After Volatile Primary Season, G.O.P. Faces New Test
By JEFF ZELENY
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: September 13, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/us/politics/14memo.html?_r=1&hp
As the long and turbulent primary season of the midterm election campaign drew to a close on Monday, the Republican establishment was placing its confidence on hold and bracing for the prospect that voters in yet another state would send a message of defiance to party leaders in Washington.
The Senate primary in Delaware on Tuesday was prompting anxiety among party officials, who feared that a victory by Christine O’Donnell, a candidate backed by the Tea Party, could complicate Republican efforts to win control of the Senate. Republican leaders rushed to the aid of Representative Michael N. Castle, a moderate lawmaker and former governor, as internal party warfare — including accusations of a death threat — intensified on the eve of the primary.
“We need to prove to the Republican Party that we need to move it to the right, that we need to move back to good basic values and the Constitution,” said Lynn Brannon, a leading Tea Party activist in Delaware. “I will have a little bit of regret, but the Republicans need to learn their lesson: that we want things to go back to the right.”
It is a fitting end to an unusually volatile seven-month stretch of primaries that demonstrated in state after state that the discontent percolating in the electorate does not discriminate by political party.
Voters in seven states will choose nominees in House, Senate and gubernatorial races on Tuesday, the final marquee primary day of the election cycle. The Senate contests in Delaware and New Hampshire were being watched closely by Democratic leaders, who believe that divisive purity tests in Republican primaries have improved their chances of retaining their majority.
“Republicans have chosen extremists to be their nominees, and this has changed the political map of the cycle,” said Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “In a year where Republicans want these races to be all about Democrats, Republican nominees who have extreme positions help us make the contrasts we need to make.”
Republicans are finishing the primary season in a stronger position than they imagined when the year began, when winning control of the Senate was not included in even the most optimistic projections. But discord inside the party has steadily accumulated and will test Republicans in November and beyond. Seven candidates supported by the National Republican Senatorial Committee have already fallen this year.
When Senator Robert F. Bennett of Utah, a three-term Republican, was defeated before reaching his primary, party leaders in Washington dismissed his loss as a product of the state’s quirky political system, where candidates must clear a series of hurdles with party activists before making the ballot. But back in the spring, shortly before his defeat, Mr. Bennett detected that trouble was on the horizon for the party’s establishment members.
“A politician always thinks he’s in better shape than he really is,” he said.
His defeat was followed by campaigns in Colorado and Connecticut, Florida and Kentucky, Nevada and Alaska, where insurgents knocked off candidates initially favored by the Republican leadership in Washington.
Senator John Cornyn of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has argued that the November elections will be a referendum by voters on the policies of the Obama administration and the Democratic-led Congress. “Voters see the need for checks and balances,” Mr. Cornyn said.
The race in Delaware is to fill the seat that Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. held for 36 years. Republicans recruited Mr. Castle, a fixture in state politics, and until recently even many Democrats believed he would be difficult to beat. But when Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska lost her Republican primary last month to a candidate backed by the Tea Party, activists were emboldened and the Delaware contest came to life.
Ms. O’Donnell, who until this year was a perennial candidate who struggled with her finances and other elements of her personal life, was endorsed by Sarah Palin and Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina. But other conservative leaders and groups steered clear of her race, saying that the purity test among Republicans could be taken too far.
FreedomWorks, an advocacy group that has helped expand the Tea Party movement and train groups to help with voter turnout, did not support her candidacy.
“It’s not wise to elect a philosophically perfect candidate who is not capable of winning the general election,” said Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks. “We’ve stayed out of the Delaware primary because we worry that Christine O’Donnell can’t win the general election.”
The Delaware campaign took an odd turn on Monday, as Republican officials disclosed that the party chairman, Tom Ross, had received a death threat that was under investigation by the Justice Department in Washington. He has been outspoken in his support for Mr. Castle and his criticism of Ms. O’Donnell.
The outcome of the Senate primary in New Hampshire was less worrisome to Republican leaders in Washington. The party’s top candidate, Kelly Ayotte, a former state attorney general, also won the backing of Ms. Palin. She appeared to be locked in a close contest with Ovide Lamontagne, a lawyer and a longtime political figure in the state.
The winner of the contest will face Representative Paul W. Hodes, a Democrat. Republicans must win 10 seats in November to win control of the Senate. There are few ways they can do so without holding the Republican seat in New Hampshire.
Kate Zernike contributed reporting from New York, and Michael D. Shear from Washington.
Boehner Plays Central Role in Democratic Ad
By CARL HULSE
Copyright by The New York Times
Published: September 13, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/us/politics/14boehner.html?hpw
WASHINGTON — Democrats are again stepping up their effort to elevate Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio into a symbol of the Republican Party virtually equivalent to the elephant. And in doing so, they are executing a strategy intended to do more than just provide President Obama and his party with a convenient punching bag.
The Democratic National Committee is weighing in with a new anti-Boehner advertisement scheduled to begin running Tuesday on cable television, and Mr. Obama again singled him out as a voice of opposition Monday in an appearance in Virginia.
Representative Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said Monday that “voters deserve to know more about John Boehner and what Republicans plan to do if given the opportunity.”
But the Democratic effort goes beyond introducing Mr. Boehner to a public mostly unfamiliar with a man who has been in and out of the House Republican leadership over the last 16 years. Democratic officials say the Boehner offensive is a calculated, multitiered plan put in place to achieve several objectives.
They said that with his long career in Washington and role in leading the party in the 1990s and again recently, Mr. Boehner could easily be painted as representing the old-style Republican rule that turned voters off in 2006 and 2008. Democrats say his long tenure could also diminish enthusiasm among Tea Party activists and others who want to clean house in the House.
Democrats also hope that by treating Mr. Boehner as the new head of the party, they can drive a wedge between him and other ambitious Republicans who see the coming election as their moment to shine as well, causing friction and disharmony on the issues.
They already claimed some success, noting that Mr. Boehner’s comments on a potential compromise on tax cuts floated on Sunday were not immediately echoed on Monday by colleagues like Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the No. 2 House Republican, or Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader in the Senate.
Finally, with news organizations and other groups closely examining Mr. Boehner’s background and record because of his potential rise to power, Democrats say they have laid the groundwork for using any potentially damaging material that turns up by putting Mr. Boehner in the spotlight.
To Mr. Boehner, who began his career in Washington as a rebel on the House floor taking on the entrenched Democratic majority, the assault is no surprise.
“It comes with the territory,” Mr. Boehner said during a recent meeting with reporters. “They are trying every way possible to make this election about something other than them. But they are kidding themselves. This election is going to be a referendum on their policies and votes over the last 20 months. They can do whatever.”
With a recent poll showing Mr. Boehner largely unknown to the public, turning him into a major liability seems like a formidable task for Democrats. And for much of Mr. Obama’s first two years in office, with Republicans having no high-profile leader in office, Democrats had aimed most of their fire at Mr. McConnell, blaming him for stalling the Democratic agenda.
But the Democratic National Committee evidently sees an opening. A new ad to begin running on cable television beginning Tuesday takes on Mr. Boehner over his opposition to a measure that provided money to preserve jobs of teachers and emergency workers and was partly paid for by closing a tax loophole for companies that do business overseas.
Brad Woodhouse, a party spokesman, said the ad should serve to remind voters of the days of Republican majorities in the House, when the party in power “did the bidding of corporate America while leaving ordinary American families to fend for themselves.”
Allies of Mr. Boehner say they believe the Democrat attacks will fall flat. They said that Mr. Boehner’s talk of a potential opening on retaining middle-class tax cuts was shared ahead of time with his leadership colleagues and that Mr. Boehner had not split with them.
They also say that Mr. Boehner, in past leadership races, has undergone thorough scrutiny and that they expect nothing new to materialize beyond a rehash of past activities.
As for the Tea Party, the Republican leader has regularly appeared at their events, receiving a strong reception from the activists and leaders. And Mr. Boehner’s own history of not seeking earmarks and pushing for lowered federal spending plays exceedingly well with the conservative groups.
Shrugging off the Democratic attacks, the leader’s office on Monday issued a statement under the heading of “muckmakers,” saying that the “White House focuses on picking fights, not creating jobs.”
“Boehner is happy to take incoming fire from the president and this White House because it proves our point,” said Kevin Smith, a spokesman for the Republican leader. “They are panicked, desperate and have nothing positive to offer the American people to create jobs or cut spending.”
In the seven weeks between now and the election, voters are certain to learn much more about Mr. Boehner from both Democrats and Republicans. The question is whether the information will break through the barrage of election material and make a difference in how people vote and how Republicans work with another.
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