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By Zach Montellaro | 07/06/2018 10:00 AM EDT


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.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP WAS BACK doing his favorite activity Thursday night: rallying in front of his supporters. He made the trek to Great Falls, Mont., where he promoted the Republican Senate nominee, state auditor Matt Rosendale, and bashed Democratic incumbent Jon Tester. And while the rally hit all the marks you'd expect a Trump rally to hit - attacking the media ("fake news, bad people!") and Hillary Clinton (inspiring a "lock her up" chant), mocking criticism of his foreign policy and jabbing at potential 2020 candidates - there are four important takeaways for the race in Montana:

- The main line of attack on Tester will be that he doesn't represent the values of Montana and doesn't adequately support the president. "So Jon Tester says one thing when he's in Montana - I will tell you, I'm testament to it - he does the exact opposite when he goes to Washington," Trump said during the rally. "A vote for Jon Tester is a vote for Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and the new leader of the Democrat[ic] Party, Maxine Waters!" He also complained that Tester says "such nice things about me" but never votes to support him, citing issues like the Affordable Care Act, estate tax, abortion rights, immigration and Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch's confirmation. "We need Matt
Rosendale in the Senate to continue our fight," the president said. "This November, I need you to get your friends, get your colleagues, get your neighbors and get your ass out to vote!"

- For Trump, the Montana Senate race is somewhat personal. He's publicly fumed at Tester after the senator helped sink the nomination of Ronny Jackson, the former White House doctor, to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs. Trump said he felt "guilty" about bringing Jackson into the world of politics, and blamed Tester for things that "were horrible and were untrue." Trump admitted in an aside that Tester's role was "probably why I'm here" rallying Thursday. "I won Montana by so many points I don't have to come here," he said.

- The broad GOP midterm messaging will revolve around security, if the president has his way. "If you want to protect your family, and your community then you have no choice," he said. "You have to vote for Matt. You have to vote for Republicans." And while Trump also touted how strong the economy was, the crowd (and Trump himself) seemed most animated when talking about protecting ICE and the administration's immigration policy, inspiring another "build the wall" chant.

- Expect to see more of Donald Trump Jr. on the campaign trail, both in Montana and across the map. The president's eldest child served as the warm up act for his father, saying that as a hunter and an outdoorsman he has fallen in love with the state. "I get asked to do a lot of the political events, but when they ask, 'Will you go out to Montana,' how do you say no?" he said at the beginning of the rally. Read my colleagues James Arkin and Maggie Severns' story on Don Jr.'s expanded political role from a couple of weeks ago.

For his part, Tester largely conceded the spotlight. He greeted Trump Thursday morning with a full page ad in several Montana newspapers "thanking him for signing 16 bills the Democrat sponsored or co-sponsored," per The Associated Press. His camp also pointed out that the president praised two pieces of legislation spearheaded by Tester: the VA Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act, which he called "landmark" legislation, and the VA MISSION Act. Here's how the Great Falls Tribune covered the rally.

Happy Friday! As always, you can email me at zmontellaro@politico.com or DM me at @ZachMontellaro.

You can email the rest of the great Campaign Pro team at sbland@politico.com, jarkin@politico.com, mseverns@politico.com, eschneider@politico.com and dstrauss@politico.com. Follow us on Twitter: @PoliticoScott, @JamesArkin, @MaggieSeverns, @ec_schneider and @DanielStrauss4.

Days until the 2018 election: 123.

Upcoming election dates - July 17: Alabama primary runoffs. - July 24: Georgia primary runoffs.

Upcoming primary filing deadlines - Delaware: July 10. - Louisiana: July 20.

SCOTUS ON THE BALLOT - Josh Hawley, Missouri attorney general and the GOP's Senate nominee, is preparing to attack Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) over the Supreme Court. From POLITICO's Burgess Everett in Marshfield, Mo.: "'She's been wrong on every single court nominee since she has been running for the Senate or in the Senate. So I'm not surprised in the least,' Josh Hawley, Missouri's attorney general, said in an interview, sitting in a pick-up truck with the AC blasting after marching in a July 4 parade. 'It is,' he added, 'the defining issue of this campaign.'

"If the pre-nomination clash between McCaskill and Hawley is any sign, the Supreme Court confirmation battle over Trump's high court nominee will reverberate in Missouri more than any other Senate battleground this year. Unlike a trio of other red-state Democrats on the ballot ... McCaskill opposed Neil Gorsuch last year."

FUNDRAISING FORCE - Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has already become a bonafide fundraiser for other progressives. An interesting nugget from POLITICO New York's Laura Nahmias' piece on Ocasio-Cortez crashing the Democratic primaries: "In Kansas, where Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders endorsed Brent Welder in a crowded Democratic primary, the campaign saw an 'unprecedented level of interest...from national and local press,' Welder's campaign manager Shawn Borich told POLITICO. In addition to gaining more volunteers, the Welder campaign raised $50,000 online from 2000 donations in the week since Ocasio-Cortez tweeted her support - nearly double what it raised the week before in Welder's bid to
take on GOP Rep. Kevin Yoder."

** Presented by AARP: There's only one true deciding factor in this year's elections: 50-plus voters. They won't be ignored and their votes are up for grabs. Medicare, Social Security, support for family caregivers, and prescription drug costs are all on the line-so you can be sure they'll be voting in record numbers.
aarp.org/vote **

NOT WORRIED! - A lot of Democratic incumbents who are facing an insurgent challenger got a second look. Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.), who's facing attorney Tahirah Amatul-Wadud in September for Massachusetts' 1st District, insists that he's not worried. From the Springfield Republican's Shannon Young: "Neal told The Republican this week that he believes it's hard to glean a prediction of the Massachusetts primary's outcome from the New York results given the differences between the two districts. 'When you look at what happened in that congressional district there were a lot of moving parts,' Neal said following a Monday event in Wilbraham. 'Every congressional district in America is
different, and I think that needs to be acknowledged.'"

- And to further pump the brakes, Democrats are saying that the moderate wing has (largely) been winning out over progressives. From NPR's Kelsey Snell and Scott Detrow: "In interviews with more than a dozen Democrats running in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Texas, California, Nebraska and Washington State, as well as party strategists, campaign managers and elected Democrats, NPR found that pragmatism is winning out over progressivism in the key races that will decide control of Congress."

ANYONE HOME? - The FEC has now gone five years without a "duly appointed" general counsel. The Center for Public Integrity's Dave Levinthal and Suhauna Hussain dig in on why the job remains unfilled and how it's been hurting the agency: "[Thursday] marks five years since the FEC employed a bona fide, duly appointed general counsel to oversee its attorneys and orchestrate the agency's legal efforts -- a void that is a 'reflection of the dysfunction at the FEC,' says the last man to hold the job, Tony Herman, now senior counsel at Washington, D.C.-based law firm Covington & Burling. ...

"It's a situation, several former leading FEC lawyers contend, that continues to keep the ideologically divided and oft-gridlocked agency from fully executing is mission. Notably, it 'hurts the morale of the staff and the credibility of the agency,' said Larry Noble, a former FEC general counsel from 1987 to 2000."

FIRST IN SCORE - 2020 WATCH - Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) will jointly host a rally in Eau Claire, Wis., on July 14.

ALL ABOUT THE MONEY - POLITICO California's Carla Marinucci and Jeremy White: "California Republicans are banking on a ballot measure this fall that the embattled state party believes can stave off a Democratic wave in November - and perhaps even spark a GOP revival in the run-up to 2020. Carl DeMaio, a former San Diego city council member, announced this week he's raised more than $1.1 million online for his campaign to repeal the 12-cent-a-gallon gas tax backed by Gov. Jerry Brown - and polls suggest it may be heading for a November victory. ...

"The repeal effort - known as Proposition 6 on the November ballot - has also attracted backing from state and national Republican leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. They are counting on it to energize enough voters to save a handful of endangered California GOP House members - which could prevent the House from flipping [to Democrats]."

MORE EARLY FUNDRAISING NUMBERS - CA-39: Democrat Gil Cisneros announced he raised $479,000 and has $715,000 on hand.

IL-06: Democrat Sean Casten announced that he raised just under $790,000 earlier this week.

- OH-01: Democrat Aftab Pureval raised $885,000 and has more than $1 million cash on hand, via the Cincinnati Enquirer.

ON THE AIRWAVES - Ads from Demand Justice, a Democratic group working against President Donald Trump's eventual Supreme Court nominee, are out, via CNN's Dan Merica. The ads say a vote for Trump's pick is a vote against abortion rights. POLITICO's Burgess Everett reported earlier this week that the group planned to spend $5 million.

- In Ohio's 12th District, Democrat Danny O'Connor released a new television ad about a Trump voter who backs him in the special election. "I voted for John Kasich the last 3 times, I voted for Trump because I didn't like the way things were going in Washington, and now I'm supporting Danny O'Connor," says voter Shannon Ward in the ad. "John Kasich and Danny O'Connor both don't worry about the labels of Democrat or Republican, they're going to get things done either way."

- Democrats have now outspent Republicans on Obamacare for the first time. HuffPost's Amanda Terkel: "Affordable Care Act supporters have spent $13,950,400 on pro-Obamacare ads this cycle (through June 30), just more than the $13,441,570 spent on anti-Obamacare ads. It's the first time total spending on pro-Obamacare ads has surpassed anti-Obamacare ads in an election cycle."

LABOR PROBLEMS - A right-to-work group is threatening states that are still collecting union dues from non-union public employees in the wake of Janus v. AFSCME. The Cleveland Plain Dealer's Jeremy Pelzer: "A 'right-to-work' advocacy group has threatened to launch a class-action suit against Ohio and 19 other states if they don't immediately stop deducting union dues from non-union public employees' paychecks following a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling. ... In a July 2 letter to Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation Vice President Raymond LaJeunesse stated that unless there's an 'immediate cessation' of union-due collections from state workers who
aren't [union members], the group will file a civil-rights lawsuit on behalf of any non-union workers who request the group's help." Ohio's largest public employee union said it will make sure non-members aren't paying dues.

CODA - "Do you know what Rapini means in Italian? Broccoli rabe. When you Google my name, you get recipes for broccoli rabe." -- Connecticut GOP Senate candidate Dominic Rapini to the Connecticut Post.

** Presented by AARP: Americans 50 and over are the nation's most powerful voting bloc. In fact, more than 60 million of them voted in 2016-and this year, they're more motivated than ever to making sure that their voices are heard in Washington.
They're frustrated with broken government. And they're fed up with politicians who'd rather get into fights than get results. The issues they care about most including Medicare, Social Security, support for family caregivers and prescription drug costs, are all on the line. America's 50-plus voters have put the candidates on notice. Anyone who ignores them will feel it on Election Day. aarp.org/vote **

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