Blackburn strategist: ‘Death by 10,000 cuts’ will beat Bredesen in Tennessee US Senate race

Joey Garrison | The Tennessean

Show Caption Hide Caption Tennessee U.S. Senate race polls: Phil Bredesen, Marsha Blackburn vie to replace Bob Corker A look at the several polls detailing the race of Marsha Blackburn and Phil Bredesen for U.S. Senate

Tennessee’s U.S. Senate race will be won by “death by 10,000 cuts,” the top strategist for Republican Marsha Blackburn’s campaign said this week, likening Democrat Phil Bredesen to a soon-battered boxer who won’t survive the punches coming before the November election.

Ward Baker, speaking before a room of Republican activists in Nashville, also had a warning for Republicans who cross over and back Bredesen, a former two-term Tennessee governor:

“We have a list of everybody that’s screwing us,” Baker said, drawing laughter from the crowd over what seemed to be a joke as he began answering a question.

Leaked audio: Listen to Blackburn strategist talk about beating Bredesen in Tennessee US Senate race Tennessee’s U.S. Senate race will be won by “death by 10,000 cuts,” the top strategist for Republican Marsha Blackburn’s campaign said this week

“I believe when the TV ads are out, and we lay out our case, I think some of them will come back. And the ones that don’t, I’ll do everything in my power to make sure that they have trouble living in the future.”

That comment too was met by laughs and applause.

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Baker, former executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, hinted at a combative race to come during a question-and-answer session while addressing the monthly Republican-led First Tuesday luncheon.

The USA TODAY NETWORK - Tennessee obtained audio that was secretly recorded of Baker's speech, which was at times sarcastic but still direct in message. It captured a campaign strategist ready for a fight and defiant over GOP fundraisers who dare offer help to Bredesen, known as a centrist, over Blackburn, a firebrand conservative congressman from Williamson County.

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Baker referred to Bredesen as “Phantom Phil,” accusing him of a disappearing act on the campaign trail. Although Baker declined to discuss Blackburn’s full campaign strategy, he predicted, “I think you’ll see a lot more come out” about Bredesen.

"You’re going to see a very good controversy,” he said, a “very big contrast.”

He did not elaborate.

Voting in the Aug. 2 Republican and Democratic primaries for the U.S. Senate begins Friday, but both Blackburn and Bredesen face nominal opposition. The general election is Nov. 6.

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Polls have shown a tight race in a state where Democrats haven’t won a Senate race since 1990.

Baker made a boxing ring analogy while discussing how to win U.S. Senate races, saying you must force the opponent, in this case Bredesen, in the corner.

“They’re going to try and, you know, tell voters, ‘Oh, I’m OK with Trump on this,’” he said.

“We’re going to make sure that he is in a corner, and we are going to constantly punch him in his face over and over and over again. This race will not be won by death by a thousand cuts. It’s going to be death by 10,000 cuts. But at the end of the day, the oxygen will be taken out of the room, and he will not survive come election night.”

Baker, a former Marine and Nashville native who is credited with helping Republicans expand their Senate majority in 2016, is known for a hard-nosed approach to his profession and sometimes using terms from the battlefield to discuss politics.

Unclear when Blackburn will go on TV

In the race to replace retiring Republican Sen. Bob Corker, only Bredesen has paid to air television ads to this point, starting in March. His first set of ads re-introduced Bredesen, governor from 2002 to 2010, to Tennessee voters followed by another round that touches on the issue of tariffs.

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Although Baker indicated Blackburn’s upcoming televisions ads will be a turning point, he did not say when they will start airing. “We’re going to go up on TV in the next 205 days,” he told the group, while repeatedly touting Blackburn's "data-driven campaign."

Earlier this year, Corker made waves for giving only a tepid endorsement of Blackburn, and he continues to be critical of President Donald Trump.

“Look, I’ve had a lot of people ask me to speak about Sen. Corker,” Baker said. “Sen. Corker’s a friend of mine. And Sen. Corker, when I was in the Senate Committee, was great to me and bent over backwards, called, and checked in on me, and was great. And he said he’s going to vote for us. Great. There's comments he made, that yeah, I didn’t like it either.

“But at the end of the day, no one on our team ever curled up in the corner and cried. We just move forward because when you do that they’re winning.”

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He pointed to Blackburn’s fundraising haul over the course of the campaign, saying his team didn’t get there by “wringing our hands.”

“We’re going to be the first to the finish line,” he said. “And then after the finish line, we’re going to look behind us and look at who was cheering for the other people, and like I said, we’ll do whatever we can to make sure their lives are miserable after that.”

Tennessee is among a handful of states that could prove pivotal in deciding which party controls the Senate after the November midterm elections.

But Bredesen has sought to downplay the national significance as he courts much-needed Republican support in a reliably red state. Bredesen, who won all of Tennessee’s 95 counties during his 2006 reelection for governor, wants to run on his individual brand, not that of the national Democratic Party. He has said repeatedly that he’s not running against Trump.

But Blackburn has worked to tie Bredesen to Democrats in Washington. That includes an assist in March from Trump, who during a campaign rally in Nashville said Bredesen if elected would be a “tool” for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Donald Trump says Bredesen 'is a tool' at Blackburn rally President Donald Trump called Phil Bredesen, who is running for a Senate seat against Marsha Blackburn, a "tool" during his latest visit to Nashville.

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Baker made a similar case to the First Tuesday club, calling Tennessee "ground zero for the Senate majority" and that "Blue Dog Democrats are never there when you need them."

He pointed to Bredesen’s past campaign contributions to former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, saying this race is "more than Marsha Blackburn and Phil Bredesen."

“This race is about Bernie Sanders being the Budget chair,” Baker said. "This race is about Elizabeth Warren being the finance chair. This race is about Patty Murray taking the place of Sen. Lamar Alexander as health chair.

"We have an opportunity. We have an opportunity to break the Democrats’ backs.”

When asked by someone in attendance whether groups led by the conservative brothers Charles and David Koch, whose network includes Americans for Prosperity, would be getting involved in the race, Baker predicted they would.

"They're only doing what the unions have been doing for years," Baker said. "I mean, you think the SEIUs not going to work against us?

"At the end of the day, we try to figure out what we have to do to win this race on our own, and if anyone else comes in, that's great. But, will AFP be involved? Yes."

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He said Super PACs and outside groups are "part of your campaign now. And if you don't treat it that way, then you're going to lose because that's just another arm."

He also indicated that Trump would be returning to Tennessee to campaign for Blackburn but did not give a date. Vice President Mike Pence is set to appear in Chattanooga on July 21 for a campaign fundraiser.

Trump in Nashville: Marsha Blackburn joins Donald Trump on stage President Donald Trump brings Marsha Blackburn on stage at Municipal Auditorium during a fundraising rally for Blackburn's Senate campaign on Tuesday.

In an emailed statement, Bredesen campaign communications director Laura Zapata called Baker's comments from the First Tuesday luncheon "typical of the vitriol that embodies the swamp."

"Phil Bredesen is running a campaign against hyper-partisanship," she said. "The opposition’s bizarre rant just underscores why we need common sense in Washington."

Baker, in a statement, did not address his remarks and instead accused Bredesen of lying to Tennesseans.

“Phil Bredesen has the ability to self-fund, and even though he said he wasn’t going to put money in the race, he already has lied to voters about that,” Baker said. “He’s spent nearly $3 million on TV; he’s opening up 12 field offices across the state.

“We’re taking this race seriously," he said. "We are going to appropriately define Bredesen as the out-of-touch liberal he truly is, but it is going to take real work and someone who focuses in the Nashville and Memphis media markets early to do so.”

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Reach Joey Garrison at 615-259-8236, jgarrison@tennessean.com and on Twitter @joeygarrison.