RC’s ace reporter on things going on out here in the West penned this piece in today’s Roll Call Newspaper:
Parties on Edge in California
By David M. Drucker
Roll Call Staff
The wild special election to replace former Rep. Duke Cunningham (R) in California’s 50th district comes to a head today, and the outcome will have broad implications in the battle for the House and on the role issues such as illegal immigration and ethics might play in the fall.
In a normal year, the race probably wouldn’t be close.
But Cardiff school board member Francine Busby (D) has pushed ex-Rep. Brian Bilbray (R) to the limit in the special election runoff that was forced by Cunningham’s resignation and subsequent incarceration after he admitted to taking bribes. Republicans acknowledge that she effectively has exploited Bilbray’s post-legislative career as a lobbyist in a San Diego-area district that has experienced multiple corruption scandals of late, including at the local government level.
But Bilbray, a longtime, staunch opponent of illegal immigration despite other views considered moderate by Republican standards, successfully has nailed Busby on that subject. His support for the hardline House immigration bill — and his opposition to the Senate bill — has been well-received by voters and the local newspapers.
The race also has enabled national organizations to give the strategies they plan to use in the fall a trial run.
“This election, five months out, has given both parties a chance to test the messages they will use in November,” said Martha McKenna, campaign services director for EMILY’s List, which is playing heavily in the race on Busby’s behalf.
Republicans, who have been apprehensive about their chances for weeks despite the 50th district’s solid GOP tilt (there are about 50,000 more registered Republicans there than Democrats), now feel cautiously optimistic that Bilbray will squeak out the victory.
Republican sources both in the district and in Washington, D.C., said that Bilbray turned the corner in the past five days, partly because for the past two weeks of the campaign the main topic of debate had been illegal immigration.
Although the GOP base there has been described as unhappy with the party’s leadership on Capitol Hill and ambivalent toward Bilbray, one Republican said that the GOP has returned to the fold in recent days.
“Bilbray’s camp is now super energized — just where you want to be the day before a tight election,” a Republican House aide with knowledge of the race said Monday.
Even if Busby loses today, some Democrats believe the race will have helped them
toward their goal of taking back the House
this November. The National Republican Congressional Committee will end up spending up to $4.8 million to defend a GOP seat, said one Democratic strategist, giving Republicans less money to use in the fall to either defend more vulnerable Republican seats or target Democratic seats. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had spent $2 million on this race as of Friday.
That Busby has benefited in this campaign from the fact that Bilbray has worked as a lobbyist since losing his House seat to now-Rep. Susan Davis (D) in 2000 also has buoyed Democrats. This proves, the Democratic strategist indicated, that a message centered around the need to send “change” candidates to Washington to address the lobbying scandals — many of which have been associated with GOP lawmakers — could be a potent strategy.
If Busby wins, look to hear one word spouted by Democrats over and over again: momentum; as in, positive momentum for fundraising, volunteer recruitment, media coverage and overall excitement about November.
McKenna, of EMILY’s List, believes Busby’s message of clean government has resonated with the district’s voters in the wake of the Cunningham scandal and said Bilbray’s move to change the subject to illegal immigration has failed. But conservative activist Grover Norquist said the jury’s still out on that claim.
Norquist argued there is no better district to test the effectiveness of the Democrats’ “culture of corruption” message, at least as one that can help Democrats pick up the 15 seats they need to take control of the House.
If Busby loses in a district whose former Congressman went to jail for taking bribes, Norquist said it effectively eliminates “culture of corruption” as a Democratic trump card in November.
“If you’re going to have tsunami in November, you’re going to have to surf a wave in San Diego in June,” he said.
Ron Nehring, chairman of the San Diego County Republican Party and vice chairman of the state GOP, cautioned against reading too much into the results of this race.
Nehring said the race revolves around a number of issues, and he predicted that individuals and political factions looking for evidence to support a particular point of view will cherry-pick from the election’s results and spin those results to prove the point that suits them.
“This special election is awash in externalities: Duke Cunningham, national mood, national issues, and forces outside the 50th, all acting on this special election — so I think it’s easy to overestimate the impact of those externalities,” Nehring said. “I think we’re looking at a confluence of factors that is unlikely to be repeated in any Congressional district.”
As they have for weeks, both parties are playing heavily in this race. Estimates peg the number of Democratic volunteers on the ground for Busby at around 400, with at least 160 Republican volunteers under the supervision of about seven Republican National Committee staffers on the ground for Bilbray.
The RNC is coordinating the get-out-the-vote effort for Bilbray, and in recent days volunteers have logged about 105,000 phone calls and knocked on nearly 20,000 doors. Meanwhile, both the DCCC and the NRCC have been on television and radio for weeks with independent expenditure campaigns.
With the polls closing at 8 p.m. PST tonight, a number of wildcards remain that could affect the outcome of this race.
The regular statewide primary is also being held today, and voters in the 50th district essentially will have two ballots. One is for the special election and features Bilbray, Busby, a Libertarian candidate and an Independent; the other is for the regular primary and includes the party primaries for the 50th district race for the right to run for a full term in November.
The winner of the special election earns the privilege of serving only the remainder of Cunningham’s term. In addition to fending off Busby from the left, Bilbray has had to deal with multimillionaire Bill Hauf (R) on the right, running against the former Congressman on the regular primary ballot for the GOP nomination to the November election.
The Independent candidate on the runoff ballot, William Griffith, was endorsed by the San Diego Minuteman, the local chapter of an outspoken, anti-illegal immigration group whose volunteers have patrolled the Mexican border.
Busby has had the luxury of a unified Democratic Party behind her candidacy and might also benefit from the gubernatorial primary on the ballot today between state Treasurer Phil Angelides (D) and state Controller Steve Westly (D). Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is not being contested in his primary.
But Busby’s biggest problem might be of her own making. She was recorded at a campaign event Friday telling a group of supporters, many of whom were Latino and spoke Spanish as a first language, that “you don’t need papers to vote.” Busby said she simply meant to say that non-citizens were allowed to volunteer on her campaign, but Republicans have used the recording against her.
The NRCC went up with radio ads about the recording Monday morning, and it has been playing repeatedly on conservative talk radio. Republicans monitoring the race credit this statement with sending undecided voters and unenthusiastic Republicans into Bilbray’s camp.
