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Halfway to November:
Some Shades of ’94 in Primary Results
By Rhodes Cook
Editor, The Rhodes Cook Letter
As originally published in the "The Rhodes Cook Letter".
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Yet for all its seeming quietness, the 2006 primary season is shaping up much like that of 1994, which preceded the massive voter revolt that November which turned the Congress from Democratic to Republican.
There were few obvious signs in the congressional primaries a dozen years ago of the carnage that would follow. Two years earlier, the combination of new district lines, the House banking scandal, and the independent presidential candidacy of Ross Perot that loosed many voters from their traditional moorings had produced a turbulent primary season in which a post-World War II record 19 House incumbents had gone down to primary defeat (as well as one senator).
But the 1994 primaries had a “back to normalcy” look to it. Through June that year, only two House incumbents had lost their bids for renomination. And by the time the primary season was over, the number of House casualties had reached only four. In addition, not a single senator had been beaten.
Yet down in the weeds that spring and summer emerged a pattern that proved prescient for the fall – namely, that it was the members of the president’s party that were having the most trouble winning renomination. Of the 53 senators and representatives renominated with less than 75% of their party’s primary vote in 1994, 36 were Democrats.
A similar trend is developing in this year’s primary season. Of the 20 members of Congress held to less than 75% thus far this primary season, 14 are Republicans.
Losing 25% of the vote may seem like a modest loss for an incumbent, and it would be in a general election. But a primary is different. The turnout is much lower than in a general election and it tends to be dominated by those who represent the party’s most active and interested members. In an era when both parties are marshalling their base vote, losing even a fraction can spell the difference between victory and defeat in the fall.
In 1994, nearly one out of every four Democratic representatives (eight out of 34) that received less than 75% of their party’s primary vote went on to lose their seats in November. It was a group that included both backbenchers and congressional heavyweights. Among the latter were Jack Brooks of Texas, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and Dan Rostenkowski, head of Ways and Means. To boot, House Speaker Thomas Foley, received a warning shot in Washington’s primary that September when nearly twice as many votes were cast for the Republican candidates in his district as were cast for Foley on the Democratic side. The speaker, like Brooks and Rostenkowski, was ousted in November.
This year’s list of sub-75% primary winners include a number of Republican congressional heavyweights, topped by former House majority leader Tom DeLay, who resigned his Texas seat in June in the wake of what he even admitted was a lackluster 62% showing in his district’s Republican primary. Several GOP committee chairmen are also among those who have seen their primary vote fall below 75% this year. It is a number that includes Steve Buyer of Indiana (Veterans’ Affairs); David Dreier of California (Rules); Bob Ney of Ohio (House Administration); and Richard Pombo of California (Resources).
Too Soon to Tell
Yet it is way too soon for Democrats on Capitol Hill to begin contemplating the spoils of victory. Based on a review of primary and special election voting thus far this year, one can produce as compelling a case for a Republican victory this fall as a Democratic one.
A case in point: What is the message from the closely watched California 50th special election June 6?
On one hand, the come-from-behind victory of Republican Brian Bilbray shows that the GOP still knows how to do the fund-raising, targeted messaging and get out the vote work needed to win critical elections – something that the Republicans have done effectively throughout the Bush presidency.
On the other hand, it was the third straight special congressional election in the past year where the GOP winner failed to reach 52% of the vote in a strongly Republican district, and raises the prospect that a much higher than usual number of marginal and even GOP-leaning districts could be in play this fall.
A second case in point: What is the resonance of the ethics issue, which Democrats once saw as their ace in the hole?
It certainly seems to be of dubious value as a national campaign theme, in part because the Democrats have some tainted members of their own and key White House strategist Karl Rove has avoided prosecution. If there was any doubt that the issue would be tough to sell, it was dispelled in the GOP’s special election victory in the San Diego-area district that was formerly held by the recently convicted Republican incumbent, Randy “Duke” Cunningham. There, the case for a tougher immigration policy (championed by Bilbray) trumped “the culture of (congressional) corruption” theme that was propounded by Democrats and their candidate, Francine Busby.
Yet while the ethics issue has yet to claim any casualties, DeLay notwithstanding, or appears to have national resonance as a winning campaign issue for the Democrats, it could be a powerful factor in selected districts and ultimately lead to the defeat of several vulnerable Republicans.
A number of ethically tainted Republicans have already seen a large part of the GOP base in their district look for other alternatives. It is a group of legislators that includes Ney, Pombo, Rep. John Doolittle of California and Sen. Conrad Burns of Montana. All have been tied in some way to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. All lost at least 25% of the Republican primary vote in their state or district, with Pombo losing nearly 40% to a pair of opponents led by former Rep. Pete McCloskey, best known for his anti-Vietnam war challenge to President Nixon in the Republican presidential primaries of 1972.
A third case in point: What is happening with the “hot button” issues – such as immigration and the Iraq war?
Voting on both issues has taken place on multiple levels, although immigration is still largely an issue that roils the Republican Party, while the Iraq war bedevils the Democrats. The partisan implication of each issue for the fall is still unclear.
In recent months, there have been a variety of contests from coast to coast that have focused on immigration. In early May, there was a highly publicized vote in Herndon, Va., a suburb of Washington, D.C., that saw the victory of anti-illegal immigration forces on the issue of a town-operated work center for day laborers. The mayor and a pair of council members who had championed the facility were ousted. In early June, Republican Bilbray won the closely watched special election in the California 50th on a “secure the borders” theme. But momentum on the issue may have shifted in late June, when Republican Rep. Chris Cannon of Utah, who was generally supportive of President Bush’s more nuanced immigration policy, beat back a well-funded primary challenger who favored a crackdown on illegal immigration.
As for the Iraq war, there were a series of “bring the troops home” referendums across Wisconsin in early April. Basically, Democratic communities favored the antiwar position; Republican communities did not. Since then, the issue has largely been fought out in the Democratic primaries in ways both direct and subtle. As an example of the latter, the party’s primary voters in the suburban Chicago district being vacated by Republican Henry Hyde nominated an Iraq war veteran to carry the Democratic banner. However, when given the opportunity to do likewise, Democrats in Kentucky’s Louisville-based district did not. Meanwhile, in Southern California, Rep. Jane Harman, the ranking minority member on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, lost nearly 40% of the Democratic primary vote in her district to an antiwar challenger.
The issue is expected to come to a head in Connecticut on August 8, when Democratic primary voters choose between incumbent Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman and wealthy Greenwich businessman Ned Lamont, whose candidacy is built around opposition to Lieberman’s outspoken support of President Bush’s Iraq policy. Lamont won one-third of the votes at the Democratic state convention in May, well above the 15% that he needed to force a primary.
In what may be a demographic preview of the primary, Lieberman won big among delegates from “old line” Democratic cities, such as Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven and Waterbury. Lamont carried affluent suburbs near New York City, such as Darien, Greenwich and New Canaan, as well as Mansfield (Storrs), the home of the University of Connecticut.
Meanwhile, the gay marriage ban continues to draw support from both Republican and Democratic voters wherever it appears on the ballot. In Alabama, 81% of voters approved the ban in June balloting. It won 90% support in historically Republican Winston County, 83% in suburban Shelby County outside Birmingham, 76% in populous Jefferson County (Birmingham) as well as academic-oriented Lee County (the home of Auburn University), and drew 70% support in Macon County (Tuskegee), which in the last census was 85% black, the second-highest share of any county in the country.
Yet thus far, the gay marriage issue has been primarily a manifestation of “red state” politics. Outside the Republican heartland of the South, the Plains states and the Mountain West, only voters in three states – Ohio, Michigan and Oregon – have cast a ballot on the issue.
Political Pragmatism
With the stakes high, the leaders in both parties are actively engaged this year in shaping their midterm tickets. For President Bush, it is nothing new. Throughout his presidency, Bush has not been shy about interjecting the White House into party primaries, something that many presidents in the past were loath to do.
This year, Bush has already taken an active role in bailing out several embattled congressional incumbents, including Pennsylvania’s Don Sherwood, who faced a difficult primary after admitting to an extramarital affair, and Utah’s Chris Cannon, who looked favorably on the president’s immigration policy against a primary challenger who emphasized the need for tighter border security. In both cases, the president recorded phone messages on behalf of the incumbent, and in both cases the incumbent prevailed.
Democratic congressional leaders also have been actively engaged in the nominating process in a bid to field what they believe are the most electable Democrats. In Ohio, they pressured prominent Iraq war veteran Paul Hackett to drop out of the Senate race in favor of Rep. Sherrod Brown. In Pennsylvania, they lined up early behind the pro-life state Treasurer Bob Casey Jr., overriding the objections of anti-abortion activists to his candidacy. And in Virginia, the chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Charles Schumer, made a primary-eve endorsement of former Reagan Navy secretary, James Webb, over a candidate who had been chairman of the Fairfax County Democratic Party. Webb won the primary narrowly.
Looking for Voters
Ultimately, the 2006 election will be decided by who votes, and thus far the nominating stage of the process has not significantly engaged the voters. Although more ballots were cast in the 2004 presidential election than any other in the nation’s history, fewer voters have turned out for the primaries thus far this year than in 1994, when the size of the electorate was smaller.
At least that is the case when one compares the gubernatorial primary turnouts in the nine states that held contested Democratic and Republican primaries in both 1994 and 2006. In six of the states, the number of primary ballots cast this year is down from a dozen years ago, with a particularly severe falloff among the Democrats.
But at the moment it is less a nationwide problem for the Democrats than one focused in the South, where Republicans continue to consolidate their new-found hegemony. In South Carolina, where the Democratic and Republican gubernatorial primary turnouts were roughly equal in 1994, the GOP turnout was nearly twice as large this year. In Alabama, where the Democratic primary turnout for governor in 1994 was more than three times as large as the Republicans, the two parties were virtually even this year. And in Texas, where the Democrats had almost twice as many primary voters as the Republicans in 1994, the turnout advantage swung to the GOP in 2006.
But while the comparative size of primary turnouts can help shed light on the basic partisan leanings of a state, it is of limited value in predicting the outcome of races in November. And there is probably no more prominent an example of that than the Texas gubernatorial race in 1994, where in spite of the Democrats’ large turnout advantage in the primary, it was a Republican, George W. Bush, who won in the fall.
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Rhodes Cook
rhodescook@aol.com© Rhodes Cook 2005.
