Koch's to ramp up ground war

 
By Jonathan Swan - 09-15-16 09:34 AM EDT

The powerful conservative network led by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch is shifting its cash away from TV and to an all-out ground assault for the final stretch to Election Day.

The Koch network, which expects to spend $250 million this election cycle, has decided that the most efficient use of that money is in the field and not over the air, top Koch officials James Davis and Tim Phillips said in a briefing at the network's Virginia headquarters Wednesday.

TV advertising by the Koch network will stop Oct. 5. The Kochs have already pulled out of Ohio, and they are canceling the last week of ad reservations in Florida, between Sept. 27 and Oct. 4.

The network feels good about the chances of incumbent Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) in those states.

The Koch network is the most powerful outside group on the right, with a nationwide staff of 1,600 - about 1,200 of whom are in the field across 36 states.

And the group has built arguably the most sophisticated data operation in conservative politics.

That strength is about to be tested as the Koch network fights to help the Republican Party hang onto the Senate majority.

The network is refusing to get behind GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, whose rhetoric and policy positions, particularly on trade and immigration, have dismayed network officials.

The Koch network will end spending about $42 million in TV and digital advertising to help vulnerable Republican Senate candidates.

They spent early and often, hammering Democratic candidates with brutal ads, including a $10 million campaign in Ohio to damage Portman's Democratic challenger, Ted Strickland.

But for the final stretch to Nov. 8, Koch officials say they don't believe television ads can achieve the results they want: to send 5 million voters they've identified as "persuadable" to the polls.

These 5 million targeted voters live in the eight battleground states in which the Kochs are playing: Florida, Ohio, Indiana, Missouri, North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

These voters fit into two categories: People who haven't decided who they're supporting at the presidential level but are leaning toward a Republican senator backed by the Kochs; and people who are traditionally reliable Republican voters but aren't enthusiastic about voting this year.

The largest chunk of the remaining budget for the cycle will go to this, the largest field organizing effort undertaken by the Koch brothers since they got involved in politics several decades ago.

Koch network officials say they will deploy their nationwide field staff to these eight battleground states, with the intention to contact - via phone, door-knocking or local events - every one of these 5 million voters between now and Election Day.

In some states, like Indiana, the network has already made attempted contacts with all of these persuadable voters more than once.

Millions of dollars will be spent on direct mail to these voters' homes.

Florida is where the Kochs have their biggest presence.

They've got 165 staff members across 16 field offices in the Sunshine State, according to Tim Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity, the largest field organizing group within the network. That's up from nine field offices and 100 staff members in Florida in 2014, Phillips said.

Phillips said the Kochs are focused on increasing their ground staff in two states in particular: Indiana, where the network currently only has 11 staff members, and Pennsylvania, where the network currently has 18.

Using their data firm i360, the Koch network had originally targeted 10 million voters they had identified as persuadable.

But over recent months, they narrowed that to 5 million.

Despite the hype over the potential of split-ticket voters, the Kochs decided they weren't an efficient group to target, said spokesman James Davis.

While it's hitting these doors and phones, the Koch network will also be doubling up and helping Republican House candidates who are vulnerable in their districts.

Davis said the network would spend more than double what it spent on ground operations in 2012.

While Davis wouldn't provide the exact dollar figure, he said the investment is clear from the staff numbers. In 2012, the Koch network had about 450 staff in the field; now the group has about 1,200 field staff.