MA-Sen: Markey Won’t Run

According to the Boston Globe, Rep. Ed Markey from MA-07 won’t run in the special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat:

Markey, a Malden Democrat, said he could do more as a senior member in the House than as a freshman US senator. He has been active on global warming issues and on health care.

“I have had the honor to serve the people of the Seventh Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives for 33 years, and am now the eighth most senior Democrat,” he said in a statement. “I believe that my leadership positions and seniority in the House allow me to accomplish more for my Congressional District and for Massachusetts. I have therefore decided not to become a candidate for the Senate.

Markey’s seniority would certainly be hard to give up. Although he has the largest warchest of all the current members of the House delegation, he probably also saw only a difficult path to victory, with AG Martha Coakley with a substantial polling lead thanks to her statewide presence, and with Reps. Stephen Lynch and Michael Capuano already battling it out for Boston-area votes.

UPDATE (James): Andy Card is out, too:

Former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card (R) announced Friday night that he would not run. “Now is not the right time for me to enter a political race,” he said in a statement.

25 thoughts on “MA-Sen: Markey Won’t Run”

  1. This is a great development, and a wise decision on Mr. Markey’s part. He’s accumulated all that seniority in 30+ years, so why waste it on a Senate run?

    I bet that John Tierney from the 6th district will run alongside Coakley, Lynch and Capuano. I just have the feeling he will. Tierney is a solid progressive.

  2. Unless she does something incredibly stupid.  The only way I see her losing minus a scandal is if Lynch can consolidate all of the labor support and become a “nominal Republican” type of candidate that can attract enough GOP crossover votes due to his pro-life positions.  I don’t see that happening.

  3. He’s risen so far in the House, it just doesn’t make sense to switch this late. Ironically, he’s the one who’s been eying promotion to the Senate for the longest.  

  4. …it’s Coakley’s to lose. But, for Lynch’s sake, let’s look at some exit polling from the ’08 MA Dem Presidential Primary:

    Liberal – 59%

    Moderate – 34%

    Conservative – 7%

    So, assuming liberals pass on him, his ceiling is perhaps just a little over 1/3. Which, I doubt he could win with.

  6. Lynch is too conservative to win a Democratic primary in Massachusetts at this point. And I’m not even (only) talking about abortion; there’s plenty of history suggesting that many liberal Dems will support pro-life candidates, but only if they have a record they like on other issues. His best shot would be that he’d have the easiest time distinguishing himself from a crowded field if one were to emerge. He would have a lot less competition for the moderate-to-conservative share of the electorate than the various liberal (or liberal-to-moderate in some cases) candidates would have vs. each other.  

    Capuano’s got a pretty short period of time to introduce himself to voters outside his district. He probably hasn’t run many ads in a long time since in that district (MA-08 is the bluest district in the state by a decent margin, and that’s saying something) a Democrat don’t need to worry much about being re-elected. He seems to be someone that the true believer progressive types could get behind if they are really dissatisfied with Coakley. He’ll have a fundraising advantage on Coakley too for the structural reason that state officials like Coakley can’t use their campaign funds from state offices for federal offices.

    Although if Capuano has to seriously compete with Tierney or someone else for the attention of this community, both of them are probably sunk. And of course there’s some incentive for everyone in the House delegation to take a shot at this Senate seat right now. They don’t have to give up their seat to do it, and one of their House seats likely disappears come 2012. (My wild guess is that John Olver retires.)

    I take polls this early in the evolution of a race with a grain of salt since they are largely an exercise in name recognition.  

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