why aren t republicans putting this away? and they aren t. the economy might be the thing that every single voter says is their number one issue. and they might trust republicans more than democrats, but, abby, to your point, voters can go to the polls with more than one issue on their mind. and if you look my biggest question going into this election cycle is the trend that we saw in the five special-held special elections in especially in new york 19 with pat ryan and what happened in kansas, is that going to hold water still? and what we re saying in the early vote, we were talk about it earlier is that it is. right now, democrats are leading the early vote by 3 million votes. and so, that is not a little thing. and no one is treating as if it was a huge deal. and it is a huge deal. why? because that s not a poll. these are votes that are already banked. and from a strategic campaign
democrats actually spend money driving a message around it. what we ll take from probably the best we can take from the committee hearings is that so there was a politically set the context and environment, look, this is real, they tried to, in fact, overthrow the american people and the will of the american people, but democrats from a campaign standpoint from paid communications is put money behind driving that message and what that means to the average american person, and, again, it is hope and it is fear. you know, what does it mean to you suburban mom if our democracy ends. what does that chaos mean for you and your family, if democrats are going to define that and put messaging and dollars behind that, i think it breaks through. we can t count on it to breakthrough and earn communications alone. i want to be really granular here. i want matthew to pick up on
ellison, first off to you, give us the state of play in georgia right now. reporter: it s fascinating to watch this senate race in particular. on the democratic side you really don t have a viable primary challenger. the incumbent is expected to kind of ease away with this. because of this, we really haven t seen him on the campaign trail too much. he and his team said he s been focused on governing, not on the campaign. when you look on the polls and what s happening on the republican side from a campaign standpoint, that approach makes a lot of sense. you have herschel walker on the republican side very much leading the field. his closest competitor gary black is a whopping 58 points behind him in the latest poll in this state. so he s kind of been able to sit back and sort of watch republicans go after each other. gary black in particular has been a very strong, vocal critic
in the senate race, incumbent senator raphael warnock, he does not have a viable candidate. she s never pulled above 6%. from a campaign standpoint, he has been pretty quiet. and it makes sense, when you think about the fact that he does not have a very valuable primary challenger. you have such a crowded republican primary, the republicans have sort of been fighting and attacking each other. so his campaign, he has said, he s focused more on governing. the work he is doing in washington, d.c., not on the campaign. he did speak at that fundraising gala last night, i got a bit of a preview of the issues that he likely will focus on once we get into the general election. after tuesday. a big issue that we talked about last time, abortion rights. let s listen. i just happen to think that a patients room is too small and cramped with space for a woman, her doctor, and the
hell yes is what he said. taking away assault weapons. where was the applause louder in the room of democrats or among republicans who support the nra position? well, from a policy and campaign standpoint, let s say the republicans can say he gave a gift to republicans who have said all along the ultimate goal of democrats is to confiscate guns. congressman o rourke received well deserved praise for the leadership and the compassion he showed in the wake of the terrible shootings in el paso. hats off to him for that. he s understandably emotional and that led to extreme comments on confiscation of guns. even democrats have said today it under mines current bipartisan efforts to go about sensible gun violence control. and also is counter productive to the progress that has been made. so in my view i understand why he is extremely emotional. efts are under way.