Tag: Orrin Hatch

• IL-Sen: The Tom Dart boomlet didn’t seem to go anywhere; the attention-grabbing Cook County Sheriff announced that, contrary to rumors, he wasn’t going to run in the Democratic Senate primary and would instead stand for re-election.

• LA-Sen: David Vitter is wasting no time in trying to define Charlie Melancon with new TV spots, saying “Life sure is swell when you’re a liberal-loving, Obama-endorsing congressman like Charlie Melancon.” The good news is: this means everyone recognizes this is a highly competitive race; conventional wisdom says define your opponent if he’s strong, ignore him if he’s weak so you don’t inadvertently give him free PR.

• MA-Sen: Rep. Stephen Lynch, the most conservative member of the Massachusetts House delegation and a former Ironworker, has been trying to lock down the slot as organized labor’s candidate in the upcoming Senate special election, but he was booed at a health care rally and not even invited to a labor breakfast over the weekend, suggesting that his skepticism over the public option could be hurting him among the potential backers he most needs. Campaign Diairies has a handy compare-and-contrast chart of key votes among the Mass. delegation; interestingly, Lynch was also the only one to vote in favor of the Peru free trade agreement, another potential black mark for labor.

• NV-Sen, NV-Gov: There’s something almost Shakesperean (or Freudian?) about this story: father and son Reid are both looking at each other as dragging down each others’ poltiical fortunes. Rory sees Harry’s presence on the ballot as hampering his potential gubernatorial run, while Harry sees Rory’s run as hurting his senate re-election bid.

• TX-Sen: There’s been increasing chatter about a run for the Democratic Republican Senate nomination in the possibly-upcoming special election by Dallas mayor Tom Leppert. He’d start out at a financial and name rec disadvantage compared with Bill White and John Sharp, though, having just been in office for half a term.

• UT-Sen: Bob Bennett may be in for some tough sledding in the GOP primary in the Utah Senate race, but he can count on the support of his fellow Senator Orrin Hatch, who gave Bennett a full-throated endorsement last week. Buried in the story, though, is something more troubling: Bennett managed to finish in last place at a Utah County GOP straw poll, where AG Mark Shurtleff won with 42% and ultra-right weirdo Cherilyn Eager got 32%. Bennett is also challenging the legality of Shurtleff’s fundraising; Bennett alleges commingling of federal and state accounts at Shurtleff’s Wasatch Shotgun Blast fundraising picnic (Utah has very lax limits on state fundraising).  

• AZ-Gov: A poll for Arizona Capital Times has, buried in the fine print, some very alarming numbers for appointed GOP Gov. Jan Brewer. They don’t poll her on head-to-heads, but she has perilously low re-elects: 18% say they’ll vote for her, 46% say they’ll vote for someone else, and 36% are undecided. More evidence that the anti-governor tide is high on both sides of the aisle. Sensing her vulnerability (following a budget standoff in which the conservative Brewer found herself to the left of her legislature), primary opponents are considering the race, including state Treasurer Dean Martin and polarizing Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

• GA-Gov: There are now seven viable candidates running for the GOP nomination for Georgia Governor, as state Sen. Jack Jeff Chapman, who represents Brunswick on the coast, got in the race. The little-known Chapman has ruffled some feathers fighting overdevelopment along the coast.

• NH-Gov: John DiStaso points to a couple GOP challengers sniffing out the race against Democratic incumbent Gov. John Lynch, one of the few gubernatorial races left in the country that falls in either “Safe” category. Leading the way is behind-the-scenes conservative activist Karen Testerman, founder of Cornerstone Family Research, who apparently feels ready to step in front of the curtain. Another rumored name is state Sen. Chuck Morse. Little-known businessman Jack Kimball is the only confirmed candidate.

• VA-Gov: We’ve had a deluge of polls in Virginia in the last week, some showing some a tightening race, some not. The newest offering from SurveyUSA definitely falls into the “not” column, giving Republican AG Bob McDonnell a 54-42 lead over Democratic state Sen. Creigh Deeds (the same margin as their previous poll). Crosstabs show that Deeds has pulled into the lead in northern Virginia, but is still way behind in the rest of the state.

• VT-Gov: Here’s someone actually considering switching from the Dems to the GOP: state Auditor Tom Salmon, whose father was Democratic governor in the 1970s and who defeated incumbent GOPer Randy Brock in 2006. Republicans are trying to spin this as a referendum on local Dems being too liberal, but there may be some garden-variety ambition behind this: Salmon says he plans to run for re-election, but may also be considering a run for Governor if Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie doesn’t run, and this seems an easier way to get into the general election than through the already-crowded Dem field.

• AK-AL: Rep. Don Young, who recently drew a strong Democratic challenger in the form of state Rep. Harry Crawford, will also have to run the gauntlet of a strong primary opponent too. Businessman Andrew Halcro, who got nearly 10% of the vote in his independent campaign for governor in 2006 and since then has seen his profile increase via his anti-Sarah Palin blogging efforts, said he’ll run against Young as a GOPer. Crawford gets good notices from local observers, using words like “old-school,” “blue-collar,” “backwoods,” and “gritty” to describe him, which may be a better matchup against the crusty former tugboat captain than the more polished Ethan Berkowitz was last year.

• IL-07: Rep. Danny Davis made it official; he’s out of the House in 2010. He’ll be running for Cook County Board President instead. The 7th is D+35, so spare us the hand-wringing.

• IL-14: This could take us up to five Republicans vying to take back the 14th from Democratic Rep. Bill Foster: state Senator Randy Hultgren is now exploring the race. This could get more than a little inconvenient for crown prince Ethan Hastert, the presumed GOP frontrunner: remember that a bitter primary between dairy magnate Jim Oberweis and st. Sen. Chris Lauzen put a crimp on GOP chances in the 2008 special election here that Foster won.

• LA-02: I don’t know if there was anyone out there fretting that we weren’t going to get a top-tier Democratic candidate to go up against Rep. Joe Cao, but if there was, they can rest easy. State Sen. Cedric Richmond, who didn’t make it into the runoff in the primary against ex-Rep. Bill Jefferson last year, announced he’ll run again in 2010. State Rep. Juan LaFonta and state Sen. Cheryl Gray are also likely Dem candidates in the D+25 seat.

• LA-03: Roll Call takes another look at the many players jostling to take over for Charlie Melancon in the now R+12 3rd. Dept. of Natural Resources head Scott Angelle gets top billing, but nobody is sure whether he’d run as a Democrat or Republican. On the Dem side, state Rep. Damon Baldone, state Rep. Fred Mills, Ascension Parish sheriff Jeff Wiley, and attorney Ravi Sangisetty also get mentions, while other prominent GOPers in the mix are Lafourche Parish sheriff Craig Webre, state Rep. Nickie Monica, former state House speaker Hunt Downer, Plaquemines Parish president Billy Nungesser Jr., and former state Senate candidate Jeff Landry. Complicating the candidates’ decision to run is winning may be a pretty lame prize, seeing that the 3rd may be on the district elimination docket following the 2010 census, with parts of it possibly being subsumed into the nearby 2nd.

• MO-04: Sensing vulnerability or at least a possible retirement, a third Republican has piled on, against 33-year Rep. Ike Skelton. James Scholz, president of a computer security company, has filed to run. Skelton looks like he’s going to stay and fight, though; he has five fundraisers scheduled for the next two months, including one with Steny Hoyer.

• ND-AL: Earl Pomeroy may get a real challenge for once, from Kevin Cramer, the Republican chair of the state’s Public Service Commission (which regulates utilities). Cramer lost two races to Pomeroy in the 1990s, but this time he points to an NRCC-commissioned internal poll that has him within 4 points of Pomeroy, 46-42.

• NC-11: Local physician Daniel Eichenbaum has been in contact with the NRCC about a run against Heath Shuler. His biggest selling point: if he wins, he promises to stay for only one term. (That ought to get the NRCC interested, seeing as how they just love open seats.)

• SC-03: A bit more winnowing of the field in the dark-red 3rd, as businessman and engineer Stuart Carpenter pulled the plug on his campaign and endorsed state Rep. Rex Rice.

• WA-09: Better-than-usual GOP prospects started eyeing Adam Smith’s seat early this year, speculating that a special election might be in the offing if Smith (an early Obama endorser) got an administration job. That never happened, and now one of them, moderate state Rep. Tom Campbell (not to be confused with the moderate GOPer running for California governor), pulled out of his bid last week, sensing a complete lack of interest from the NRCC. Nevertheless, Pierce County Councilor Dick Muri remains in the race.

• Redistricting: Remember the new independent redistricting commission that was created to take responsibility for California’s legislative districts? Now there’s an initiative afoot to add jurisdiction for congressional districts to the panel as well. The initiative also includes some vague language about preserving “communities of interest,” which, depending on how it’s interpreted, could result in some smoothing-out of California’s remarkably convoluted boundaries and thus some more competitive districts.

[Originally posted yesterday on my blog Senate 2008 Guru: Following the Races.]

In early February, the Guru offered his first Retirement Watch rundown, and in mid-March there was the first Retirement Watch Update.  Allow the Guru to present you with the brand new May Retirement Watch Update.

Key Statistic: Courtesy of Swing State Project, since the 1988 election cycle, mid-term election cycles have seen an average of 4.8 Senate retirements per cycle, while Presidential election cycles have seen an average of 7.7 Senate retirements per cycle.  With only Colorado’s Wayne Allard officially out, statistical trends suggest that we should see a few more retirement announcements.

(See below for the full update.)

UP Virginia’s John Warner: Most notably, the five-term incumbent raised a mere $500 in the first quarter of 2007.  This is a gigantic red flag.  Further, Warner just today announced the departure of his Chief of Staff to the private sector.  He has continually suggested that he is still unsure of his future electoral plans, but it just takes too much effort for a longtime incumbent Senator to raise next-to-nothing for a quarter.  Barring an unexpected fundraising surge in Q2, a retirement announcement is quite likely.

UP New Mexico’s Pete Domenici: Domenici has not been vocal about a re-election bid, particularly considering his involvement in the Attorney Purge scandal.  Two factors suggest a hightened likelihood of retirement here.  First, since Domenici’s involvement in the scandal has come to light, his approval rating (previously comfortably in the mid-to-high 60’s) has been in a consistent and unabated free fall, plunging from a 43-point net approval in November 2006 to a 16-point net approval last month.  Next month’s polling data will offer further insight into the momentum of the trend.  Second, Domenici had a lackluster fundraising quarter for a longtime incumbent facing a potentially tough re-election bid.  Even the Republican netroots are suggesting that Domenici ought to consider retirement.  While there is no end in sight for Domenici’s continued negative press coverage and while his approvals continue to sink, his retirement may ultimately hinge on whether the Democrats field a strong opponent, and soon.

UP Idaho’s Larry Craig: Craig delayed his 2008 electoral plan announcement from “this summer” to “late summer or fall.”  Also, regardless of how inexpensive the Idaho media market is, by any measure Craig had a very weak Q1 fundraising take, suggesting that his heart isn’t in a re-election bid.  It also doesn’t help perceptions that GOP Lt. Gov. Jim Risch is chomping at the bit for Craig to retire so that he can enter the race.

EVEN Mississippi’s Thad Cochran: Fundraising has been the biggest signal that Cochran may in fact run for another term, as he nearly met his fundraising goal for the first quarter of 2007 while his likely understudy, GOP Rep. Chip Pickering, raised only a meager sum in Q1.  However, two subtle hints suggest a Cochran retirement is more likely than some may suspect.  First, Karl Rove’s presentation on the Senate’s “Republican Defense” states included Mississippi, likely to only be competitive if Cochran retired.  Did Rove have inside info on Cochran’s decision-making process?  Second, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania suggested that he would be the senior Republican Senator on the Appropriations Committee in 2010, despite Cochran’s committee seniority.  Did Specter have inside info on Cochran’s decision-making process?

EVEN Nebraska’s Chuck Hagel: Since Hagel’s notorious non-announcement, he has suggested that he is ramping up his fundraising to prepare for a Senate re-election bid.  But state Attorney General Jon Bruning has demonstrated early strength in a possible NE-GOP Senate primary.  And Hagel’s approval-disapproval has seen better days.  Meanwhile, Hagel’s own comments as well as his time spent with New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg has fueled speculation of an independent Presidential bid.

EVEN Utah’s Orrin Hatch: Yes, Utah’s Orrin Hatch.  Documented rumors have suggested that Hatch has been “campaigning” in a sense for the position of U.S. Attorney General should Alberto Gonzales resign, be fired, or otherwise lose the position.  An unknown, to be sure, but something to keep an eye on.

DOWN Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander: Alexander declared in early April that he “plans to run for re-election in 2008.”

DOWN Alaska’s Ted Stevens: While Stevens’ advanced age will perpetually keep him on the Retirement Watch radar, the fact that he has just recently taken lengths to distance himself from his son’s involvement in a corruption scandal rather than defend his son suggests that he’s still most interested in politically protecting himself, suggesting that he plans on making good on his threat to run for re-election.

With the dust settling, the Retirement Watch breakdown currently stands at:

Definitely retiring: Wayne Allard (CO)

On Retirement Watch: Thad Cochran (MS), Larry Craig (ID), Pete Domenici (NM), Chuck Hagel (NE), Jim Inhofe (OK), John Warner (VA)

Running (or most likely running) for re-election: Lamar Alexander (TN), Saxby Chambliss (GA), Norm Coleman (MN), Susan Collins (ME), John Cornyn (TX), Elizabeth Dole (NC), Mike Enzi (WY), Lindsey Graham (SC), Mitch McConnell (KY), Pat Roberts (KS), Jeff Sessions (AL), Gordon Smith (OR), Ted Stevens (AK), John Sununu (NH)

There have been persistent rumors for weeks now that Sen. Orrin Hatch is aggressively seeking to be nominated by President Bush to replace embattled Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. The Nation is the most recent publication to report on the possibility that Hatch could be appointed. If Hatch is named that Republican Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman would appoint an interim senator.

http://bluesunbelt.c…

It is no longer a secret that Hatch is moving aggressively to position himself as the replacement for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. With the scandal involving Gonzales’ firing of U.S. Attorneys deepening on a daily basis, there is no longer much question that President Bush is going to need someone new to take charge of the Department of Justice. And Hatch has made little secret of the fact that he thinks he is the man for the job.

http://www.thenation…

For those who fear that the disembodied head of Orrin Hatch suspended in a jar will be serving in the U.S. Senate well into the next century, there is good news: Hatch could be up for Attorney General. Utah’s senior senator denies it, but a fellow senator claims Hatch is openly campaigning for the job vacancy after the inevitable departure of embattled AG Alberto Gonzales.

http://www.slweekly….

A rumor floating in Washington D.C. has Utah Senator Orrin Hatch openly campaigning for the nomination to be Attorney General’s job, should Alberto Gonzales step down.

Hatch says the rumors are pure speculation, and that he would never campaign for the job because it would make doing his current job as Senator more difficult.

That speculation came to light on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” program when Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy said Hatch was indeed campaigning for the position – a charge Hatch denies.

http://www.kcpw.org/…