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| Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) |
Each cycle, there are almost always candidates that at first decline to get into a race, and then make the jump. Cory Gardner, specifically, comes to mind on this front. In 2014, Gardner repeatedly turned down Republicans when they asked him to run for the Senate. This wasn't due to a lack of ambition, but as Colorado had just recently gone blue in 2008 & 2012 at the presidential level (and the Democrats had won against the environment in the Senate election of 2010), Gardner didn't want to risk a safe House seat at the age of 39 to make a play against popular incumbent Sen. Mark Udall. However, as the tides shifted and it was obvious the Republicans were going to have a strong cycle, Gardner decided to role the dice for a promotion, a decision that paid off handsomely when he bested Udall that November in one of the closest elections of the cycle.
Colorado provides a clear case study of what we might be looking out for in terms of candidates who will swing into a House, Senate, or gubernatorial race that (so far) have declined to make a jump into a specific race. The race was one where Gardner still started as a slight underdog, but there was potential in the race. It wasn't open-and-shut that Gardner would win, and quite frankly it was a race that on Election Night was closer than polling had indicated at that point. So what you need to find to "spot the Gardners" are races that are theoretically winnable (either through past precedence or with the right candidate), but don't really have a decent candidate yet. And yes, even in a wave candidates do matter. Considering how close Udall was able to keep the Senate race that cycle, had he been running against Ken Buck (the presumptive nominee at that point), Buck's rightward lean and lack of retail politicking polish (where Gardner is his superior) would have been enough of a problem that Udall probably could have won a slight victory similar to Jeanne Shaheen and Mark Warner that cycle. So if the Democrats can win these recruits, it increases their chances greatly in 2018 of winning major seats. So, in a first for the blog (I've never done a list like this), here is a rundown of the recruits who have declined, but may now change their minds due to increased likelihood of a Democratic wave next year.
(A Couple of Notes: I'm sticking to just Governors, House, and Senate races here-I'm sure other races will gain traction for a specific dream candidate, but there's already too many maybes to factor in more down-level races. Also, some of these people are more on this list because they've "declined by saying nothing" at this point; I'm actively skipping people like Phil Bredesen who are publicly flirting (Update: it sounds like Bredesen is less flirting and more committing, though I don't think he's made an official statement on this yet), and am sticking to people who either publicly declined the race or have skipped public comment so long they've been forgotten. Finally, I initially tried to rank these, but then couldn't quite figure out a way to put one above the other so I'm going alphabetically by state.)
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| Amanda Renteria (D-CA) |
Few GOP-held districts offer more obvious advantages to Democrats than CA-21. The district is second only to FL-26 in terms of Republican-held districts with a Democratic PVI (it's D+5), and it went to Hillary Clinton in 2016 by 16-points. After Virginia's near clean sweep of Clinton-won State Assembly districts, one has to assume this would be a race the Democrats are targeting ferociously, but so far Rep. David Valadao continues his bizarre teflon-coated political career, vastly out-raising his Democratic opponents, with presumptive nominee Emilio Huerta posting pathetic numbers compared with the 6-digit hauls some of his fellow California Democratic challengers are bringing in this cycle.
Which is all the more reason that Amanda Renteria is worth a second look. Renteria admittedly lost (by a lot) in 2014, but that was a completely different environment, and she's since added a major kudo to her resume in the form of the Clinton campaign (which would give her access to mountains of cash, and Clinton herself, who would be a good surrogate in this district). Plus, she ran a pretty decent race up until the end-a better environment could help her there. Renteria has so far declined mention in this race, but it feels like foolishness not to press her on it-she's a rising star in the party, and since she won't be in a cabinet for a while, this feels like a logical leap.
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| State Attorney Dave Aronberg (D-FL) |
In October, Palm Beach County State Attorney Aronberg declined to run against freshman incumbent Rep. Brian Mast in Florida's 18th, a district with a reddish hue (it's R+5), but has been held by a Democrat for years prior with Rep. Patrick Murphy, and did go to Barack Obama in 2008. If the Democrats were to win back the seat (which in this environment is certainly possible), they'd probably need their top candidate. Aronberg would be that choice. He's polished on the road, he's held political office here for years (before he won office as a State Attorney, he served a decade in the State Senate), and he would be a solid counter to Mast, who got off much easier in 2016 than he should have when the Democratic candidate Randy Perkins ended up being a disaster (as is the wont of the Florida Democrat). Aronberg recently declined, but would probably be still worth a look as none of the replacement candidates could match his name recognition or politicking abilities in the state.
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| State Sen. Andy Manar (D-IL) |
Manar, it's worth noting, is one of a couple people on this list who hasn't exactly declined his race, but has waited so long that it feels like they're just running out the clock at this point. Still, the DCCC has to be holding out hope that Manar will make the entry into the race against Rep. Rodney Davis in the 13th, a perpetual target for the Democrats during wave elections that nearly always bucks the trend. The current slate of contenders has been thin since Carol Ammons left (and with no obvious frontrunner, there's always the chance that David Gill once again wins the nomination and throws in the towel for the Dems). Manar's rural profile (he's a more conservative Democrat, which fits a district that went for Obama and Trump) works well here, as does his past electoral success. It's probable that if Davis loses this cycle, it would be with Manar in the race, and as he's an ambitious Democrat (he toyed briefly with running for governor) in a state without a lot of opportunities for promotion, this feels like his best bet at moving up.
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| Attorney General Doug Gansler (D-MD) |
I put three governor's races on this list, two of them because I think the popular incumbent Republican is being overestimated and the third because I think that voter fatigue can set in even on the most ensconced of incumbents if the national mood is right. This is one of the former. While Gov. Larry Hogan is popular with Old Line State voters, he is still a Republican running in an unpopular Republican President's midterm, and potentially facing a wave in a royal blue state. The last time that happened, Gov. Bob Ehrlich (whose approvals were actually higher than Hogan's now), ended up falling in an epic fail to Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, who then parlayed his two terms into a presidential run. Gansler lost relatively handily to then-Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown in 2014's primary, but would be the favorite were he to enter in 2018 considering the shallow field. If he sees a potential for a sequel to 2006, will he jump into the race?
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| Attorney General Maura Healey (D-MA) |
Few would argue that Bay State Attorney General Maura Healey lacks ambition-she regularly shows up on lists of "Democrats to watch" and she's in a state that frequently hosts future presidential contenders. The problem for her is that there aren't a particularly large number of promotion opportunities for Democrats in the state, which is why her refusal to run against incumbent-Gov. Charlie Baker (R) seems perplexing. While Baker is popular, like Hogan, he'll still have to answer to his party label in an era of Trump and this is a sapphire blue state. She could theoretically be avoiding the fortunes of her predecessor Martha Coakley (whose two failed parlays onto the national stage in 2009 and 2014 turned her into a Democratic pariah), but that caution comes with a price-there's no guarantee she'll have such a clean opening to the nomination in 2022, and waiting has its costs (just ask Thomas Reilly, her predecessor before Coakley, whose gun shyness to running cost him a national profile when Deval Patrick beat him in the 2006 primary).
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| Mayor Stephanie Miner (D-NY) |
Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner actually inspired this list, because unlike everyone on this list, she's publicly musing that she could be the next Cory Gardner (my words, not hers). Miner declined a run for Congress in October, but in light of the recent tax bill, has been actively attacking Rep. John Katko and stating that she may reconsider running for the seat. Call me cynical, but I wonder if the tax bill has less to do with it and more the fact that Miner, who has been mayor since 2010, is an ambitious pol who sees an opening. After all, the DCCC has so far failed miserably to get a challenger to Katko despite this being a district that went for Obama by 16-points in 2012 and is the rare upstate New York seat that went for Hillary Clinton (Trump outperformed outside of NYC in the Empire State). Miner's entry would be a HUGE coup for the DCCC, instantly putting this as a tossup, and putting a seat that needs to be on the table for the majority into play.
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| City Councilman PG Sittenfeld (D-OH) |
Sittenfeld (along with Hamilton County Commissioner Todd Portune, who would have made this list were the district not already represented and were Sittenfeld not the bigger name right now in the Democratic Party) both could be a savior for the Ohio Democrats, who have struggled in recent years due to gerrymandering to breakthrough in congressional pickups. The youngest member of the Cincinnati City Council was probably the candidate Democrats should have gone for last year in their Senate primary (which Ted Strickland royally lost in the general election), and at 33 is a star-on-the-rise in Ohio who didn't run statewide despite multiple opportunities headed into next year. This isn't a district that Obama or Clinton won in in 2012/16, but it is one they came close in, and that has been friendly to Democrats in the past (Steve Driehaus held it on the list from 2009-11). If Democrats are going to start making inroads in the Buckeye State, they're going to have to transform a district like OH-1, and it's hard to find a more promising candidate than Sittenfeld to make the transformation.
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| County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia (D-PA) |
In my opinion, there is virtually no district in the country that the DCCC should be hanging its head in shame harder over than PA-8 (well, maybe NY-24, but Miner's public musings puts that #2). A seat with a PVI of R+2, it went to Donald Trump by only 0.2% of the vote, while Mitt Romney won it be 0.1%-as a result, it's slight Republican, but emphasis on the slight. The problem for much of Pennsylvania is that while the Democrats can frequently (though as 2016 illustrated, not always), win statewide, their bench is shallow at the local level, where Republican have dominated outside of Philadelphia for years. Ellis-Marseglia is one of the few truly prominent Democrats who could take on Fitzpatrick in 2018, and while she's declined a race so far, she's the sort of candidate that Pelosi needs in this race to turn a district that should be ripe for the picking.
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| Rep. Jim Matheson (D-UT) |
The only Senate race on this list, mostly because with Bredesen, O'Rourke, Sinema, and Rosen already running, the DSCC has done better than pretty much anyone could have dreamed in terms of recruitment. But if the Utah Senate race does open up (Sen. Orrin Hatch seems completely indecisive about running again), or if Steve Bannon tries to implement his shenanigans in the primary, it might be worthwhile for the Democrats to have a first-tier candidate running for the Senate (though it has to be said that Jenny Wilson isn't a gadfly). The only Democrat that fits that description is former Rep. Jim Matheson, who at 57 is still pretty young to be done with politics, and has long toyed with the prospect of following in his father's footsteps and running statewide. Matheson would face a gargantuan challenge (no Democrat has won a Senate seat here since 1970), but a damaged Republican winning the primary or a three-way race (neither out-of-the-question) could have him reconsidering his previous disinterest in this contest.
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| State Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling (D-WI) |
Our final entry is in a race that could still see a solid contender (one could argue that Madison Mayor Paul Soglin is a first-tier candidate), but I'd argue that the best antidote to Scott Walker might be a female lawmaker, and the most agile female lawmaker currently in Wisconsin politics would be Jennifer Shilling. The State Senate Minority Leader has clashed repeatedly with Walker since she was elected in 2011 (during the famed recall elections that cycle), and would be a formidable challenger to him as he tries for a third term (that could theoretically position him for another presidential race in the future after an embarrassing lost in 2016). Wisconsin voters tend to like reelecting their governors, but they aren't immune to fickleness, as was evidenced by Tommy Thompson's loss in 2012. Walker is a titan, no doubt, but I suspect if he were to go down it would be to someone like Shilling, and she has to realize that the nomination could be hers for the taking (and that running alongside Tammy Baldwin could help her with female turnout).
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