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By Zach Montellaro | 07/13/2018 10:00 AM EDT


With Elena Schneider

The following newsletter is an abridged version of Campaign Pro's Morning Score. For an earlier morning read on exponentially more races - and for a more comprehensive aggregation of the day's most important campaign news - sign up for Campaign Pro today. (http://www.politicopro.com/proinfo)

The FEC filing deadline for the second quarter is Sunday. Here are five things Score will look out for as the filings roll in:

- Where do the remaining battleground Senate candidates stand? As of late last night, we still have a handful of incumbents and challengers who have not announced their hauls. In no particular order, we're watching for Sens. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.), Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.) and Bill Nelson (D-Fla.). The numbers are still outstanding for Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn and former Democratic Gov. Phil Bredesen in Tennessee, and GOP challengers Kelli Ward (Arizona), Rep. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) and Leah Vukmir (Wisconsin) have yet to file or announce their second-quarter totals.

- Where's the mayor? Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, that is. Bloomberg has committed to spending $80 million on the midterms, largely to help elect House Democrats. Will we see any personal donations in the filings? Keep an eye on filings from candidates endorsed by Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) for any signs of Bloomberg's involvement.

- How are endangered House Republicans holding up? So far, the House Republicans locked in tight elections that have released their totals have sound numbers - Virginia Rep. Barbara Comstock raised $1 million and Florida Rep. Carlos Curbelo brought in about $785,000, for example. But there are plenty who haven't released anything. Will the numbers for other embattled incumbents be as strong as the ones already announced?

- How much money are self-funders kicking in? Florida Gov. Rick Scott already announced an eye-popping $10.7 million fundraising quarter, but his campaign said that total does not include how much he's contributed from his personal fortune. We also haven't seen numbers from Democrat Gil Cisneros, a lotto winner who's pledged his own money to run in CA-39. And for those in the DMV, keep an eye out for Democrat David Trone, who kicked in at least $10 million of his own money for his MD-06 race in his pre-primary filings and flooded the airwaves with ads.

- What can filings tell us about the future? Potential 2020 presidential candidates such as Sens. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) have been actively fundraising off their opposition to President Donald Trump and could be sitting on big piles of cash they can use for their future reelection - or higher office. Another fun one to watch is Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. After her upset primary victory in NY-14, did small money donors flock to her? And might she kick some of that money to other candidates over the next few months?

Happy Friday! In line with weird stories for Friday the 13th, Speaker Paul Ryan said this week that his car "was eaten by animals." As always, you can email me at zmontellaro@politico.com or DM me at @ZachMontellaro. Elena Schneider (eschneider@politico.com; @ec_schneider) pitched in today.

Email the rest of the great Campaign Pro team at sbland@politico.com, jarkin@politico.com, mseverns@politico.com and dstrauss@politico.com. Follow them on Twitter: @PoliticoScott, @JamesArkin, @MaggieSeverns and @DanielStrauss4.

Days until the 2018 election: 116.

Upcoming election dates - July 17: Alabama primary runoffs. - July 24: Georgia primary runoffs. - Aug. 2: Tennessee primaries. - Aug. 7: Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and Washington primaries.

Upcoming primary filing deadlines - Louisiana: July 20.

MORE EARLY FUNDRAISING - AZ-SEN: GOP Rep. Martha McSally raised about $3.25 million and has more than $4.5 million cash on hand.

- IN-SEN: Republican Mike Braun raised $2.5 million with over $1 million cash on hand, per a release.

- MN-SEN (SPECIAL): Republican Karin Housley raised $1 million, per a release from her campaign.

- MT-SEN: Democratic Sen. Jon Tester raised $3 million and has nearly $6.1 million cash on hand, per his campaign.

- PA-SEN: GOP Rep. Lou Barletta raised nearly $1.3 million, with more than $1.5 million cash on hand.

- WV-SEN: Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin raised $1.5 million and has $6.2 million cash on hand, per a release.

- FL-13: Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist raised $386,000 and has $2.16 million cash on hand, per his campaign.

- FL-25: Democrat Mary Barzee Flores raised about $450,000, per Florida Playbook.

- FL-26: Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell raised $700,000, per Florida Playbook.

- FL-27: Democrat Donna Shalala raised $770,000 last quarter, per Florida Playbook.

- MO-02: Democrat Cort VanOstran raised $300,000 and has $540,000 in cash on hand, per his campaign.

- NC-13: Democrat Kathy Manning raised $725,000 and has $1.3 million cash on hand, per her campaign.

- NJ-05: Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer raised more than $1.5 million and has $4.5 million in the bank, per NorthJersey.com.

- NJ-07: Democrat Tom Malinowski raised $1.3 million and has $1.6 million cash on hand, per his campaign.

- NY-11: Democrat Max Rose raised $700,000 and has $1.2 million cash on hand, per his campaign.

- NY-19: Democrat Antonio Delgado raised $800,000 and has $660,000 cash on hand, per his campaign.

- WA-05: GOP Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers raised $1.1 million for her reelection campaign and has just over $1.7 million cash on hand, per her campaign.

BIG MONEY - The Congressional Leadership Fund, the super PAC aligned with House Republican leadership, announced it raised $51 million this quarter. Some more details via POLITICO Playbook: "That's more than CLF raised all of last cycle. The super PAC has $71 million on hand, and it's raised $93 million this cycle. ... Yes, $30 million of that haul is from Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas casino mogul and prolific Republican donor. But an additional $21 million on top of that is significant and gives Republicans a more-than healthy outside group willing to wage war to keep the majority."

DARK MONEY - A large chunk of the ads this midterm come from groups funded by secret donors. USA Today's Fredreka Schouten: "Secret donors funded more than four out of every 10 television ads that outside groups broadcast this year to influence November's high-stakes congressional elections, according to a USA TODAY analysis of Kantar Media data. ... In all, nearly 386,000 television spots focused on House and Senate races have aired between Jan. 1 and July 8 of this year, ranging from ads by candidates to those funded by outside groups. That total surpasses the 355,464 broadcast TV spots that ran at the same point in the last midterm elections for Congress in 2014 and underscores the
battle already raging for control of Congress."

PARTY (DIS)UNITY - Ocasio-Cortez and her vanquished primary foe Rep. Joe Crowley (D-N.Y.) spent Thursday morning fighting on Twitter. Ocasio-Cortez was miffed at Crowley, writing on Twitter that "he's stood me up for all 3 scheduled concession calls" and is "mounting a 3rd party challenge against me and the Democratic Party" through the Working Families Line (and got a fundraising plug in there for good measure). Crowley responded in a tweet of his own that he's "made my support for you clear and the fact that I'm not running." He went on to say that her team has not followed through on phone calls and that he'd "like to connect but I'm not willing to air grievances on Twitter." He went on
to explain why it would be very difficult for him to drop the WFP line (he also happens to be right, it is a complicated process!). My POLITICO New York colleague Laura Nahmias has a good explainer on New York's bizarre system that's allowed third party lines to thrive. For what it's worth: the WFP has taken Ocasio-Cortez' side, tweeting "There are many ways for @JoeCrowleyNY to remove himself from the November ballot. It's outrageous that he refuses to show @Ocasio2018 the basic respect of doing so."

- Ocasio-Cortez is also taking on other longtime Democratic lawmakers. CBS News' Ed O'Keefe: "Ocasio-Cortez this week decided to send at least three paid campaign staffers to Delaware to help Kerri Evelyn Harris, an Air Force veteran and community activist who is challenging three-term Sen. Thomas R. Carper, D-Delaware, in a Sept. 6 primary."

LIBERALS MOBILIZE - The American Civil Liberties Union announced it is launching its first nationwide "voter education and mobilization program" called ACLU Voter. The organization will roll out its first congressional scorecard on "key civil liberties votes" and will back the new effort with a "seven-figure ad buy."

NEW THIS MORNING - ON THE AIRWAVES - CLF is going after Democrat Antonio Delgado in a new radio ad, attacking him for raps he recorded as "AD the Voice." The radio ad casts the music as "vile, a sonic blast of hateful rhetoric and anti-American views." Delgado, who's running in New York's 19th District, told The New York Post that it's a "willful and selective misreading of my work for political purposes."

- Democrat Tom Niermann, a teacher running to take on GOP Rep. Kevin Yoder in Kansas' 3rd District, released his first TV ad on active shooter drills. "I never imagined I'd have to teach my kids how to react if someone busts through the door with an assault rifle," Niermann says in the ad.

'HOSTILE WORK ENVIRONMENT' - Former aides to Democrat Archie Parnell, who is running in South Carolina's 5th District, said they weren't surprised when a local paper reported in May that he beat his first wife in the 1970s because of the hostile work environment on his campaign. From HuffPost's Daniel Marans: "[S]ix former paid Parnell staffers who spoke to HuffPost anonymously to protect their employment prospects described a candidate still plagued by a hair-trigger temper that occasionally caused them to fear for their physical safety. ... 'I've never seen a candidate who was basically violent and belligerent toward staff and would turn violent and belligerent within seconds and out of
nowhere,' said a former campaign aide with years of political experience. The aide emphasized that the 'violent' conduct was limited to fits of yelling and 'getting in people's face.'"

CREATIVE ACCOUNTING - Montana Republican Matt Rosendale thumbed the FEC right in the eye with some creative accounting. The Daily Beast's Lachlan Markay, in his Paydirt newsletter: "In April, the Rosendale campaign began raising money explicitly for the purpose of retiring [debt owed to Rosendale by his campaign committee from his failed 2014 House bid]. ... Nine donors stepped up in April and May to help retire the campaign's debt to Rosendale ... [and] eight of the nine donors had already maxed out to the Rosendale campaign. ... But then the Rosendale campaign pulled an audacious accounting maneuver. On May 14, it used the money from those nine donors to repay $32,831 of the debt the
campaign committee still owed to Rosendale. The very next day, Rosendale re-lent the exact same sum to the campaign. In effect, donations to Rosendale's 2014 campaign were routed through the candidate's personal bank account and transferred to his 2018 campaign."

ANOTHER DEFECTION - Another top House Democratic candidate said he wouldn't back House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi for speaker. Aftab Pureval, who is running in Ohio's 1st District, told the Cincinnati Enquirer's Jason Williams that he won't back Pelosi, saying "I'm running for Congress because I genuinely believe we need a new generation of leadership. Washington is broken. It's toxic, and it's on both sides."

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "My musical tastes lean more toward Ella Fitzgerald," Rep. John J. Faso (R-N.Y.) while talking about his opponent Democrat Antonio Delgado's rap career to the Albany Times Union.

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