IA-Gov: Early Republican reaction to Branstad’s move

Terry Branstad shook up the Iowa governor’s race yesterday when he formed an exploratory committee headed by Mary Andringa, the CEO of Pella’s Vermeer Corporation. (Republican power-brokers tried and failed to recruit Andringa to run for governor earlier this year.)

Election-watchers like the Swing State Project and Campaign Diaries bloggers immediately recognized that Branstad is the toughest potential challenger for Governor Chet Culver. But some Iowa Republicans have doubts about going back to the future:

Drew Ivers, a longtime social conservative Republican leader, said some party activists object to the growth in the state budget during Branstad’s tenure. The budget Branstad approved in 1983, his first year in office, included $2.05 billion in general fund spending. In 1998, his last year in office, he approved general fund spending of $4.5 billion.

“The party needs to get back to the Goldwater definition of conservative: that which governs least governs best,” said Ivers, of Webster City, who is uncommitted in the race. […]

Branstad brings many assets, but not a fresh face, noted Roger Hughes, a longtime Iowa Republican strategist.

“I would be hard-pressed to vote against my friend Terry Branstad, but I think we need some new folks,” said Hughes. “I’m not sure him running is good for the party.”

The Republican primary field will narrow if and when Branstad formally becomes a candidate, but no one dropped out in response to yesterday’s news. Updates on the other Republican gubernatorial candidates are after the jump.

State Representative Chris Rants confirmed what we all suspected: he’s staying in the race, and the Branstad recruitment talk has hurt his fundraising efforts. He also wasted no time in laying out one of the strongest arguments against Branstad: “I think it’s a mistake for Republicans to nominate somebody who ran up budget deficits, played all kinds of financial games and raised taxes.”

Bob Vander Plaats’ campaign spokesman, Eric Woolson, told Charlotte Eby that Vander Plaats is “in the race until the end, and this certainly doesn’t change anything from our perspective.”

State Senator Jerry Behn will wait and see before deciding whether to end his candidacy, which never looked all that credible to me.

State Representative Rod Roberts also is holding off on ending his gubernatorial bid for now. I can’t see a path to the nomination for Roberts even if Branstad decides not to run in the end, but I do agree with one thing Roberts said yesterday: “This is a very different political environment, and it’s a different state and a different country than it was during the years when governor Branstad served.”

Iowa Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley confirmed that he will drop out if and when Branstad becomes a candidate. He noted that the Branstad speculation “put everything in limbo” for other candidates trying to raise money and early support. For what it’s worth, I haven’t seen evidence that McKinley even tried to launch a real campaign.

Branstad’s candidacy puts Christian Fong in an awkward position. He crafted a campaign narrative about restoring Iowa values, but Branstad is the ultimate “restoration” candidate. Fong has tried to make a virtue of his lack of political experience, but his resume looks even lighter when compared to a former governor. He raised some big money in July, but the draft Branstad effort must have hurt his campaign receipts, and his first radio ad may have drained his campaign account.

Speaking to Eby yesterday,

Fong, who has been on a 17-city campaign tour this week, said Republicans should have a choice of candidates.

“It’s not only good for Iowans to have a choice, but it makes for a healthier process to have a good dialogue about the ideas,” Fong said.

Vander Plaats and Rants will be taking the fight to Branstad, but for now Fong is keeping his powder dry. He could play nice in the hope of becoming Branstad’s running mate, but Branstad might already have someone else in mind for that job.

We never did learn who was behind that YouTube claiming there’s no difference between Branstad and Culver. In recent weeks the creator of that piece posted another video on Branstad, set to the “Time Warp” song from Rocky Horror Picture Show:

In addition, this short clip indicates that the Draft Branstad PAC sent a cease and desist letter to creator of the “Terry and Chet” videos:

Final note: if Branstad wins and serves a full term, he will be among the longest-serving governors in U.S. history. However, his 20 years as governor of Iowa would fall just short of George Clinton’s 21 years as governor of New York from 1777 to 1795 and 1801 to 1804.

IA-Gov: Roundup of recent news

It’s been a while since I posted a diary here about the Iowa governor’s race, so I’m catching up today after the jump.

Governor Chet Culver said this summer that he’d be “cranking up” his campaign operations soon, and last week the governor hired Andrew Roos to run his re-election campaign and Jesse Harris as deputy campaign manager. Jason Hancock has background on Roos and Harris at Iowa Independent.

Republican candidate Christian Fong, a Cedar Rapids flood recovery leader, claims Culver hasn’t done enough on flood recovery (more on that here). Illogically, Fong also opposes the I-JOBS state bonding program, which has allocated $45 million to flood recovery projects in Linn County alone. (Click here and here for a more detailed look at the Obama-like campaign narrative Fong is building.)

The Republican front-runner (for now), Bob Vander Plaats, held a few events around Iowa on Labor Day to officially announce his candidacy. In keeping with his tendency to advocate unworkable policies, he pushed another off-beat idea. Instead of just criticizing Culver’s I-JOBS state bonding program, like every other Republican does, Vander Plaats says that if elected, he would try to pay back the bonds during his first term (you can read the Vander Plaats press release here). State Treasurer Michael Fitzgerald, a Democrat, and State Representative Chris Rants, a rival Republican gubernatorial candidate, agree that the Vander Plaats idea is unworkable.

Meanwhile, Vander Plaats is promising not to balance his ticket with a less-conservative running mate:

“I’m not looking to balance the ticket with somebody who’s moderate or liberal or who doesn’t believe in those core values like I do,” he said. The core values, he noted, include believing in a right to life and that marriage should be between one man and one woman.

He didn’t mention former Gov. Terry Branstad, but the inference was clear – the former governor chose pro-choice Republican Joy Corning as his running mate.

Lest anyone get too impressed by Branstad’s ticket-balancing, Rekha Basu reminded me recently that Branstad endorsed the inept Jim Ross Lightfoot over the highly capable Corning in the 1998 GOP gubernatorial primary. Also, when one of Lieutenant Governor Corning’s annual diversity conferences included a workshop on workplace discrimination, Branstad sided with an anti-gay crusader who attacked the workshop.

Establishment Republicans have been trying to recruit Branstad since two Republican-commissioned polls taken in July showed him leading Culver in a hypothetical matchup. The Iowa Republican blog’s poll, in the field the first week of July, had Branstad ahead of Culver 53-37. Hill Research Consultants did a poll for the 527 group Iowa First Foundation later in July and found Branstad ahead of Culver 53-34.

Branstad has said he’ll announce in October whether he plans to run next year, but it looks increasingly likely that he’ll jump in. Since he’s not a candidate yet, he can’t raise or spend money on the race. Enter the “Draft Branstad” political action committee that former State Representative Sandy Greiner launched at the beginning of September. They’re collecting signatures on a petition at draftbranstad.com. They’ve been advertising on The Drudge Report, one of the highest-traffic conservative websites. Draft Branstad flyers were distributed at Saturday’s Iowa/Iowa State football game. They’re running a 60-second radio ad statewide. Among other things, the flyers and radio ad praise Branstad for his “fiscal discipline” and balancing the budget. That’s quite the revisionist history lesson.

I’m enjoying the @draftBranstad Twitter feed, which periodically reprises the great one’s profound words: “My passion for our state has grown with every day I have served it.” Branstad 1/13/98″; “This spirit of neighbor helping neighbor is as Iowan as the tall corn we grow.” -TEB 1/9/96

Des Moines Register Marc Hansen wrote last week that “coming back could be the biggest mistake of [Branstad’s] life.” Highlights:

The best Branstad could do in 1994 against fellow Republican Fred Grandy was talk about how Rep. Gopher wasn’t a real Iowan. […]

The further removed from office he gets, the more popular he becomes. In February 1997, not long before Branstad reaffirmed his decision not to run for a fifth term, the Iowa Poll said 55 percent of Iowa adults believed Branstad should not seek another term in 1998. Thirty-five percent said he should. The other 10 percent were unsure.

The minute he wasn’t running, his numbers started climbing.

I don’t even want to get into Richard Johnson, the state auditor who supported Grandy in ’94 because of the way he said Branstad was keeping the books.

Incidentally, Richard Johnson is co-chairing the Vander Plaats campaign. We’ll probably be hearing more from him if Branstad enters the gubernatorial race, as most political observers now expect. For a preview of other arguments rival Republicans are likely to make against Branstad, see here and here.

Branstad didn’t turn up at the Iowa Family Policy Center Action’s fundraiser on September 12, but four others in the Republican field attended. For some reason, State Senator Jerry Behn wasn’t there, despite recently forming an exploratory committee for a gubernatorial bid. Iowa Senate minority leader Paul McKinley didn’t attend the Iowa Family Policy Center’s event either, but that’s par for the course for him since he claimed to be “aggressively” exploring a campaign for governor.

Vander Plaats was on friendly turf at the Iowa Family Policy Center event, easily winning the straw poll with 63 percent of the votes. (Fong and Rants finished a distant second and third.) The Vander Plaats plan to stop gay marriage on day one as governor is a hit with that crowd. Vander Plaats also also promised not to expand gambling and to put representatives for parochial schools and home-schoolers on the State Board of Education.

Rants usually talks about the budget and taxes in his stump speeches, but he adapted his pitch for the Iowa Family Policy Center event, referring to moments of personal prayer as well as his efforts to bring a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage to the Iowa House floor. Rants also

acknowledged that there’s not a lot of space separating Republican candidates on the issues.

But honesty will be important, he said. That might be difficult in the primary, he said, noting that some of the things he’s said in the past few weeks have made some people uncomfortable. He did not give more explanation, but in the past few weeks, he’s called into question Bob Vander Plaats’ portrayal of himself as a CEO who’s been a turnaround artist. Rants released tax returns that appear to show deteriorating finances at a nonprofit organization that Vander Plaats led.

“If we’re going to ask Iowans to trust us,” candidates have to lead by example, he said.

I can’t see any way Rants gets the nomination. I don’t even know of another state legislator who’s endorsing him, which is remarkable given that he used to be Iowa House speaker until the GOP lost the majority in the 2006 elections. That said, Rants is smart enough to know that there probably will be room for only one other candidate if Branstad enters the race. So, he’s been going after Vander Plaats for bad policy ideas as well as his record as CEO and board president of the non-profit Opportunities Unlimited. (I recommend reading the whole comment thread under this story.)

Fong tried to inspire the Iowa Family Policy Center crowd:

Too much debt and too-high taxes are problems; so are abortion and other major issues, he said. But “the critical issue for our cause” is spiritual, he said.

Christ-like leadership is needed, with integrity and compassion, he said. It’s service above self. Voters are hungry for something greater than government and politics, he said.

“A hurting Iowa” needs that leadership, he said.

He called for leadership based on the “political philosophy of Jesus Christ himself.”

State Representative Rod Roberts claimed to have the right leadership qualities for a governor:

He’s been asked, “Rod, Aren’t you too nice to run for governor?” He replies: His two favorite Republican presidents are Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan. They were friendly, civil and respectful, but they also knew what they believed, stood their ground and knew where they were going, he said.

“That’s what leadership is about,” he said.

“A leader is someone who knows the way, goes the way and shows the way,” he said.

Before the gubernatorial candidates spoke, Iowa Family Policy Center head Chuck Hurley previewed his group’s efforts to pass a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

“If they don’t see the light, maybe they’ll feel the heat,” said Hurley, who urged supporters of a constitutional amendment to define marriage as between one man and one woman to seek more information at luviowa.com on how to get involved. […]

The goal of the group’s effort is to get all 150 state legislators on the record where they stand on the marriage issue and then “to pressure middle-of-the-road legislators who said they believe in one-man, one-woman marriage to vote that way in January and February,” Hurley said.

He also made a special point to let the audience know that three of the seven Iowa Supreme Court justices who overturned the state’s 1998 defense of marriage act will be up for retention votes on the 2010 ballot. Hurley said it was the justices’ “rogue decision” to allow “counterfeit marriage” that now requires a vote of the people to “rein-in” the judicial malpractice and to “rebuild the moral and legal culture that respects and strengthens marriage rather than tears it down.”

It looks like Hurley’s group is not focusing on the quickest way to amend the constitution: urging voters to approve the ballot initiative calling for a Constitutional Convention. That’s going to be on the November 2010 ballot anyway and, if approved, could lead to amendments being drafted in 2011. Social conservatives may be afraid that Democrats would end up controlling a Constitutional Convention, but if stopping same-sex marriage is such an urgent need for them, they should be pursuing all legal avenues to do so.

I didn’t see whether anyone at the Iowa Family Policy Center’s event mentioned the September 1 House district 90 special election. The Republican Party and conservative interest groups went all-in for that race but came up 107 votes short. Craig Robinson thinks the GOP erred in letting staff from Iowans for Tax Relief run the campaign of Republican Stephen Burgmeier. The Iowa Family Policy Center also delegated a staffer to work on Burgmeier’s campaign.

Share any thoughts or predictions about the gubernatorial campaign in this thread. If you follow Delaware or Virginia politics, feel free to share your thoughts about Andrew Roos.

I am looking forward to the next Selzer poll for the Des Moines Register, which will probably come out during the next month.

SSP Daily Digest: 7/22

FL-Sen: Looks like Charlie Crist has decided that, despite mediocre polling and worse fundraising from Marco Rubio, he’s facing a bigger threat in the primary than he is in the general. Crist came out in opposition to the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor yesterday, trying to shore up what remains of his conservative bona fides.

IL-Sen/Gov: Here’s an explanation for why Chris Kennedy has been dawdling on declaring for the Illinois Senate primary: he’s considering whether or not to jump over to the Governor’s race instead. This seems very odd… not that he’d have a good chance in either race, but it seems like he’d have a better shot in a primary in an open seat race against Alexi Giannoulias, who has some vulnerabilities, than against Pat Quinn, who’s fairly popular and has the benefits of incumbency. Apparently Giannoulias’s fundraising scared him off.

MO-Sen: Here’s an interesting tidbit out of Missouri, suggesting that former Treasurer Sarah Steelman is getting less and less likely to run in the GOP primary. Jeff Roe, who ran Steelman’s 2008 campaign, has started working for Rep. Roy Blunt. Blunt still faces a primary challenge from state Sen. Chuck Purgason, though, but he doesn’t pose the same level of threat that Steelman would.

NH-Sen: This is a big surprise, as he’s been pouring a lot of money into advertising (for his STEWARD organization, though, not as a candidate) and starting to build a staff. Anti-tax businessman Fred Tausch announced today that he won’t be running in the GOP Senate primary after all (or for anything, including the House). Considering that he was lobbing bombs at AG Kelly Ayotte just a few days ago, this is a sudden change of heart. Former Board of Education member and 1996 gubernatorial candidate Ovide Lamontagne may still provide a challenge from the right, though.

NY-Sen-B: Last night was the vaunted Bill Clinton/Carolyn Maloney fundraiser, which pulled in about $300K for Maloney’s House account. Meanwhile, the Albany Project has an interesting catch in this race. It turns out that there was one question from the internal poll in May that gave Maloney a 34-32 lead over Kirsten Gillibrand that didn’t get released to the public, and only came out in that City Hall News profile from a few days ago: “Asked whom they would vote for if they knew Gillibrand had the support of Schumer and Obama, people chose Gillibrand over Maloney 50-24.”

IA-Gov: A fifth candidate officially got into the GOP field in the Iowa governor’s race yesterday: little-known state Rep. and pastor Rod Roberts, who represents a rural part of western Iowa. Roberts polled a whopping 1% in a poll last week by the Iowa Republican blog of the GOP primary field; the poll found Bob Vander Plaats leading the field with 46%, trailed by Chris Rants at 16%, and Paul McKinley and Christian Fong each at 3%. Incumbent Democratic Gov. Chet Culver defeats Vander Plaats 48-39 and Rants 46-36.

NV-02: Ooops, back to square one in the 2nd. Douglas County school board president Cindy Trigg, who said she’d run against Rep. Dean Heller in 2010, has backed out, saying she needs to focus on the school board for now instead.

NY-23: The NRCC has gone on the air in the 23rd, launching pre-emptive TV attacks on state Sen. Darrel Aubertine before he’s even a declared candidate for the special election, for voting for new taxes in the state Senate. Meanwhile, word has leaked (perhaps from GOP rival Matt Doheny’s camp) that moderate Republican Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava was in fact under consideration for the Democratic nomination, but that they were scared off by unpaid tax problems associated with her brother’s business (for which she’s listed as the COO).

VA-11: Home inspection company owner Keith Fimian has decided on a rematch with Rep. Gerry Connolly in the now-blue 11th. Fimian, who can self-fund, lost the 2008 open seat race to Connolly, 55-43.

NY-LG: A New York judge put the kibosh on David Paterson’s appointment of Richard Ravitch as Lieutenant Governor, issuing a temporary injunction to stop it, saying the state constitution does not appear to permit appointment to fill a vacancy in that position. Still, even if the appointment never goes through, it looks like it may have succeeded for Paterson, in terms of forcing Pedro Espada’s hand and breaking the state Senate deadlock.

OH-AG: As was previously leaked, former Senator Mike DeWine announced today that he’ll run for state Attorney General. He’ll face off against Democratic incumbent Richard Cordray.

Fonts: Ever wondered about the font that defined the Obama campaign in 2008? Here’s a profile of that “uniquely American” sans-serif typeface, Gotham.