State Senate Democratic Leader Al Lawson will challenge incumbent U.S. Rep. Allen Boyd in 2010, sources close to Lawson confirmed this morning.
Boyd, elected to Congress twelve years ago, is a leader of the “Blue Dog Coalition,” a group of conservative Democrats. The Panhandle farmer also served in the state House.
Lawson is a Tallahassee insurance agent who is approaching three decades as a state lawmaker. He was first elected to the Florida House in 1982. He will be term-limited out of office in 2010.
This has been a long time coming, as Boyd’s strong conservative tendencies (even by Blue Dog standards) overcompensated for his moderate, R+2.2 district. Boyd, as you may remember, was the lone Democratic defector on George Bush’s plan to privatize social security in the aftermath of the 2004 elections.
Without knowing too much about Lawson (a quick profile is available here), he could make a strong challenge for the primary electorate’s African-American votes; the 2nd CD is only 22% black, but that share would be much higher in a Democratic primary.
If nothing else, Lawson’s challenge could force Boyd to tack leftward for once in his life.
(Hat-tip: The Hotline)
Than an Al Wynn but hope springs eternal.
Maybe at the very least it’ll scare him.
Black vote could reach up to 42% in the primary. In 2008 primaries, it seemed like African Americans voted just under 2X their population. I doubt it will get that high since this isn’t Obama here. He’d need to run a very strong campaign and find a lot of support from around the district outside of the black community.
Lawson could win a general only if no serious Repub challenger steps up, otherwise we’d likely lose this seat. I can’t stand Boyd, but a primary challenge is something very counterproductive for that district.
we will see how he runs and how it shapes up, but if he focuses this on Boyd’s anti-stimulus, pro-bad SSP and other problematic issue stances but runs as a sensible progressive and builds a real campaign then this could be a great opportunity.
Every black member of Congress is to the left of Allen Boyd even conservatives like Sanford Bishop, Bob Etheridge, David Scott and Artur Davis. At worst, we elect a moderate-to-conservative Democrat rather than someone who makes Blue Dog Charlie Melancon look like a liberal rather than a Blue Dog spokesman.
This district is moderately conservative rather than deeply conservative. We can do better than Boyd here (just don’t expect Maxine Waters or Hank Johnson).