Is the Missouri Senate race the secret bellwether of 2010? Some are saying that the still largely below the national radar race between Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan (D) and likely Republican nominee Rep. Roy Blunt is the clearest place to see what this year’s mid-term is about. Faced with the incumbent Blunt with his fingerprints on the TARP program, Carnahan supporters say the Democrat can run on the outside in a Republican year. But Republicans say that the Democratic agenda — and Blunt’s opposition to it — will win the day in a year when voters want the Democrats gone.
In a race that pits one establishment politician vs. another in an open contest — incumbent Sen. Kit Bond (R) is retiring — the difference could come down to whether voters don’t like the way Republicans used to do things more than they dislike the way Democrats are doing them now. That sets the stage for a campaign that some say could define the Obama midterm.
Carnahan is the scion of a Democratic political dynasty in Missouri, the daughter of two Senators (her dad was also Governor) and the sister of a sitting Representative. Her grandfather served eight terms in Congress, too. She’s already won an couple of elections of her own, narrowly winning the secretary of state’s job 2004 before winning reelection in landslide in 2008. In short, she knows what she’s doing when it comes to running a campaign.
She’s done well recently, raising nearly $1.5 million in the last fundraising quarter — the most of any non-incumbent Democrat, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. And despite a record that puts her squarely on the Democratic side of things — she voiced support for the concept of a health care public option, for example — the race with Blunt has remained close in early polling.
The current TPM Poll Average shows Blunt ahead by a margin of 47.5 to 41.0.
Democrats say that Carnahan’s relative good fortunes are due to Blunt’s past as Republican party insider. The leader of political dynasty of his own — Blunt’s son, Matt, served one term as Governor before deciding not to run for reelection last year — Blunt is a powerful conservative voice on Capitol Hill. He served as deputy GOP leader under Tom DeLay, a position that put him in the middle of the Abramoff scandal that was part of DeLay’s eventual undoing. (Blunt lost his bid to replace DeLay to current House GOP leader John Boehner in 2006, and he became as Bohener’s deputy.)
Blunt has the backing of some national conservatives in this Senate bid — RedState.com endorsed him early — but others are concerned by his role in the financial bailouts that have fired up the tea partiers. Blunt was the designated House GOP bailout negotiator in late 2008, and he was among the 65 Republicans who voted for the TARP program.
Blunt explained his vote for TARP — and against Obama’s stimulus plan — to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:
[Blunt] said it’s his argument that the TARP money is likely to come back to taxpayers at some point.
“The stimulus money is just gone,” he said.
But the support for the bailout puts him at odds with independent voters, Democrats say, and gives Carnahan room to run as the anti-bailout candidate. And that sets the stage for a fight that could determine whether voters are casting their ballots against Democrats in 2010 or against any incumbent associated with the policies (like the bailout) they don’t like.
Missouri itself plays a role here as well. Though Obama lost it narrowly in 2008, Democrats have a long tradition of winning in the state, all the way up to Sen. Claire McCaskill’s (D) win in 2006. It’s fertile ground for Democrats to run against the grain — and often against their own party — and win.
But Republicans dismiss the idea that Blunt can be cast as the pro-bailout candidate in the race. They say that Carnahan will be carrying the baggage of her supporters — which include pro-environment groups and labor unions — as well as running with a national Democratic party that lets Republicans make the race about Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Obama. They like their odds in a race like that.
