Month: April 2009

Angry social conservatives are speculating that Senator Chuck Grassley could face a primary challenge in 2010. The religious right has been dissatisfied with Grassley for a long time (see here and here).

After the Iowa Supreme Court struck down the state’s Defense of Marriage Act, Grassley issued a statement saying he supported “traditional marriage” and had backed federal legislation and a federal constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. But when hundreds of marriage equality opponents rallied at the state capitol last Thursday, and Republicans tried to bring a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage to the Iowa House floor, Grassley refused to say whether he supported their efforts to change Iowa’s constitution:

“You better ask me in a month, after I’ve had a chance to think,” Grassley, the state’s senior Republican official, said after a health care forum in Mason City.

Wingnut Bill Salier, who almost won the Republican primary for U.S. Senate in 2002, says conservatives are becoming “more and more incensed [the] more they start to pay attention to how far [Grassley] has drifted.”

Iowa GOP chairman Matt Strawn denies that party activists are unhappy with Grassley. I hope Salier is right and Grassley gets a primary challenge, for reasons I’ll explain after the jump.  

Before anyone gets too excited, I want to make clear that I don’t consider Grassley vulnerable. His approval rating is around 71 percent (if you believe Survey USA) or 66 percent (if you believe Selzer and Associates). Either way, he is outside the danger zone for an incumbent.

That doesn’t mean Democrats should leave Grassley unchallenged. Having a credible candidate at the top of the ballot in 2010 will increase the number of straight-ticket Democratic voters. So far Bob Krause is planning to jump in this race. More power to him or any other Democrat who is willing to make the case against Grassley. We should be realistic, though, and understand that unless something extraordinary happens, we are not going to defeat this five-term incumbent.

So why am I hoping a right-winger will take on Grassley in the Republican primary? Here’s what I think would happen.

1. A conservative taking potshots at Grassley would intensify the struggle between GOP moderates and “goofballs” just when Iowa Republicans are trying to present a united front against Democratic governance. GOP chairman Strawn claimed this weekend that Democratic tax reform proposals had unified his party, but if Grassley faces a challenger, expect social issues to dominate next spring’s media coverage of Republicans.

2. Although some delusional folks seem to think Grassley could lose a low-turnout primary, Grassley would crush any challenger from the right. That has the potential to demoralize religious GOP activists and their cheerleaders, such as the popular talk radio personality Steve Deace. (Deace already has plenty of grievances against Grassley.)

3. Every prominent Iowa Republican will have to take a position on the Senate primary, if there is one. I assume almost everyone will back Grassley, which would offend part of the GOP base. But if, say, Strawn or Congressman Steve King surprised me by staying neutral in the primary, that would demonstrate how much power extremists have within the Republican Party. Most people intuitively understand that you don’t try to replace a U.S. senator from your own party who has a lot of seniority.

A Senate primary could become a distracting sideshow for Republican gubernatorial candidates. It’s not clear yet how many Republicans will run against Governor Chet Culver, but almost all of the likely candidates would endorse Grassley over a right-winger. I would expect even Bob Vander Plaats to support Grassley, although he could surprise me. Vander Plaats believes Iowa Republican have been losing elections because they’ve become too moderate.

Watching the Republican establishment line up behind Grassley will remind social conservative activists that the party likes to use their support but doesn’t take their concerns seriously. These people will hold their noses and vote Republican next November, but they may not donate their time and money when Strawn and the gubernatorial nominee need their help to improve the GOP’s early voting operation.

My hunch is that no challenger to Grassley will emerge, because even the angriest conservatives must understand that they have little to gain from this course. Then again, we’re talking about people who believe the little-known, inexperienced Salier would have done better against Tom Harkin in 2002 than four-term Congressman Greg Ganske. Maybe some Republican is just crazy enough to run against Grassley next year.

Research 2000 for Daily Kos (4/6-8, registered voters):

Brian Moran (D): 24

Terry McAuliffe (D): 19

Creigh Deeds (D): 16

(MoE: ±5%)

Brian Moran (D): 36

Bob McDonnell (R): 37

Terry McAuliffe (D): 33

Bob McDonnell (R): 40

Creigh Deeds (D): 31

Bob McDonnell (R): 38

(MoE: ±4%)

Research 2000 polls the Virginia governor’s race for the first time, finding that ex-Delegate Brian Moran has a small advantage in the primary over former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe. A recent PPP poll had Moran and McAuliffe tied, but gave Moran the momentum (McAuliffe had previously led), and found McAuliffe with higher negatives. That’s mirrored here: Moran’s favorables are 36/33 while McAuliffe is the only candidate in net negative territory at 35/36.

Moran fares slightly better in the general than the other Dems because of his solid base in northern Virginia (he used to represent Alexandria), winning NoVa against Bob McDonnell 49-21. McDonnell wins the rest of the state 43-31, though, and sports impressive favorables of 48/31. Once the Dem primary is over and the winner can aim his fire at McDonnell instead of the other Dems, though, maybe his negatives can get driven up. McDonnell’s support for the GOP-led House of Delegates’ decision to reject federal stimulus money for unemployment benefits provides a good opening.

* MD-HD-30: Progressive blogger and founder of Think Progress Judd Legum is running for a seat in Maryland’s House of Delegates. MD has an unusual system whereby the top three finishers in each party’s primary all face each other in the general election, and the top three from that pool all become delegates for that district. The 30th HD went for Obama 52-48, but a few years ago, an out-of-step, conservative Republican snuck through in the third slot by just a handful of votes. Judd (whose blog is here) is taking on this malefactor. We wish him the very best of luck! (D)

* NY-20: The see-sawing continues: at the end of counting yesterday, the semi-official BoE tally had Scott Murphy up by 8 votes. The four counties that hadn’t returned full results for paper ballots, though, were four of the pivotal ones: Saratoga (Tedisco’s base), and Washington, Warren, and Essex (Murphy’s base). The Albany Times-Union puts Murphy’s lead at 34, including some additional numbers from Essex. The Hill, as of this hour, is reporting a 46 vote lead for Murphy as more absentees seem to start trickling in.

* SC-Gov: Rep. Gresham Barrett, one of the House’s most forgettable members, posted surprisingly strong fundraising numbers in his quest to become South Carolina governor: $371,000 in the first quarter, with more than $1 million CoH. He faces a crowded field, most prominently AG Henry McMaster, who raised $287K.

* CA-32: Here’s a strange twist in the CA-32 special election: another Chu has filed to run. Betty Tom Chu, a city councilor and former mayor in Monterey Park, jumped in as a Republican. (She used to be registered as a Democrat and holds nonpartisan office.) There are rumors of bad blood between the two Chus, but this may not necessarily be a dirty trick to sabotage Judy Chu. Although it’s an all-in-one-field primary (where the top vote-getter from each party advances), Betty Chu will have an R next to her name, helping somewhat to differentiate her from Judy Chu. The real confusion may be in the general, which could therefore be Chu vs. Chu.

Before I analyzed OHIO, I first did an intensive analysis of INDIANA, which you can find at Google Docs, in three parts:

Part I

Part II

Part III

Excel Document with all raw data.

If you don’t have a gmail account, you probably don’t have access to the excel document, you can get it from me over email by writing to me here

Rationale: Obama, who took the Hoosier state by a +1.03% margin, was the first democratic candidate to win this state since 1964. This means that two complete generations of citizens from Indiana had voted in the majority for the republican presidential candidate until 2008.

A number of myths and angry retorts have gone around (mostly from the GOP and the extreme right) about what happened in INDIANA since election day, so I decided to do an exact analysis to get to the facts and to dispel myth and rumour. The results of this analysis are quite amazing.

Over all-

John McCain beat Obama 62% to 34% compare that to Bush beating Kerry by 71% to 26%. Obama did 8% better than Kerry. I think in the long run Utah will go blue as it is one of the fastest growing states with a growing number of hispanics.

The percent that Obama improved on Kerry in each county-

Box Elder County-5%

Beaver County-3%

Cache County-9%

Carbon County-4%

Daggett County-8%

Davis County-8%

Duchesne County-3%

Emery County-4%

Garfield County-7%

Grand County-6%

Iron County-5%

Juab County-2%

Kane County -8%

Millard County-3%

Morgan County-5%

Piute County-2%

Rich County-4%

Salt Lake County-11%

San Juan County-8%

Sanpete County-4%

Sevier County-5%

Summit County-11%

Tooele County-8%

Uintah County-1%

Utah County-6%

Wasatch County-9%

Washington County-4%

Wayne County-5%

Weber County-8%

If Utah keeps on this track we should see a blue Utah one day(lets hope).

Our friends at the Cook Political Report have released an updated Partisan Voting Index that now includes the results of the 2008 presidential election. They’ve also made a small change in the formula used to calculate PVIs, and I think it’ll be instantly recognizable to SSPers:

To determine the national average for these latest ratings, we have taken the average Democratic share of the two-party presidential vote for 2004 and 2008, which is roughly 51.3 percent, and that of Republicans, which is roughly 48.7 percent. So, if John Kerry captured 55 percent of the vote in a district and Barack Obama carried 57 percent in the district four years later, the district would have a PVI score of roughly D+5. (Emphasis added.)

As we discussed at length, the old PVI formula compared district-level results for the past two presidential elections to nationwide results for only the most recent election. This choice sparked plenty of debate, and some folks even suggested we use our own “SVI” that would compare 2004 to 2004 and 2008 to 2008.

Fortunately, the debate has been resolved. As you can discern from the description above (the key part is in bold), Cook has decided to revise its methodology along the lines proposed by people here. Charlie Cook (an SSP reader, as is House editor David Wasserman) told me he wanted something that was “totally apples and apples,” and I agree with the choice. Ultimately, this means that the new PVIs will be about two points bluer than under the old system – e.g., a district that would have been R+10 will now come in at R+8.

You can find the new PVIs by partisan rank in this PDF, as well as by member name and by state/district. There’s also a giant-size map and a cool chart showing trends in the PVI over the last decade. (As you’d expect, the number of “competitive” districts, at least on the presidential level, has been shrinking.) Have fun!

Here is Episode 9 of my never-ending redistricting series, in which I cover three states (Alabama, Arizona, and Kentucky) with little in common demographically other than all voting for John McCain.

Previous efforts:

Diary 1: Massachusetts and Texas

Diary 2: Michigan and Nevada

Diary 3: Iowa and Ohio

Diary 4: Georgia and New Jersey

Diary 5: Florida and Louisiana

Diary 6: Pennsylvania and Utah

Diary 7: Illinois and South Carolina

Diary 8: Indiana, Missouri, and Oregon

Jump below!

Note that Arizona was originally intended to share a diary with New York, but the delay in the NY-20 election has forced me to put off a final New York plan (if Tedisco wins, my NY map applies, but if Murphy pulls it out in the final count, I need a do-over).

Alabama

The overriding goals here were clear, and are regardless of which party wins the governor’s mansion in 2010. Either a Republican or Democratic Governor will contend with a legislature controlled by conservative Democrats, and so protecting Rep. Bobby Bright of Montgomery will be Priority #1 (a major flaw in my reasoning here: if Bright loses to a Republican in 2010, a very real possibility, the 2nd will be preserved more or less as-is or made more Republican to accommodate the hypothetical freshman GOPer). Anyway, I assumed Bright survives 2010 and is the big winner from redistricting. As a direct result of protecting Bright, another winner is made clear, Republican Mike Rogers of Anniston (his district was carved to elect a Democrat in 2002 and, well, that didn’t work out, so for the sake of helping Bright, Rogers will get more favorable turf).

The other districts weren’t altered much; Artur Davis’ VRA-protected 7th was made a tad less heavily African-American but should still be about 60% so, keeping it clear from controversy, and the other four seats barely change at all in partisan or racial composition.

District 1 – Jo Bonner (R-Mobile) — heavily Republican Gulf Coast districts stays mostly unchanged.

District 2 – Bobby Bright (D-Montgomery) — again, this map assumes he survives in 2010. Race tracking closely with partisan behavior in this state, the obvious tack was to boost the 2nd’s black population, so I dumped the district’s southernmost counties and anchored it in the eastern half of Alabama’s Black Belt, with the main population band stretching from Selma almost to the Georgia border, adding an arm up in Talladega.

District 3 – Mike Rogers (R-Anniston) — Rogers would now represent the only clear gerrymander in the state, and its lines are, I assure you, only as ugly as they are for a good purpose: I had to connect the heavily Republican counties northeast of Talladega with the heavily Republican counties bordering Florida’s Panhandle, so that meant creating a skinny north-south band along the Georgia line, in counties that were otherwise reserved for Bright. It’s unaesthetic, yes, but it gets the job done, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see legislative Democrats and Republicans agree on a plan like this for the mutual benefit of helping both Bright and Rogers.

District 4 – Robert Aderholt (R-Haleyville) — heavily Republican Appalachia-Tuscaloosa-exurban Birmingham mix.

District 5 – Parker Griffith (D-Huntsville) — as before, it’s socially conservative and mostly white, but with a good bench of local Democrats. Unlike Bright’s district, the 5th couldn’t be shored up much since there are no African-American areas nearby that aren’t necessary to keep the 7th VRA-protected.

District 6 – Spencer Bachus (R-Vestavia Hills) — meant to soak up every possible Republican between Birmingham and Montgomery.

District 7 – Artur Davis’ (D-Birmingham) replacement — Davis is running for Governor in 2010, but whichever Democrat succeeds him will retain a black-majority district anchored in Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, and the heavily black counties of western Alabama.

Arizona

The nonpartisan redistricting commission typically seeks to draw districts with geographical communities of interest in mind, and does little or nothing to protect incumbents. This means we shouldn’t expect a plan that explicitly shores up any of the three marginal Democratic districts (the rural 1st, suburban 5th, or mixed urban-rural 8th). While the 2001 plan created a new Hispanic-majority district for the Democrats and a competitive new rural seat (dubbed the 1st), I found that 2011’s map is due for a GOP seat in the suburban/exurban Phoenix area, based in fast-growing Pinal County. Since Arizona will be gaining two seats, the other may be of a less predictable nature, though everyone expects that it, too, will be based in metro Phoenix. My proposed 10th is a mixed Phoenix district with a considerable Hispanic population (one problem: said Hispanic pop. under my plan may be big enough to move the VRA-protected 7th out of majority-Hispanic status, which would be a non-starter).

One thing that made my numbers less-than-perfect was the lack of reliable data on Hopi Reservation population in northern Arizona (Hopi and Navajo areas are kept in separate districts due to traditional tensions between the two tribes). I used rough statistical guesstimates to separate the reservations into the 2nd and 1st, respectively. This, and my lack of certainty regarding the Hispanic percentage in Grijalva’s 7th District in this map, are the two potential demographic issues present here (and note that I used 2007 Census estimates, before 2008 numbers were available, making the data already obsolete).

All those caveats aside, I think the general spirit of Arizona’s next district map is present here:

District 1 – Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Flagstaff) — still rural with the highest Native American population in the state. Personally, as someone who is admittedly ignorant about Hopi/Navajo history, I think it unfortunate that the tribes insist on being separated, since moving the Hopi reservation into this district would put its Native population over 25% and possibly close to 30%, a clear VRA opportunity when coupled with the district’s Hispanic and other minority populations.

District 2 – Trent Franks (R-Glendale) — though it appears rural, this district is a lot more Maricopa County-heavy than one might assume.

District 3 – John Shadegg (R-Phoenix) — Republican neighborhoods of Phoenix and suburban Maricopa County keep Shadegg in the clear, for the near future at least.

District 4 – Ed Pastor (D-Phoenix) — combines the Latino neighborhoods of Phoenix to remain a strong VRA seat.

District 5 – Harry Mitchell (D-Tempe) — as before, this comprises traditionally Republican Phoenix suburbs that are trending the other way with time. In Mitchell’s current 5th, Obama garnered a respectable 47%, though I haven’t a clue how he would have fared in my 5th since my method is so low-tech and crude.

District 6 – Jeff Flake (R-Mesa) — weary though I am of this guy and his precious privileged resolutions, this 6th would stay safe for him.

District 7 – Raúl Grijalva (D-Tucson) — if the Hispanic pop. is under 50-55% in this proposed Maricopa-free iteration (and it may indeed be), then it is worth a reconfiguration, this time using 2008 stats. Regardless how accurate my map may or may not be, the commission will ensure a VRA majority-Hispanic seat for Grijalva.

District 8 – Gabrielle Giffords (D-Tucson) — now very Tucson-dominated and free of Hispanic-majority Santa Cruz County.

The new District 9 – anchored in Pinal County with significant chunks of Maricopa and Pima for a Republican-leaning suburban/exurban seat between Phoenix and Tucson.

The new District 10 – entirely within southwest Maricopa County, possibly Hispanic opportunity (but cannot dilute the Hispanic pop. in District 7, so I question whether the commission would draw something quite like this…I’m a bit more certain of the rough boundaries for a new GOP seat in District 9).

This being a commission-run redistricting process, no incumbents are deliberately protected, and only logic, geography, and racial consideration go into the process. It’s a double-edged sword, really, but makes a private citizen’s map-making simulation much simpler (no gerrymandering to help Congressman X, that is). Other than my possible trespass in District 7, I’m not aware of any probable controversy with boundaries roughly akin to these.

Kentucky

Like Alabama, the process here is likely to be split between the parties, and Democrats are assured a strong hand by holding both the governor’s mansion and the House. Even if redistricting is delayed after the 2011 elections and a Republican is elected Governor, the Democratic House majority seems too large to overcome in a couple cycles, making it likely that Rep. Ben Chandler (D-Versailles) will be protected (and that, of course, assumes he doesn’t run for another office in 2010 or 2011). Making Chandler’s 6th a tad more Democratic for future insurance was the only clear priority of this map, which otherwise leaves lines mostly unaltered.

District 1 – Ed Whitfield (R-Hopkinsville) — expands in area due to lagging population growth, but remains strongly Republican and mostly rural or “small town”.

District 2 – Brett Guthrie (R-Bowling Green) — changes only minimally, remains GOP-friendly with several pockets of urban population and (somewhat outnumbered) Democratic votes.

District 3 – John Yarmuth (D-Louisville) — comprises 99.7% of Jefferson County, and that’s it. Talk about simple!

District 4 – Geoff Davis (R-Hebron) — looks virtually identical to its prior incarnation as an Ohio River-based, heavily GOP district.

District 5 – Hal Rogers (R-Somerset) — heavily rural and Republican, possibly the most socially conservative seat in Kentucky, but drops some traditionally Dem areas for the 6th’s benefit, picking up the slack elsewhere.

District 6 – Ben Chandler (D-Versailles) — McCain won Chandler’s current 6th 55-43 but the incumbent is very popular and is likely unbeatable. Still, he has long held statewide ambitions, and one of these days he will vacate for bigger things, making it a priority for House Democrats and the Governor to shore up the 6th for a future Democratic candidate. Thus, an equestrian-heavy Central Kentucky seat is reconfigured as a Frankfort-Lexington-coal mines district with stronger Dem history. McCain may still have won here, but not with more than 51-53%, making it that much easier for a future Dem to win.

Other states I hope to cover soon include: Colorado, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. There are some key states (among them, California, Minnesota, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin) that could or will require two maps each based on different hypothetical outcomes regarding seat distribution or partisan control. It isn’t clear what the seat count will be in California, North Carolina, or Washington, and in the other four states, partisan control of redistricting is utterly up in the air between now and after the 2010 elections. So most likely, these states will be those that I cover last.

• NJ-Gov: The latest poll of the New Jersey governor’s race shows that things aren’t getting any worse for Jon Corzine, but he is settling into a deep rut. Fairleigh Dickinson finds that he loses 42-33 to Chris Christie, the same 9-pt margin as their previous poll one month ago (41-32). Corzine’s approval rating is 40/49, and he beats even nuttier GOPer Steve Lonegan by only 37-36. There is some good news, though: he’d still win in a Democratic primary, if for some reason senate president Richard Codey or Newark mayor Corey Booker challenged him.

Could An incumbent Democratic governor of New Jersey come back after trailing by double digits in the polls for most of the campaign? It happened once before, when Gov. Brendan Byrne beat Republican Raymond Bateman, despite being down as much as twelve points in September of 1977. “Hopeful” at Blue Jersey does some excellent digging through the archives to tell Byrne’s story. (D)

• VA-Gov: National politics just injected itself into the Virginia governor’s race in a big way, as the GOP-held House of Delegates rejected $125 million in federal stimulus funds that would have extended unemployment benefits. Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell supported his party’s callous move.

• AK-Sen: Ted Stevens just filed his exploratory paperwork to get his old job back, by running for senator in 2014 (when he’ll be 91). Don’t actually expect to see Ted 2.0, though; his spokesman says it’s just a receptacle to receive donations that came in after the November election.

• FL-Sen, NH-Sen: In other unlikely comeback news, though, this one appears to be for real: Bob Smith, the former senator from New Hampshire, has filed the paperwork to run for Senate again… in Florida, where he now lives. This seems odd, since there are political titans jostling for the Florida nomination while the New Hampshire nomination still seems to be pretty much free for the asking. (As an indication of how far down the totem pole the NH GOP is looking, Ovide Lamontagne, last seen losing the 1996 gubernatorial race, is now eyeing NH-Sen.)

• AR-Sen: Mediocre polling and pressure on EFCA seem to have gotten Blanche Lincoln worried, but she may be able to breathe a little easier after her first quarter fundraising haul: $1.7 million, with $1 million of that coming at a campaign kickoff event headlined by Joe Biden.

• MI-Gov: Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson has announced that he won’t seek the GOP nomination for the governor’s race next year. Patterson narrowly led the primary field in a recent poll, so that leaves a wide-open field with a possible advantage to 2nd-place finisher Rep. Pete Hoekstra.

• TN-Gov: State senator Roy Herron entered the race for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, joining former state house majority leader Kim McMillan and Nashville businessman Ward Cammack. Mike McWherter, son of former governor Ned McWherter, also seems a likely candidate.

• PA-06: We have at least a warm body lined up in PA-06: Doug Pike, who hasn’t held elected office but wrote for the Philadelphia Inquirer for a number of years, was an aide to Paul Tsongas, and is the son of Rep. Otis Pike (of New York). A better-known candidate may still crop up, especially if Rep. Jim Gerlach follows through on his likely plans to bail on his increasingly-Democratic seat (Obama won 58-41) and run for Pennsylvania governor instead.