While we've already had quite a few presidential contests, tonight, the nation's first non-presidential primaries kick off, beginning with the state of Ohio. The Buckeye State now has 16 congressional districts, down from 18 due to reapportionment, though only three races look like they'll have interesting primaries. (Dem Sen. Sherrod Brown is also up for re-election this year, though state Treasurer Josh Mandel has long had the Republican Senate nomination sewn up.) Because of redistricting, you'll want a copy of the state's new congressional map on hand:
And you'll also want to keep a tab open to our
redistribution chart, which shows you how much of each old district wound up in each new district—important, because some incumbents are getting introduced to a whole lot of new territory this cycle.
(Continue reading below the fold)
But without further ado, here are the races to watch on Tuesday:
• OH-02 (R): Republican Rep. Jean Schmidt has always had an unusually weak grip on this dark-red seat, and her road to renomination has always been bumpy. Starting in the 2005 special election to replace Rob Portman, Schmidt won an 11-way primary in something of an upset—but with just 31% of the vote. In 2006, her first re-election campaign, she faced a stiff primary challenge that she barely turned back, winning less than a majority—48%—compared to 43% for her chief opponent. In 2008, she was challenged yet again, doing ten points better, but still a weak total for an incumbent. Schmidt then faced another challenge in 2010, and though her opposition was virtually unfunded, she took in just 62% of the vote.
That history of weakness undoubtedly inspired surgeon and Iraq war vet Brad Wenstrup to take her on this year, and he may finally be the one to succeed. Wenstrup caught some attention for his run for Cincinnati mayor in 2009; though he was unsuccessful, his 46% performance (against incumbent Mark Mallory) was considered surprisingly good. However, Schmidt's outraised and outspent Wenstrup, but he's been on the air with radio ads—as has the very strange, generically anti-incumbent super PAC called the Campaign for Primary Accountability, which has also paid for radio ads attacking Schmidt. If Schmidt's doing any paid media, I can't tell: There's nothing on her website or in her recent FEC reports that would indicate she is. One thing which might give Schmidt an advantage in a close fight: There are two Some Dudes on the ballot, so the anti-incumbent vote might once again get split and allow Schmidt to escape with a plurality. No polling has been released for this race, so while you have to figure Schmidt is favored despite her soft performance here over the years, Wenstrup could definitely pull off the upset.
• OH-03 (D): When Republican re-drew Ohio's congressional map last year, they deliberately sacrificied one of their own, Rep. Steve Austria, to create an incumbent-less Democratic vote sink centered on the city of Columbus, in order to make surrounding GOP-held seats safer. This means that whoever wins the Dem primary is almost assured of winning the general as well. Based on polling, the frontrunners appear to be ex-Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy, who represented the old 15th for a single term before losing in 2010's red tide, and former state House Minority Leader Joyce Beatty, who more recently worked as a VP of "outreach" at the Ohio State University, undoubtedly a good position to forge all kinds of connections. A January Kilroy internal gave her a wide 48-14 lead over Beatty, but a more recent poll for Beatty had the race a virtual tie, with Kilroy at 35 and herself at 34, after an ad blitz.
Also in the race are state Rep. Ted Celeste (who was actually in second place at 17 in Kilroy's poll, but a distant third in Beatty's, at 15) and Columbus city councilmember Priscilla Tyson. Kilroy's led the pack in fundraising and had the most cash on hand entering the stretch run. She also has Nancy Pelosi's backing and used to represent about 38% of this district, so on paper, Kilroy would appear to be the favorite. But if Beatty's unanswered poll is accurate, then this race is up for grabs.
• OH-09 (D): The mother of them all: This primary pits two longtime incumbents against each other, Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Cleveland and Rep. Marcy Kaptur of Toledo. As you can see from the map below, Kaptur has the geographic advantage, representing 47% of the new 9th's constituents vs. 39% for Kucinich:
With both members' careers on the line here, this race has become very negative, along fairly predictable lines. Kaptur's aired ads criticizing Kucinich for a long history of votes he's taken to preserve his purity—votes against bills which contain military funding but also include all sorts of worthy spending as well. Kucinich has howled about this line of attack, but he's had little standing to complain, since he's castigated Kaptur for doing the exact opposite: voting in favor of war appropriations. Kucinich has definitely had his share of unforced errors: One radio ad rather stupidly took a dig at Toledo (the district's other anchor where voters are much less familiar with him), and amazingly, a staffer refused to rule out the possibility that Kucinich could run for Congress in another state
this year if he loses today. (You'll recall that Kucinich rather absurdly flirted with the idea of moving to Washington state and making a bid there.)
But while this race has long felt like Kaptur's to lose, in recent days, she started airing a rather strange radio ad in which she lambasted Kucinich for entering a former public official's name into the congressional record on the occasion of his birthday—an incredibly routine occurrence, but one that happened to involve a guy who was later brought up on corruption charges. It seemed like such a reach of an issue that you have to wonder whether the race is closer than meets the eye. As in OH-02, though, there hasn't been any polling, though Kucinich (thanks to the national network he developed through his two presidential campaigns) had outraised and outspent Kaptur considerably as of mid-February. But Kaptur had more money left over from last cycle and therefore had more to spend in the final weeks. That odd final ad notwithstanding, Kaptur seems to have the overall advantage here, though win or lose, this may not be the last we hear of Dennis Kucinich.