John Cornyn (R-Texas), the Senate GOP campaign chief, says Barack Obama's declining popularity is helping Republican recruiting and boosting the party's prospects for 2010.
“I don’t have to tell you about the general environment,” said Cornyn, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. “President Obama is now looking like a mere mortal, as opposed to someone who previously exceeded gravity.”
“I think there will be a significant number of voters who, leading up to 2010, will wonder if they voted for someone they didn’t get.”
Cornyn didn’t hesitate to jab Obama, saying that the president had achieved little in his first months in office. And the Texas Republican called Obama’s economic stimulus package “ill fated.”
Cornyn also touted recruiting successes in a handful of states, including Florida (Gov. CharlieCrist) and Illinois (Rep. Mark Kirk), and said it was evidence of the party’s success in the first part of the 2010 election cycle.
As NRSC chairman this cycle, Cornyn has history on his side — the party in power historically loses seats in the midterms — so he is more confident than his predecessors in the last two election cycles.
“While we’ve had some good successes in candidate recruitment, Democrats have had some notable failures,” Cornyn said, noting Democrats’ inability to woo Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan into a Senate bid. “I am optimistic.”
But with Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor headed for a vote later this week, Cornyn was also peppered with questions from reporters about whether his party’s strident opposition toward her candidacy would hurt Republican prospects among Hispanic voters.
Cornyn responded that, her ethnicity aside, Republicans had focused on Sotomayor’s record as a federal judge.
“One thing I do think is important is that we treated her with respect,” Cornyn said.
Cornyn — who has faced criticism in his heavily Hispanic state for coming out in opposition to Sotomayor — also said the GOP’s failure to win Hispanic support in 2008 was not necessarily a harbinger of things to come.
“I think it’s myopic to read too much into 2008 and Republican appeal among Hispanic voters,” Cornyn said, arguing that Hispanic voters would be more interested in Democratic policies headed toward 2010.
Cornyn was also asked whether he would support Sen. John Ensign should the embattled Nevada senator seek reelection in 2012.
“I’m really not going to comment on 2012 right now,” Cornyn said.
Cornyn defended protesters who were speaking up at Democratic town hall events across the country, saying it was wrong for the Democratic Party to “demonize” them.
“It’s part of our political process for people to express ... whatever they feel,” Cornyn said.
Republican Rand Paul, the son of 2008 presidential candidate Ron Paul, is ramping up to run for the Kentucky Senate seat currently held by Jim Bunning.
Paul announced his formation of an exploratory committee last night on MSNBC’s "Rachel Maddow Show," where he declared that the Republican party has “lost its mojo" on fiscal issues. He said that he supports Bunning, but is skeptical that the senator is planning to run for re-election.
“I’m happy tonight to announce on 'The Rachel Maddow Show' that I’m forming an exploratory committee to run for the U.S. Senate,” Paul said.
“I’ve gone around the state saying good things about [Bunning]. I think the problem is every time a reporter asks Jim Bunning are you running, their follow-up question is, ‘Jim are you really running?'”
Bunning has said he still plans on running for a third term, but Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson has formed a Senate exploratory committee in case he changes his mind.
On MSNBC, Paul raised the possibility that Grayson and Bunning struck a private deal to ensure that Grayson would not face any Republican opposition on the primary ballot — and speculated that Bunning may announce his retirement right before the state’s filing deadline.
“What I hate to see is a politician who might go all the way up to the deadline and pull their papers out an hour before, and then you have one candidate and there’s no real primary,” Paul said.
By Josh Kraushaar
Source: Politico
