In Other Frays, 6 Battlegrounds for Governors

New York Times ^ | 10/22/04 | KIRK JOHNSON

[conservative in nyc]

October 22, 2004

In Other Frays, 6 Battlegrounds for Governors

By KIRK JOHNSON

ALT LAKE CITY, Oct. 19 - The presidential election has deeply divided many Americans along partisan lines, but in the half dozen states with close races for governor, party labels do not really tell the story.

Indiana, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire and Washington have become battlegrounds in governors' races even though, in most cases, the outcome of the presidential race there is not in doubt. In these states, voters are wrestling with local issues like education, energy, wages and unemployment - all of which echo only distantly the concerns about terrorism and war that dominate the presidential contest.

Local politics, in other words, have remained local. And nowhere is that more obvious than here in Utah, a deeply Republican state where Senator John Kerry will get 30 percent of the vote if he is lucky but where, for the first time in 20 years, a Democrat, Scott Matheson Jr., is considered a serious contender for the governor's chair.

Voters like Rebecca Christianson - committed nationally, but still shopping locally - are the reason.

Ms. Christianson, a C.P.A. and self-described conservative Republican who lives in the suburbs of Salt Lake, said she would definitely vote for President Bush but had not decided in the governor's race between Mr. Matheson and the Republican candidate, Jon Huntsman Jr. She likes them both.

"They're both very well regarded," Ms. Christianson said as she walked to a lunchtime debate between the two men in downtown Salt Lake sponsored by the Salt Lake Rotary Club. "It'll probably be a gut reaction at the last minute."

Political analysts say that lingering economic troubles in many states, combined with a presidential election centered on foreign policy and global security, have made voting for governor and president very different choices this year.

"Usually in a presidential year there are some inevitable common threads; this year they're in parallel universes," said Jennifer Duffy, who tracks Senate and governors' races at the Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan newsletter in Washington.

The fact that cliffhangers are occurring in governors' races in several states that are not really in play in the presidential election underscores that disconnection. Only 11 states are electing governors this year, but Cook considers more than half of those - Indiana, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, Utah and Washington - to be tossups. The Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, which also tracks local races, lists Missouri, New Hampshire, Utah and Washington as too close to call.

Most are not major battlegrounds in the presidential race. Indiana, Missouri, Montana and Utah are generally considered safely in Mr. Bush's camp, while Washington rests securely in Mr. Kerry's column. The race in New Hampshire remains tight, though many political observers say it is leaning toward Mr. Kerry.

What is driving these governors' races, local politicians and political analysts say, are questions close to home - jobs, wages and education. Beginning in 2001 and continuing through last year, voters across the nation began giving governors fits as local economies sputtered.

In the 42 governor's elections held since 2001, including the California governor's recall vote last year, 25 states turned over party control of the governor's office, according to the Cook Report. Twelve went from Republican to Democrat, and 11 went from Democrat to Republican. Both of the third-party governors in 2001 are now gone; one seat went to the Republicans, the other to the Democrats.

And those incumbent troubles remain a big theme again this year. In Indiana, the incumbent Democrat, Joseph E. Kernan, who took over last year after the death of Gov. Frank L. O'Bannon, is running a close race against the Republican candidate, Mitch Daniels, the former director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Bush. Democrats have controlled the Indiana governor's office since 1989.

In Montana, Gov. Judy Martz, a Republican whose popularity plummeted through a difficult four-year term, chose not to seek re-election, leaving the field open to a tight race between the Democrat, Brian Schweitzer, a farmer who has campaigned hard on the weak performance of the state's economy, and the Republican candidate, Secretary of State Bob Brown.

In Missouri, Claire C. McCaskill, a Democrat who is the state auditor and a former prosecutor, beat the incumbent governor, Bob Holden, in the primary and has run neck and neck with her Republican opponent, Secretary of State Matt Blunt.

In New Hampshire, which elects a governor every two years, the Democratic challenger, John Lynch, has capitalized on weak approval numbers for the incumbent, Craig Benson.

"They're making this race about personal destruction of a governor," said the New Hampshire Republican Party chairwoman, Jayne Millerick.

In Washington, Gov. Gary Locke, a Democrat, chose not to run for a third term, leaving the field open to a battle between Attorney General Christine O. Gregoire, a Democrat, and former State Senator Dino Rossi, a Republican, over who is best qualified to revive the state's economy. Washington has not had a Republican governor since 1985, and has lost about one quarter of its manufacturing jobs since the late 1990's.

"Everywhere people are going back to work," Mr. Rossi said in a recent television commercial. "Everywhere but Washington."

Here in Utah, analysts and polltakers say that party politics have been at least partly overtaken by the power of family names.

Mr. Matheson, a Rhodes scholar, former United States attorney and currently dean of the University of Utah Law School, is the son of Utah's most recent Democrat governor, Scott M. Matheson, who served from 1977 to 1985. Mr. Huntsman is a former ambassador to Singapore who speaks fluent Mandarin Chinese and is one of the wealthiest men in Utah, as heir to the Huntsman chemical fortune.

"These are two magic names in Utah," said Dr. Ronald J. Hrebenar, the interim director of the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah. "It's the richest family in the state against the richest family political tradition in the state."

How to stimulate the economy and generate jobs are the topics both men continually address.

At their recent Rotary Club debate here, Mr. Huntsman said that if he was elected, the sign on his door would not say "Governor," but rather "Economic Development Tsar." Mr. Matheson said the priority for the next governor should be education, because improving the state's schools, he said, is the long-term strategy that will keep companies moving here and create the work force those companies need.

Women - both as candidates and as voters - are also playing a prominent role in the governors' races. Of the six tightest elections races, two involve women - Ms. Gregoire in Washington and Ms. McCaskill in Missouri.

Here in Utah, polls also show that some Republican women have become important swing voters because of their concerns about how the state's current governor, Olene S. Walker, was treated by her party. Ms. Walker, who took office last year when Michael O. Leavitt resigned to become administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, decided to run for election in her own right early this year. But Republican Party delegates rejected her at their convention, where she did not even finish among the top three candidates.

Experts in polling say coattails remain an unknown force in many of the state races. Mr. Matheson, here in Utah, is expected to be helped some, for example, by the popularity of his brother, Jim, a Democratic congressman who is running for re-election and is ahead in the polls.

Mr. Huntsman, by contrast, has the immense power of the Utah Republican Party behind him, along with the popularity of President Bush, elements that analysts say probably give Mr. Huntsman an edge however tight the race becomes in the final week.

[conservative in nyc]

Your thoughts on whether these races are as close as the Slimes claims are appreciated.

[sam_whiskey]

I look for Mitch Daniels to score a pretty solid victory in my old home state. Blunt will probably win in MO. I don't see any other Republican pick-ups when it comes to governorships though. I've heard good rumblings about Rossi in Washington...but I'm skeptical, because afterall, we're talking about Washington.

[UnionCountyYoungRepublican]

We have a close race in North Carolina between Tax Hike Mike Weasley and Patrick Ballantine. Easley is leading by 5 pts in many polls.

[Aetius]

I'm going to assume that these Mathesons' are conservative in their rhetoric. I know Congressman Matheson won a close race 2 yrs ago, but now he is up by a significant margin against the same guy. Does this mean he has actually voted like a resident of Utah and hasn't given his opponent any ammo to use against him?