Indiana Voters Missed Taking Out Joe Donnelly Last Month

Indiana voters came close to bringing about the extinction of the loathsome Blue Dog species in that state. The only one they missed-- and just barely-- was Joe Donnelly, so now, of course, the Inside-the-Beltway media is touting him as a statewide candidate!

Let's start by taking a look at the election results in Indiana November 3. (We already did a focus on dead Blue Dog-- permanently this time?-- Baron Hill.) Keep in the back on your mind that this red state, after giving Bush a 57-41% win in 2000 and a 60-39% win over Kerry in 2004, went with Obama in 2008-- 1,374,039 (50%) to 1,345,648 (49%). Compare that to the statewide turn out for extremely conservative Blue Dog Brad Ellsworth in this year's Senate race to replace equally conservative retiring Evan Bayh. Ellsworth just wasn't defeated handily by sleazy lobbyist Dan Coats (55-40%), the statewide Democratic turnout plummeted to 695,859 (slightly over half). GOP turn out was down as well, but not by nearly as much. Coats claimed over 70% of the McCain voters. Many Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents looking at the voting records of the incumbent Blue Dogs, Hill, Ellsworth and Donnelly, saw no reason to bother coming to the polls. These three tended to vote with the Republicans on a fairly consistent basis. All three, in fact, are among the 40 House Democrats who vote more frequently on contentious substantive issues with the Republicans than they do with the Democrats. Their ProgressivePunch scores for the 111th Congress are abysmal:

Baron Hill- 42.86
Brad Ellsworth- 42.06
Joe Donnelly- 37.01

All three are anti-choice voters and they all were among the 64 Democratic supporters of the Stupak Amendment, restricting women's choice. I'm guessing there were some women in Indiana who remembered that on election day and chose to stay away from the voting booths. And gay voters aren't terribly enthusiastic about Donnelly and Ellsworth, who were among only 17 viciously homophobic Democrats to join the Republicans in voting against including the LGBT community in Hate Crimes protection. And this wasn't an anomaly of their part. When Patrick Murphy's amendment came up to repeal Don't Ask Don't Tell only 26 Democrats crossed the aisle to vote with the GOP against it-- and one was Joe Donnelly. (Ellsworth already knew he would be running statewide and would need LGBT votes to beat Coats, so he lightened up on the homophobia.) Now don't get the idea that Hill is some kind of a progressive. He gave the gays a break, saving his reactionary instincts for financial matters instead. Hill was one of only 27 Democrats to vote against the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.

In the Senate race, Ellsworth didn't even win his own district and statewide only wound up with a meager 8 counties in his column. And the Blue Dog trying to succeed Ellsworth in the 8th CD, Trent Van Haaften, was slaughtered-- 75,480 (37%) to 115,778 (58%), losing all 18 counties in the district. The two non-Blue Dog Democrats, Andre Carson and Peter Visclosky, each was reelected handily, respectively with 58 and 59% of the vote.

OK, let's get to Donnelly, the most conservative of the three Indiana Blue Dogs in the House-- and the one, ironically, in the bluest district, the 2nd CD. Obama beat McCain there 54-45% (while losing narrowly in Hill's and Ellsworth's more conservative districts). Like Ellsworth and Hill, Donnelly was swept into office in the 2006 Democratic wave and each defeated a far right Republican incumbent who voters were fed up with. Donnelly took 54% (104,016 votes) and radical freak Chris Chocola's 88,871 votes (46%). Donnelly's path to victory was to win big in the two biggest counties, St. Joseph, where he took 58% of the vote and LaPorte, where he took 61% of the vote, with high turnouts. Chocola's victories in 7 of the remaining 10 smaller counties didn't help him much.

2008 was another big Democratic year and Donnelly's reelection was impressive, a landslide-- 187,416 (67%) to 84,455 (30%) against a hapless Republican. This time Donnelly won every county in the district. In their less Democratic districts, Hill and Ellsworth also did extremely well.

This year was very different. Donnelly barely scarped to his 48-47% win. He held onto 91,330 voters, down by about half, while Jackie Walorski took 88,787, more than the Republican candidate against Donnelly did in 2008. And on the county level, the worm had turned. For example, Donnelly's 53% win in red-leaning Carroll County in 2008 turned into a staggering loss (31%) this year. He managed to win modestly in the two biggies, St Joseph (53%) and LaPorte (54%) and won two others narrowly, leaving Walorski with wins in 8 counties.

On top of that, Donnelly spent $1,574,332 (as opposed to Waloski's $772,722)-- both as of October 13, the latest FEC filing available. Most of Donnelly's financing came from PACs; most of Walorski's from individuals. The DCCC spent $770,760.74 beating up on Walorski, while the NRCC spent $562,969.13 attacking Donnelly (who also had around a million dollars in independent money from shady right wing groups deployed against him).

Based on all this Roll Call somehow sees Donnelly as a viable candidate for statewide office. They point out that the state legislature is likely to gerrymander more Republicans into Donnelly's district, making it harder for him to win in 2012-- at a time when Democrats will be looking for a candidate to run for governor (an open race since Mitch Daniels is term-limited out of running again) and as a sacrificial lamb against the immensely popular Senator Dick Lugar. I'd say Donnelly has a bleak future in politics.