Natl Republicans Raise Stakes Vs. Dems In #AZ02, Call in #AZ01, Fold (For Now) In #AZ09 (FOLLOWING MONEY IN ARIZONA'S POLITICS)

Today was the National Republican Congressional Committee's ("NRCC's") turn to place some of their chips on the table for the autumn battle for votes, and has folded their hand - for now - in Arizona's 9th Congressional District, matched their counterpart's wager in CD1 and raised the stakes in CD2.

The Democrats' DCCC (Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee) announced 2 1/2 weeks ago where it was placing some $44 Million in advertising bets, committing nearly 10% of its announcement to Arizona's three "swing" districts - all currently held by Democrats.

The NRCC announced $29.5 Million in reservations today - and, nearly 10% of that is headed towards Arizona.  However, the NRCC avoided mentioning CD9, where Wendy Rogers and Andrew Walter are seeking the GOP nomination to contest Rep. Kyrsten Sinema.  (DCCC reserved $2.0M to attack the GOP nominee.)

The NRCC continues to express its confidence in Martha McSally to knock off Rep. Ron Barber in CD2.  They are planning to spend $1.0M on Tucson TV, which is greater than the $700K the DCCC announced.

CD1 is pretty evenly matched at this time, in the NRCC vs. DCCC battle of the negative campaign ads.  The NRCC announced $1,950,000 in Phoenix TV spots, which is within (venom-)spitting distance of the DCCC's $2.2M reservation.

For comparison purposes, in 2012 the NRCC spent $2.6M in losing CD1, $1.6M in CD2, and $1.5M in CD9.  (Keep in mind that that is for the entire election cycle, and was easily obtained by consulting OpenSecrets.org.)

Of course, today's announcements are not written in legally-binding stone, and independent outside spending groups look to have a much larger impact on these ad wars.

Deal another round of cards. (That next round will likely be following the August 26 primary.)

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