Democrats look to fatten lead in House, Senate
Zachary Coile, Chronicle Washington Bureau
Monday, April 7, 2008
(04-07) 04:00 PDT Washington - --
There's a reason House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is smiling despite a contentious Democratic presidential primary that goes on as if it will never end.
The buzz is growing in Washington among election analysts, Democratic leaders and even some dispirited Republicans that Pelosi is poised to increase her majority in the House in the November election and Democrats are also seen as likely to add seats in the Senate.
Republican fortunes have fallen because of a cascade of retirements by GOP lawmakers and because Democrats are outmatching their rivals in both fundraising and voter enthusiasm this year. The Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan group that handicaps congressional races, predicts Democrats could pick up five to 10 seats in the House and three to six seats in the Senate.
"It's certainly a larger gain that I would have predicted on election night in 2006," said David Wasserman, the House editor of the Cook Political Report. "I would have said there was going to be some sort of Republican rebound, and the question was how large the Republican rebound was going to be."
All sides agree that the early forecasts could change - especially if Democrats fail to unite around the party's presidential nominee after a long, bruising fight.
Still, the predictions are a far cry from what most insiders expected after Democrats swept to power by capturing 29 House seats and six Senate seats in November 2006, riding a wave of anti-President Bush and anti-Iraq war sentiment.
Usually in the vote following a "wave" election, the party that won big will lose seats. Inevitably, some of the winning party's weaker first-term lawmakers are defeated as the losing party takes back House districts that they traditionally held easily. But the 2008 election could buck that trend.
"Democrats are going to gain seats (in the House) this fall," predicted Nathan Gonzales, political editor of the nonpartisan Rothenberg Political Report. "We just don't know how many. We don't know if it's going to be in the high-single digits or something considerably more."
Gonzales said there were several factors, but chief among them is the decision by 29 House Republicans to retire, while only six Democrats are resigning. The departures were a psychological blow - many were committee chairs or former House leaders - and were widely seen as a sign that top Republicans believed they were not likely to win back the majority soon. Some of the seats are in swing districts, creating new opportunities for Democrats to compete.
"The large number of Republican retirements really prohibits Republicans from going on the offensive," Gonzales said. "It takes all of their money and puts it into defending their incumbents or defending these empty seats. It leaves few resources to really take on some of these Democratic incumbents that under normal circumstances should be very vulnerable."
Republican leaders, eager to rally their troops and boost fundraising, say the pessimism is unwarranted. House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said last week that he sees a far better Republican year than most are forecasting.
"I think we will gain seats this year. Period," he said.
Democrats are eyeing some of the retirees' seats - including those of Reps. Jim Walsh and Tom Reynolds of New York, Jim Saxton and Mike Ferguson of New Jersey, Jerry Weller of Illinois and Tom Davis of Virginia - in districts that have been tilting away from the GOP.
In a few cases, the retirements could actually help Republican chances of holding seats, such as those of Rep. Rick Renzi of Arizona, who is under federal indictment, and Rep. John Doolittle, R-Rocklin (Placer County), who's being investigated as part of the Jack Abramoff influence-peddling scandal.
Other Republican retirees hail from conservative districts that are unlikely to change hands, including Rep. Tom Tancredo's seat in the Denver exurbs or Rep. Duncan Hunter's district in San Diego County.
Boehner said he's not worried. "Most of those retirees are from safe seats," he said, adding, "If you look at the difficult seats, we were going to have a difficult race whether we had an incumbent or someone new."
But analysts say the districts will be much tougher for Republicans to defend with untested candidates.
Democrats, while quietly optimistic, are trying to downplay expectations. They remember 1994, when Republicans took power after another wave election and 28 Democrats retired. But the historical trend held: Democrats, the minority party, picked up 9 seats two years later.
"One of the things we have tried to point out is - from the perspective of history - we have to literally beat history to win any seats," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., who chairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
"Certainly the new Republican retirements have given us new opportunities. ... Instead of starting on defense and trying to defend our gains, we've been able to remain very much on offense."
Republicans, however, say they have reasons be hopeful this November, too. There are 61 House Democrats in districts that President Bush carried in 2004, but only eight seats held by Republicans in districts that Democrat John Kerry won.
The GOP sees a chance to pluck off seats Democrats won in 2006, including those held by Reps. Chris Carney of Pennsylvania; Nick Lampson of Texas, who won former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's old seat; and in the Bay Area, Pleasanton Rep. Jerry McNerney, who unseated Republican Richard Pombo.
"These are districts where John McCain will undoubtedly win," said Ken Spain, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee. "Neither Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton can carry these districts."
But the GOP could be hamstrung by a lack of money. At the end of February, the National Republican Congressional Committee had $5.1 million on hand, while its Democratic counterpart had $38 million. Donors on both sides are arming up so-called 527 groups - political advocacy entities of the type used by Republican Swift Boat Veterans in the 2004 presidential campaign - for the campaign, but it appears likely the GOP will be outspent in the presidential, House and Senate races.
"On the resource side, we suck," Boehner admitted.
Republican fundraising efforts have also been hurt by an accounting scandal, in which the Republican national committee's treasurer is being investigated for allegedly moving hundreds of thousands of dollars from the committee's accounts into his own.
The GOP suffered a morale blow in losing a special election last month for the Illinois seat being vacated by retiring former Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert. Democrat Bill Foster, a scientist, beat Republican dairy mogul Jim Oberweis in an election Democrats saw as a sign that their change message from the 2006 campaign is still working with voters.
Republicans say the long nomination fight between Clinton and Obama is giving them an opening by exposing flaws in both candidates and threatening to thwart Democratic hopes for a huge turnout in November. Even Democratic leaders acknowledge the risk.
"If the Democratic presidential primary doesn't focus on what unites us and focuses on what divides us, it could create problems in November," Van Hollen said. "If you create wounds that cannot be healed, that will hurt our Democratic congressional candidates."
E-mail Zachary Coile at zcoile@sfchronicle.com. |
