3 Wall Street-Owned New Dems Face Rematches

Teabagger Robert Lowry poses with realistic Ted Cruz blow-up doll

Everyone is probably relieved there won't be a Patrick Murphy-Alan West rematch, but next year a handful of New Dems almost as bad as Murphy are going to have to face the Republican ex-congressmember they beat in 2012.
Actually, Sean Patrick Maloney has an even worse voting record than Murphy. In fact, Maloney, who does his call-time from the office of a sleazy hedge fund in Manhattan, has the single worst voting record of any Democratic freshman-- yes, generally worse than Sinema and Gallego. He votes even more conservatively than the DCCC recommends. Not a very astute man, he thinks conservatives will vote for him because he's almost as conservative as a Republican. That won't happen and now that Democrats know he isn't really one of them, the base that elected him in 2012 isn't likely to turn out for him next year. Maloney's district, NY-18-- all of Orange County, all of Putnam County and parts of Dutchess and Westchester counties-- has an even PVI (one of only 9 in the nation) and he beat incumbent Nan Hayworth last year (143,845 to 133,049) largely because Obama turned out the voters. Obama beat Romney in NY-18 149,610 to 137,144. In the last race Maloney spent $2,246,008 to Hayworth's $3,254,072 (which included $110,033 from her personal fortune). This cycle she's expected to spend a lot more of her own cash, although she hasn't reported raising anything yet and Maloney, a notorious Wall Street whore, has already brought in $1,362,653 (64% from big donations and 28% from PACs). And he's already taken $76,050 from Wall Street, which is reflected in one of the most pro-Wall Street voting records of any Member of Congress. Last week, for example, he voted with the Republicans to exempt private equity fund investment advisers from its registration and reporting requirements. His sole claim to being "progressive" is that he's gay and married with adopted children. It's a profoundly false claim on progressivism and the only thing that could possibly keep him in office is what a horrible candidate Hayworth is.

Another really bad New Dem facing the Republican he beat in 2012 is Brad Schneider (IL-10, a carefully gerrymandered district north of Chicago that was redrawn specifically to elect Democrats). Like Maloney, Schneider is a Wall Street whore who also voted last week with Republicans for that same dreadful exemption for private equity fund investment advisers. Last year, Obama won IL-10 157,400 (58%) to 112,552 (41%) but Dold nearly held onto the seat anyway. Schneider was clearly saved by Obama's coattails, barely beating Dold 133,890 (51%) to 130,564 (49%). Last year Dold outspent Schneider $4,543,049 to $3,029,605. So far Schneider has raised $1,144,430. At the end of September, Dold reported he had $819,000 in the bank, slightly more than Schneider's $767,000 cash on hand. This is a real toss-up.

Another extremely conservative New Dem-- and Blue Dog-- is Pete Gallego and he may or may not face the very flawed Republican he beat in 2012, Francisco “Quico” Canseco. I'm sure he hopes he does. The Republican Party Establishment, on the other hand, opposes Conseco and is reluctantly backing an ex-CIA agent, Will Hurd (after failing to recruit a more plausible opponent to Gallego).

TX-23, the biggest district in the state (23% of Texas, 29 counties), is a long stretch of border country between San Antonio's western suburbs and El Paso. 70% of the people there are Hispanic, although last year Romney won 51-48%, around the same margin that Obama won it in 2008. The PVI is R+3, but that index is backward-looking and the district is getting bluer. Last year Gallego actually outpolled Obama, winning against Canseco 96,676 (50%) to 87,547 (46%). Canseco beat Hurd in 2010 but the NRCC didn't want him to run again and trued recruiting Rolando Pablos, a Rick Perry crony who declined to run. But the GOP doesn't acknowledge that what makes Canseco so weak in this Hispanic and military-oriented district-- even against an incumbent as lame and incompetent as Gallego-- is that he opposed both comprehensive immigration reform and the Dream Act and voted for sequestration that caused unpaid furloughs and hundreds of millions of dollars in lost wages for defense employees, a much bigger deal in the San Antonio area than almost anywhere else in America. The third GOP loser in the primary is a fringy Ron Paul backer who is being backed by the Tea Party (and potheads), Robert Lowry.