Campaign. They actually murdered a couple and their granddaughter. You had a Police Detective standing outside pointing to this, insinuating that this was somehow the fault of dan indicating that infamous Willie Horton ad. There was an immediate outcry from the victims family, saying that they didnt want this out there. Sullivan released a response that named the alleged murderers names. They pulled down the response. Seen as awe had pretty well oiled campaign therefore mark begich, this was a significant misstep that they have continued to have to explain. Why was this an issue . When you went back to the facts of this, this was a clerical error that was done even before sullivan took office. Them rating this as a pants on fire ad. Host meaning ally. Meaning ally. Meaning a lie. Guest yes. This was very much out there in the news. The victims attorney took it out there before begich took it down much later. Attempting to correct the ad. They pointed out in that letter that to be clear it was your ad that was the one they were unhappy with. They had put the community on edge, and away. Into the race that we had not seen before. Jessica taylor, her work is available online. Here is how sullivan responded to it. [video clip] millions of dollars are flooding into alaska pet alaska, paid for by special interests. Pretty soon you will want to do this to your television. Ive proposed a plan to stop the mudslinging from outsiders to keep the selection focus on the issues. Unfortunately, mark begich said no. I am dan sullivan and i approved this message. He should tell his friends to stay out of alaska. It points out the fact that in these closely watched races where just a few thousand votes can make the difference, one misstep or another could determine the direction of the campaign. Guest republicans are trying to demonize mark begich as being too close to the president. But if you can choose a different opponent, if you dont like outside spending or intervention, there is another opponent that you can create and maybe try to create some momentum. From one of our viewers on the twitter page i think that kentucky is going to be one of the most contentious. Earlier we mentioned that there is no love lost between Mitch Mcconnell and Allison Lonergan grimes. There have been accusations back and forth. The campaign bus purchased by her father with controversy over the Mitch Mcconnell campaign manager. The ron paul campaign, he had to step down amidst questions. Every race, we get closer and closer. What we have seen from the pushback is that this is going to be a closely fought battle. It will be highly negative, not just in kentucky, but in louisiana and North Carolina. Stake. S how much is at Congress Returns this week. They will have as few as seven legislative days before another break to campaign for the midterm elections. The president will be sitting down with congressional leaders on tuesday. What is it going to get done . Nothing major. It will be the Bare Necessities to keep it going. Another Government Shutdown will be unlikely. A enough republicans learned lessons from the last one. But that is something to watch. The more times that they can get voters to the focus on republican obstructionism, i think that is better for democrats. They want to get in, do what is necessary, get out and get back on the campaign trail. We are dividing the phone lines between political parties. You can also make comments online. Connie, north bergen, new jersey. Good morning. Good morning. Thank you for taking my call. I have a few comments. And discuss it. I believe that the issue will out. About the borders, they come to the borders for the recount. They come to the borders to pick them up. The spanish people should get together. The one thing that i blame or is the humans. They come to this country like before. And then we have senators against it. I saw the father on television myself. I will say that he should go back to canada. Where are you from . I am from spain, european, i have nothing to do with this. Guest one thing that she pointed out that i think you will have a lot of voters feeling is this frustration with negative advertisement. Seeing as much. Cory booker in new jersey, should win pretty easily. The cell of an advertisement from earlier, lots of people may want to shoot their televisions by the time the election season is over. As nathan said there is no way to get away from these executive ads that get more and more prevalent. Another thing that she mentioned is that mcconnell, she was afraid he was going to work against the president if he does become majority leader. It is true, has laid out some of the things hed could do in the Republican House and senate, pushing a path to legislation that the republicans will not be happy with. This week we had an interview with paul ryan and one of the things was that if we win both houses of congress, get ready to veto. We are only going to see more gridlock if republicans take full control. That will set up an interactive dynamic for 2016 the democrats. Hillary clinton likely running on dysfunction. I dont know that the president doesnt want this, pointing to dysfunction in congress as he continues to do, i think it will be even more dysfunctional if we have more gridlock in congress. Host iowa is one of those states that is a tossup. Speaking of, Hillary Clinton will be there today. I want to share with our viewers and with you one of the latest ads from the Koch Brothers organization. It is on the congressmans attendance record. [video clip] missed 79 of the Veterans Affairs committee meetings. Veterans risked their lives for our country. He didnt have the respect to show up and support them. Joan harris is a true iowan who keeps her smalltown roots. To care for troops. That is what you would expect. Freedom partners action fund is responsible for the content of this advertising. Example ofer negative advertisements and outside funding . Guest i think that this is a specific issue that we will see from now until election day. There are republicans believe that this is an effective way to tie him to service and why he should not have a promotion. The next caller comes from pennsylvania. Frank, independent line. Do you explain to me how someone would spend 50 million, 100 million to get a job that only pays 178,000 per year . Guest they are not actually spending their own money. Some will come you are right. We have seen the numbers grow astronomically. A lot of times the investment has not worked out. Sometimes the return on the is return on the investment is not what you hope it would be. Clearly they see their influence rising. It certainly brings up the stock for some of this. The prestige. A genuine call to service. A lot of these people are independently wealthy. They are not resting on that 170 8,000 per year, certainly. We are entering an age where you cannot just have anyone run. Donors that are willing to back your campaign. To some people it takes out that citizen politician element. Host charles, good morning. Caller morning good morning. I am the veteran of two wars and a proud democrat. I cant understand why at this time we would ask anyone to vote for the Republican Party. I can only remember the big depression climbing out of this one. Been horrifying. We are just now coming out of it. We will be back in the same place that we were in 2007, 2008, 2009. I hope you can convey this message to the people and let them think about that. Host thank you. Is the message that democrats across the country are trying to make. Why go back to having more publicans and power and this is what happened . The president has been in office for six years now and enough people are dissatisfied, the president s job Approval Rating is in the low 40 nationally, but in the states and districts that are the most competitive, he is in the high 30s. There is an uneasiness, and unwillingness by some voters to keep blaming republicans and democrats are having to answer for more than they did. A lot of attention on New Hampshire, where two former senators are on the ballot. As to whether scott brown will win the nomination . Guest that would be a major shocker if he was not the nominee. There were some comments about it being a big surprise. I am not exactly sure what he has in store, but that is a race that we have had to read on Jeanne Shaheen being favored for, but there is evidence that this has closed some and it may be becoming more competitive than it was a few months ago. Host what is the track record senators, one current and one former, running against each other . I mean, it has happened in the past, but someone who has moved from massachusetts to New Hampshire and tries to run as a favorite son . Host guest this is not scott brown moving to hampshire , a lot of people do go back and forth between the states. Of as made some kind little gaffes along the way. Maybe a couple of times he has messed up and almost said massachusetts or something. That will continue to of course be a line of attack against him. As nathan said, there is an indication that this is certainly becoming a more and i thinkrisk that one thing that is is the numbers of Jeanne Shaheen have not moved much. The president has seen his Approval Ratings drop. If he is a drag on places like New Hampshire, iowa, states that he carried twice, imagine how bad that will be for democrats in places like louisiana, arkansas. Alaska. Responding to the earlier point about the job and how much it pays stanley, myrtle beach, california. Hello. My name is stanley and i am from orlando, florida. I have worked for the citrus for 12 years. The people that hire the mexicans to pick citrus in florida. I think all of you people are theseception having about mexicans. These mexicans are making 700, 800 or we. Years ago they got paid on what they picked. Now i have seen them in the mountains of tennessee, doing the tobacco where white people used to work, my family used to work there. Take people have come and over these things because we have too many lazy americans, too many people on welfare that will not work. We need to change that. Host hank you for thank you for the call. Immigration is a complicated issue tied to the economy and other peoples welfare. I hot issue now, it might be a hotter issue when the president untilhis initial decision there is a balance between Border Security and Immigration Reform in general. Roger, good morning. Were talking about negative ads earlier. Who do they work on . They are a turnoff for me. Negative on they are not better than their opponent. What do your guests think about the turnout in the houses of the senate . Is he going to go in the majority . One question is who they turn towards. Parties are gearing this a lot towards their base. Traditionally when you see more of the base voters turn out. Ads are targeted towards giving those people more. You will see democrats the same way. They need their base to turn out in places. Arkansas is especially a place where the president didnt have an infrastructure and democrats could rely on that osa model that the president had used. You saw the Democratic Senatorial CampaignCommittee Going in there to essentially create something that had not been there before. The emphasis is really on democrats to turn out their voters in places they really need, but in both of these places they need to sort of anger these voters to get to the polls. Turning they do risk off these independent voters in the middle who if they dont turn out the advantage still goes slightly more towards republicans. Phone lines are open the we are joined here at table by Jessica Taylor and nathan gonzales. Have people walk through negative ads, Media Consultant do not just wake up in the morning and think about the worst ad they can make today. Polling that goes on where they ask voters in each district what issues they care issues, if they had certain information, changes their mind. The reason you see so many negative ads is because negative ads crafted in the right way work, influencing the persons opinion on how they will vote. Most people are inclined to say they dont like negative ads, but then they see one and say i didnt know that. It starts to influence their vote. Host lets turn our attention to the house. With 435 members of congress, you point out there are 174 listed as safe. 200 10 republican seats. Of the seats in play, 25 republican seats, 25 democratic seats. Only seven complete tossup races. Including arizona. The seat formerly held by gaby giffords. Her former aide, ron barber, facing a republican charger. This was an extremely close race in 2012. Sally, one of the first woman to fly in combat. With somed advantages, like higher name identification. Often a challenge to a candidate is getting known. Negativestarted with because of being attacked. This is also a border district. If the president were to decide coulding here, that influence the race as well. It will be clay the close. Another one, West Virginias three in what is becoming a pretty red state. , congressman rahal representing one of the most republican districts. Evan jenkins, the republicans really feel like they have always tried to go after rahal, but never had a good candidate against him. There was heavy republican spending earlier in the spring. The congressmans numbers started to crater. Now it is kind of bouncing around a little bit. Democrats have been emboldened by this race. They feel like they pushed back on specific elements of the Affordable Care act and they feel emboldened by it. Can use thatey blueprint in districts across the country. Tossup, whypublican is he in trouble . It is a competitive district. The former democratic nominee and speaker of the house, a tremendous fundraiser, i think it will be a great race. What surprised me was that coming into the race, mike cotton, the congressman, his numbers are surprisingly strong. As romanoff starts to spend more money and make his case, we will see it tighten a little bit. Very competitive Gubernatorial Election there. In the sixth district it is one of the battleground districts of a battleground state. This morning in the new york times, the sunday review, this piece, why democrats cant win. One of the points is pennsylvania, the state has been solidly democrat, but the democrats cannot win a majority. N the house districts they took a district in pennsylvania guest they did a district where they try to defeat him for years, they said they were just going to pack democrats into this district. What it did isidore democrats from the neighboring districts and made that more republican, made a few of these members safer. That is an example of republicans using redistricting in order to hold the majority they already had. That is why 2010 was a difficult. Eelection for democrats they lost control of the redistricting process in key states. Myrtle beach, south carolina, good morning. Caller you had an advertisement in iowa there about a race, 79 of the meetings for Veterans Affairs. Is that true . If its true, why is it negative . Whats your point . Host whats your point . Caller the press, rather than finding out whether it is a true ad, says it is a negative ad. Negative, if you are informing the public, it depends on what those people are doing. Guest republicans would not see this as a negative ad, what campaigns call this is a contrast ad. Youre giving more information that may be negative but contrasting it with the other persons record. Anie is a veteran, shes running on her service. She had to leave the campaign trail for part of her reserve duty. So if you have a member of congress who has missed this many votes, then brailley certainly is coming under a lot of scrutiny for meetings that he has missed there. Contrasted with a female combat veteran. Thats exactly the kind of contrast that they were wanting to make and one that is certainly contributing to why this race is so close host another contrast can be made by this. In response to the Koch Brothers here are the coke sisters. Im karen around im joyce and we are the coke sisters. Were not biological sisters but sisters in spirit. And were not related to the Koch Brothers those rightwing billionaires. Were just two average women who raised families. We dont have billions to spend on political campaigns but we do have our convictions and voices. We think thats important. If you agree then join us with an all be a nation of coke sisters. Host we have been focused on outside money including the Koch Brothers but does this resonate with the general public . Guest i dont think that it does but this ad is certainly designed for the Democratic Base. The Koch Brothers are democrats boogie torry reids men. This brings in money if you know especially as we get close to the end of a month you are inundated with pleas for money, the coke brotters are going to take over this race and this is something that certainly people who may not know as much about these races, oh my goodness all this money and the coke brothers want to do this around democrats have painted them as the evil sort of funding machines and things too so theyre trying to contrast this with these average everyday women who have worked really hard and their names happen to be koch. One thing that confused me theyre not actually sisters. Its confuse bug this is more so designed to try to continue to get money to sort of grow their email list and again going back to turnout. Democrats need these people that are sort of frustrated and angry about this money and the millions that the coke brothers are spending through many different venues. If youre just tuning in or listening on cspan radio, our focus, the mid term elections less than 60 days before voters go to the polls and early voting in many pa