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By Daniel Strauss | 04/30/2018 10:00 AM EDT


With Elena Schneider and Scott Bland

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 NEXT SPECIAL - "GOP civil war in Ohio threatens another special election loss," by Campaign Pro's Elena Schneider: "Republicans' latest special election headache is unfolding in central Ohio, where a chaotic primary has divided the party and stoked fears of losing another seat in Donald Trump territory to Democrats. The race pits the two wings of the House Republican Conference against each other. ... On one side is the scrappy co-founder of the House Freedom Caucus, Rep. Jim Jordan, who is lining up behind Melanie Leneghan, a self-described Trump Republican. Jordan is going up against former Rep. Pat Tiberi, a close ally of GOP leadership who resigned from his seat in January and has
spent hundreds of thousands of dollars from his old campaign account to boost state Sen. Troy Balderson as his successor. A week before the primary, the Club for Growth, a longtime conservative antagonist of business-backed Republicans like Tiberi, is jumping into the 10-candidate race with TV ads attacking Balderson, Club strategists told POLITICO."

- "... Balderson's backers say there is more than intraparty politics at stake: They argue that a Leneghan primary win would put the GOP in danger of losing another special election this summer, in a district that's been held for decades by Republicans like Tiberi and Ohio Gov. John Kasich. ... '[Leneghan] is out-of-step with mainstream Republicans that dominate that district, and we've got a bunch of candidates dividing up that majority, so we could pick someone who doesn't represent the district with her pretty extreme viewpoints,' said Matt Borges, the former Ohio Republican Party chairman. ... Borges added: 'I don't want to see another Pennsylvania-18,' referring to the March special
election in southwestern Pennsylvania, where Democrat Conor Lamb beat much-criticized Republican Rick Saccone in a district that Trump carried by almost 20 points in 2016. The president carried Ohio's 12th District with 53 percent of the vote in 2016, a slimmer margin." Full story.

SUPER PAC SHENANIGANS - Two super PACs spending big money in West Virginia's Republican Senate primary appear to have manipulated the campaign finance system to avoid disclosing donors until after voters pick the nominee on May 8. Both groups (Duty and Country PAC and Mountain Families PAC) told the FEC in early April that they wanted to file reports monthly - and monthly filers don't have to file pre-primary reports, which were due next week. Duty and Country has spent over $1.2 million attacking Rep. Evan Jenkins and Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, while Mountain Families has spent even more attacking coal baron Don Blankenship.

- POLITICO's Alex Isenstadt has reported links between the groups and the main Senate super PACs for both parties, Senate Majority PAC and Senate Leadership Fund.

STRAW DONOR SCHEME? - "Rokita, Messer deny wrongdoing in possible straw donor scheme," by The Indianapolis Star's Kaitlin Lange and Tony Cook: "Three Indiana members of Congress gave and received money from Ohio Rep. Jim Renacci in what experts said may have been an improper straw donor scheme - including two Indiana congressmen running for the U.S. Senate. The Senate candidates, Reps. Todd Rokita and Luke Messer, denied any wrongdoing. Rep. Jackie Walorski's campaign did not respond to multiple phone calls and emails seeking comment. The Cincinnati Enquirer reported that Messer and Walorski received contributions from Renacci's congressional campaign between April and June last year.
Although he was not named in that story, Rokita also received campaign contributions from Renacci." Full story.

Days until the 2018 election: 190

Upcoming election dates - Indiana, Ohio, North Carolina and West Virginia primaries: May 8 - Idaho, Nebraska, Pennsylvania and Oregon primaries: May 15 - Arkansas, Georgia and Kentucky primaries, plus Texas primary runoffs: May 22.

Upcoming filing deadlines - Florida: May 4 - Massachusetts: May 8 - Washington: May 18 - Arizona: May 30.

Thanks for joining us! You can email tips to the Campaign Pro team at sbland@politico.com, eschneider@politico.com, dstrauss@politico.com and mseverns@politico.com.

You can also follow us on Twitter: @politicoscott, @ec_schneider, @politicokevin, @danielstrauss4 and @maggieseverns.

POLITICO's Ben White is bringing Morning Money to the Milken Institute Global Conference to provide coverage of the day's events and evening happenings. The newsletter will run April 29 - May 2. Sign up to keep up with your daily conference coverage.

Campaign Pro Race Dashboard, POLITICO Pro's campaign tracking solution, is revamped and ready for 2018. Dive into campaigns with biographical candidate pages and a dedicated race dashboard for each House, Senate and gubernatorial contest. You also get access to FEC campaign finance data for federal elections. Get started.

CEASE AND DESIST - Cisneros campaign says Intercept recording 'manufactured': Democrat Gil Cisneros' campaign sent a cease and desist letter to The Intercept, demanding it remove the story it published last week saying that Cisneros left a voicemail for Democratic opponent Andy Thorburn promising to "go negative." The Cisneros campaign is also "readying to pursue legal action for defamation and false light against The Intercept and the Thorburn campaign."

DEMS IN... - "Left vs. Left: Richard Cordray and Dennis Kucinich Battle for Governor of Ohio," by The New York Times' Matt Flegenheimer: "Richard Cordray speaks softly and carries a big stack: lime-green index cards, pressed into his shirt pocket, near enough for any sudden onset of note-taking. ... Dennis Kucinich speaks until someone interrupts him - and even this is often insufficient - and carries a bag of vegan groceries heavy enough to sink his right arm like a weight-bearing scale of justice. ... Trump won Ohio by eight points. It has a Republican-controlled legislature and has had a Republican governor for all but four years since 1991. But the prospect of a Democrat-friendly
election year and a whiff of scandal in Columbus - where the House speaker resigned this month as federal investigators questioned his conduct - has convinced strategists that even a proudly liberal candidate could win in November." Full story.

WOLVERINE STATE - "Michigan Gov. Candidate Delayed Rescue Of Animals He Claims He Tried To Save," by The Huffington Post's Daniel Marans: "A top Democratic contender in the Michigan governor's race fought to sell off more than 100 animals at a shuttered pharmaceutical testing facility he owned, court records show, contradicting his account of events that culminated in the neglected animals' rescue. ...

"Businessman Shri Thanedar has been weathering accusations of animal neglect after HuffPost reported Wednesday that animal welfare groups had to rescue over 170 dogs and monkeys months after the Oxford, New Jersey, facility shut down in 2010. On Thursday, the candidate tried to pin the animals' neglect on Bank of America, which repossessed the property in April of that year. He said the bank sought to sell the animals against his advice. But court records show that the court-appointed receiver, charged with managing the disputed property, actually tried to place the animals in sanctuaries against Thanedar's wishes. In fact, it was Thanedar's attorneys who unsuccessfully sought to have the
animals assessed and sold." Full story.

INCUMBENT PRIMARY WATCH - "Inside the North Carolina scramble to be the most Trump-like candidate of them all," by McClatchy's Katie Glueck: "At a church 5K run and a local Republican convention, an early voting station and a panel discussion hosted by a pro-Trump group, [GOP Rep. Robert Pittenger] typically waited between five and 30 seconds before invoking the president as he campaigned last weekend-and often, the favorable comparisons to iconic conservative President Ronald Reagan weren't far behind. It was a constant reminder of the lengths Republican candidates are going to embrace Trump this primary season, from here in Pittenger's district to Senate races in West Virginia, Ohio and
Indiana, all places where primary Election Day comes May 8. It's more evidence of the president's grip on the GOP base-and of the perils facing any Republican candidate in a conservative area who is perceived as insufficiently supportive of Trump." Full story.

CASH RACE - "An NC Republican says he just made campaign history," by The Raleigh News and Observer's Paul A. Specht: "...U.S. Rep. Mark Walker and other North Carolina Republicans believe his April 20 luncheon with Vice President Mike Pence in Greensboro was the most lucrative fundraising event for a U.S. House race in state history." Full story.

ANNALS OF CAMPAIGN FINANCE - "One Seattle man's quest to cancel his $10.48 monthly donation to Hillary Clinton's nonprofit," by the Seattle Times' Joseph O'Sullivan: "[Corey] Koscielniak's decision to cancel a recurring monthly donation of that sum to Hillary Clinton's nonprofit organization Onward Together turned into an odyssey that's lasted several weeks. The organization's webpage didn't allow him to cancel, and a phone call to the group didn't seem to resolve things. The situation prompted Koscielniak to file a complaint with the Washington state Attorney General's Office. The experience also gave the 29-year-old Clinton voter a brush with the opaque world of nonprofit, quasi-political
organizations that disclose little about their operations." Full story.

CODA - QUOTE OF THE DAY: "I think some of those allegations do warrant being investigated." - Rep. Trey Gowdy on allegations against Rear Admiral Ronny Jackson.

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