This is cross posted from our friends at RinoAlert.
The race in CD 11 is down to the wire: Republican establishment candidate David Harmer has moved from behind and is neck in neck with U.S. Marshal Tony Amador. Harmer has made much of his victim status due to an unfortunate mailer by Elizabeth Emken commenting on membership in the Mormon church. This resulted in a significant uptick in his fundraising (not to mention sympathy votes) and a last crash and burn for Emken.
At a recent event, I was challenged about my belief that Harmer would be a weak candidate against McNerney. We Republicans need to remember that who defeats McNerney is unimportant- what’s important is that he is defeated and we end the Pelosi dynasty.
Let’s remind ourselves about the 11th Congressional District-
REGISTRATION
Since the last gerrymander , the district is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats.
Party | Republican | Democrat | Decline to State | Others |
% Registratrion | 39.30 | 39.06 | 17.72 | 3.92 |
The area has historically trended Republican, but that is mostly gone. Cook Report rates it at Republican +3, but this is optimistic.
DEMOGRAPHICS
- 64.1% White
- 19.7% Hispanic
- 8.7% Asian
- 3.4% African American
Generally affluent (over $60,000 median income) but unemployment in the Valley is running near 20%.
David Harmer must be able to attract enough DTS, disaffected Democrats, and Hispanic votes to have any chance. Put simply, he can’t.
NO HARMER PATH TO VICTORY
Wait until Jerry “Milquetoast” McNerney and the DCCC get their teeth into Harmer. Think of the choice hits Harmer will take-
- Carpetbagger
This will hurt – despite the exceptions to the rule, and more importantly the DCCC spinmeisters will tell the story of district shopping and hypocritical positions at every turn - Collection Lawyer for the credit card industry
Everybody loves bill collectors - TARP porker
Recipient of TARP bailout money after taking a huge severance, then he proceeded to apply for and take unemployment benefits while running for Congress. - Utah
Candidate Emken’s scandalous anti Mormon comments in the Republican primary hurt her credibility, but you can count on the the Dems to make sure everyone in the District knows that the real story of Harmer’s values are in Utah not the Bible belt of the Central Valley. His shameless use of his religion and family to raise money will become an embarrassment. - Anti-immigrant
His “Arrest them all and send them back to Mexico” attitude should eliminate that pesky Hispanic vote - Intellectual and personal arrogance
Harmer comes off as a parody in public. When cutting his radio commercial, his handlers had to alter his voice electronically for his radio. - The 11th Commandment
Harmer’s invocation of the “11th Commandment” and then waging a vicious whispering campaign to attack the integrity of his opponents will come back to haunt him.
The details of the predicted attacks don’t matter, this will become truth by the time the Democratic left wing attack machine is done with David Harmer. McNerney’s strategic positioning regarding Veterans and his “hide and deny” strategy will insure that Pelosi’s lap dog stays in the Dem kennel.
I challenge anyone to devise a strategy that gets Harmer over the goal line. Numbers matter: where is the coalition of voters to defeat McNerney? Is he going to turn out Hispanics to vote for him? Is his lawyerly past going to motivate the DTS folks? McNerney won’t win big, but he’ll win. Harmer is following the Dean Andal failure playbook.
If Harmer is the Republican candidate, it will be a national tragedy, not just a local embarrassment.