Tag: Tom Latham

(From the diaries – promoted by DavidNYC)

The U.S. Census Bureau confirmed this week that Iowa will lose a Congressional district following the 2010 census unless we experience unprecedented (for Iowa) population growth in the next two years:

During the past eight years, Iowa has gained as many people – about 76,000 – as states like South Carolina and Virginia gained between 2007 and 2008 alone.

To retain the congressional seat, the state would have to gain nearly twice that number by 2010, according to projections by Election Data Services, a Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm that analyzes the impact of demographics on politics.

So, Iowa will be left with four Congressional districts. No one knows what the new map will look like, but it’s likely that the 2012 race in the new third district will determine whether Iowa Democrats (who now hold a 3-2 edge in U.S. House seats) gain a 3-1 advantage or have to settle for a 2-2 split.  

Note: A non-partisan commission draws up the new Congressional map after each census in Iowa, so Democratic gerrymanders will not take place, even if Governor Chet Culver wins re-election in 2010 and Democrats hold their majorities in the state House and Senate.

However, if the Democrats maintain control of the legislature, they have the option of rejecting the first and/or second map produced by the non-partisan commission. Republicans in the Iowa legislature rejected the first map proposed after the last census.

Most of what’s now the fifth district, represented by Republican incumbent Steve “10 Worst” King, is likely to become the new fourth district. It makes no difference whether the new counties added to IA-04 come from the current third or fourth districts–that is going to be a safe Republican seat.

Given the voting trends in eastern Iowa, I assume the new first and second Congressional districts will still be relatively safe for Democrats. (Remember, fewer than 10 Republicans in the whole country represent districts with any kind of Democratic partisan lean.) Either Bruce Braley or Dave Loebsack may need to move if the new map throws Waterloo (Black Hawk County) in the same district as Mount Vernon (Linn County), but that should not present much of a problem.

The big question mark is what happens to IA-03. Polk County will remain the largest county in the district, but it won’t be as dominant in the new district as it is now. A majority of the votes in the current third district come from the county containing Des Moines and most of its suburbs.

In which direction will IA-03 expand? If the counties added to it come mostly from the southwest, Republicans will have a better chance of winning the district. One reason Greg Ganske beat longtime incumbent Neal Smith in the 1994 landslide was that Smith’s fourth district had lost Story and Jasper counties, and gained a lot of southwestern Iowa counties, following the 1990 census.

If IA-03 includes more counties from the southeast, Democrats would be better positioned to hold the seat, although it’s worth remembering that Ottumwa resident Mariannette Miller-Meeks carried seven southern counties in her unsuccessful challenge to Loebsack in IA-02 this year.

Speaking at an Iowa Politics forum in Des Moines last month, Miller-Meeks said she was leaving her ophthalmology practice at the end of 2008. She strongly suggested that she will run for office again. Whether that means another bid for Congress or a run for the state legislature was unclear.

Miller-Meeks has little chance of winning a district as strongly Democratic as IA-02, but I could easily see her taking on Leonard Boswell if Wapello County ends up in IA-03 after the next census. The Des Moines Register has endorsed Boswell’s challengers before and would back any credible Republican opponent against him.

The Republicans’ best chance in a third district stretching to the south, though, would be to run someone with strong Polk County connections to keep down the Democratic margins there. I don’t have any idea which Republicans have their eye on this race.

If IA-03 expands to the north, it’s good news and bad news for Democrats. Story County and Marshall County are reasonably strong territory for the party. On the down side, current fourth district incumbent Tom Latham lives in Story County. Latham is a mediocre Republican back-bencher; what else can you say about a seven-term incumbent whose big achievement on health care, according to his own campaign, was co-sponsoring a bill that never made it out of committee?

However, Latham has obviously used his position on the Appropriations Committee to build up a lot of goodwill in the district. He just won re-election by 21 points in a district Barack Obama carried by 8 percent, and he even carried Story County.

I don’t care to run Boswell or a non-incumbent Democrat (in the event of Boswell’s retirement) against Latham in a redrawn IA-03. I’m not saying Democrats couldn’t hold the seat in those circumstances, but I feel it would be a tough hold.

We would be better off electing a new, ambitious Democrat to Iowa’s third district in 2010, so we can run a rising star in the majority party against Latham, if it comes to that. Actually, we’d have been better off if Boswell had retired in 2008, allowing someone new to compete for this seat as a two-term Democratic incumbent in 2012. But what’s done is done.

Anyone think there’s a chance Boswell will reconsider his promise to run for re-election in 2010?

If Democrats still control the state legislature after 2010, should they reject the first new Congressional map suggested by the non-partisan commission if that map puts Story County in IA-03?

What kind of map would give Democrats the best chance of holding the third district?

I look forward to reading your absurdly early speculation about the 2012 races in the comments.

For those who are interested in the national implications of the post-census reapportionment, DavidNYC created a chart showing which states are likely to gain or lose Congressional districts.

Chris Bowers has already created a 2012 electoral college map, and even with one fewer electoral vote, Iowa will remain important to Obama’s re-election chances. You should click over and read the whole post yourself, but the good news is that Obama has a clear path to 270 electoral votes in 2012 even if he loses Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Indiana and North Carolina.

UPDATE: Iowa blogger John Deeth looked ahead to the 2012 Iowa races in this post last week. He concluded that in order to win three out of the four Congressional districts, Iowa Democrats will need to 1) beat Latham in 2010, and 2) get Boswell to retire in 2012. Click over to read how he reached that conclusion.  

Democrat Becky Greenwald has been low on cash the last few weeks, but her campaign bought 60 seconds of air time on the CBS and NBC affiliates in Des Moines and Mason City immediately before Barack Obama’s prime-time special on October 29.

Greenwald’s ad was outstanding and could not have been more clear about the contrast between her and incumbent Tom Latham. Click the link to watch the commercial, which made clear that Latham is a Republican who’s voted with George Bush 94 percent of the time–even more often than John McCain. Meanwhile, the ad made clear visually and in the voice-over that Becky Greenwald is a Democrat who will support Barack Obama’s policies.  

I hope they will be able to air this commercial during the final days of the campaign. Please donate to Greenwald’s campaign if you can afford to, so that more viewers will be exposed to this message. It’s much stronger than the biographical ad Greenwald was running in late September, which didn’t make much of a case against Latham.

In response to the Research 2000 poll showing a tight race in IA-04, Latham’s campaign released partial results from an internal poll showing him ahead by 22 points.

Latham’s early tv spots were positive about his record (while avoiding the Republican label). In October he started running negative ads on the bailout in heavy rotation.

We’ll find out next Tuesday if Obama’s coat-tails are enough to overcome Latham’s big edge in paid media. It’s a D+0 district where Democrats have made huge gains in voter registration in the past two years.

In related news, Time magazine says IA-04 is a “race to watch.” The political director of EMILY’s List says he is “cautiously optimistic” about Greenwald’s chances and falsely claims that EMILY’s List “came on board” for her soon after meeting with her this summer. In fact, EMILY’s List didn’t endorse Greenwald until September 16. The group has been communicating with Greenwald’s campaign but hasn’t run any ads in Iowa’s fourth district.

The Des Moines Register endorsed Greenwald today, while the Mason City Globe-Gazette endorsed Latham over the weekend.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the United Auto Workers PAC has been running a radio ad criticizing Latham for voting for tax breaks for corporations and against equal pay for women. The ad also says we need Becky Greenwald in Congress.  

Research 2000 for Daily Kos (10/20-22, likely voters):

Becky Greenwald (D): 42

Tom Latham (R-inc): 47

(MoE: ±5%)

We’re still sweeping up from the avalanche of Research 2000 polls that Daily Kos released this weekend, but although this one has been out since Saturday, I’d hate to see it slip through the cracks. IA-04, one of our true longshot races languishing down in ‘Likely R’ and not getting any DCCC love beyond R2B status, looks to be a truly competitive race.

This seems to be one of those happy confluences of a motivated challenger, a coasting incumbent, a Democratic wave year, and a swingy district (D+0). In fact, the presidential results seem odd, pointing to a possible sample problem (unless there’s a lot of ticket-splitting going on) that might suggest an even better IA-04 result: McCain leads Obama 46-42 in this district. But in a D+0 district, Obama should be breaking at least 50, based on his national numbers, and probably more, since he’s overperforming in Iowa in relation to Gore and Kerry numbers.

This is shaping up to be one of the best shots that we have where the DCCC isn’t getting involved with independent expenditures (yet), and it’s a dirt cheap district. Time to strike while the iron’s hot! (Discussion is already underway in desmoinesdem‘s diary from Saturday.)

I suspected that Republican Congressman Tom Latham’s internal polling must be showing a close race when he put up a negative tv ad on the bailout. Now the first public poll of Iowa’s fourth district is out. Research 2000 for Daily Kos found this:

Tom Latham 47

Becky Greenwald 42

undecided 11

Click the link for the internals.

Interestingly, the same poll found John McCain leading Barack Obama in the fourth district by 46 to 42 percent. Given the many polls showing Obama above the 50 percent mark in Iowa, I would have thought Obama would be leading McCain in this D+0 district.

If Greenwald is doing as well in IA-04 as Obama, then I feel really good about our chances for an upset in this district. Obama’s superior ground game could easily be worth several percentage points on election day.

Paging EMILY’s list and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee: please start spending some money on tv ads in this district! Greenwald has launched a good web ad recently, but she hasn’t been on tv for the past ten days or so.

EMILY’s List endorsed Greenwald last month, and the DCCC added her to Red to Blue in early October, but I am not aware of any independent expenditures on her behalf yet. (UPDATE: Supposedly the United Auto Workers just went up on the air with an anti-Latham radio ad, but I haven’t heard it and don’t have a transcript.)

Please donate to Greenwald if you can.

UPDATE: The DCCC  added IA-04 to the Red to Blue list on October 14 and moved IA-05 up from Races to Watch to Emerging Races.

There have been no public polls in the race between Republican incumbent Tom Latham and Becky Greenwald in Iowa’s fourth Congressional district, and neither candidate has released any results from internal polling.

However, Latham may be increasingly concerned about holding this D+0 district amid what looks like a landslide victory for Barack Obama in Iowa.

Until this week, Latham’s campaign messaging touted his record and mostly ignored his challenger. But on Monday he went negative, issuing this statement blasting Greenwald’s support for the recent bailout package. (She came out against the first bailout bill the House considered but supported the version that cleared the Senate before coming up for a House vote.)

Latham voted against both bailout bills, one of very few times he’s ever refused to support something the Bush administration wanted. For months, Greenwald has been hitting him on his lockstep Republican voting record. He is clearly grateful to have this issue to separate him from the White House and Republican leadership in Congress.

Last week Latham and Greenwald held two radio debates, and Latham brought up his no votes on the bailout at every opportunity. I commented at Bleeding Heartland that the bailout was the only thing that kept the second debate from being a rout for Greenwald.

During and after the debates, Greenwald brought up Latham’s consistent Republican voting record on lots of issues, including the deregulation of the banking sector which has contributed to the current economic problems. She also linked Latham to John McCain’s failed approach on health care reform and hammered him for supporting a privatization scheme for Social Security.

Latham denies he has backed privatizing Social Security, but to paraphrase Josh Marshall, he uses classic Republican “bamboozlement” language on this issue. He has supported private investment accounts, which could be devastating to seniors’ income in a bear market.

Greenwald has challenged Latham to televised debates as well. He declined one invitation and is dragging his feet on rescheduling an Iowa Public Television debate that was postponed while Congress was considering the bailout.

The third quarter financial reports for Latham and Greenwald are not available at Open Secrets yet. As of June 30, Latham had a big cash on hand advantage, in part because he sits on the House Appropriations Committee and in part because Greenwald had to get through a four-way Democratic primary (she won with more than 50 percent of the vote).

Greenwald’s summer fundraising must have been reasonably strong, because she went up on tv in September, got the endorsement of EMILY’s List, and was put on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Emerging Races” list.

No doubt Latham still has a money edge, because he has been advertising more extensively on tv and radio throughout the district. His first two television commercials focused on a bill he co-authored to address the nursing shortage and the need to “crack down on Wall Street greed” and help Main Street businesses.

Most House race rankings still put IA-04 in the “likely Republican” category, but this is a district to watch, especially in light of the big Democratic gains in voter registration and Obama’s double-digit statewide lead over McCain, confirmed by at least ten polls.

If Latham does hold on to his seat, I think he should send Nancy Pelosi a thank-you note. Here’s Latham’s voting record on corporate subsidies. Here’s Latham’s voting record that relates to government checks on corporate power. Here’s Latham’s voting record on corporate tax breaks in general (including sub-categories on tax breaks for the oil and gas industry and for the wealthiest individuals).

Yet despite his long record of standing with corporations rather than middle-class taxpayers, the bailout has allowed Latham to position himself this way going into the home stretch of the campaign:

“Reckless Wall Street CEO’s made a mess and they asked Iowans to pay to clean it up,” noted Latham for Congress spokesperson Matt Hinch. “Tom Latham stood up in Congress and protected Iowans by twice voting no on this massive Wall Street bailout. Tom Latham believes that, as a matter of principle, it is wrong to spend hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to reward, benefit and bailout those on Wall Street who created this mess.”

Highlights of Becky Greenwald’s endorsed Wall Street bailout plan includes:

* The largest corporate welfare proposal in U.S. history all at taxpayer expense;

* Gives the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, and Wall Street veteran and former Goldman Sachs CEO, Henry Paulson a no-strings checkbook with $700 billion in taxpayer funds to spend as he sees fit;

* The Washington Post reports that there is a strong possibility of conflicts of interest, since the same companies who created the mess on Wall Street will, “be managing the assets while also selling their own troubled securities to the government.”;

* Taxpayer funded pork in the bill included tax breaks for rum, sports entities, television and the manufacturer of wooden arrows for children;

* And, no guarantee by Secretary Paulson that his plan will actually work.

“Becky Greenwald would reward the same greedy CEO’s who caused this crisis,” continued Hinch. “Becky Greenwald would spend $700 billion of Iowans’ money to fix Wall Street mistakes and greed. No accountability and no guarantee it will even work. It’s clear that Iowans can’t trust Becky Greenwald with our tax dollars.”

I don’t know whether this tactic will work for Latham, but I do know that if he were very confident, he would be sticking to a positive message.

Growing up liberal during the Reagan years taught me to go into elections expecting to be disappointed. Watching high-ranking Democrats in Congress fail to challenge the premise behind the dreadful and unnecessary proposed bailout of Wall Street, I share thereisnospoon’s concern that Democrats will snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yet again.

But looking at the polling trends in the presidential race and in key Senate races, even a pessimist like me has to admit that a big Democratic wave seems quite possible.

Currently Democrats seem poised to pick up 12 to 18 seats in the House and five to six Senate seats. If we are on the verge of a wave, Democrats could win more than that, including a few districts where the Republican incumbent never saw it coming.

Waves can drag down well-funded incumbents with tremendous clout. Democratic losers in 1994 included House Speaker Tom Foley and my own 18-term Congressman Neal Smith.

This is a thread for discussing House districts and Senate seats that may seem likely Republican holds today, but which could shock us on November 4.  

I’ll get the ball rolling by telling you about Iowa’s two House districts currently held by Republicans.

In the fourth district (D+0), Becky Greenwald faces Tom Latham, who has remarkably little to show for his seven terms in Congress. I went over many reasons I think Greenwald can win this race here.

Latham understands that it will be a big Democratic year in Iowa, judging from his first television commercial (which glosses over his lockstep Republican voting record). David Kowalski noticed that Latham’s campaign website avoids mentioning that he is a Republican (see, for instance, this bio page). Aside from the odd newspaper clipping on his site that refers to him as R-Iowa, you would never be able to tell which party he belongs to.

IA-04 shows up as “likely Republican” on House rankings, in part because Latham sits on the House Appropriations Committee and in part because he has been re-elected by double-digit margins in the past. However, 2002 was the only time Latham faced a well-funded challenger, and that was a bad year to be a Democrat running for Congress. Greenwald had raised more by June 30 than our 2006 candidate against Latham raised during his whole campaign, and she’s fundraised aggressively since then. She is already up on television and recently got the endorsement of EMILY’s list.

Whatever pork Latham has brought back to his district is nothing compared to what Neal Smith brought to central Iowa during his 36 years in Congress, and that didn’t stop voters from giving Smith the boot in 1994.

Now let’s look at Iowa’s fifth district (R+8), where Rob Hubler is running against one of the most atrocious House Republicans, Steve King. I laid out my case for why Hubler can win this race at Bleeding Heartland, but here are the highlights.

Hubler is the first Democrat to run a real campaign against King, who does not have a big war chest and has not been campaigning actively. Although Republicans maintain a voter registration edge in IA-05, Democrats have made big gains since 2006, putting Hubler in position for an upset if he wins independents by a significant margin. King’s extreme views and tendency to make bigoted, embarrassing statements are a turn-off to moderates.

Also, an internal poll of the district for Hubler’s campaign showed the generic ballot for Congress virtually tied at 36 percent for the Democrat and 38 percent for the Republican.

Nearly three months ago, the editor of the Storm Lake Times newspaper wrote:

Republican despondence also may be a threat to incumbent Rep. Steve King, R-Kiron. Scoff if you will, but again recall that Harkin defeated incumbent Bill Scherle and Bedell knocked off incumbent Wiley Mayne in the post-Watergate landslide. The atmospherics may be similar this year.

Like I said at the top, upsets happen in wave elections. After winning in 1974, Tom Harkin represented most of the southwest Iowa counties now in IA-05 for five terms, until his election to the U.S. Senate in 1984. Berkley Bedell represented most of the northwest Iowa counties now in IA-05 for six terms, until he retired because of health problems caused by Lyme’s disease.

Despite Sarah Palin’s presence on the ballot, I do not believe Republicans in western Iowa are going to be fired up to turn out this November. During the past month five separate polls have shown Barack Obama above 50 percent in Iowa and leading John McCain by double digits. McCain has never campaigned much in Iowa, skipping the caucuses in 2000 as well as 2008. He’s against ethanol subsidies, which causes him to underperform in rural Iowa. Certainly McCain lacks the appeal George Bush had to conservatives here in the last two elections.

Harkin is cruising against a little-known Republican challenger for the U.S. Senate, and King is not giving his supporters any reason to believe he’s concerned about Hubler. Why should the western Iowa wingnuts put a lot of effort into getting their voters out?

Meanwhile, Obama’s campaign has at least half a dozen field offices in both IA-04 and IA-05 to drive up turnout among Democrats and other Democratic-leaning voters.

Clearly, Greenwald and Hubler go into the home stretch as underdogs. But who thought Dave Loebsack was going to beat Iowa Congressman Jim Leach two years ago? Democrats put tons of money and effort behind a strong challenger to Leach in 2002 and came up short. As a result, Loebsack got no help from the DCCC or outside interest groups in 2006, and just about everyone viewed IA-02 as “likely Republican.”

Carol Shea-Porter’s amazing victory in New Hampshire’s first district seemed just as improbable two years ago. She was massively outspent by the Republican incumbent and got no help from the DCCC. By the way, NH-01 is D+0 and mostly white, as is IA-04.

The partisan lean and demographic profile of IA-05 (mostly white and largely rural) is similar to KS-02 (R+7), where Nancy Boyda came from behind to beat a Republican incumbent in 2006. The DCCC did get involved in that race, but it didn’t appear to be a very likely pickup before the election.

Two weeks ago Stuart Rothenberg mocked the DCCC for putting “absurd races” (including the Hubler-King matchup) on its list of “Races to Watch” and putting long shots on the “Red to Blue” and “Emerging Races” list. James L. already took down Rothenberg in this great post, so I won’t pile on.

I will say, however, that I have put my money where my mouth is by giving as much as I can afford to Hubler and Greenwald.

Somewhere, somehow, some unheralded challengers will give House or Senate Republicans the surprise of their lives on November 4. I ask the Swing State Project community, who’s it gonna be?

cross-posted at Bleeding Heartland

If you were a loyal Republican foot-soldier seeking re-election in a state that’s trending Democratic, where the Democratic presidential candidate has a commanding lead over your party’s nominee as well as a much bigger ground game in your own Congressional district, you might want to reinvent yourself.

Late last week, Tom Latham did just that in his first television commercial of this election cycle. You can view the ad at Latham’s campaign website. It focuses on a bill Latham introduced to address the nursing shortage in Iowa.

Judging from the content of this ad, Latham recognizes that 2008 will be a big Democratic year in Iowa.

Neither the commercial nor the campaign’s accompanying press release mention that Latham is a Republican. Instead, they note that he authored “bipartisan legislation” in a specific area.

Polls typically give Democrats an edge on handling health care and education. Even someone watching this ad with the sound turned down can see that Latham is portraying himself as sensitive to these issues. Here are the words that flash on the screen during the commercial:

Nursing Shortage (footage of ambulance with siren, nurse alongside patient on stretcher)

Iowa Faces Severe Nursing Shortage (hospital scenes)

Bipartisan Legislation (Latham sitting and writing)

Help Nurses Repay Education Loans (nurse with patients)

Tom Latham (as he talks with one of the nurses quoted in the ad)

In addition, Latham’s ad features three testimonials from nurses. One of them is “nurse practitioner Linda Upmeyer,” wearing a white nurse’s coat with a stethoscope around her neck, who says, “Tom has done a wonderful job of hearing the need and translating that into legislation.” Conveniently, the ad fails to identify Upmeyer as the Republican state representative from Iowa House district 12.  

The press release announcing Latham’s television ad is even more blatant about running away from the Republican label. It describes Latham as “bipartisan” twice and notes that he “teamed up with Wisconsin Democratic Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin to introduce this bill in the United States Congress.”

I never thought I’d see the day when the conservative Republican Latham would brag about working with Baldwin, who is openly gay and has one of the most progressive voting records in Congress. Latham’s voting record as a whole could hardly be more different from Baldwin’s.

Not only does Latham’s ad avoid mentioning his party affiliation, it seems designed to address the gender gap by having a female voice-over and three women nurses do almost all of the talking. The only male voice you hear is Latham’s at the very end, saying “I’m Tom Latham, and I approved this message.”

Democratic candidates tend to do better among women, and the disparity may be even greater this year in IA-04. Becky Greenwald is giving Iowans the chance to send a woman to Congress for the first time.

One clever feature of this ad is that it implies Latham has delivered for Iowa’s nurses, without mentioning whether the bill he authored has any chance of becoming law. The wording of the press release suggests that the bill has not advanced:

Latham teamed up with Iowa nursing and health care professionals through numerous roundtables around the state to listen to their unique perspective and input on what was needed. He then wrote legislation and teamed up with Wisconsin Democratic Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin to introduce the bill in the United States Congress.

You would think that someone who spent 14 years in Congress (12 of them as part of a Republican majority) would be able to point to some concrete achievement on behalf of nurses or in the area of health care.

Instead, the Latham campaign talks about his “trusted leadership” on the nursing shortage, when he has nothing to show for this “leadership” other than writing one bill that went nowhere.

By the way, Latham signaled last week that he is not willing to defend the totality of his record in a public forum. He declined an invitation from KCCI-TV and the Des Moines Register to debate Greenwald during prime-time television. Latham also refused invitations to debate in August.

In a debate, Latham might have to explain why he talks about helping nurses repay their student loans in his commercial, when he voted for enormous cuts to federal student loan programs in 2005 and 2006.

As a challenger, Greenwald has lower name recognition than Latham, and understandably used her first television ad to introduce herself to voters. With Latham avoiding debates and using skillful image construction to conceal his ineffectiveness, I believe Greenwald will need to run some television ads that spell out why she is seeking to replace “Iowa’s low-yield Congressman.”

UPDATE: The Greenwald campaign responded to this ad with a statement exposing Latham’s real record on health care.  

UPDATE: On September 16 EMILY’s List announced their endorsement of two more Congressional challengers: Becky Greenwald in IA-04 (D+0) and Sharen Neuhardt in OH-07 (R+6).



Maybe someone out there who knows the inner workings of EMILY’s List can explain to me why this group has not put money behind Becky Greenwald, the Democrat challenging loyal Republican foot-soldier Tom Latham in Iowa’s fourth Congressional district.

I have been going over the list of Democratic women running for Congress whom EMILY’s List is supporting, with a particular focus on the six challengers most recently added to this group in early August. I do not mean to denigrate any of those candidates, and I recognize that every race has its own dynamic.

However, after comparing Greenwald’s race to those of other candidates, I remain puzzled that EMILY’s list is not more involved in IA-04.

Follow me after the jump for more.

First things first: IA-04 has a Cook Partisan Voting Index of D+0. Since 2004, every Congressional district in Iowa has seen big gains in Democratic voter registration, which surged in connection with this year’s presidential caucuses. For the first time since Iowa’s districts were last redrawn, IA-04 now has more registered Democrats than Republicans.

Democrats have an advantage in the generic Congressional ballot nationwide, but what may be more relevant for this district is Barack Obama’s big lead over John McCain in Iowa (double-digits according to the two most recent polls). The Obama campaign’s enormous ground game in Iowa will be working in Greenwald’s favor too. Her staffers and volunteers seem pleased with the level of coordination between the campaigns’ turnout efforts.

Turning to Greenwald as a candidate, you can see from her bio that she has strong roots in the district as well as experience in the business world and a history of volunteering for causes including the Iowa Democratic Party. She dominated the four-way Demomcratic primary on June 3, winning over 50 percent of the vote. As of June 30, she had raised about $143,000 for her campaign but had only about $82,000 cash on hand because of her competitive primary.

Several Iowa political analysts observed this summer that Greenwald can beat Tom Latham if she can raise enough money to compete. Latham serves on the House Appropriations Committee and was sitting on more than $800,000 cash on hand as of June 30. Then again, plenty of well-funded incumbents have lost seats in Congress when facing a big wave toward the other party. Cook has this race as likely R, but I would consider it lean R. There have been no public polls on the race yet.

The current reporting period ends September 30. I don’t have inside information about Greenwald’s cash on hand now, but I know she has been aggressively fundraising all summer long. I assume things have gone fairly well on that front, because the DCCC just put IA-04 on its “Emerging Races” list. One thing working in Greenwald’s favor is that the Des Moines and Mason City markets, which cover most of the 28 counties in the district, are not too expensive for advertising. So, she can be up on the air for several weeks, even though she clearly won’t be able to match Latham dollar for dollar.

Side note: Shortly after the Democratic primary in IA-04, the sore loser who finished third vowed to run for Congress as an independent. However, he quickly turned his attention to the fight against Iowa’s new smoking ban. He then failed to submit petitions to qualify for the ballot, took down his Congressional campaign website and reportedly moved to Florida. In other words, he won’t be a factor in November.

Why should EMILY’s list get involved in this race? Not only is Greenwald a good fit for the district, she is pro-choice whereas Latham has a perfect zero rating on votes related to abortion rights.

As a bonus, Greenwald has the potential to end Iowa’s disgrace as one of only two states that have never sent a woman to Congress or elected a woman governor.

Now, I will briefly examine the six candidates for U.S. House whom EMILY’s list most recently endorsed. As I said earlier, I don’t mean to knock any of these candidates, but I do question why these districts would be considered more winnable than IA-04.

1. Anne Barth. She is running against incumbent Shelley Moore Capito in West Virginia’s second district (R+5, somewhat more Republican than IA-04). Cook has this race as lean R, Swing State Project sees it as likely R. As of June 30, Barth had about $353,000 cash on hand, compared to more than $1.2 million for Capito. My understanding is that this district is quite expensive for advertising because of its proximity to Washington, DC.

2. Sam Bennett. She is running against incumbent Charlie Dent in Pennsylvania’s 15th Congressional District (D+2, slightly more Democratic than IA-04). Cook and Swing State Project both rate this race as likely R, although Chris Bowers is optimistic given the partisan lean of the district. As of June 30, Bennett had just under $354,000 cash on hand, compared to about $687,000 for Dent.

3. Jill Derby. She is running against incumbent Dean Heller, who beat her in the 2006 election to represent Nevada’s second district (R+8, markedly more Republican than IA-04). It’s not too uncommon for Congressional candidates to win on their second attempt, but Cook and Swing State Project both view this district as likely R. As of June 30, Derby had about $314,000 cash on hand, while Heller had just over $1 million in the bank.

4. Judy Feder. This is another rematch campaign, as incumbent Frank Wolf beat Feder by a comfortable margin in 2006 in Virginia’s 10th Congressional District (R+5). Again, Cook and Swing State Project agree that this is a likely R district. As of June 30, Feder was doing quite well in the money race with about $812,000 cash on hand, not too far behind Wolf’s $849,000.

5. Annette Taddeo. She is running against incumbent Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in Florida’s 18th Congressional District (R+4). Cook and Swing State Project both rank this district as likely R. Taddeo made a great impression on people at Netroots Nation and had just under $444,000 in the bank on June 30, while the incumbent reported nearly $1.9 million.

6. Victoria Wulsin. In 2006, she fell just short against incumbent “Mean Jean” Schmidt in Ohio’s second district (R+13). Granted, Schmidt is ineffective as an incumbent, which is probably why Swing State Project has this in the lean R category (it’s likely R according to Cook). Wulsin also had about $378,000 in the bank on June 30, compared to about $390,000 for Schmidt. Still, this is a markedly more Republican district than IA-04.

I understand that EMILY’s List does not have unlimited resources, but I still find it surprising that they have not jumped in to support Greenwald. A little money goes a long way in the Mason City and Des Moines media markets.

If you want to help send her to Congress, go here and give what you can. September 15 is her birthday, by the way.

I look forward to reading your comments about EMILY’s list or any of these Congressional races.

cross-posted in slightly different form at Bleeding Heartland

Congressman Tom Latham is a conservative Republican representing a swing (D+0) district. He has a lot more money in the bank than Democratic candidate Becky Greenwald, but Iowa political observers think this race could be very competitive.

Today Latham opened up his war chest to start running statewide radio ads touting his advocacy of more oil drilling in the U.S.

Follow me after the jump for more.

Iowa Politics has this press release from Latham’s campaign about

a statewide radio ad highlighting Latham’s work to lower gas and energy prices for Iowa families.

The sixty second ad reinforces Latham’s continued commitment to renewable energy but also discusses the need for Congress to work immediately to increase domestic energy supplies that America controls.

“$4.00 a gallon gas hurts Iowa families,” notes Latham in the ad. “And they’re frustrated with leaders in Congress for not doing more about it – and they have every right to be.”

“I have always been, and will continue to be, a strong supporter of alternative energy research and production, but we need to work for solutions that get Iowans from point A to point B without busting their family budget.”

Latham has been working in Congress on legislation aimed at increasing our domestic supply of affordable that will lower gas and energy prices through the increased use of our current resources, to include off-shore drilling and drilling in ANWR.

Latham recently told Iowa Independent that Republicans can ride high gas prices to victory this November. It’s not clear to me why this is a big selling point for the GOP–shouldn’t they have been doing something to reduce our dependence on foreign oil during the years Republicans controlled Congress as well as the presidency?

Anyway, some Republicans clearly believe that this issue will save them from an otherwise hostile political environment. Last week John McCain started running a television ad blaming Barack Obama for high gas prices because Obama opposes more offshore oil drilling.

The rapid response from Becky Greenwald’s campaign points out the various misleading aspects of Latham’s radio ad:

For Immediate Release                                                                      Contact: Erin Seidler

July 29, 2008                                                                                                         515-537-4465

Latham Runs Misleading Ad on Drilling To Divert From Votes Against Immediate Gas Price Relief

Waukee, IA – This week, Tom Latham’s campaign released a radio ad misleading voters about offshore drilling. Experts agree that offshore drilling will do nothing to lower gas prices for seven to ten years, and its clear that this ad is a diversion from Latham’s votes against opening the Strategic Petroleum Reserves and forcing oil companies to drill on existing leases. (McClatchy, 6/18/08)

“I’m running for Congress because of these sort of shenanigans. Latham is trying to get Iowans to think about leasing 2,000 more acres when 68 million acres already leased are open, untapped and will lower prices. Latham is trying to divert attention from his failure to support immediate relief through opening the Strategic Petroleum Reserves and forcing oil companies to drill on existing leases,” said Becky Greenwald, Candidate for Congress in Iowa’s 4th District. “Is it too much to ask for leaders to be honest with us?”



Unfortunately, Latham, like George Bush decided to play politics with gas prices. Last week, he voted against a bill that would release 70 million barrels of oil from the strategic oil reserve to bring relief from high gas prices. This bill would bring almost immediate relief to high gas prices. (H. Res. 6578)

And two weeks ago, Latham voted against a bill to force oil companies to drill on existing leases. There are 68 million acres of federal land already leased by oil companies. That is two times the size of the state of Iowa available for energy production that is now sitting idle. (H.R. 615)

Instead, Democrats in Congress and Becky Greenwald are fighting for a comprehensive energy policy that includes in the short term, opening the Strategic Petroleum Reserves and forcing oil companies to drill on almost 68 million acres of existing leases.

In the long term, Becky will fight to invest in a green energy industry here in Iowa by investing in ethanol, wind energy, biodiesel, and other homegrown, alternative forms of energy.

“I know that investing in renewable fuels will reduce our reliance on foreign oil and bring down gas prices and create thousands if not hundreds of thousands of jobs in rural America, including Iowa’s 4th District,” Greenwald continued. “It’s time for a solution, not diversion tactics.”

The bolded passages were bold in the original, by the way.

Latham’s advocacy of more oil drilling will do nothing to solve our energy problems. Even the president of the Teamsters Union, which has long supported increased oil drilling in the U.S., declared last week that

“We must find a long-term approach that breaks our dependence on foreign oil by investing in the development of alternate energy sources like solar, wind and geothermal power.”

Furthermore, public opinion on this matter may not be where Latham thinks it is. The polling firm Rasmussen says the public is divided on whether more drilling is the answer:

A new Rasmussen Reports national survey, taken last night (Monday), finds that 45% think placing more restrictions on energy speculators is more important , while 42% take the opposite view that allowing offshore oil drilling is more important.

A major partisan divide on the issue, like the split in Congress, is evident, however. Sixty-seven percent (67%) of Republicans say lifting the ban is the highest priority, while 59% of Democrats – and 48% of unaffiliated voters — say controlling speculators is more important. Only 29% of unaffiliateds say lift the ban first.

Unaffiliated or “no-party” voters have a slim plurality among registered voters in Iowa’s fourth district, and there are about 8,000 more Democrats than Republicans in the district.

If Rasmussen’s findings are accurate, it seems that Latham is out of step with his district on this issue.

If you reject Latham’s misleading spin on energy policy, please donate to Greenwald’s campaign to help her respond on the air. She has a lot going for her in this race and a real chance to win if she raises enough money to get her message out. Remember, the fourth district has a partisan index of D+0.

Final note: Latham’s press release says the radio ad is running statewide. That’s a lot more expensive than just running the ad in fourth district markets.

Is he trying to raise his profile outside his district to pave the way for a gubernatorial bid in 2010? If he loses to Greenwald, he could start campaigning for governor immediately. But even if he wins re-election, serving in Congress isn’t much fun when you’re in the minority party.