#F150CampaignTour Day 8

We started the morning visiting with Austin Petersen and John Marsh on their KWOS Morning show. 

• Austin was in his tropical shirt, and was in day before election mode, a.k.a. peak Austin. I love doing his show because he has a consistent theory on government, and can apply it to about whoever, whenever. 

  

• I wore my sporting Bean and Bean Cotton hat. 
• Now if he has a bias it’s toward just absolutely burning everything down, hence his love of Eric Greitens. Well that and ratings I think spawn his admiration of the lil pervert. 
• We talked about the JeffCo senate race, it got weird. 
• We discussed Breitbart’s love of Eric Greitens. Breitbart loves Eric Greitens bout like I love the Cardinals, both likely unhealthy. We talked about how a Trump endorsement of Greitens would be helpful to Greitens. 
• Austin tried to convince me, and I think himself, that Trump not endorsing Greitens was a favor to Greitens. Little did we know how the day would unfold. 
• I told Austin what I’ve told Austin and everyone that I think a third of the undecided vote is actually Greitens voters who are just ashamed to tell anyone they are sickos and thereby for Greitens. Right now there is about 15% undecided, so I’d say there is about a 5% bump that I’d put on top of whatever Greitens is polling today. 
• I gave him a dark horse candidate to keep an eye on for an upset in the 32nd senate district with Jill Carter taking on Senator Bill White. 
• You can watch the interview here, my segment starts at the 1:02 mark: https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=1633038080412310 

I got to visit with Rep. Nate Tate who is really coming on strong in the 26th. 

• Nate is currently right there in the thick of things. If he wins and Roorda wins in the 22nd then it’s the best night for labor in state senate races in the last decade. 
• Look all cycle it’s been the fashionable thing to criticize the Right Path PAC for generally being ineffective at defeating potential members of the conservaite caucus. Up until last week Lembke had played his cards amazingly well, and Right Path hadn’t really showed up very big to counter the trial attorneys in the key open seat races. Well Right Path came in heavy, real heavy against Ben Brown, who was on a path to win, and may have opened the path to either Nate or Bob Jones. 
• Nate says his message has been aimed at common sense conservatives. It’s almost an arranged marriage if the republican party is going to leave the business community and be a blue collar party then you are inevitably going to have a seat at that table for labor, and Nate Tate may be on the beginning of the trend of labor taking that seat. 
• He said he has been proud that his campaign has been 100% positive, and folks on the doors have been thanking him for refusing negative campaigning. 
• He thinks he will win starting with his strength in southern Franklin County, and go from there. He says the polls are tighter than he would like, but is confident going into election day. 

Then I got to hop on the fastest two hours in radio, on The Viper 100.7 with television’s own Vic Faust and one of the most entertaining people on the radio Eric Johnson. 

• So everytime I do this show I end up 100% agreeing with Eric Johnson in my heart, and totally disagreeing with him in my head. 
• I suggested that Trump could still make an endorsement, they all laughed at me. By all logic they were right to do so, but we were talking Donald Trump here so strap in. 
• Eric is a big Jane Dueker supporter and has his heart set on her winning. Vic told me that Mike Kelley said that while he liked Jane she didn’t have much of a chance to win, MSK knows more about such things than I do, but I tend to agree with him. Regardless, if you’re reading then she is probably somewhere saying awful things about you behind your back right now. Yes I meant that literally, all of you. 
• I told them that I thought Danforth’s candidate wouldn’t amount to much against Schmitt or Hartzler, but if gas gets to $2 then a Danforth’s guy might pull enough votes against Greitens to elect Trudy Busch. 
• We talked about Billy Long and I suggested that his strength is his personality, and everyone in the room gravitates to him, but he has to be in the room to gravitate toward him. I’m not sure if he was in enough rooms.
• You can watch the interview here, my segment is around 31:30: https://www.facebook.com/1007TheViper/videos/347963937392810 
• Now with about 15 minutes left in the show I sent Vic a text of Trump saying that he in fact would make an endorsement in the U.S. Senate race, funny radio ensued. 

Then I had the chance to visit with the deepest baritone in St. Louis McGraw Millhaven on the BIG 550 KTRS. 

• I love listening to McGraw. I love hearing Ben Frederickson, of Sedalia, break down our chances to get Soto before I went on. 
• We discussed the senate race. 
• He asked about Danforth’s candidate. Look, I was in elementary school when he left the U.S. Senate so maybe I missed his real effective years. However, my entire professional life he has basically complained about republicans then did nothing. The only thing he succeeded at was helping elect Josh Hawley and now he isn’t happy about that. 
• My take is simple, Mr. Danforth went out and picked someone he would like to vote for, not someone Missourians would like to vote for. If he would have teamed up with Dave Schatz or something that might have been different. I think that folks who broke stuff at the capitol that folks working today have to pay to replace oughta go to jail. However, no one in West Plains gives a damn about the January 6th Commission. Maybe folks should, but they don’t.  
• We visited about the Cori Bush vs. Steve Roberts race. My take is that the incumbent goes into election day as the favorite. However, if she doesn’t get to around 60% then a lot of people are going to rush to Senator Brian Williams and the pressure will be high for him to challenge her in ‘24. Now there is also going to be a huge push from national democrats to recruit him to run for U.S. Senate against Hawley. The bottom line is that he is the most skilled politician in the Missouri Democratic Party and will have a long line of people trying to get him to sign onto their vision for his future. 

We ended the #F150CampaignTour in Saline County. 

• I first went to Rep. Kurtis Gregory’s event at StoneHenge Country Club. He had nearly 200 golfers and put on quite an event. The amount of local people was impressive. 

  

• Kurtis is just a natural leader when he walks into a room, and if you made a list of people in the legislature that could one day be Governor you wouldn’t fill your second hand without naming him. That also includes folks who have lost fingers in chainsaw accidents. 
• Evidence of that is the full house, full roster of golfers, and Mizzou President Mun Choi and Lt. Governor Mike Kehoe in attendance. 
• Big propst to Kella Gregory who can now enjoy her summer after a very very successful event. 
• I was there while the “endorsement” came in from Trump. All of a sudden the room kinda got quiet and everyone started looking at their phones….just like The Donald would have wanted. 
• When Trump first announced he was endorsing I understood it was gonna be Greitens. Then you got to see the killer instinct that Schmitt doesn’t always show as he knife fought all damn day to get Trump’s endorsement as well. Amazing politics, and amazing toughness from Schmitt. Bizarre situation. 
• Imagine being Eric Greitens, and having a month of no money, falling poll numbers, and being bombarded by negative ads, and court hearings. You haven’t had a good piece of news in a month, and you’ve spent a solid year kissing Trump’s ass 24/7 and promising to do literally anything no matter how degrading or demeaning to get his support. Then on the last day of the campaign, you think your salvation has arrived. They tell you you’re getting your long awaited endorsement, but the day goes on, and goes on it doesn’t come. Then when he finally releases the endorsement that you’ve been waiting for as your lifeline to save a failing campaign…he endorses Schmitt too. If I were a worse person I would laugh, wait who am I kidding I laughed for five solid minutes. 

To end the #F150CampaignTour I drove by the Jim the Wonder Dog Museum and then dropped into Bud’s Cafe to see what folks in Saline thought about Trump. 

• Of course by the time I got there everyone knew, and in either a sign of the Apocalypse or Trump’s amazing personality every single person thought it was funny as hell.  

  

• So my hillbilly style focus group of six folks at the bar drinking free Bud Lights (one person only drinks Miller Lite, and since I only buy Anheuser Busch products unless I’m with Jeff Schrag he was eliminated from the focus group). 
• The votes went as follows: Trump jerking everyone around all day was freaking hilarious 6-0. 
• U.S. Senate race: Schmitt- 2 Hartzler- 2 Greitens- 1 McCloskey- 1 
• As most Miller Lite drinkers tend to be he was obnoxious, he kept trying to inject his views into my highly scientific focus group so apparently he is a democrat and he doesn’t plan to vote but if he did he would vote for Kunce (of course he would). 
• How many would actually vote tomorrow 3-3 
• Of those that would actually vote Hartzler- 2 Schmitt- 1 

Well that wraps it up for the #F150CampaignTour be sure to check www.missouritimes.com and our social media platforms tonight for the results. 

Scott Faughn

Scott Faughn is the publisher of The Missouri Times, owner of the Clayton Times in Clayton; SEMO Times in Poplar Bluff; and host of the only statewide political television show, This Week in Missouri Politics.