Cuccinelli: Maness has a better shot to beat Landrieu in La.

Senate Conservatives Fund President Ken Cuccinelli said in an interview with The Hill that Republican Rob Maness is the better choice to defeat Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) than fellow Republican Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-La.).

{mosads}“Rob Maness is the most electable Republican in that race,” he said. “Every single survey Senate conservatives have taken, every single one, Col. Maness finishes 2 or 3 points better head-to-head against Mary Landrieu than Congressman Cassidy does and when it happens over and over and over, regardless of the circumstances, August, September, October, that begins to tell you this is a fact. This isn’t just a snapshot, this is a fact.”

Landrieu currently leads in the polls, with Cassidy a close second and Maness at least 20 percentage points behind. But no candidate is predicted to win the 50 percent needed to win the race outright and the top two will go to a runoff in December.

The available polling on a runoff assumes that Maness doesn’t make the runoff. Cassidy leads the most recent polls in a head-to-head matchup against Landrieu by between 3 to 7 percentage points.

But Cuccinelli told The Hill that Maness would fair better in a straight challenge to Landrieu because he gives voters a starkly different choice.

“It exemplifies very well how conservatives who are distinguishing themselves from their Democrat opponents are doing better,” he said, adding that dynamic shows why Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) is further ahead in his Senate race than state Speaker Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) is in his.

Maness has received a fair amount of support from the Republican base. The Tea Party Patriots Citizens Fund PAC endorsed him earlier this week, joining former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R), Family Research Council founder Tony Perkins, and the Tea Party Express, among others.

So far, those endorsements haven’t moved the needle enough to propel Maness into contention for the runoff and his campaign has attacked the state’s Republican Party for a “concerted and coordinated effort to smear Rob Maness.” They claim a GOP school board candidate was pressured into backing Cassidy over Maness.