I haven’t been covering the early movements in the lead-up to the 2010 U.S. mid-term elections on this blog. One of the key contests has been shaping up to be in Pennsylvania, where moderate Republican Senator Arlen Specter was facing a challenge from conservative Republican Pat Toomey.
Toomey had challenged Specter in 2004, when the Republican establishment fell in behind Specter and saw him re-elected. Since 2004, however, much of the moderate Republican voter base has switched to become Independents or Democrats, and polls indicate Toomey was on track to win the primary, before being badly beaten by any old Democrat in the general election.
Well, Specter has now done what appears to have been inevitable in hindsight: he has switched to the Democratic Party, and will run as a Democrat in 2010. It looks likely that Specter will win the Democratic primary, and will likely defeat Toomey in the general election.
This decision also means that, once Senator Al Franken is seated, the Democrats will hold the vaunted 60 seats in the Senate, with prospects of more gains in 2010.
More elsewhere: at Polswatch, at FiveThirtyEight, and much, much more at Daily Kos.
Both conclusions you draw are somewhat premature.
Firstly, you underestimate the money that conservatives are now going to pump into PA – Specter is now Target #1 nationally – and a lot of people who havn’t donated before will now do so. There really will be an all out effort, and I wouldn’t count Toomey out. In fact, if you look at Toomey’s results in congress, where he was elected and reelected in a democratic district, he can get strong biparisan support.
Secondly, Specter has specifically said that he will not necessarily vote with the Democrats on cloture on many things, and this isn’t giving them the necessary 60 votes at all. I doubt his erratic voting behaviour will change all that much.
Besides, who knows if he’ll survive till the general. I’m pretty sure he was around since before the Revolutionary War – and if you see him in person (as opposed to on TV), he looks very very frail, old and dottering.
Starting from the end: of course there’s always a chance he could be rolled in the Democratic primary or, y’know, die.
60 votes has never meant complete control for the Democrats. You already have a group of moderate Democrats who don’t vote with the party all the time. While Specter moves from the group of moderate Republicans to the group of moderate Republicans, it remains that a group of a dozen moderates control cloture in the Senate.
As far as Toomey winning in PA, I can’t see it. If the Republicans are stupid enough to pour their money into Pennsylvania, it will be a disaster for them. They will still be fighting a defensive battle in 2010 (although less so than 2006 and 2008) and really can’t afford to focus on a right-wing ideologue running in a moderate state against a moderate ex-Republican incumbent.
I would say that 60 seats is almost certain and that the Democrats may even get 67 (2/3) which would assist with treaty ratification and constitutional amendments.
With such a majority they might try again to get congressional representation for DC which would help the Democrats.
I agree that the Republicans may decide to focus a lot on Pennsylvannia now and it will be disastorous for them. Pennsylvannia has been a blue state for a quite a while now and they’ve only managed to keep Republican senators because of the incumbency advantage. Now, with the incumbency advantage on the Democrats side, there is no way they will win. However, they will be stupid enough to think they can (as McCain did last year) and I suspect will put resources into Pennsylvannia, taking them out of seats like Florida and Missouri which could easily lose.
On 2010 have a look at my other post – it should be useful…http://polswatch.wordpress.com/2009/04/26/will-the-republicans-continue-to-crumble-in-2010/
67 is a chance, although slight – it could happen…
Fantasyland. The Democrats won’t get to 67.
There are only six winnable Republican seats in 2010 – New Hampshire, Missouri, Kentucky, Ohio, Florida and North Carolina. So barring a Snowe/Collins defection, 66 is the ceiling.
Plus word is that Governor Crist is about to enter the race in Florida, which would make that state very difficult.
Caveat: Despite his age, I’m assuming Chuck Grassley isn’t going to retire in Iowa. He’s apparently in full fundraising mode. But in the unlikely event that he does retire, that would open up one more possibility.
However, the Democrats have also got their own turf to defend. Chris Dodd’s had some shocking poll numbers of late. Harry Reid is no sure thing in Nevada. The newly appointed Michael Bennet has to make himself known to the voters of Colorado. Republican Congressman Mike Castle is making noises about running for the open Delaware Senate seat. And Pennsylvania will probably be a contest if Specter is ousted in the Dem primary.
http://nrsc.org/meetarlen/ – interesting strategy from the NRCC to pain ARlen as a bush-loving, labor-busting republican…
Thoughts?
I would like to see a real Democrat primary Specter. I still think that a real Democrat would comfortably beat Toomey.
If Specter doesn’t move to the left on issues like EFCA, he’s gonna have a challenge of some kind, although you’d have to say he’s the favourite still.