Posted on 02/19/2010 9:56:20 AM PST by campaignPete R-CT
Democratic Rep. Brad Ellsworth said Friday he will seek Evan Bayh's Indiana Senate seat, a newspaper reported.
The Evansville Courier & Press said the 51-year-old Ellsworth made his announcement Friday in his hometown Evansville.
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The two-term congressman emerged as a leading possible choice for Democrats after Bayh's unexpected announcement Monday that he wouldn't seek a third Senate term.
Ellsworth is considered an attractive candidate because he won by big margins in both his campaigns his largely rural congressional district in southwestern Indiana after eight years as sheriff of the district's largest county.
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A political ally of Ellsworth's on Friday morning filed for the May primary in his congressional district. When state Rep. Trent Van Haaften, D-Mount Vernon, was asked whether his filing for the congressional seat indicated Ellsworth's Senate decision, he said: "I am confident I will not be running against my friend Brad Ellsworth."
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Other candidates could be considered by the state Democratic Party's 32-member central committee, which will pick the nominee since no one met this week's filing deadline for the May 4 primary. Rep. Baron Hill has been mentioned as a possible candidate for the Senate nomination and Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr. has said he is interested.
Former Sen. Dan Coats, who left office in 1998, is being backed by national Republicans in what is a crowded field in the primary for the GOP nomination. Other candidates include former Rep. John Hostettler — whom Ellsworth unseated in 2006 — and state Sen. Marlin Stutzman.
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Ellsworth unseated the six-term Hostettler in 2006 with 61 percent of the vote and won re-election with a nearly 65 percent support in 2008.
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He ended 2009 with more than $500,000 in his campaign fund and raised nearly $1.6 million for his 2008 campaign.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Tom McDermott, Mayor of Hammond IN in the Poeple’s Republic of Lake County has also expressed interest on that side
“Two men enter, one man leaves....
Chaos II???
32 people will decide this. they have until June 30
so the whole thing has become banal in February.
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