No surprise given the chatter, but the GR Press has coverage of the official announcement this morning:
Eleven months from the 2nd district GOP congressional primary, the race is shaping up as a battle of the insiders vs. the outsider with a familiar name.
Former NFL star Jay Riemersma kicks off his formal campaign today with a speech in Holland. He vows a new brand of politics for the conservative district that U.S. Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Holland, has held since 1993. Hoekstra is running for governor.
“The last thing we need right now is legislative experience,” said Riemersma, 36. “What we need is leadership, strong conservative leadership.”
Read the whole story here:
http://www.mlive.com/news/gran…
The article is pretty positive towards Riemersma, allowing him to polish quotes bashing the other official GOP candidate Bill Huizenga (State Senator Wayne Kuipers is also expected to run). Riemersma raised $154,244 in the 2nd quarter filing report, of which $100,000 was his own money, compared to $76,201 for Huizenga. Riemersma touts his conservative creed by noting his connections to Focus on the Family, something which might appeal to the hard-core right in the 2nd District.
I’m still waiting on whether Kuipers runs; if he does, that makes this race a Ottawa County battle (three candidates) and provides an opening for a candidate from another portion of the district. Also, the 3rd quarter filing statement (due September 30) will also show how the two declared candidates are faring with raising funds for a sure to be expensive primary.
You should probably say in your diary that this is MI-02, just for clarity purposes.
She was a Dutch Democrat, serving on the local community college board and running unsuccessfully for State Legislature. Unfortunately she passed away a few years ago. She wouldn’t have been a high enough profile candidate anyway, but someone is better than no one.
This is generally the most Republican part of Michigan. (I think MI-02 was McCain’s best showing in the state.) I imagine there’s a dearth of credible candidates for this seat on the Democratic side since this area has been so Republican for so long. (One of my college roommates was from Ottawa County and despite being pretty conservative his family and neighbors thought he was a flaming lefty.)
I would love to hear someone in Michigan tell me otherwise.
Many thanks-I’ll edit it in a minute.
PB
As previous readers mentioned, this is a very conservative district. Maybe not the most conservative in the state (MI-4 might win that honor), but very close to the top of the list.
The most damaging thing about the 2nd is that there is not much of a Democratic bench that can run a congressional level campaign. We have a few Democratic state representatives in this district, but no state senators. Two of the state representatives (Mary Valentine and Dan Scripps) won districts that historically have been Republican, and it will take a while to build a local-level organization that can compete through the entire district.
From what I hear in Lansing and other places, the 2nd District is going to be radically remade in 2011. There is a strong possibility that the northern part of the district will be given to another district, while Ottawa County would be added to a southern district would take a majority of the 6th District (represented by Republican Fred Upton), moving Cass, Berrien, Van Buren, and Allegan Counties to Ottawa County and the four southern townships in Kent County (Byron, Gains, Caledonia, and Bowne Townships). The new 2nd District would likely force the new 2nd District Representative (whoever replaces Pete Hoekstra in 2010) into a nice runoff against Fred Upton, who lives in Berrien County (St. Joseph). I would suspect that Upton would be able to win a primary, and given that he is a relative moderate in the GOP caucus, it would be beneficial long-term for moderates in the GOP.
Here is a photo for a map of the potential district.
http://i303.photobucket.com/al…
Muksegon County would be added to a Kent County district that would be a swing seat instead of a GOP stronghold. This would help the local Muskegon County party to work on long-term growth to develop a deep bench. We’ll see what happens in 2010 elections that determine the state’s redistricting process.