Bevin doubles down on his investment to gain high office and emphasizes effort to link Conway to Obama

By Matthew Young

University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications

               Republican Matt Bevin knows a lot about investing. He has had a successful career managing wealth and investments for customers. But in the last two election cycles he has invested nearly $4.8 million of his own cash on a new customer: himself. Now, with one week until voters hit the polls to determine the next governor, Bevin is really hoping for a big return on the money he has given to his two campaigns for public office.

               The latest polls show Bevin down five points to Democrat Jack Conway. This is where Bevin has found himself for most of the race, but never able to really cut into Conway’s lead.

               Now, as Bevin stares down the barrel of Tuesday, Election Day, he appears to be feeling the urgency of the race. His campaign strategy has shifted over the last two weeks to be markedly more aggressive. Content for months to run a largely positive campaign, his tone seems to be sharpening.

               There was the occasional punch thrown early on, like when Bevin told Conway at a September debate, “So much of what comes out of your mouth, Jack, is absolutely made up... You literally make lies up on the fly.” Overall, though, Bevin stayed positive in his message. He stood his ground and kept talking about his issues; Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, job creation, and fighting President Obama.

               But as the race comes down to the wire, Bevin has made a stronger foray. At the final two debates of the campaign, held Sunday at Eastern Kentucky University, and Monday at KET, Bevin repeatedly called Conway a liar, challenging his assertions and often interrupting him.

               Bevin accused Conway of lying to voters, and saying anything to get elected. He cited Conway saying Bevin would kick 400,000 people off Medicaid and does not support early childhood education Conway claiming he cut his budget by 40 percent as attorney general.

               The last two debates were outliers. Bevin has changed the tone of his campaign to attack Conway as a “rubber stamp” for President Obama. Early in the campaign Bevin did not emphasize the tactic common to Republicans over the last seven years, attacking the Democrat as a clone of Obama.

                “Jack Conway is a rubber stamp for Barack Obama. ... I am not a career politician. ... I’m a guy like so many out there who simply want better opportunity for themselves, for their families, for their state and for America,” Bevin said on the Glenn Beck Show.

               In a TV ad with unidentified people speaking, one says, “He’s just like Obama, maybe worse than Obama.”

               Most recently Bevin put out an ad titled “Stamp” mirroring his public accusations:  “Career politician Jack Conway is a rubber stamp for Obama's liberal agenda. “He’s for Obamacare, just like Obama. He’s for gun restrictions, like Obama. He’s pro-abortion, like Obama. He’s anti-coal, just like Obama. Conway even voted for Obama. Twice! Jack Conway would be Obama’s Governor.”

               Conway often notes that he is the only Democratic attorney general to join a lawsuit against the Obama administration for its regulation of greenhouse gases form coal-fired power plants.. He favors applying the federal background-check law to gun shows.

               If Conway were to “be Obama’s governor” he would have only a year and a month to do so, given that Obama leaves office in January 2017. But the attempt to link the two is clear, and it is a clear shift in strategy for Bevin. A strategy that reflects a candidate who might get zero return on a nearly $4.8 million investment.

FACT CHECK

●            In February Bevin said he would reverse the Medicaid expansion immediately, but since July he has talked about changing the program but has offered few details. However, when asked Monday by moderator Bill Goodman whether he would keep the Medicaid income limit at 138 percent of the federal poverty level, Bevin simply said, “No”.

●            A Democratic video shows Bevin saying Head Start “serves no purpose after 3rd grade,” meaning its effects disappear after that point, according to one study. In a separate video Bevin appeared to compare Head Start to brainwashing, criticizing its expansion to include 4-year-olds in a federal budget deal. Bevin said “certain regimes” use early education for political gain. “Look at these various regimes throughout history and what is it that they've always said? Give me the children. Give me the minds of the children. That's what they've always said. And it's true. Because I'll tell you, it's not coincidental or accidental that you have them now trying to get 4-year olds." However, Bevin insists he supports the overall cause of early education, and has cited a United Way program, Success by Six, as an example.

●            Bevin called Conway a liar for claiming that he cut his budget 40 percent. Bevin is correct; the attorney general proposes his budget, but the governor revises it and submits it to the legislature, which changes and approves it.

●            Referring to the Medicaid expansion, Bevin said Conway’s citation of a Deloitte study showing the Medicaid expansion will pay for itself until 2020 was proof that doesn’t know what he is talking about. The study predicts that by adding hundeds of thousands of people to the health-care system, the expansion will create jobs in health care and other industries, but its conclusions have not been proven. Gov. Steve Beshear claimed Tuesday that “Right now, it is paying for itself.”

               

ANALYSIS: Republican Governors Association re-enters ad fray, again trying to tie Conway to Obama

By Matthew Young

University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications

The Republican Governors Association is back, and in a big way: $1.6 million big. After spending $2.6 million in the governor's race on ads in the summer and early fall, the RGA pulled its support for Republican candidate Matt Bevin at the end of September. While no official reason was given, it left Bevin, who has a huge fundraising deficit in his race with Democrat Jack Conway, alone in a race where he needs help. After Bevin spent almost $1 million of his own money on ads and was unable to gain any ground in the polls, the RGA stepped back in. In a race that has generated little public interest, the RGA is hoping it can tip the scales toward Bevin in the last two weeks by connecting Conway to Obama.

Ad message

A new ad, called “Trust” is set in black and white, while gloomy string music plays in the background. The top of the screen shows families and workers struggling to make due. It begins by saying: “Our families are struggling, healthcare costs have skyrocketed, too many jobs have been lost, our paychecks seem smaller while career politicians make government bigger.” The bottom of the screen is split with a black and white portrait of President Obama next to Conway with the label “Obama-Conway Record.”

Analysis

“Struggling families” and “paychecks seem smaller”: Data from the Census B ureau shows that median income in Kentucky fell by almost 3 percent from 2013 to 2014. The ad would like you to believe that Democratic policies, led by President Obama, are to blame, but the responsibility is not clear. Income has been falling for quite some time, and not just in Kentucky. Americans not in the top 10 percent of income earners are doing worse than in years past. Almost all growth in wealth since Ronald Reagan was elected in 1980 has gone to the top 10 percent of income earners. Adjusted for inflation, median household incomes peaked around 2000, when George W. Bush was elected, and have been on the decline ever since. If the president in office is to blame for income and wealth performance, the RGA might not want to throw stones. The claim is true, but it certainly does not say what the RGA wants you to believe.

“Politicians make government bigger” is also a claim that deserves more scrutiny. The RGA is not so subtle in its insinuation that Conway is making government bigger; his picture is the focus of the ad as the statement is made. As evidence of this claim the RGA points to the growth in the budget of Kentucky over the last three years, and the expected growth for the next two. In those years, the state budget has grown slightly faster than the gross state product, which is the amount of goods and services produced in the state, but the attorney general doesn’t control the purse strings; the state legislature does.

“Skyrocketing health-care costs”: Health-care costs are up, but “skyrocketed” stretches too far. While horror stories of individual premiums rising as much as 40 percent are not difficult to find, data show these are outliers. An analysis by the National Conference of State Legislatures found that the average premium increase from 2014 to 2015 was effectively zero, a significant difference from annual premium increases in the previous decade of about 10 percent. Comparative numbers for 2016 will not be available for some time, but we do know that individual policies on the state’s Kynect insurance exchange are averaging increases between 5.2 percent and 12.2 percent, not including an 11 percent decrease for WellCare. Seeing a rate increase at or below the 10-year average could hardly be called skyrocketing. This claim is largely false.

“Too many jobs have been lost”: The RGA’s documentation for this point cites Kentucky’s loss of more than 1 in 10 coal jobs during the first three months of 2014. In the last three years, about half the state’s coal jobs have been lost. However, the ad does not mention coal, and unemployment in Kentucky is 5 percent, the lowest in 14 years. The total number of people with jobs in Kentucky is 13,000 fewer than five years ago, but that may not be the best way to measure it. The total nonfarm employment is more than 133,000 higher than five years ago, and 34,000 higher than last year.

"Our families can't afford four more years of the liberal policies of President Obama and career politicians like Jack Conway”: As evidence for this the RGA points to the Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare. But this claim conflicts with the conclusions of an analysis done for the state by Deloitte Consulting. The study says the added tax revenue from jobs created in the medical sector, due to the increase in the number of Kentuckians with health coverage, will pay for the expansion of Medicaid through 2020. Kentucky must start paying 5 percent of the expansion cost in 2017, rising in steps to the law’s limit of 10 percent in 2020. But that is six years away. This ad cites fur years as the time frame, and the available data shows that the Medicaid expansion will not cost Kentucky in the next four years.

Conclusion: The ad breaks to a black and white video of President Obama saying his “policies are on the ballot.” A woman is shown next to Obama with her face in her hands, upset. The video is form 2014 and Obama has said nothing of the sort about this governor's race. Some voters may remember the comment from last year’s Senate race, but most are unlikely to do so. The ad closes, “Can you really trust Obama and Conway to make things better?” Should Conway become governor, his term and that of President Obama will only overlap for little more than a year and a month. As far as we know, Obama is not planning to be an adviser to the governor of Kentucky after he moves out of the White House. This is an attempt to connect Conway to Obama, but it is a stretch at best.

Candidates for attorney general question personal backgrounds and sources of support in KET forum

By Anthony Pendleton
University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications

Monday's "Kentucky Tonight" KET debate between the candidates for attorney general included as much mud-slinging about personal backgrounds and campaign finance as it did debating of the issues. When the candidates did debate issues, they often agreed.

Republican Whitney Westerfield and Democrat Andy Beshear attacked each other for the source of their campaign funds. Beshear accused Westerfield of being "bought and paid for" and of having 95 percent of his campaign funded by “one special-interest group,” the Republican Attorneys General Association and its donors. RAGA has run more than $2.2 million worth of television commercials over the past three months. Three of the four ads have been attack ads against Beshear.

Westerfield defended himself, saying, “I can’t control that PAC.” He also took a jab at Beshear for raising $2.7 million, saying he had heard that in return, contributors were getting roads and other favors from the administration of Beshear’s father, Gov. Steve Beshear.

Some Beshear ads have noted Westerfield’s unfavorable job evaluation when he was an assistant commonwealth’s attorney in Christian County. Beshear said he had been evaluated by his peers and has been listed in America’s Best Lawyers for four years, while his opponent got a bad evaluation for “putting personal interests over his job.”

Westerfield replied, “They’re attacking me for things that are petty,” and said prosecutors had recognized him as “an outstanding legislator.”  He noted his role in passing bills to fight heroin and domestic violence.

Beshear accused Westerfield of pushing a bill for the Koch brothers of Wichita, conservative, libertarian, multi-billionaire businessmen who are major financiers of conservative groups and politicians. Westerfield said he didn't know what the bill was. Beshear replied, "It was the bill about changing the attorney general's office and the ability to use outside counsel." Westerfield then said he remembered that it was the “transparency in private attorney contracts” bill. According to the business group Partnership for Commonsense Justice, it would require a bidding process for private law firms to get contracts from the attorney general.

Beshear claimed that Westerfield doesn't support the bill for transparency, but because of outside influence. "He was pushed by one of the lobbyists for one of the main Koch brothers groups here in Kentucky to do that, and he's received even a direct PAC contribution from them," Beshear said.

Westerfield said that if elected, he would "increase the litigation intensity of the office" against not only the federal government, but the state as well. Asked after the debate how the state’s chief lawyer could sue the state, Westerfield noted that in 2007, then-Attorney General Greg Stumbo sued then-Gov. Ernie Fletcher for appointing too many Republicans as trustees of the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville.

The candidates agreed on restoring voting rights for felons who have served their sentences. Westerfield noted that some legislators want a waiting period for restoration, but he's "not as married" to that as they are. "Once you've served your sentence, I'm inclined to be prepared to let you have your voting rights back," he said.

Both said they're against legalizing recreational marijuana, but offered different conditions for approval of medicinal marijuana. Beshear said it would need to “go through the same FDA process that all other medicines do.” Westerfield said he would consider supporting medicinal marijuana if “it was narrowly tailored, and it'd have to be some years down the road - after Johns Hopkins, or the Mayo Clinic, or some well-established medical professionals in the field, did studies that show it produces some results.”

The Mayo Clinic grades marijuana's effectiveness in treating certain conditions, such as chronic pain, multiple sclerosis and epilepsy. Every condition gets a grade of B or C.

In a quiet race, gay marriage steals the focus from other issues; first debate with all 3 candidates is Tuesday night

By Matt Young
University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications

In 2004 Kentucky voters passed by a 3-1 margin a state constitutional amendment defining marriage to be between one man and one woman. You’d be forgiven for assuming the initiative was on the ballot again this year.

The governor's race between Republican businessman Matt Bevin and Democratic Attorney General Jack Conway has been conspicuously quiet. “People like to know their governor, and I don't think either of these guys have done that with the people of Kentucky yet,” House Speaker Greg Stumbo told cn|2’s Pure Politics.

The lack of focus on the Nov. 3 election has left Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis to fill the attention the news media and voters.

Bevin called a federal judge’s jailing of Davis for defying his order to issue marriage licenses “utterly ridiculous,” saying that there is no need to jail someone for First Amendment beliefs, and called on Conway and Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear to take action to remove clerks’ names from marriage licenses. They said the law doesn’t allow them to do that.

Conway has exercised caution, waiting until after Davis was jailed to make his first comment. He said on Twitter, "I understand that passions are high on both sides of this issue, but we are nation of laws and no one can defy an order from a federal judge."

Asked by the county attorney to appoint a special prosecutor to look into an official-misconduct cases against Davis, Conway first did not respond. After Davis was released on condition that she not interfere with her deputy clerks’ issuance of marriage licenses, Conway said he would not name a special prosecutor because the matter was in federal court.

Conway has been largely mute lately, as he concentrates on raising money and wondering how much personal wealth Bevin will put into the race. His public appearances and media outreach have been almost non-existent since the Aug. 1 Fancy Farm Picnic.

Traditionally the governor’s race heats up after the Labor Day weekend, with a more intense schedule of debates and forums. Conway and Bevin will have their first face-off with independent candidate Drew Curtis at Bellarmine University in Louisville at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 15. The debate will be televised on Louisville’s WHAS-11 and Lexington’s WKYT-27; it is sponsored by the stations and their newspaper partners in the Bluegrass Poll, The Courier-Journal and the Lexington Herald-Leader.

The latest Bluegrass Poll, taken in late July, showed Conway leading Bevin 43 to 38 percent, with an error margin of plus or minus 3.7 percentage points (which applies to both numbers). Curtis had 8 percent.

Each side has turned up the rhetorical volume, with new TV ads.

Americans for Prosperity, a ”super PAC” supported by the Koch Brothers of Wichita, is attacking Conway for his support of federal health reform, or “Obamacare,” which it blamed for "a crisis in our hospitals” and “skyrocketing” insurance premiums.

The Kentucky Hospital Association says Obamacare has been a small part of its problems, but worries about future impacts. A national analysis by the National Conference of State Legislatures found that the average premium increase from 2014 to 2015 was effectively zero, while premium increases in the last decade have averaged about 10 percent. Kentucky rate increases for 2016 range from a 25 percent increase by the Kentucky Health Cooperative, which has sold most of the policies on the state’s Kynect insurance exchange, to an 11 percent decrease from WellCare. Other increases are between 5.2 and 12.2 percent.

The Republican Governors Association has been attacking Conway along the same lines, while Bevin hasn’t run ads of his own. Conway’s first attack ad builds on the “East Coast con-man” moniker that U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell applied to Bevin last year in their primary battle.

The ad shows Bevin making statements on the campaign trail, then apparently walking them back. It starts out showing Bevin saying, “I was opposed to the Farm Bill because it was an insult to farmers.” The screen then splits and shows him saying that that was “a misrepresentation of what he said.” He has a case; he objected to the bill’s spending for non-farm programs (most of its funds are for nutrition) and the money it funneled to big agribusiness.

The ad gets right that Bevin has backtracked on his opposition to the Medicaid expansion in Kentucky. He initially said that he would end it, but now says he would scale it back.

Beneath the fray is Curtis, CEO of Fark.com. Without the big money that comes with a party nomination, Curtis has been unable to air TV ads, but being an independent underdog comes with its advantages; he can ignore partisanship, and be free to talk about the issues. Curtis has released the most detailed plan to address the state’s underfunded pension system.

As the race heats up expect all three candidates to address other important issues. There will be sparring over the tax code, and how to create additional revenue the state needs; education, including the Common Core standards; and “right to work” legislation, which forbids employers from requiring union membership as a condition of employment.

However, if this summer can be used as a crystal ball for the fall, expect Bevin to continue his defense of Davis, and Conway’s refusal to appeal the gay-marriage ruling that was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. State law allowed Conway to do that, but Bevin accuses him of hypocrisy.

Bevin: 'odds are increasingly high' he will win, and is vetting possible appointees and seeking suggestions

By Anthony Pendleton
University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Telecommunications

Republican gubernatorial candidate Matt Bevin said Thursday “the odds are increasingly high" that he will win the Nov. 3 election, and is encouraging the public to submit considerations for cabinet positions through his website.

At a Commerce Lexington luncheon, Kentucky Coal Association President Bill Bissett asked the candidate, "Tell us what a Bevin administration would be like . . . Hiring practices? If you would win, it'd be a change in party as well. . . . So how would you handle that process?"

Bevin replied that he will be as "unencumbered" as Democrat John Y. Brown Jr., who also self-funded his own primary campaign, was in his 1979-83 term.

“One thing John Y. did well is, he brought together professionals,” Bevin said. “He was agnostic, as I will be, with respect to party. I don’t give a rip whether they’re Republican or Democrat. That's the thing that has been killing this state, and others, for far too long. Let's remove the partisanship, and let's start governing as if we're being good stewards of the taxpayers' money.”

Earlier, Bevin said, "There's not one person who has been promised a job. There is not one favor that needs to be paid back. There was not a single elected official - not one - who supported me or endorsed me during the primary. . . . This is wonderful! I've got no favors to pay back."

Bevin says people who have suggestions for cabinet positions should send him "the person's name, what their qualifications are, what you think they would be good at, and how I can get a-hold of 'em."

              

Bevin said he has "already started [candidates] through the vetting process" because he doesn't want to get behind. "One mistake that is often made is that you wait until you win, and then all of a sudden you gotta transition, and you gotta submit a budget. All of a sudden, you're upside-down."

Under Section 73 of the Constitution of Kentucky, the governor is inaugurated the fifth Tuesday after election, which will be Dec. 8. Newly elected governors have 15 legislative days to submit a budget, meaning it will be due on or before Jan. 26.

In replying to Bissett, and earlier in the luncheon, Bevin said the odds are increasing that he will be governor. When asked afterward what made him think that, he replied, "I think if you just look at the trends themselves - not only in terms of what people care about, the things they're talking about - but, frankly, polling as well."

Bevin added that "there's only been one poll done" that shows him behind. He said that poll was conducted by "a combination of several different media outlets who have been historically, sort of, lopsided in their thinking and historically wrong."

Bevin was referring to the Bluegrass Poll, conducted for Louisville’s WHAS-TV and The Courier-Journal, and the Lexington Herald-Leader and WKYT-TV. In its latest survey, July 22-28, Conway led Bevin 45 percent to 42 percent, and 43-38 with the inclusion of independent Drew Curtis, who got 8 percent. The only other public poll was conducted by Public Policy Polling from June 18-21. Bevin led 40-38 in that poll. Both results were within the polls’ margins of error.

The Bluegrass Poll sponsors are also sponsoring the first debate among the three candidates this Tuesday, Sept. 15, from 7 to 8 p.m. at Bellarmine University in Louisville. It will broadcast live on WKYT and WHAS, and will also be available on the sponsors' websites.