In N.J., Virginia, And California, GOP Struggles

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The New York Sun

WASHINGTON – Mayor Bloomberg’s apparent re-election today may be the high point for the national Republican Party in a dismal off-year Election Day, political analysts and pollsters said yesterday. Key gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, and a slew of GOP-backed ballot initiatives in California, are leaning Democratic, observers said yesterday, boding ill for Republicans’ electoral hopes in 2006.


Perhaps the most closely watched contest is the battle for Virginia’s statehouse, waged by the state’s Democratic lieutenant governor, Timothy Kaine, and a former Republican attorney general, Jerry Kilgore. Public-opinion polls yesterday showed Mr. Kaine maintaining his lead over Mr. Kilgore, with the margin ranging from 1 percentage point to 9.


The managing editor of RealClearPolitics.com, John McIntyre, said late polling data showed the race would be “very close,” while a veteran national pollster based in upstate New York, John Zogby, labeled Mr. Kilgore’s campaign “a Hail Mary effort.”


One of the principal unknowns of the Virginia contest, observers said, is the effect of an eleventh-hour Kilgore campaign rally in Richmond last night, headlined by President Bush. The editor of the Rothenberg Political Report, Stuart Rothenberg, said a Kilgore loss would now be portrayed by Democrats as a sign of President Bush’s political poison, and that a last-minute Kilgore victory would be trumpeted by Republicans as evidence of the president’s resilience, enduring popularity, and saving power.


“Virginia will be read as a referendum on Bush,” Mr. Rothenberg said.


If the “referendum” goes the way of the Democrats as a result of low voter turnout among Republicans, Mr. Rothenberg added, the election would serve as a “warning sign” for Republican candidates in congressional and gubernatorial races nationwide next year.


The Virginia race is also said to have implications for the 2008 presidential contest. If Democrats retain the governorship, some analysts have argued, it will provide a boost to outgoing governor Mark Warner, said to be on the Democrats’ short list for 2008, and may pose obstacles for Senator Allen, a Republican presidential contender.


In New Jersey’s governor’s race, Senator Corzine, a Democrat, is facing off against the Republican nominee, Douglas Forrester, a businessman and former assistant state treasurer.


Recent polls showed Mr. Corzine leading Mr. Forrester by margins ranging from 5 to 9%. Mr. McIntyre, whose Web site monitors and compiles polling data, cautioned yesterday that last minute surveys showed independent voters breaking toward Mr. Forrester.


“If the national backdrop were more favorable to Republicans, you could be looking at an upset,” Mr. McIntyre said.


Yet analysts said yesterday that New Jersey’s gubernatorial race would be less a barometer for the national GOP’s popularity than a measure of voters’ tolerance of state Democrats’ corruption. In 2002, Senator Torricelli withdrew from his re-election race over campaign finance abuses, and last year New Jersey’s Democratic governor, James McGreevey, resigned after disclosing an extramarital gay affair with his counter-terrorism adviser, Golan Cipel.


The biggest unknown in the New Jersey race, Mr. Zogby said, was the effect of last-minute ads run by the Forrester campaign featuring Mr. Corzine’s ex-wife, Joanne Corzine, in which she accuses the senator of sacrificing his family and convictions in his pursuit of power. The television ad, Mr. Zogby said, would probably be perceived as “overkill” and backfire on the Forrester campaign.


While Mr. Warner and New Jersey’s acting governor, Richard Codey, are both Democrats, for Republicans, it’s “not enough to say that Democrats held both governorships” if Messrs. Kaine and Corzine are victorious today, Mr. Rothenberg said.


“Republicans need some good news to change the current psychology,” he added.


A surprise victory for one of the ballot measures advocated by California’s Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, might do the trick, analysts said. Most polls show the Schwarzenegger-backed propositions – which would require parental notification for minors to receive abortions; make it easier for public-school teachers to be terminated after unsatisfactory evaluations; require that labor unions obtain employees’ approval before using their dues for political campaigns; impose limits on state spending, and alter the laws determining how election districts are drawn – likely to be defeated.


Of most national interest, analysts said, are Propositions 75 and 77. Proposition 75, which would impose restrictions on how unions spend employees’ dues, has been combated fiercely by state and national organized labor, and Proposition 77, observers said, lacks the support of state and federal legislators of both parties who would suddenly find themselves facing competitive races upon the alteration of gerrymandered districts.


Success for Proposition 77, Mr. McIntyre said, “might start a trend to get competitive house races – which to be honest, right now, is in the benefit of the Democrats, because they’re in the minority.”


Mr. Rothenberg cautioned that the measures’ impending defeat would not necessarily doom Mr. Schwarzenegger’s re-election bid next year, adding that despite record-low approval ratings, many believe Mr. Schwarzenegger “has a chance to resurrect himself, phoenix-like.”


Mr. Zogby, however, reached by phone in Los Angeles yesterday, said the California ballot measures would likely prove “a trifecta for the Democrats.” Republicans, the pollster added, would probably seize on Mr. Bloomberg’s impending triumph to spin some good news out of an otherwise disappointing day.


Other major votes around the country include mayoral contests in San Diego, Cleveland, Detroit, and St. Paul, a gay-marriage ban in Texas, a ballot initiative limiting medical-malpractice awards in Washington, and a redistricting measure in Ohio.


The New York Sun

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