Tag: NH-02

• CT-Sen: The new lovefest between Joe Lieberman and the Democratic Party seems to be reaching the point where they need to get a room. In the wake of yesterday’s endorsement of Chris Dodd, Lieberman is today floating the idea of running in 2012 in the Democratic primary, instead of just as an independent. (Of course, unless Connecticut passes a sore loser law in the next few years, what’s the downside? If he loses the Dem primary again, he can just switch back to CfL one more time.)

• NV-Sen, NV-Gov: The GOP is running out of options for a good challenger to Harry Reid. Former state senator Joe Heck (who lost his Las Vegas-area seat last year) has decided to run in the GOP primary against chronically embattled governor Jim Gibbons instead. (Although if Heck is going against Gibbons, what is Rep. Dean Heller planning to do then?) With ex-Rep. Jon Porter taking the K Street route and Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki under indictment, the GOP’s Nevada bench is nearly empty.

• PA-Sen: Joe Torsella won’t have the Democratic primary in the Pennsylvania senate race to himself. State Rep. Josh Shapiro, a 35-year-old reform-minded legislator from the Philadelphia suburbs, is now exploring the race. This may be a tea leaf that Rep. Allyson Schwartz isn’t getting in the primary, as Shapiro (who’s in PA-13) would likely run for Schwartz’s seat instead if it were going to be open.

• CA-32: EMILY’s List has weighed in in the CA-32 primary, and they’re endorsing… believe it or not… the woman in the race: Board of Equalization chair Judy Chu. Chu’s main competition is state senator Gil Cedillo, who comes in with the endorsement of nearby House members like Xavier Becerra, Linda Sanchez, and Grace Napolitano (Hilda Solis, who used to occupy CA-32, hasn’t endorsed). The district is about 65% Hispanic and 20% Asian.

• NH-01, NH-02: We’re looking at a crowded field for Republican opponents to Carol Shea-Porter: John Stephen, who barely lost the primary last time to ex-Rep. Jeb Bradley, is eyeing the race, as is Manchester mayor Frank Guinta. Businessman Jim Wieczorek also plans to run. Meanwhile, next door in the open NH-02, radio host Jennifer Horn says there’s a good chance she’ll run again in 2010.  

• FL-22: State house majority leader Adam Hasner has been launching a series of attacks on Rep. Ron Klein over EFCA… is this a preview of the 2010 race? (It’s a Dem-leaning district, but Klein’s 2008 victory margin wasn’t impressive.)

• Votes: Also on the EFCA front, Campaign Diaries has an impressively thorough chart head-counting the positions staked out by all the Democratic senators (and potential GOP votes).

• Blue Dogs: After lifting their self-imposed 20%-of-the-Dem-caucus cap to expand to 51 members, the Blue Dogs are talking about growing again, to 56 members. No word on who that might be (although the door’s apparently open to Scott Murphy if he wins).

• NRSC: Roll Call is running a story today with the banner headline “McConnell Criticizes GOP for Lack of Diversity.” What’s next? “Sanders Criticizes KFC for Serving Chicken?”

The Bassmaster:

Rep. Charlie Bass (R), whom Hodes defeated in 2006 by a 7-point margin, has expressed interest in running for his old seat, but he is also mulling a Senate bid.

“If I feel like people here in New Hampshire are ready for a right-of-center pragmatist, then I’ll consider running,” Bass said.

Bass added that if he runs for his old House seat and wins it, he’ll be able to use his six terms of seniority to return to his work on the Energy and Commerce Committee where, he said, he was “rudely interrupted” by his re-election loss. Nonetheless, Bass cautioned that he would not make a decision for a while, but certainly before the June 2010 filing deadline. (Emphasis added)

I can has seniority back?

Like Punxsutawney Phil yesterday, Katrina Swett emerges:

With U.S. Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H., ready to announce his candidacy for Judd Gregg’s U.S. Senate seat within a week, veteran Democratic activist Katrina Swett will become a candidate for his 2nd District U.S. House seat, Democratic sources say.

Swett briefly ran for senate last cycle, but dropped out when Jeanne Shaheen got into the race. Afterwards, as Dean says, she made nary a peep for the whole campaign. And as far as I can tell, she didn’t make any donations to Paul Hodes, who currently holds the seat she now seeks. Mind you, at no point was Swett hurting for cash. She raised $1.5 million before bailing in 2007 and still has $900K in the kitty.

I have several other problems with a Swett candidacy, among them the fact that she’s wobbly on reproductive choice. Worse still, she was a national co-chair of Joe Lieberman’s campaign for president in 2004, and she supported him to the end against Ned Lamont in 2006. But I’ll let her own words do the talking:

Swett believes Lieberman lost because of three perceived Democratic “sins”: the sin of supporting the Iraq war and being tough on defense, the sin of being bipartisan and the sin of displaying religious faith. Swett said those traits might make Lieberman undesirable to many Democrats but they could be key for Democrats in winning future national elections.

“Round two in Connecticut is going to be a battle between two Democrats: Joe Lieberman, a centrist Democrat, and Ned Lamont, a pretty-far-left-of-center Democrat,” said Swett. “I’m convinced that Joe Lieberman is the better leader… and I’m also convinced that he’s the better positioned politically for the future of the party that I love.”

That’s not the sort of person I’d like to see fill a blue-leaning open seat. Hopefully some other challengers, undeterred by Swett’s warchest, will emerge. Some possible names include: Jay Buckey, an astronaut and professor of medicine at Dartmouth who also briefly sought the senate nomination in 2007; state Sen. Molly Kelly; Stonyfield Farm CEO Gary Hirshberg; and retired Adm. John Hutson, dean of Franklin Pierce Law Center (who shot down speculation that he might run for this seat two years ago). I’m sure we’ll see how the field shakes out soon enough.

After taking a look (here and here, on SSP here and here) to see how our two re-elected reps grew in strength from ’06 to ’08, I thought it might be a good idea to see how they fared compared to Jeanne Shaheen, the next step up on the ticket (NH-Sen). It’s an especially interesting question with the first election behind us in many years without straight-ticket voting.

With very few exceptions (Danville, New Boston, and Rindge), both Carol Shea-Porter (NH-01) and Paul Hodes (NH-02) gained higher vote percentages than Jeanne Shaheen in towns big and small, liberal and conservative, rural and urban.

The following charts track the ten biggest percentage discrepancies between Shea-Porter/Hodes and Shaheen for all towns and cities with more than 2000 votes cast for the congressional race in 2008. For ease of use in plugging the numbers into a spreadsheet (full data available here), I chose the lists at NHPR rather than the SoS.  Any mistakes are my own.

Town	Shaheen %	CSP %	% Diff.	Votes Cast
Rye	44.2	51.4	7.2	3693
Moltnboro	36.2	41.9	5.7	2967
Greenland	50.9	54.9	4	2227
Conway	55.1	59	3.9	5020
Strafford	50.5	54.2	3.7	2310
Seabrook	45.7	49.2	3.5	3988
Portsmouth	64.7	68.1	3.4	12326
N.Hampton	46.9	49.9	3	2810
Lee	61	64	3	2486

And I’ll throw in number 11 on the list, because ManchVegas is where so many of the votes are to be found in CD1:

Town	Shaheen %	CSP %	% Diff.	Votes Cast
Manchester	52.3	55.1	2.8	46268

Now on to CD2 and Paul Hodes.  Even greater discrepancies are to be found in the western half of the state:

Town	Shaheen %	Hodes %	% Diff.	Votes Cast
Newport	50.7	59.4	8.7	2845
Littleton	49.9	57.8	7.9	2699
Claremont	56.8	64.2	7.4	5480
Henniker	52.9	59.8	6.9	2405
New London	47.3	54.2	6.9	2788
Pembroke	51.4	56.8	5.4	3580
Weare	43.4	48.7	5.3	4447
Plymouth	62.7	67.9	5.2	3457
Hanover	73.6	78.7	5.1	6912

I’m going to resist interpreting this data too closely, other than to say that it’s clear that Carol and Paul, despite being lower on the ballot, performed better than Shaheen.  There are so many ways to answer why – and some of them non-exclusionary to others – that I’m not sure what conclusions can be drawn fairly.

Factors to consider: John Sununu was arguably a tougher opponent than Jeb Bradley (NH-01), who in turn was tougher than Jennifer Horn (NH-02).  Sununu and Shea-Porter and Hodes were all incumbents.  Shaheen was on the receiving end of far the greatest deluge of negative ads, followed closely by Carol, and finally Paul.

While I have a hard time drawing conclusions about ’08 from these numbers, I will happily draw from them for 2010.  Carol and Paul, by their strong showing relative to a senate nominee with tremendous name recognition, can both point to their results as ammunition for re-election down he road or even a run at the senate.

(Crossposted from Blue Hampshire, because I like to send my geekier vote analysis posts over here to SSP.)

(From the diaries – promoted by James L.)

I confess it – this was more challenging for me to put together than my earlier piece on Carol Shea-Porter, because in comparing the Charlie Bass (R-inc) – Paul Hodes (D) race of 2006 to the Paul Hodes (D-inc) – Jennifer Horn (R) race of 2008, the numbers tell you over and over again that the two are not really comparable.  Very much apples and oranges.

There are a number of reasons for this.  For starters, Charlie Bass held on to a district for six terms that showed less and less opportunity for the GOP every year, especially given the radicalism of the Bush brand in the final six of them. So the absence of a Bass incumbency factor gave us he opportunity to see the district more as it may actually be. Secondly, freshman class president Paul Hodes has proven to be, unlike the BassMaster, something of a leader in Congress, and has paid excellent attention to the needs of his district.  Third, he’s a capable fundraiser.  And finally, in Jennifer S. Horn-Palin, the GOP chose a standard-bearer who could not be more out-of-touch with CD2.  But let’s listen to what the numbers are saying.

(More below the fold…)

First, the list of towns that flipped from Charlie Bass in ’06 to Paul Hodes in ’08 is – happily – so long it’s not useful even listing, imho.  But just for the record, the total number is forty-five.  And the most important ones, in voter-rich terms, are accounted for in the tables below.

Jennifer Horn, on the other hand, flipped one whole town:  Millsfield. Total votes cast? 15.

Due to the larger number of towns in CD2 v. CD1, and the convincing victory Hodes had (and leaving aside cities with wards for a moment), I thought it would be both more readable and more useful to focus first on those towns with greater than 2000 votes cast for the general election cycle. As in my earlier post on CSP, the following list represents those populous towns where Paul Hodes raised his vote percentage from ’06 to ’08 by three percentage points or more.  The table also lists total votes cast, and Hodes’ 2008 vote percentage, the color of which declares who won that town (blue for Hodes, red for Horn):

Town	’08 Hodes %	’06-’08 +/-% Diff.	Total Votes Cast
Littleton*	57.7%	+16.5%	2699
Newport	59.4%	+9.8%	2845
Plymouth	67.8%	+8.4%	3457
Northfield*	53.9%	+8.0%	2204
Hillsborough	56.9%	+7.5%	2743
Epsom*	51.3%	+7.1%	2397
Pembroke	56.7%	+7.0%	3580
Loudon*	51.8%	+6.2%	2742
Weare*	48.7%	+5.4%	4447
New Boston	45.04%	+5.2%	2982
Jaffrey	56.8%	+5.1%	2766
Charlestown	63.2%	+4.9%	2475
New London*	54.2%	+4.9%	2788
Bow*	53.4%	+4.9%	4645
Allenstown	57.3%	+4.8%	2064
Henniker	59.8%	+4.7%	2405
Enfield	64.6%	+4.6%	2333
Pelham	46.0%	+4.3%	6310
Walpole	61.0%	+4.3%	2143
Hopkinton	60.6%	+4.1%	3744
Litchfield	45.0%	+3.7%	4252
Hudson*	49.1%	+3.3%	11,332

* Flipped to Hodes in 2008.

Now, the next step would be to do the same for those towns of over 2000 votes cast where Paul’s vote percentage decreased by three points or more.  The (happy) problem with that?  There’s only one town that fits the bill, Brookline. With 2,706 votes cast, Hodes won 41.8% of the vote, a decrease of 4.5% from 2006.  And I’ll be generous: neighboring Boston-commute southern tier town Hollis gets honorary mention with a Hodes decrease of 2.9% from the last cycle.

Finally, let’s have a look at how Paul fared from 2006 to 2008 in the major cities of the second district:

City	’08 Hodes %	’06-’08 +/-% Diff.	Total Votes Cast
Berlin	73.0%	+13.0%	4179
Claremont	64.2%	+6.7%	5470
Concord	65.6%	+5.2%	21,128
Franklin	58.2%	+8.9%	3587
Keene	70.2%	+3.4%	12,263
Lebanon	68.1%	+3.4%	6455
Nashua	55.3%	+0.2%	37,995

So. What observations, if any, come from these numbers, aside from the obvious points above about the lopsided nature of this race compared to 2006?

* Check out Littleton, Plymouth, and Berlin on those charts.  Huge increases for all three. North Country Yankee natives are Democrats now.

* The Upper Valley continues to be a dominant – and growing – sector for Democrats.  Not on the chart, and populous enough to have its own wards, Hanover gave Hodes 78.7% of its vote with 6,912 votes cast.

* From the long litany and diverse nature of flipped towns such as Grafton, New London, Milford, Colebrook, and Boscawen, you can feel the grip of the GOP’s too-long grip on CD2 slipping away, perhaps for a good long time. The six term backbencher BassMaster really did hold on to half of New Hampshire longer than was ultimately viable.

* Here’s the biggest surprise of all for me from these numbers.  Take a look at the percent increases for the larger towns, and for all the cities.  What stands out? Nashua.  It didn’t budge.

But guess what else?  With all due respect to the good Granite Staters of Nashua, it didn’t much matter, either.  Despite being by far the most populous city in the district, it simply isn’t enough to focus on Nashua and hope it spreads outwards.  In this sense, NHGOP Chair Fergus Cullen, imho, made a critical tactical mistake in throwing his heft behind Horn (if the rumors and spin are to be believed).  A far-right, socially conservative talk radio show host from the southern tier was not going to cut it with the rest of the district’s demographics. Far better it would have been to have had Bob Clegg as the nominee, if of course Clegg showed himself to be a better candidate (he didn’t), or perhaps the more moderate, Concord area primary spoiler Jim Steiner, if he could have shown a better fundraising presence.

The long and the short of it, though, is that if the GOP ever wants a chance at CD2 again, they’re going to have to stop going to the Massachusetts tax refugee well like flies to honey. They will need to field someone much more moderate.  And someone who understands rural and agricultural issues, alternative energy concerns, the importance of the North Country, and the newly dominant progressive voter in the Upper Valley.

Too bad Paul owns all those areas.  It’s a good day to be a Democrat.

Research 2000 for Concord Monitor (10/17-19, likely voters, 9/22-24 in parens):

Jeanne Shaheen (D): 50 (50)

John Sununu (R-inc): 43 (41)

(MoE: ±4%)

Carol Shea-Porter (D-inc): 48 (44)

Jeb Bradley (R): 43 (43)

(MoE: ±6%)

Paul Hodes (D-inc): 49 (47)

Jennifer Horn (R): 35 (34)

(MoE: ±6%)

Things are looking pretty stable in New Hampshire in the newest round of Research 2000 polls of that state for the Concord Monitor. Probably most notable is the improvement for Carol Shea-Porter, who has posted mostly underwhelming poll numbers this cycle; however, she’s up to a five-point lead from a one-point lead last month. (With a 6% margin of error, though… each CD’s sample seems to be half of the statewide sample… anything could be going on there.)

On the Senate side, John Sununu has gained a couple points on Jeanne Shaheen, probably on the back of major advertising expenditures (he’s got a big warchest; now’s the time to spend it). He’s left with an awful lot of ground to make up over the next few weeks, though.

Obama leads McCain 50-43 at the top of the ticket. And as a bonus, I know everyone has been losing a lot of sleep worrying over the New Hampshire governor’s race; incumbent Dem John Lynch leads John Joe Kenney 60-34.

There’s been a bunch of polls released over the past couple of days that we haven’t gotten around to blogging yet. Let’s blast through ’em all in one post (trendlines in parens):

• IN-Gov (Research 2000): Daniels 49 (47), Long Thompson 45 (46)
• NH-Gov (Saint Anselm College): Lynch 73, Kenney 7 (!)
• NH-01 (Saint Anselm College): Shea-Porter 42, Bradley 35
• NH-02 (Saint Anselm College): Hodes 35, Horn 18
• NJ-03 (Monmouth): Adler 41, Myers 44
• NM-Sen (Research & Polling): Udall 51, Pearce 36
• NM-01 (Research & Polling): Heinrich 43, White 41
• OK-Sen (TVPoll): Inhofe 53 (56), Rice 40 (37)

All yours.

Research 2000 for the Concord Monitor (9/22-24, likely voters):

Jeanne Shaheen (D): 50

John Sununu (R-inc): 41

Ken Blevens (L): 2

(MoE: ±4%)

There was some heartburn recently over a funky Rasmussen poll showing Sununu lunging ahead by seven points. Between this poll and yesterday’s UNH’s Granite State Poll that found Shaheen ahead by four points, I think it’s safe to call “outlier” on Rasmussen’s latest.

Research 2000 for the Concord Monitor (9/22-24, likely voters):

Carol Shea-Porter (D-inc): 44

Jeb Bradley (R): 43

(MoE: ±6%)

Paul Hodes (D-inc): 47

Jennifer Horn (R): 34

(MoE: ±6%)

UNH found Bradley leading by 45-42, and Hodes up by 38-26. I trust R2K more than the Granite State Poll, but both pollsters are finding similar spreads here — especially when you factor in the hefty 6% MoE. While I think we can dismiss a GOP internal showing Hodes leading by only 4 points as bunk, it certainly seems that Shea-Porter is in for a tough fight.

Bonus finding: R2K finds that Obama is leading McCain by a 48-44 margin statewide.

University of New Hampshire (WMUR Granite State Poll): (9/14-21, likely voters, 7-11/20 in parens)

Jeanne Shaheen (D): 48 (46)

John Sununu (R-inc): 44 (42)

(MoE: ±4.3%)

The University of New Hampshire is back with new polls, and they show a continuation of Shaheen’s four-point lead from July. The July poll was considered a bit out-of-whack at the time, but this week’s poll seems more in line with overall polling trends: still a consistent Shaheen lead (with the exception of that recent wacky Rasmussen poll), but now within the margin of error instead of out in double-digit land. Encouragingly, Sununu’s favorables are dropping, down to 44% from over 50 in July. The same sample gives McCain a 47-45 lead.

University of New Hampshire (WMUR Granite State Poll): (9/14-21, likely voters, 7-11/20 in parens)

Carol Shea-Porter (D-inc): 42 (40)

Jeb Bradley (R): 45 (46)

Undecided 12 (14)

(MoE: ±6.2%)

Paul Hodes (D-inc): 38 (43)

Jennifer Horn (R): 26 (23)

Undecided 33 (32)

(MoE: ±6.0%)

UNH also takes a look at the two Congressional races in New Hampshire. Carol Shea-Porter continues to trail Jeb Bradley (now by 3) in the rematch of their 2006 race in NH-01. The gap has closed a bit from last time, probably as Jeb Bradley emerges from an acrimonious primary covered in mud. Shea-Porter has only a 44% favorable rating (up significantly from the previous sample), but Bradley is even worse at 36% favorable, down from nearly 50 last time, which indicates that his primary battle with John Stephen may have mortally wounded him. Shea-Porter maintains a financial edge and can count on DCCC help, but this still looks to be a close race come November.

The other freshman representative, Paul Hodes, is in much better shape in the more Dem-leaning NH-02, giving Hodes the tie-breaker in the battle of dueling internals we saw earlier this week. Hodes is up by 12, although note the huge number of undecideds in this race (which has only grown since the GOP primary was resolved).

Playing “spot the methodological weaknesses in the UNH poll” has become a favorite netroots pastime, and there are a few things to point out: each of the Congressional samples is only half of the statewide sample, leaving them with sample sizes of only 252 and 271, and enormous 6% MoEs. In addition, these samples seem especially heavy on the Republicans (although New Hampshire may be one state where old school New England Republicans retain their registration even as they increasingly vote Democratic as the national GOP devolves into Theocon Central). This is especially glaring in the 2nd District, where the sample includes 60 Democrats and 91 Republicans (50% more).

Anzalone-Liszt for Paul Hodes (9/14-18, likely voters):

Paul Hodes (D-inc): 50

Jennifer Horn (R): 32

Chester Lapointe (L): 4

(MoE: ±4.4%)

Horn, a disingenuous, unaccomplished radio host, recently released an internal poll of her own showing her trailing Hodes by a mere 43-39 margin. Yes, we’re looking at the results of two partisan pollsters, but I’ll take an Anzalone survey over a cheapo Public Opinion Strategies poll any day of the week.

Here are some bonus numbers: Jeanne Shaheen holds a 55-38 lead over John Sununu in the district, and Obama is leading by 52-39.

The full polling memo is available below the fold.

UPDATE: And yeah, I saw that new Rasmussen poll showing Shaheen trailing Sununu by a whopping seven-point margin. This one has “funky outlier” written all over it.