Posted on 11/24/2007 8:51:41 AM PST by Montana Headlines
HELENA - Despite having already raised more than $775,000 for his re-election campaign, Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer is now turning to Republicans for money.
In a highly unusual move, Schweitzer is soliciting money for his 2008 re-election campaign from individuals who donated to Republicans running for governor in 2004.
The solicitation tells exactly how much the recipient gave to a Republican gubernatorial candidate in 2004 and asks for an identical amount to be given to Schweitzer and Republican Lt. Gov. John Bohlinger's re-election campaign.
"We've been reaching out to people," Schweitzer said in a phone interview. "We only received 51 percent (actually 50.4 percent) of the vote last time. We'd like the support of most Montanans. This is a completely appropriate letter."
Republicans are not amused.
"Everybody's pretty outraged about it," said Republican gubernatorial candidate Roy Brown, a state senator from Billings. "Everywhere I go, people are handing it to me. It does make me a little upset. After I got to thinking about it, I think the majority of people who received that letter might send me a check."
Brown said people are upset that Schweitzer's campaign dug around into the 2004 campaign records to find out how much money they donated to someone and asked for the same amount.
"Even my wife got one, for gosh sakes, asking for $389," Roy Brown said. His wife, Kim, gave that amount to the 2004 campaign of Bob Brown (no relation), the 2004 GOP nominee for governor.
Bob Brown, meanwhile, was surprised his donors were being asked to contribute to the man who defeated him.
"As far as I know, what he did is not illegal, but it is audacious, and if audacity was music, he would be a brass brand," Bob Brown said.
(Excerpt) Read more at billingsgazette.net ...
Not sure if this is something that is done commonly elsewhere around the country, but it was a first for Montana to have a candidate send a fundraising letter to supporters of his opponents, citing exactly what they had donated to Republican candidates in the last election cycle.
As we note in the Montana Headlines commentary, every Republican we know of who got one of these letters was ticked off about it.
And also, as we note in the MH commentary, the specific content of the reactions have been a sort of Rorschach test of how individual Republicans feel about the governor.
The governor was almost certainly doing this to provoke a reaction -- he certainly got one. The question is whether it will be to his long-term benefit or detriment.
I think people are overlooking the intimidate factor here. Suddenly you get mailings from the Govt showing how much you donated to his opponent and asking for a similar donation? I think this is a calculated move of political thuggery. People should be ringing their legislature phone off the hook demanding this be investigated. While it may be legal, it is certainly unethical
Believe me, no-one is overlooking it on the GOP side. Seeing it as intimidating is the most common response to the letter that we have encountered.
The problem is that the letter was written so very nicely, without a single bad word about Roy Brown or any other Republican.
So if anyone makes a public stink about it, the Democrats point to this sweet letter and ask, “what was wrong with it? We were nicely reaching out to Republicans.”
And to independents who aren’t terribly engaged with politics (about a third of the MT electorate,) probably there would seem to be nothing wrong with it.
It was very skilfully done. The governor is an incredibly good politician.
As pointed out in the comments section of the blog, if W had sent a similar letter to big Al Gore supporters in the run-up to the 2004 election, one suspects that many Dems would have seen it has overtly intimidating.
Especially coming from an incumbent. I don’t know much about the GOP party in Montana (I hope it is better organized than it is in Washington!). Perhaps FReepers can mount a campaign to raise awareness.
“Republicans are not amused.”
If the GOP were to offer meaningful choices, they would not have to worry about their base crossing over to Dems.
You make a good point that a letter like this has a different flavor coming from someone who is an incumbent and who is at the moment at the reins of government — as opposed to a gubernatorial hopeful.
The main point to the letter, still, is probably to get an over-reaction from Republicans.
I posted this on FR at the risk of being part of an over-reaction. It is just such an unusual political maneuver that I thought it might be of interest outside of Montana.
Another reason I posted it was to see if anyone around the country has encountered similar tactics, by either party.
Feel free to ping this thread around to see what kind of reaction it gets.
Reminds me of the intimidation of what Chavez is doing in Venezuela.
In general, your point is a good one.
But in this particular upcoming governor’s race, the choice in Montana is a pretty clear one between Roy Brown and Brian Schweitzer.
And in general, choices in Montana tend to be pretty clear, but not always.
Bob Brown in the last election was too moderate to be a stark difference from Schweitzer (and the latter used a lot of conservative rhetoric.)
Likewise, in the 2006 Senate race, Conrad Burns talked about all of the federal spending he brought to Montana — not a good way to endear fiscal conservatives to your cause.
But these are the exception in Montana.
This mailer may get enough checks in response to cover the cost of sending it, but the point was to provoke a reaction from Republicans, not actually to get Republicans to cross over.
As I noted above, your response was precisely how most Republicans we’ve talked to saw the letter.
Again, a reason for posting this was out of curiosity to see how people outside Montana would see the letter and to see if anything similar has been encountered elsewhere around the country.
You must be talking about the locals?
Because considering the national front runners for the Dems are 3 short time Senators, I think the GOP field shows considerable more meaningful, intellectual and political diverse candidates, then the Democrats would ever dare run
I have a friend in Bozeman who votes reliably Republican, but otherwise is disinterested in politics. When I talk politics with him he has a low “boiling point” and quickly throws up his hands with a dismissive “What can one guy do?” attitude. I’ve been working on him to get more involved, and will call him about this in an effort to “build a fire”.
He has strong attitudes but cannot enunciate them so he shuns places like FreeRepublic (or the Internet et al).
I don’t believe his situation is uncommon at all. These folks are desperate for leadership - for people to voice their concerns.
I can see where you would be reluctant to post this to the boards - there are a lot of cynics - but it’s a fair question and an important one.
Good luck!
On the other hand, in the last cycle we had one Republican (INO) state Senate Candidate running against a popular Dem incumbent, who gathered support from many Democrats and the endorsement of usually faithful Democratic supporters, such as labor unions (including teachers unions) and still lost.
These examples are from the Eugene area, where weird stuff like that happens. During election cycles I see groups of lawn signs all the time touting the Republicans in most races alongside signs for Defazo (Rat) for the US House. Go figure.
It means that even dems are waking up to the fact that he’s a clinton-lite loser, he never was real governor material like Marc Roscoe. Montana’s economy is doing well now because of past republican fiscal restraint, which BS is squandering as fast as he can by paying off his teachers, union buddies.
But world wide financial storm clouds are gathering on the horizon, BS knows he’ll go under too if Montana’s economy tanks because of it. Thus he’s using police state tactics in finding how much money was given to Reps by Reps, using the velvet glove of intimidation(we know who you are). This violates the principle of the secret ballot, one of the foundation stones of our democracy. It was put in place so that there would be no retaliation for voting for an opponent. On that basis, could he be called to account in a court of law? At least it shows he’s already running scared, and a LOT can happen in the next 12 months.
If I lived in Montana and received that letter, I am pretty sure I’d be furious.
Roy Brown is not a RINO.
There seems to be an implied threat in this. It’s almost like a “protection” scheme.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.