Senate GOP Leaders May Entice Conservative Senate Dems

Republicans continue to smart over their failure to capture the Senate last week, with some vocal GOP rank-and-file blaming the Tea Party movement for forcing extreme, unattractive candidates into the primary process.  Looking to close the slim 53 Democrat to 47 GOP Member gap in the upper chamber, there are reports of Republican leadership quietly approaching conservative Democrats from openly “red” states about party switching.  Despite the maintained Democratic majority in the Senate, the calculus assumes that these Democrats are vulnerable in states that won’t accommodate their party affiliation.

In addition, Democrats face the problem of a handful of conservative or moderate Democratic Senators who will either reject the party line vote or seek to make deals with Republicans.  There are a small, but very active crowd of Senators from conservative-leaning states where Democrats experienced significant losses and they have no intention of jeopardizing re-election bids in 2012.  Reports Gerald F. Seib in The Wall Street Journal:

More important, among those 23 Democrats who face voters in 2012 are a handful of incumbents from the kind of moderate to conservative states where Democrats took a beating last week: Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Jon Tester of Montana, Jim Webb of Virginia and Claire McCaskill of Missouri. Joe Manchin, who just won a Senate race in West Virginia by separating himself from President Barack Obama and his party’s congressional leaders, also faces voters again in two years because he was elected only to fill out an unexpired term.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, looks at this field and thinks he may see some votes for his side. He points in particular to his desire to roll back parts of this year’s big health bill.

There are already reports of Republicans approaching Sen.-elect Joe Manchin (D) for a party switch, but he disputes those claims, perhaps feeling that his 11-point spread against Republican opponent against John Raese was substantial enough not to worry.  Still, Manchin will be up for reelection in 2012, and there could be worries that a President Barack Obama on the ticket could cause issues in a state like West Virginia where the President is highly unpopular:

[A] Senate Republican leadership aide said GOP leaders made no such offer. Manchin and the Senate GOP aide were reacting to a FoxNews.com story posted earlier in the day. The report indicated that leaders were trying to entice Manchin to switch parties by offering sweeteners, such as support for favored legislation, and that he was considering the offer.

“Joe Manchin is a lifelong Democrat, and he is not switching parties. This is exactly what is wrong with Washington — individuals try to put politics before our nation,” said Melvin Smith, a spokesman in the governor’s office. “Joe Manchin wants to go to Washington to encourage Members of Congress to stop partisan bickering and start putting our nation’s needs at the forefront.”

And despite rumors suggesting GOP Senate leaders have approached him about a party-switch, Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) the well-known conservative Democrat famous for his centrist appeal and tendency to make deals across the aisles, adamantly refutes that claim in a local radio interview on KFAB-AM:

“They’ve never approached me.  I’m not looking to leave the party and that’s why the party hasn’t left me.”

Charles D. Ellison, Managing Editor for Politic365.com, Washington Correspondent for The Philadelphia Tribune and a weekly political analyst providing insight on WDAS-FM (Philadelphia), WVON-AM (Chicago) and KSRO-AM (Sonoma County, CA). He is author of the critically-acclaimed urban political thriller TANTRUM. More information can be found at http://www.cdellison.com

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