Afternoon Fix: NRCC ‘putting resources’ into New York

The NRCC is feeling bullish in New York, Rick Perry is headed into enemy territory, Mitt Romney is going to South Carolina and Obama is going on tour.

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WHAT YOU MIGHT HAVE MISSED:

* National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Pete Sessions said today that national Republicans “are putting resources” in the race for the seat formerly held by Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), although the Texas Republican declined several times to say how much the committee is investing in the race. “The National Republican Congressional Committee is involved in the race in New York. ... I have been engaged in this race since June 21 or 22,” Sessions told reporters at the Capitol Friday afternoon. He praised businessman Bob Turner (R) as “an outstanding candidate” and took aim at Assemblyman David Weprin (D) as “a candidate who cannot come within $10 trillion of the national debt.” Asked about the surge in support for Turner among Jewish voters, Sessions said that there has been “a good response from a large Jewish population.”

* While former Utah governor Jon Huntsman scales back in Florida, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is scaling up. He’s participating in the state’s Sept. 24th straw poll, and he’s named three to his Florida team — Nick Hansen as state director, Bret Prater as political director, and Anthony Bustamante as a grassroots adviser. Hansen ran Perry’s Tampa Bay field operation in 2008.

* Perry will enter enemy territory next Tuesday — Massachusetts. The Texas governor, who said in his book that “I would no more consider living in Massachusetts than I suspect a great number of folks from Massachusetts would like to live in Texas,” will be speaking to a dinner for the conservative Pioneer Institute.

* Former Missouri Sen.  John Danforth  (R) says he won’t run for governor in 2012 and is fully behind Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder (R), another sign that the later is still running despite a rash of scandalous stories about his decades-ago relationship with a stripper, a story that came to light when a local alt-weekly published a recent photo of the two together at a bar.

* A federal judge today upheld Florida’s constitutional amendment demanding fair redistricting, a blow to both Republicans and black Democrats who have benefited from gerrymandering in the state. Two lawmakers, one from each party, argued that only the legislature could control mapmaking. The amendment was approved by referendum last fall.

WHAT YOU SHOULDN’T MISS:

* President Obama is going on tour next week in support of the American Jobs Act, the jobs bill he proposed in a joint address to Congress Thursday night. He’ll be in Columbus, Ohio on Tuesday and the Raleigh-Durham area on Wednesday. He stumped for the plan in Richmond, Virginia today. He’s releasing more specific details on the plan a week from Monday.

* Fresh off questioning the 2012 Republican candidates, NBC News’ Brian Williams is interviewing Obama. Segments of the sit-down will air Sunday, as part of coverage of the tenth anniversary of Sept. 11th, and Monday.

* Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney is headed to South Carolina on Monday to tour Boeing’s North Charleston plant and speak on labor relations. He plans to say that unions aren’t inherently bad, but that organized labor needs to be kept in check. The National Labor Relations Board has blocked Boeing from moving a plant to South Carolina — an issue very important to Gov. Nikki Haley (R), who endorsed Romney in 2008.

* Former Florida Democratic party communications director Eric Jotkoff has been hired on by the Obama campaign team as Florida press secretary. Jotkoff, a native Floridian, worked for now-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2008.

THE FIX MIX:

Be more like dogs, everyone.

With Rachel Weiner and Aaron Blake