service Employees International Union, one of the country’s most politically active unions, also sits on the board of Senate Majority.)

The more collaborative Democratic approach, several party strategists said, has helped shrink the traditional advantage that conservative outside groups have enjoyed in advertising spending. Democratic and liberal outside groups have spent $77 million on political advertising during the 2014 cycle, according to one Democratic media buyer. Republican outside groups focused on the general election have spent about $113 million, a figure that includes some money spent by establishment organizations to beat back conservative primary challengers. In some weeks this fall, total advertising by Democratic candidates and groups has exceeded Republican advertising.

Of course, the tightly run Democratic network hardly guarantees Democrats a victory in November. While the Republican outside network is more fragmented, it also had enough money to begin attacking Democrats as early as late last year, keeping Senate Democrats on the defensive, and forcing many Democratic candidates to dig into their own pockets earlier than expected. Feltus described the Republican approach as a free market of messaging and organization, in which the best and most effective groups would ultimately win.

“In the marketplace of political ideas, the Republicans should have the advantage because we have more players who can try different things,” Feltus said.