CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS
Sept. 19, 2008 – 12:02 a.m.
Three Republican House Candidates No Longer “Safe”
By Greg Giroux, CQ Staff
With the Nov. 4 election less than seven weeks away, some races for the House of Representatives are moving out of the no-worry zone for candidates and into the competitive arena. CQ Politics is updating its ratings of four House races to reflect district changes.
These changes — three in districts where Republican Party candidates are still favored to win, but are no longer politically safe and have to be mindful of their upset-minded Democratic opponents, and one in a district where the Republican incumbent looks more secure — don’t affect CQ’s overall outlook of the U.S. House, which is currently in Democratic control by a margin of 235 to 199 (there is one vacancy in a strongly Democratic-leaning district). At the moment, CQ Politics gives the Democrats the edge in 236 contests and the Republicans in 183 contests, with the remaining 16 labeled as “no clear favorite.” It takes 218 seats to have a majority in the 435-member House.
So the Republicans would need to sweep the 16 “no clear favorite races” — a highly unlikely scenario — just to retain their current 199-member minority. The Democrats are favored to begin the next Congress next January with more House members than they have now.
CQ’s race ratings have 7 categories, with the vast majority of races in the uncompetitive categories of “Safe Republican” or “Safe Democrat.” But the rest are on a scale from mildly to very competitive. Here are our changes:
Kentucky’s 2nd
New Rating: Republican Favored. Previous Rating: Safe Republican .
Republican Rep. Ron Lewis is retiring from a western Kentucky district that, during his 14 1/2 year tenure, has metamorphosed from a conservative Democratic stronghold — typified by the long tenure of Lewis’ predecessor, William Natcher (1953-94) — to a Republican bastion. That bodes well for Republican nominee Brett Guthrie, a state senator, who is strongly favored to win. But he faces a credible challenger in David Boswell, who is also a state senator.
Boswell began the campaign with higher name recognition than Guthrie, and the Democrat’s campaign earlier this month released a internal poll that had Boswell leading. But Guthrie has a substantial advantage in fundraising — $661,000 cash-on-hand as of June 30, compared to $45,000 for Boswell — and he will boost his visibility district-wide with a robust advertising campaign. And with John McCain likely to handily defeat Obama in a district that gave nearly two-thirds of its votes to President Bush in 2004, it will take a substantial ticket-splitting crossover vote for Boswell to prevail.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s (DCCC) decision to include Boswell on its roster of “Red to Blue” candidates — those that party officials think are waging highly competitive campaigns in Republican-held districts — is a signal that the cash-rich DCCC might help Boswell overcome a big fundraising disadvantage.
Nebraska’s 2nd
New Rating: Republican Favored. Previous Rating: Safe Republican .
Republican Rep. Lee Terry is again facing Democratic lawyer Jim Esch, who took 45 percent of the vote two years ago in what was Terry’s weakest showing in five elections in a district that includes Omaha. Terry’s reduced margin in 2006 owed in part to the unfavorable political environment for Republicans, and he may yet beat Esch by a larger margin than in 2006.
Three Republican House Candidates No Longer “Safe”
Esch’s inclusion on the DCCC’s Red to Blue list will give him access to more campaign cash, and he’ll probably will wind up spending more than the $420,000 that his 2006 campaign laid out. And the Terry campaign this week aired a television advertisement that attacks Esch on energy policy — something it probably would not have done if it thought Esch wasn’t at least a potential threat.
Ohio’s 7th
New Rating: Republican Favored. Previous Rating: Safe Republican.
It’s more likely than not that retiring Republican Rep. David L. Hobson will be succeeded by Republican state Sen. Steve Austria in a district that includes a relatively small portion of Columbus and forms a rough “U” shape to scoop up territory west, south and east of Ohio’s capital city. But we can’t count out Democratic nominee Sharen Neuhardt, a lawyer who should see her fundraising tick upward now that she has the DCCC’s Red to Blue imprimatur. A recent endorsement by EMILY’s List, a group that backs Democratic women who support abortion rights, also will help her raise some late campaign cash.
The district’s likely backing of McCain — President Bush took 57 percent of the district vote in 2004 — gives Austria a fairly solid firewall, but the district isn’t so politically one-sided as to completely discount the idea that Neuhardt could pull off a big upset.
Pennsylvania’s 6th
New Rating: Republican Favored. Previous Rating: Leans Republican .
Republican Rep. Jim Gerlach has won all three of his contests by a margin of 51 percent to 49 percent, but he seems to be heading to a more secure victory this time around in a politically competitive district northwest of Philadelphia. His 2008 opponent is Bob Roggio, a retired businessman who became the party nominee after several other better-known Democrats declined to challenge Gerlach.
CQ Politics kept the Pennsylvania 6 race in the highly competitive “Leans Republican” category mainly because of Gerlach’s history of slender elections. But it seems that the Democrats might have had their best shot at unseating Gerlach in 2006, a terrible year for Republicans nationally and in Pennsylvania — but one in which Gerlach held on to win against well-funded Democratic lawyer Lois Murphy. Roggio reported raising $405,000 through the end of June and had $260,000 on hand. He’ll need a lot more money to wage a robust advertising campaign in the pricey Philadelphia media market to boost his low name recognition.
A big late injection of campaign funds conceivably could help Roggio make this a highly competitive race. Gerlach’s campaign issued a release Friday that noted that Roggio hasn’t been included on the DCCC’s “Red to Blue” list. (The DCCC included Pennsylvania 6 on a less competitive “Emerging Races” list). Gerlach’s campign also touted an “own” poll that said Gerlach was up by 29 percentage points. It’s doubtful that Gerlach will win by that much, but the race surely isn’t a nailbiter at the moment.
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