Minnesota politicos get involved in the Massachusetts Senate race.
The U.S. Senate race in Massachusetts is getting very interesting. The polls are tightening, a Democratic staffer roughed up a reporter and one of the candidates posed nude for Cosmopolitan during law school.
Both political arms of the Senate are ramping up staff, money and support for their respective candidates, Democrat Martha Coakley and Republican Scott Brown.
The stakes are huge for both sides. Republicans see an opportunity to win the seat, reduce the Democratic majority in the Senate to 59 and stop the health care reform bill.
Gov. Pawlenty is using his Freedom First PAC to direct contributions to Brown:
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We have our best chance yet to stop the spending binge in Washington with Massachusetts Senate candidate Scott Brown. Brown is running neck-and-neck in a special election for the late Senator Ted Kennedy's seat and is Republicans' best shot at a 41st vote in the Senate to reject policies that firmly plant government as the arbiter of our lives.
But Democrats, like Sen. Al Franken, are working to make sure that doesn't happen.
Franken sent an e-mail to his supporters yesterday asking them to contribute to Coakley (the contribution runs through the Democratic leaning site Act Blue). He invoked the name of the late Ted Kennedy in the e-mail:
I served only briefly with Ted Kennedy, but like many of you I was inspired by his fight for health care for all Americans. I'm writing today because Ted's legacy is at risk. Polls show the special election for his Senate seat tightening, and voters head to the polls in less than a week.
If we lose Ted's Senate seat in Tuesday's special election, it's very likely that Republicans will have the votes to kill health care reform and undo all the tough, good work that's been done to fix our broken system. We simply can't let that happen.