Has the Virginia GOP Learned Its Lesson

According to the Roanoke Times, we will know some time this Saturday afternoon.  The Virginia GOP will hold its U.S. Senate Nominating convention in Roanoke on Saturday and choose between four candidates for the chance to take on incumbent Mark Warner.  The four candidates are former RNC and Virginia GOP Chairman Ed Gillespie, Tony DeTora, a congressional policy adviser from Stafford County; Shak Hill, a U.S. Air Force veteran from Centreville; and Chuck Moss, a businessman from Prince William County.   

Last year's convention for the three state wide offices was a disaster.  The nomination for Governor was unopposed and most people came in committed to one or the other AG candidates.  But for the Lt. Governor nomination, there were five candidates and most delegates were uncommitted, which created the perfect storm for the eventual winner, E.W. Jackson, who made a real stem winding speech and led on every ballot.  In the end, his 20 point loss in the general election likely helped pull down State Senator Mark Obenshain in the AG's race.  Will the GOP go with the best candidate this year?  UVA Political Scientist Larry Sabato seems to think so: 

Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, agreed that a Gillespie defeat in Roanoke is unlikely, given the stakes and following Republicans’ losses of all three statewide races in November.

“Political people are not dumb; their learning curve is not flat,” he said. “The GOP has a fair to good chance to take control of the Senate, and the party is trying to broaden the playing field.

I guess we will find out Saturday if Sabato is right.

Bob Marshall Makes National Review's Bad Primary Candidates List

It's primary season and National Review Online had this article by John Fund yesterday on a couple of tea party aligned candidates that Fund considers to be disasters for the GOP if they win their nomination contests.  Virginia's own Delegate Bob Marshall (R-Prince William) makes the list.

Marshall is currently one of several candidates hoping to replace retiring 10th District Congressman Frank Wolf.  The so-called GOP establishment has circled the wagons around Delegate Barbara Comstock.  But Comstock is no RINO (Republican in Name Only), which is usually who Tea Party aligned candidates target.  Comstock has an "A" rating from the NRA, and beat back a Bloomberg funded candidate to win reelection in Northern Virginia in 2013.  She has also secured the endorsement of conservative radio talk show host Mark Levin, no fan of the GOP establishment and a big fan of the Tea Party, and movement conservatives like Morton Blackwell.

There is a "fire house" primary scheduled for Saturday, April 26 to decide the GOP nominee.  While not a party convention that usually only the most dedicated activists attend, a fire house primary still has lower turn out than an actual primary.  Fund notes that Marshall has performed well in these low turnout environments in the past, like in 2008, when he lost a U.S. Senate primary to former governor and NRA Board member Jim Gilmore by just 66 votes out of more than 10,300 votes cast at a state GOP convention. And that could be the problem.  If he wins there will be a lot of past statements that Democrats will use against Delegate Marshall:

Marshall’s problem is that his extreme rhetoric marks him as easy prey for Democratic attack ads in November. In my view, he is a dead-weight loser — and I almost never reach such a conclusion about a conservative candidate in a competitive district.

Last Thursday, the Washington Times did an analysis of his record and noted that “Marshall has said disabled children can be God’s vengeance against women who have had abortions.” Indeed, in 2010, Marshall spoke at a rally calling for an end to state funding of Planned Parenthood. “When you abort the firstborn of any, nature takes its vengeance on the subsequent children,” he claimed. “This is a special punishment, Christians would suggest.”

After an uproar, Marshall waited five days to offer a quasi-apology, saying he had been misconstrued. But days after this walkback, he took to the House floor and claimed his statement had “been repeated endless times in print and in the electronic media without anyone producing the smoking-gun tape.” In reality, his words had been posted on YouTube for several days and can still be found there.

“He’s Todd Akin on steroids,” adds one Northern Virginia conservative activist who has endorsed no one for the seat. He noted that after last year’s Supreme Court decision striking down a gay-marriage ban in California, Marshall said, “For all I know, [Justice Anthony] Kennedy is a homosexual.” When asked by the Washington Times about his comment, he defended it: “Clearly, some of the people making these decisions must be rationalizing their own bad behavior.” Justice Kennedy, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, has been married for 51 years and has five children.

Marshall has support from the Tea Party in his home county.  The fact that tea party booster Mark Levin is on Comstock's side, may be what she needs to overcome Marshall's claims that she is not conservative enough.  Anyone who has listened to Levin knows he is not going to support a squish.  In the end however, she has to turn out more people than the other candidates on April 26.

Is Mark Warner Vulnerable

Conventional wisdom has it that U.S. Senator and former Virginia Governor Mark Warner is one of the safer senators seeking re-election this year.  He is personally popular in Virginia, left office as a popular Governor and was overwhelmingly elected in the 2008 tidal wave that swept Democrats into control of the entire federal government.  Until 2013, he did all he could to at least keep the NRA from endorsing any of his opponents (they made no endorsement in the 2001 election when Warner was elected governor and in 2008 both Warner and former Governor Jim Gilmore received "A" ratings but no endorsement).

Then, in 2012, Newtown happened and Warner was heard distancing himself from Virginia gun owners and NRA members, and when given the chance to say exactly what he was for and against, he could not quite do it.. In the end, in April of 2013, Warner voted for the Manchin/Schumer/Toomey criminalization of private firearm sales but voted against Diane Feinstein's amendment to renew the so-called "Assault Weapons" ban, and voted against Frank Lautenberg's ban on so-called "high capacity" ammunition magazines.

Up until now, only a couple of unknowns with very little experience had come out of the woodwork to challenge Warner as he gears up for re-election this year.  He has raised gobs of money and has gobs more in his personal fortune.  But columnist Marc Theissen suggests that if former RNC Chairman and lobbyist Ed Gillespie ends up throwing his hat in the ring, Warner may not have the easy campaign he had originally expected:

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) is in a lot more trouble than it seems. Despite his ample war chest and approval ratings, only 50 percent of Virginians say Warner should get a second term. And independents, by a margin of 49 to 43 percent, say they would rather have someone new in Virginia’s Senate seat.

A candidate like Gillespie will also likely hound Warner on the fact that he was a deciding vote in the passage of Obamacare, which continues to be even more unpopular with each passing day. And last month, former Virginia Democratic Chairman Paul Goldman and Conservative Blogger Norm Leahy noted how the election of Terry McAuliffe could be Warner's worst nightmare.

Our hunch: He learned that voters are surprised when told of Warner’s support for Obamacare. That vote is a huge liability right now among the Virginians whom Gillespie needs to attract to be more than a sacrificial lamb. And should he run, it would mean a major national GOP guru is betting he can use Obamacare to bring someone of Warner’s stature down.

Warner is already trying to tar Gillespie with the "high paid lobbyist" label, but as The Hill notes, with McAuliffe's election, that may not work.

Most bets will still be on a Warner victory in November.  But, if the Virginia GOP does not commit suicide at it's nominating convention this spring, and instead goes with a nominee that can at least match Warner's ability to raise money and make it a credible race, if the voter mood remains what it it now, Warner may find himself in the fight of his life.