Keller @ Large: Hassan's reelection to Senate anything but certain in New Hampshire
BOSTON - Surveys show Republicans are making gains in the battle for control of the U.S. Senate. And that trend is putting New Hampshire's Senate race center stage, with incumbent Democrat Maggie Hassan forced to go on the attack against a surprisingly strong GOP challenger.
After he won the party primary last month, Don Bolduc's chances of beating Hassan looked so bleak, Republican PACs who had preferred another nominee considered cutting off his funding. But now, "Republicans have come back to the family and are accepting a candidate like Bolduc, warts and all," says veteran New Hampshire political reporter Kevin Landrigan, chief of the New Hampshire Union Leader's State House Bureau.
Bolduc has pulled even with Hassan in some recent polls. And after spending the summer branding herself as an above-the-fray, bi-partisan results-getter, Hassan is hitting Bolduc with this election's most popular charge -- the e-word. "He is a really, really extreme candidate, the most extreme candidate that we have seen as a Senate nominee in New Hampshire history."
A GOP ad blitz has helped pull the challenger close, promising Bolduc "will stop reckless tax increases." And after months of stressing abortion rights, Hassan and Democratic PACs are hitting back on the economic anxiety driving voter anger. In one ad, an elderly man views a video of Bolduc saying, "Over time we no longer have Social Security," and reacts with disgust and horror: "Don Bolduc - this guy's a disaster!"
Adds Hassan, "Those are really extreme positions when you're talking about trying to help people make ends meet." (The Bolduc campaign did not respond to our requests for an interview.)
But Landrigan observes that "in virtually every survey, even Democratic surveys right now, she can't get over 50%, and for an incumbent, as you know, that's a problem."
So is Hassan in real trouble?
Landrigan points out that Hassan carries some advantages into these final two weeks, most notably a New Hampshire voter habit of splitting their tickets between the two parties. But he also suggests that the "extremist" change is being flung so often in so many ads by candidates of both parties that it's losing its impact.
If he's right, and if the election is turning into a referendum on the establishment, that could overwhelm any voter tradition of balancing things out and make this race a close call.