The retirement of a popular Democrat congressman has turned one of the coldest district's in the country into the site of a hotly contested House race.
Michigan's 1st district covers nearly 28,000 square miles of frigid terrain in the northernmost reaches of the Wolverine State. The district's population is split almost in half between the upper and lower peninsulas of Michigan. Michigan's Upper Peninsula (the UP to locals) is an area of little to no population growth with a mostly stagnant economy and some of the coldest and snowiest places in the United States. The half of the district south of the Mackinaw Bridge on the lower peninsula contains a mixture of slow growing, blue collar towns on Lake Huron and more affluent and faster-growing towns along Lake Michigan.
The UP has a Democratic heritage going back over a century, although most voters here lean toward Republican views on cultural issues such as gun control and abortion. The faster-growing portions of the 1st along Lake Michigan are Republican. The result is a district nearly split between the two major parties. George W. Bush twice carried this area, but in 2008 the 1st voted for Barack Obama 50%-48%.
The congressman representing the 1st since 1992 is moderate Democrat Bart Stupak. In his 18-year House career, Stupak, a former Michigan State Trooper, made a name for himself as a pro-life, pro-gun Democrat. Stupak has served as Chairman of the influential Oversight & Investigations Subcommittee on Energy & Commerce and has been a party loyalist on most economic and foreign policy votes.
Almost overnight, in 2009 and 2010, Stupak became a national figure. Stupak emerged as the leader of a group of about 20-25 pro-life House Democrats who originally announced that they would not support any health care reform bill that provided for government funding of abortions. The back-and-forth between the Stupak-led group, the Democratic House leadership, and the Obama White House caused many observers to questions whether the health care legislation would pass the House. Eventually, Stupak's group reached a compromise with the President Obama whereby they would support the health care reform legislation in exchange for President Obama's promise to issue an executive order stating that no federal funds would be used to fund abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother.
Many on both the left and the right were critical of Stupak's handling of the situation and tea party activists promised to make Stupak one of their top targets of the 2010 election cycle. In April, just weeks after the health care bill passed the House, Stupak announced that he was retiring to spend more time with his family.
Republicans had long hoped to take this seat, but knew that Stupak was an almost impossible target due to his popularity in the district. With Stupak off the ballot, the open seat race became a top GOP takeover opportunity. Six Republicans filed to run for the seat. The race for the GOP nomination quickly became a tight two-man race between State Senator Jason Allen and political neophyte and UP surgeon Dan Benishek.
The Republican primary, in typical northern Michigan style, was a friendly affair. On the August 3 primary night, Benishek, who had been running even before Stupak's retirement announcement, and Allen basically tied. Various reports had Benishek leading by anywhere from 1 to 15 votes. After a couple of weeks of careful vote counting, the Michigan Secretary of State's Office certified Benishek as the winner by the whopping margin of 15 votes. Allen chose not to ask for a recount and threw his support behind Benishek.
Democrats were able to avoid an intra-party battle and unanimously nominated former UPS driver and State Representative Gary McDowell, from Rudyard in the UP. McDowell has moderate views on many cultural issues, a la Stupak, and has the strong backing of the popular congressman.
To date, Benishek has outraised McDowell, but both candidates had a little over $100,000 cash on hand at the last reporting deadline. The NRCC and the DCCC are both planning to air ads in the 1st. An August WeAskAmerica poll showed Benishek leading McDowell 45%-29%.
In this rural swing district, where national Democrats' views on many issues are not popular, Benishek is the slight favorite to flip this seat from blue to red. Benishek seems to have survived his narrow primary victory none the worse for wear. Democrats probably have too many vulnerable incumbents to protect across the country to expend too many resources in this district.
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