Every Tuesday morning, I get email from the Cook Political Report analyzing current events. Today's email is about the Oh-02 election. I'll let the analysis speak for itself.
By Charlie Cook
Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2005
It's obvious why the national party committees hate special elections. They are volatile, unpredictable and take place outside the natural campaign rhythm -- often forcing committees to make campaign spending decisions long before they'd like. With nothing else on the ballot, voter turnout is often abysmally low, making polling particularly unreliable as it's extremely difficult to gauge just how tight to screen for likely voters. As a result, upsets are not that uncommon in special elections, and sometimes these elections can be harbingers of what's to come in the next election.
Special elections in 1993 and early 1994, for example, gave us a sneak preview of the storm clouds Democrats were headed for down the road.
In Kentucky's 2nd District, Republican Ron Lewis easily won a special election in May of 1994 to replace longtime popular Democrat Bill Natcher -- an early sign of the beating Democrats were going to take that November in southern districts across the country.
In Wisconsin, a special election in May of 1993 to replace popular Democratic Rep. Les Aspin -- who had been tapped by President Clinton to serve as secretary of Defense -- proved to be a political canary-in-a-coal-mine as well. Democrat Peter Barca beat Republican Mark Neumann by just 675 votes in a district that Aspin had easily carried for 23 years. Just a few months earlier, Aspin had crushed Neumann with 58 percent of the vote. In 1994, Neumann beat Barca by 1,120 votes.
The special election for the record books was in February 1974 in Michigan's 5th District to replace Minority Leader Gerald Ford, who had just been named vice president to replace Spiro Agnew. The 5th was as Republican (and Dutch) a district as they come, so state Sen. Robert Vanderlaan (R) was expected to easily dispatch Democrat Richard Vanderveen. But the Democrat pulled off the upset of the decade, winning 51 percent to 44 percent in a district that President Nixon had won just 15 months earlier with 61 percent. That election was a signal that the Watergate constellation of issues was so radioactive that it could beat a perfectly respectable Republican candidate even in a rock-ribbed GOP district like this one.
Will today's special election in Ohio's 2nd District be that crystal ball for 2006? On its face, this heavily Republican district sure doesn't look like it should be any sort of bellwether. President Bush's 64 percent last year suggests that any Democrat has an enormous amount of ground to cover just to break even. When Republican former state Rep. Jean Schmidt narrowly won the 12-way Republican primary on June 14, besting early favorites Hamilton County
Commissioner Pat DeWine and former Rep. Bob McEwen with 31.4 percent of the vote, it was assumed that her hard work was over. After all, the Cook Political Report 'Partisan Voting Index' rating is R+13, which means that in the combined
two-party vote in the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, this district voted 13 percentage points more Republican than the country as a whole.
Only four Democrats currently represent districts equally or more Republican as this one: Chet Edwards (Texas-17/PVI:R+18), Jim Matheson (Utah-02/PVI:R+17), Gene Taylor (Miss.-04/PVI:R+16) and Earl Pomeroy (N.D.-At Large/PVI:R+13). Democrats win districts as Republican as this one only under the strangest of circumstances, just as Republicans win comparably Democratic districts under equally odd conditions.
Democrats in Ohio's 2nd District nominated Paul Hackett, an attorney and Iraq War veteran, over four other Democratic contenders. Three times as many voters turned out in the more high-profile Republican primary (45,390) than the Democratic contest (13,774), just another sign of how overwhelmingly Republican this district is.
While some would argue that an August special election is likely to attract only the most committed voters, which in a district like this means conservative Republicans. Another argument would be that angry, disaffected voters turn out in such elections, which could mean Democrats or disillusioned Republicans. And if there is a state in the country that is causing heartburn for Republicans these days, it is Ohio. According to the Almanac of American Politics, no party has held onto the governorship in the Buckeye State for more than eight years since George K. Nash did in 1899, until current Gov. Robert Taft won in 1998, taking over for Republican George Voinovich who was elected that year to the Senate. Currently every single statewide elected office is held by a Republican, with Republicans holding a 22-11 advantage in the state Senate and a 60-39 majority in the state House.
So while the state is used to "rotating the crops" in terms of governors on eight year cycles, Ohio skipped that rotation in 1998. The state is now embroiled in a series of scandals that have rocked the governing Republican
Party, most notably one called "Coingate." Recent polls have shown that the ongoing investigation of Thomas Noe, a Republican fundraiser and coin dealer who has been accused of bilking millions from the state's Bureau of Worker's Compensation, has taken a serious toll on Taft's standing in the state. A late June Democratic poll showed Taft's approval rating at just 19 percent. That same poll showed that 50 percent of voters agreed that Republicans should be held responsible for the scandals.
Republicans are obviously watching this race closely to ascertain the level of collateral damage to the party caused by the Taft administration scandals, especially since they have an incumbent senator, Mike DeWine, up for re-election, as well as an open governors' race and potentially several vulnerable Republican congressional seats. GOP strategists involved in the campaign note that while the political environment in Ohio is not great, the president's numbers remain solid and the generic ballot test is still tilted strongly in their favor. Yet, the decision by the National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee to buy $325,000 worth of TV advertising attacking Hackett during the last week of the campaign suggests that this race is tighter than anyone thought it would be.
Hackett, not surprisingly, is taking every opportunity he can to tie Schmidt to the unpopular governor. At a debate on July 26, the Cincinnati Enquirer noted that Hackett mentioned Taft's name in the same sentence with Schmidt at least 12 times. An ad the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee started running on Friday did the same, noting that Schmidt supported Governor Taft's gas tax and "like Taft, Schmidt has been hit on ethics. She for taking gifts and meals from Columbus lobbyists."
Hackett's TV ad -- which starts with a clip of President Bush praising American soldiers at Fort Bragg this June -- highlights his service as an Iraq War veteran and helps to cloak his party ID, key in a district where John Kerry got just 36 percent of the vote. And, with Schmidt running only positive ads, Hackett was able to build up his profile among these traditionally Republican voters without consequence. It is not a surprise, therefore, that the NRCC advertising served to introduce Hackett as a "liberal Democrat" who has a history of raising and supporting tax increases.
Traditionally, a Democratic candidate running in a district like this one would have trouble raising national money. Until they went up this weekend with an approximately $200,000 ad buy, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had been on the sidelines financially. But, the growing influence of blog fundraising means that party involvement has become less important. Democracy for America (the group founded by Howard Dean and run by his brother Jim),
announced July 21 that they raised "nearly $80,000" in two days for Hackett's campaign. And, a recent Cincinnati Enquirer story noted that a group called ActBlue.com, brought in more than $300,000 over the last week to Hackett's
coffers.
Bottom line: Schmidt, the Republican, is still favored to win the election, but don't rule out the possibility of an upset, given the vagaries of August special election voter turnout and the problems unique to Ohio this year. But even assuming a GOP win tonight, the margin of victory can give us some insight into just how radioactive the governor's troubles and the "time for a change" sentiment in the state will be for other Republicans in the Buckeye State next
year. If Schmidt's victory margin is in double digits, this tells us that there is not much of an anti-GOP wind in Ohio right now. If the margin is say six to nine points for Schmidt, then there is a wind, but certainly no hurricane. A Schmidt win of less than five points should be a very serious warning sign for Ohio Republicans that something is very, very wrong, while a Hackett victorywould be a devastating blow to the Ohio GOP.
© Kos Media, LLC
Site content may be used for any purpose without
explicit permission unless otherwise specified.
Privacy Policy
Powered by Scoop.
Permalink | 79 comments