Rumors were circulating for weeks, Jack Conway made it official: He will run in Kentucky’s Senate race, setting up a high-profile primary clash with Lieutenant Governor Dan Mongiardo. Before Democrats start lamenting that this will complicate their hopes of conquering the Senate seat, they should keep in mind that Kentucky’s primary will be held in May 2010, a relatively early date that should leave ample time for the winning candidate to turn around and prepare for the general election.
In fact, it had long looked certain that Mongiardo would not have the primary field for himself. Conway had formed a three-way clique, along with Auditor Crit Luallen and of Rep. Ben Chandler, and he had made it clear that one of them would jump in the race. Conway’s candidacy thus allows us to rule out Luallen’s and Chandler’s - thus taking care of all of our questions about Kentucky Democrats.
While Chandler would arguably have been the party’s strongest Senate candidate, his exit should not worry Democrats. For one, his general election advantage was no sure thing and his bowing out does not deprive his party of a top-tier candidate: Mongiardo and Conway both look well equipped to pick-up the Senate seat. Furthermore, Chandler holds a red-leaning district in the House: If he had ran for Senate, the open seat would have been a huge headache for the DCCC and one of the GOP’s top take-over opportunities. On the other hand, Chandler does not look to be endangered, so Democrats are assured of keeping KY-06.
Let’s turn to the Conway-Mongiardo match-up. Both are statewide officials, and both will receive substantial backing from the establishment: Mongiardo has already been endorsed by Governor Steve Beshear, while Conway could receive Luallen and Chandler’s support as early as tomorrow. The Courier Journal reports that Rep. Yarmuth, who represents the state’s only blue-leaning district, is also set to endorse Conway. Even if the Attorney General receives the support of more Democratic figures, Beshear and Mongiardio’s stature will keep the primary widely unpredictable.
It is difficult to say how the two Democrats compare ideologically. Some observers of Kentucky politics are saying that Mongiardo is the more conservative of the two, and there is certainly evidence for that. For instance, the Lieutenant Governor co-sponsored a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage through the state Senate. On the other hand, not that much is known about Conway’s politics. He first ran for office in 2002, losing a House race against Rep. Northup by 3% in 2002, a difficult year for Democrats nationally; he returned to the campaign trail in 2007, when he ran for Attorney General - a position that does not require to take positions on many economic and social issues.
In fact, The Courier Journal’s 2002 article wrapping up the Conway-Northup race notes that the Republican ran to the Democrat’s left on some economic issues (the whole article makes for an interesting read now that Conway will run for Congress again):
Northup said the state should have started a prescription-drug benefit for seniors instead of building golf courses — even though such a program would have been much more expensive — and Republican ads showed a Conway lookalike golfing…
Jackson and Conway campaign manager Riddle said Conway also was hurt by his early statement that Congress should consider raising the retirement age and cutting benefits to save Social Security. ”Anne ran as a Democrat,” Riddle said. ”She ran on Social Security, prescription drugs and bringing pork back to the district.”
If one candidate does embrace more populist rhetoric, a variety of reasons should not make national Democrats think that a more conservative contender would be more electable: Bunning is vulnerable enough that it might not matter and both Conway and Mongiardo have shown strength in previous statewide elections.
It remains to be seen, then, how Conway and Mongardio will choose to differentiate themselves from each other. Given their profiles, neither can hope to run as an outsider or to bash the establishment. And if there are no overarching policy differences between two candidates, what often remains is personal attacks and bruising smears. After all, the stakes are high: If Bunning stays true to his promise to run for re-election, the Democratic primary could very well be more competitive than the general election.
If Bunning is the GOP nominee, then either Conway or Mongirado should win easily. Bunning has been compared to Dodd of CT. recently, and while Bunning does better against Conway and Mongirado than Dodd does against Simmons, Bunning has the addition problem of having little fundraising, the national GOP (including Senate GOP leader and KY senator McConnel) wanting him to get out, and that Bunning’s weakness are entirely of his own doing, while Dodd doesn’t have a real fundraising problem (although he has much less money then we all thought thanks to him puting in so much into the 2008 presidential run), the national Dem party isn’t trying to get him to retire, plus Dodd is being targeted unfairly in the AIG fiasco, although other actions that he did do have hurt him.
In terms of what Conway and Mongiardo would battle about, it is really unkown. Perhaps Mongiardro is more of a social conservative, but it’s unknown how that would benefit him more. Kentucky is a conservative state, so it is very unlikely for any statewide Democratic candidate to be a progressive that liberals can champion. Jack Conway is a couple of years younger than Mongiarado (39 to 48) so perhaps the race could be defined on generational grounds. It’s unknown how nasty it would become.
I would say that the Democratic primary would matter much more if Bunning is convinced by the GOP to retire and Secretary of State Tray Grayson becomes the de facto nominee. While Bunning could be defeated by any Democrat, including little known former customs agent Darlene Fitzgerald who was the first to announce a run in the Dem. primary, some Democrats are worried that Mongiarado would not be strong enough to defeate Trayson. That is probably a major reason why power Kentucky Democrats decided among themselves as an alternative so Mongiarado wouldn’t have an easy win in the primary.
I do think that the Democratic primary would matter much more if
I think Jaxx has it right. Mongiardo has tried to carve a more conservative image, partly with his vocal support of the anti gay marriage amendment. This of course was probably partly engendered by Bunning’s ads implying Mnogiardo is gay in the ‘04 race. We all know that if you take strong public stances against gays it proves you’re not gay:)
But I get the sense that Conway’s squeaky clean image, good looks, support of the leaders of the KY democratic party(with the exception of Beshear), and his base in Louisville will give him the edge in the primary.