POLITICS

How The Misery Multiplied For House Republicans

The House Republican Caucus is likely to shrink -- largely because Democrats have successfully branded the GOP as "incompetent."

by David Wasserman

Saturday, Oct. 25, 2008


POLITICS: OBAMA'S IMPACTMeasuring CoattailsThe coattail effect has waned in recent presidential elections. But how many Democratic congressional candidates might Barack Obama carry with him in a victory this year?Richard E. CohenAfter losing a 2006 bid to oust Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., Democrat Jim Esch was disinclined to try again this year. But he was encouraged in February by the enthusiasm expressed at his state's Democratic presidential caucus, and he changed his mind a month later. Now, less than two weeks before the election, Esch unexpectedly is positioned to ride Barack Obama's coattails to victory.
"When I decided to run the second time, I thought that without Obama as the nominee, it would be tough to win. But with Obama, it would make a big difference," Esch, a 32-year-old businessman, said in [more...]

Less than two weeks out from Election Day, House Republicans appear to be on the verge of their second straight electoral calamity. The party that lost 30 seats in 2006 and three more in special elections this year seems headed toward a net loss of another 20 to 25 House seats on November 4. And an even greater setback isn't out of the question.

Thus, the party that held a 232-seat majority just two years ago could be relegated to a minority holding fewer than 180 seats -- possibly fewer than 175 -- when the 111th Congress convenes in January. Such a two-cycle meltdown would represent a greater net loss than the 50 seats Democrats shed in 1978-80 and would rival the 64 seats Democrats lost in 1992-94.

Dazed and depressed Republicans must be wondering how they got here. Reciting the list of culprits behind the GOP's troubles feels like beating a dead elephant. But what began with the widespread perception that the Bush administration mishandled Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq war continued with a bevy of scandals involving GOP members of Congress, and has culminated in the exclamation-point economic crisis.

All of those problems fit neatly into the long-running Democratic narrative of GOP incompetence that is proving so damaging to Republicans' down-ballot candidates. The "incompetent" tag is the main reason that the overall state of play in congressional contests seems more tied to the troubled economy, President Bush's abysmal job-approval ratings, and the presidential race than to the public's negative attitudes toward the Democratic-controlled Congress.

It is worth remembering that the Republican brand wasn't much more popular in November 2006 than it is now, and the GOP still held on to 202 House seats in the midterm elections. But the House GOP's problems aren't just atmospheric anymore; they're also structural. Republicans are now suffering from financial and retirement woes that are almost certain to cost them dearly in November. Consider this: Even when the Dow Jones industrial average hit its high in October 2007, and even when the presidential contest was within the margin of error in most polls this summer, Republicans were on track to lose around 10 House seats. And the chief cause was fallout from 2006.

After Democrats claimed the speaker's gavel in the midterm elections, the political upheaval didn't end with the hanging of "Under new management" signs outside the House and Senate chambers. Aftershocks followed. "Welcome to Power" money started flowing from K Street into Democratic campaign coffers, and Republican candidates and campaign committees quickly realized that they could no longer count on receiving stacks of checks from their traditional direct-mail base of small donors, because those people had become demoralized, irascible, or both. Even worse, the loss of majority status helped prompt a near-unilateral exodus of Republican members into the "retiring in 2008" column.

At its widest, at the end of June, the cash-on-hand gap between the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee stood at $46.2 million ($54.7 million versus $8.5 million), an unprecedented financial advantage for Democrats that has only partially been offset by the GOP-aligned outside group Freedom's Watch. The final count of retirements is similarly advantageous for Democrats: 29 of the House's 35 open-seat races are in districts represented by Republicans. That's the most lopsided ratio since World War II. Many of those contests are in swing districts. Democratic candidates are competitive in 20 of the 29 where Republicans are retiring.

These dramatic disparities might not have been enough to get Democratic analysts talking about gaining 20 or more House seats. But the news from Wall Street over the past month has weakened Republicans' ability to mitigate their structural deficiencies. Polls of individual House races taken in the first week of October, just after the Dow's first gigantic drop, showed that voters' heightened economic anxiety took as great a toll on many GOP members as it did on Republican presidential nominee John McCain. Now Democrats are almost all offense, and they are swinging for the fences.

For the House GOP, this international economic crisis of epic proportions could not have occurred at a worse time. The stock market's free fall has coincided with the time period during which House Democrats were best able to flex their financial muscle by spending abundantly on ads defining GOP candidates while cash-poor House Republicans were off the airwaves. From the second week of September until the third week of October, the DCCC spent $31.6 million on (primarily) advertising in 49 districts, 35 of which are held by Republicans. During the same period, the NRCC spent just $3.6 million in 15 districts, just two of which are held by Democrats.

Now all the warning sirens are blaring for House Republicans. GOP insiders privately describe a playing field on which even nonincumbent Democratic House candidates who are fairly unpopular are still in the game. In other words, it doesn't necessarily matter how much voters like or dislike the Democratic alternative; they care more about voting against Bush and the party they perceive to have mishandled the economy. The "change" dynamic is now working in House Democrats' favor as well as in Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's favor.

With the exception of Democratic Rep. Tim Mahoney's sex-scandal-plagued district in Florida, just about every district on the move has moved in the Democrats' direction in the past few weeks. As was the case in 2006, this is an environment in which even second- or third-tier Democratic candidates could pull off upsets -- and a handful probably will. The shifting and expanding playing field is one reason that both parties are taking out big loans. The NRCC, its resources already spread thin, confirmed early this month that it was getting an $8 million loan. Not to be outdone, the DCCC announced that it would borrow $15 million.

In October 2006, Cook Political Report Editor and Publisher Charlie Cook wrote that it was "triage time for [House] Republicans ... a time when those who are politically dead or unlikely to be saved should be jettisoned, with resources shifted to those who can still be saved." Once again, GOP strategists face the unenviable task of determining which of their House candidates are beyond help. If the current playing field of some 61 competitive House districts were a triage staging area, here's what the breakdown might look like.

POLITICSTilted Playing FieldDavid WassermanForty-nine of the GOP's seats are at least somewhat vulnerable compared with 12 Democratic ones. The party breakdown for the seats most likely to flip is even more lopsided--with Republicans now holding 13 to the Democrats' two.
[more...]

In Dire Straits

This "Most-Endangered" category comprises the 15 seats most likely to fall to the opposite party. Republicans occupy all but two of them.

In Florida's 16th Congressional District, freshman Democratic Rep. Tim Mahoney acknowledged extramarital affairs after ABC News reported that he paid a former staffer and mistress a $121,000 secret settlement. Mahoney's behavior has all but assured that come January GOP businessman Tom Rooney will occupy the seat once held by disgraced Republican Mark Foley. And in Texas's 22nd District, Democratic Rep. Nick Lampson trails former GOP Senate aide Pete Olson in private surveys of this very Republican, Houston-exurbs district that Tom DeLay represented when the GOP controlled the House.

Republicans, meanwhile, may be down for the count in 13 districts. Three of the most vulnerable are running for open seats where their party failed to recruit top-tier candidates to replace its scandal-tarnished incumbents: the vast northern Arizona district of retiring Rep. Rick Renzi, the suburban Chicago district of retiring Rep. Jerry Weller, and the Staten Island-based district of retiring Rep. Vito Fossella. Three others are vying for Democratic-trending seats left open by retiring moderate GOP Reps. Heather Wilson of New Mexico, James Walsh of New York, and Tom Davis of Virginia. Republicans also trail in the Ohio district of retiring Republican Rep. Ralph Regula.

At the moment, the two incumbent Republicans in the worst re-election shape are Reps. Don Young, Alaska's lone House member, and Tom Feeney of Florida. Although Young has served in the House for 35 year, his combative style and his ethics problems (according to reports, he is the subject of a federal investigation) have put him behind state Rep. Ethan Berkowitz, his Democratic challenger. After Feeney apologized in an ad for what he called the "rookie mistake" of taking a Jack Abramoff-sponsored golf trip to Scotland in 2003, a mid-October Democratic survey showed him trailing former state Rep. Suzanne Kosmas, 58 percent to 35 percent.

Other Republicans in grave danger include those in districts with particularly severe economic woes, such as Reps. Phil English (PA-03), Robin Hayes (NC-08), and Randy Kuhl (NY-29). GOP Rep. Jon Porter's fast-growing suburban Las Vegas district has been hard hit by home foreclosures and has experienced a big surge in Democratic voter registration. Recent public polls have shown all four of these House veterans trailing.

Hotline's House Race RankingsHouse Race Hotline's Tim Sahd provides a regularly updated list of which House seats are most likely to switch party control in November based on a number of factors, including organization, money, buzz and polling.

Endangered

This category of races to watch includes five Democratic-held seats, including the majority party's only vulnerable open seat, the northern Alabama district of retiring Rep. Bud Cramer. It also includes the Democrats' only vulnerable longtime legislator, 12-term Rep. Paul Kanjorski, who has come under fire for acquiring millions of dollars in earmarks for projects that floundered in his northeastern Pennsylvania district and who faces one of the GOP's star recruits of the cycle, Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta. Neither Kanjorski nor the Democratic freshman in the neighboring 10th district, Rep. Christopher Carney, can be considered clear favorites. The same goes for freshman Democratic Reps. Carol Shea-Porter, who faces a rematch against the incumbent she upset in New Hampshire's 1st District two years ago, and Don Cazayoux, who stung Republicans by capturing a vacant Louisiana seat in a May special election but faces stronger general election opposition.

The list of Republican seats in intensive care, however, is four times as long, and it has been growing longer by the week, to GOP operatives' dismay.

Of the nine GOP open-seat races in this category, four are playing out in suburban swing districts and have remained pure toss-ups since their inception. At stake are the seats of retiring Reps. Deborah Pryce (OH-15), Jim Ramstad (MN-03), Jim Saxton (NJ-03), and Michael Ferguson (NJ-07).

The other five, represented by departing GOP Reps. Terry Everett (AL-02), Jim McCrery (LA-04), Wayne Gilchrest (MD-01), Kenny Hulshof (MO-09), and Steve Pearce (NM-02), are playing out in more-rural, conservative districts. Although these districts haven't been seriously contested by Democrats in years, they have become much more competitive as unusually strong Democratic contenders with populist messages have taken advantage of residual effects of tough GOP primaries.

And then there are additional endangered GOP incumbents. First are those who represent districts that range from Republican-leaning to overwhelmingly pro-GOP, but who either tend to make headlines for all the wrong reasons or are seen as polarizing conservative firebrands: Reps. Marilyn Musgrave (CO-04), Bill Sali (ID-01), Tim Walberg (MI-07), and Michele Bachmann (MN-06). Last Friday, Bachmann's statement on MSNBC's Hardball that "the news media should do a penetrating expose" to determine whether members of Congress are "pro-America or anti-America" helped her underfunded Democratic challenger raise $600,000 in less than 48 hours.

Second, five Republicans with more-moderate profiles are struggling in suburban districts that will almost certainly vote for Obama at the top of the ticket. These members are Christopher Shays (CT-04), Mark Kirk (IL-10), Joe Knollenberg (MI-09), Steve Chabot (OH-01), and Dave Reichert (WA-08). Among the five, Knollenberg has been giving GOP strategists the most headaches of late. Although he has raised plenty of campaign cash from his upper-income Oakland County district, at the age of 74 he is facing his first genuinely competitive race in over a decade, and McCain's pullout from Michigan doesn't help him.

Finally, two of the most bare-knuckle House brawls in the country are playing out in Florida. In the Orlando-area 8th District, GOP Rep. Ric Keller is struggling to keep his head above water against Alan Grayson, an anti-war-profiteering lawyer and Code Pink protester who has sent voters a mailer rehashing the charge that Keller left his first wife to marry one of his congressional staffers several years ago. Farther south, in the Miami-area 21st District, GOP Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart is locked in a grudge match against longtime Hialeah Mayor Raul Martinez and has used mug shots of Martinez in mailers and TV spots even though Martinez's 1991 federal corruption convictions were overturned on appeal.

If Democrats are winning the vast majority of these 25 races on Election Night, they could well be on their way to overall gains of 25 seats or more. If these 25 contests split fairly evenly, the GOP might be able to hold its losses to about 20.

Also Competitive

That Republicans may have to spend time and money shoring up the likes of Reps. John Shadegg (AZ-03), Brian Bilbray (CA-50), Mark Souder (IN-03), and Lee Terry (NE-02) -- all of them veterans thought of as relatively safe until a few months ago -- is a sure sign that something has gone seriously awry for their party. Polling that shows them to be surprisingly weak has encouraged the DCCC to buy substantial TV time in their districts.

Twelve more Republicans running in districts that Bush carried twice -- Reps. Dan Lungren (CA-03), Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25), Sam Graves (MO-06), Dean Heller (NV-02), Jean Schmidt (OH-02), Henry Brown (SC-01), Thelma Drake (VA-02), and Shelley Moore Capito (WV-02), and GOP candidates hoping to succeed retiring Reps. John Doolittle (CA-04), Ron Lewis (KY-02), Tom Reynolds (NY-26), and Barbara Cubin (WY-AL) -- hold only modest leads, according to most private polls. Most of these Republicans will probably win, but their contests are sapping scarce GOP dollars from other competitive races.

It is also disheartening for the GOP that their incumbents in this category look just about as vulnerable today as did some Democratic freshmen who started out as top targets but now appear to be in fairly good shape. Although it is possible that Republican challengers have fighting chances of ousting Reps. Jerry McNerney (CA-11), Jim Marshall (GA-08), Nancy Boyda (KS-02), Travis Childers (MS-01), and Steve Kagen (WI-08), each of these Democrats appears stronger than Obama in these Bush-carried districts.

With the electoral map changing quickly, both parties need to make sure that late-breaking contests do not blindside them. More than a handful of losses in this category of races, or in races not now considered competitive, would point to Republican losses in the 30-plus seat range.

Looking Ahead

Call it Congressional Darwinism, Round 2. Many Republicans thought they had already endured a "survival of the fittest" election in 2006. But plenty of seats that the GOP held easily two years ago are now within Democrats' reach. For Republicans who hope to stick it out in the minority until their party can reclaim the House, November 4 will be a test of wilderness survival skills.

Save for a few candidates in reliably conservative districts, House Republicans can no longer hope to reach 50 percent-plus-one by hitching their fortunes to those of McCain. To win, Republicans in marginal and even slightly GOP-leaning seats must articulate their own economic messages and portray their Democratic rivals as unacceptable or out of touch on more than just taxes and spending.

For House Republicans, losing 20 to 25 seats would be psychologically devastating. For Democrats, the precise number of gains could prove less important than which seats they pick up. If they flip seats primarily in swing districts, they will have a truly cohesive majority for the first time in their party's modern history. But if the party's gains are largely in conservative-tilting districts, the Blue Dog Coalition will grow and Speaker Nancy Pelosi could find herself having a harder time forging party unity.

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