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World Wrestling Entertainment magnate Linda McMahon will have her second chance in the ring in November after demolishing her moderate Republican challenger, former Rep. Chris Shays, in the Connecticut Senate primary.
With 20 percent of precincts reporting, McMahon routed Shays 75 to 25 percent, the AP reported.
Continue ReadingMcMahon will take on Congressman Chris Murphy, who beat Connecticut State Secretary Susan Bysiewicz in the Democratic primary. The two will now battle it out for the Senate seat vacated by retiring Sen. Joe Lieberman. With 26 percent of precincts reporting, Murphy beat Bysiewicz 67-32 percent.
This is McMahon’s second face off in a general election. She failed to ride the Republican wave of 2010, losing to now Sen. Richard Blumenthal by 12 points despite spending $50 million of her own fortune.
“I am crossing my fingers hoping I only get outspent 5-1. Getting outspent 5-1 would be a victory. I can’t win this race by running more TV ads or sending more mailers,” Murphy told POLITICO in a recent interview. “I have to do it by having a better message, by running a smarter campaign and having tons of volunteers out there spreading the message.”
Shays was widely seen as the more moderate Republican candidate running and campaigned as the more “electable” of the two in a face off against Murphy. But he was vastly outspent by McMahon; according to the latest information available from the Center for Responsive politics, she had spent over $11 million to his $1.2 million.
McMahon had the backing of the Connecticut GOP, beating Shays at the Republican convention. Shays regularly attacked her spending on the trail and said he knew taking her on was an uphill battle.
“You can’t call yourself a fiscal conservative and spend $50 million in a race,” he said.
McMahon’s millions are sure to make the race competitive even though Connecticut is a state that usually turns blue in a presidential year. And she’s revamped her campaign this time around, talking less about her time as a CEO of a wrestling company and focusing more on her personal story.
But while her name recognition remains high throughout the state, her unfavorable numbers do as well: a recent Public Policy Polling survey showed 48 percent of voters had an unfavorable view of McMahon versus 42 percent who had a favorable impression.
