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The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has officially ended its intervention in the Hawaii Congressional special election to replace Neil Abercrombie, judging that the unique all-candidate, first-past-the-post format makes it likely for a Republican, Charles Djou, to score a temporary victory.
“The DCCC will not be investing additional resources in the HI-01 (Abercrombie-open) special election. Local Democrats were unable to work out their differences,” DCCC communications director Jennifer Crider said in an emailed statement. “The DCCC will save the resources we would have invested in the Hawaii special election this month for the general election in November.”
The move comes as polls show Honolulu City Councillor Charles Djou (R) leading 2 other Dems — ex-Rep. Ed Case (D) and state Senate Pres. Colleen Hanabusa (D) — in advance of the May 22 special election. The winner of the plurality of votes will fill Abercrombie’s seat for the remainder of the term.
What this means is that voters, and not the DCCC, will decide which Democrat takes this seat in November. Case and Hanabusa will face one another in the September 18 primary, and the winner will go up against Djou in the general election, in all likelihood. In that matchup, the Democrat would be heavily favored and would not need too much national Democratic support.
I’m not completely convinced that Djou is now a shoo-in to win the seat from May to November, but obviously, having one Republican and two Democrats in a winner-take-all race raises his prospects significantly. Rather than make an intervention that would anger local Democrats, the DCCC decided to stay out of it. And that arguably represents some progress.
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Good news, David, thank you.
Wish the DCCC would stay out of other races as well. Am tired of Rahm deciding who the candidate will be.
This is like closing the Barn door after the horses have fled…! They’re the reason D’Jerk is winning…!
Progress indeed! Dems shooting themselves in the hand instead of the leg before a race. Makes sense to me. Not.
Well they managed to get that progressive who challenged Stupak out of the race (in a district Obama won), so I’m not too impressed.
I am still surprised that the DCCC was willing to go against the relatively powerful Hawaii unions, but I guess I shouldn’t be.
They have spent a third of a million dollars without damaging D’jerk in the least.
I can’t imagine what they thought they were accomplishing.
“Now that we’ve created total havoc, our job is done! You don’t have to thank us – your happiness is our reward!”
To save the current Democratic Party of Rahmobama it must first be destroyed.
Keeping progressives out of the party, duh. You think they actually WANT their cocktail-weenie gravy train endangered?
When contacted afterward, a clearly frustrated HI-01 refused to comment.
{/stolen_SNL_bit_from_way_back_when_they_SNL_was_funny}
See, the DCCC is not afraid to burn one of their own and loose a seat just to show those uppity voters and candidates. It is just that the Democrit voters could never muster the same kind of “burn them now to win the next round” resolve.