House Dem blame game begins

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Steve Israel (N.Y.) is blaming potential House Democratic losses squarely on liberal outside groups that he says haven’t stepped up for the cause.

{mosads}Israel told reporters Wednesday morning that the DCCC is having to shore up incumbents and cut loose some potentially competitive candidates because its super-PAC allies aren’t spending what they did last election cycle.

“Outside groups have always played a fundamentally important role in supporting our candidates and supporting our efforts. When you have 32 races within 6 points and you’re making tactical and strategic decisions to shore up incumbents, it is frustrating that the cavalry that’s always been there doesn’t seem to be there,” he said.

Democrats appear increasingly likely to lose more than a handful of House seats this fall, and Israel sought to convince reporters that none of those losses would be the committee’s fault, while maintaining an optimistic tone about where individual races stood.

He emphasized that the committee’s primary job is to protect incumbents, and pointed out that it had spent big early for many of them. He denied that the committee, which has outraised the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) by a wide margin over the last cycle, had been caught unprepared to protect any of the Democratic House members facing tough reelection races.

“Everything that has been in our control we have performed and performed well, particularly that decision to fortify and prepare early. What’s outside our control is the outside groups on both sides of the equation… I can’t control what our outside allies do,” he said. “There are still opportunities in these 32 races for other outside groups to make a difference.”

The DCCC has been in triage mode for the last few weeks, scrambling to counter a wave of spending from GOP outside groups like the Campaign Leadership Fund and American Action Network. In order to reinvest to protect incumbents like Reps. Ami Bera (D-Calif.), Julia Brownley (D-Calif.) and Brad Schneider (D-Ill.), the DCCC has had to cut loose races they once deemed top targets, like an expensive open-seat battle for retiring Rep. Frank Wolf’s (R-Va.) district and a fight to defeat Rep. Mike Coffman (R-Colo.).

As The Hill previously reported, groups like the League of Conservation Voters are spending less to protect House Democrats this cycle, while the Service Employees International Union, which spent heavily in 2012 for House candidates, has spent almost nothing. Israel is still hoping they will step up — and implicitly blaming them for Democrats’ current predicament.

“In a world of Republican super-PAC hurt the pain can be ameliorated and even reversed when some of our outside allies decide that they’re not going to leave a single race on the table and they come in and help fortify some of our candidates,” he said.

The NRCC piled on.

“Chairman Israel needs stop the Washington blame game and admit that President Obama and his devastating policies are casting a large shadow over the landscape for House Democrats,” NRCC Spokeswoman Andrea Bozek said in a statement.

This post was updated at 11:10 a.m.