Democrat Owens Wins New York House Seat

Democrat Bill Owens won Tuesday's House special election in upstate New York's traditionally Republican 23rd District -- an outcome, at the end of a tumultuous campaign, that seems certain to prompt finger-pointing between the Republican Party's ideological wings about who is to blame for the loss.

Owens defeated Doug Hoffman, the nominee of New York's Conservative Party who suddenly became the de facto Republican candidate during the last days of the campaign. Just more than 5 percent of voters stuck with state Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava, the Republican nominee and political moderate who withdrew three days before Election Day under pressure from the party's right wing.

Scozzafava quit the race on Oct. 31 after she came under attack by conservative activists who opposed her liberal views on social issues such as abortion and gay marriage and her ties to labor unions. Prominent national conservative figures, including 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin and former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, intervened to urge Republican voters to support third-party candidate Hoffman instead of Scozzafava.

Scozzafava told the Syracuse Post-Standard in remarks published Tuesday that she had been the subject of "a full frontal assault" by conservatives "personally and politically" because of her moderate political views.

But Scozzafava may have had the last laugh -- her endorsement of Owens on Nov. 1 appears to have been a factor in the Democrat's surprisingly strong performance in Jefferson County, a Republican stronghold and Scozzafava's home base in the sprawling district.

Owens' win for the seat -- held by former nine-term Republican John M. McHugh -- helped Democrats continue their recent dominance in the Northeast. His victory in the Republican-leaning district also leaves the GOP with just two out of 29 House seats in the New York state delegation. And it balanced out what was an otherwise disappointing election night for party, which lost the governor's mansions in New Jersey and Virginia.

It also represents the second special election loss for Republicans this year in New York, as Democrat Scott Murphy maintained his party's hold on the neighboring 20th District in a hard-fought contest held in March.

And it dashed conservatives' hopes of pulling off a stunning political coup after Hoffman surged from a little-known first-time candidate to the leader in final election polls released before the election.

The unexpectedly tumultuous race is already being parsed for implications far beyond the borders of the traditionally Republican but increasingly competitive 23rd District. And win or lose, it was bound to reflect more about the Republican Party than about Democrats.

Republicans enjoy a 46,000-person registration advantage in the district and had a hold on most of the territory that makes up the current 23rd District for more than a century. McHugh was a easy winner there throughout his nine-term House career. But district voters narrowly favored Democrat Barack Obama for president last year.

That's not to say the Democrats did not invest heavily in the race. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spent more than $1 million on independent campaign activities backing Owens. Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. campaigned with Owens in the district on Monday, while President Obama held a New York City fundraiser with the Plattsburgh attorney earlier in the campaign.

But even a win by Hoffman, who pledged to caucus with the Republicans in the House if elected, would have been somewhat hollow for the GOP leadership, given the fact that they were only recently converts to his campaign.

The Republican National Committee; its House campaign arm, the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC); and House Republican leaders all initially backed Scozzafava, who was nominated in a vote by the 11 county party chairmen in the district. The NRCC made nearly $900,000 in independent expenditures to boost her campaign.

It was the Club for Growth, an anti-tax national conservative group, that tallied more than $1 million in advertising, mail and bundled donations as the main surrogate for Conservative Party nominee Hoffman. Only after Scozzafava dropped out did the national Republican hierarchy reverse itself and endorse Hoffman.

In a release sent early Wednesday morning, Van Hollen deemed the election result a "double-blow for National Republicans."

"After losing a seat that was held by Republicans for nearly 120 years, they have to deal with an emboldened and well-funded far right-wing that refuses to tolerate moderate Republicans with differing opinions," he said.

But Ken Spain, the NRCC's communications director, dismissed the idea of the "so-called 'GOP Civil War,' " a recurring theme in the media coverage of the race, in a Tuesday morning memo to reporters. And he pushed back against the notion that the intensity among the conservative base seen in the special election could present a problem for Republicans in 2010, citing examples of the same sort of rowdy left-wing battles with establishment Democrats in Washington leading up to the 2006 election.

In a statement, NRCC Chairman Pete Sessions of Texas called the House result a "momentary victory" for Democrats and went on to criticize the candidate selection process in New York, saying it "should be changed to a primary system."

Conservative activists also denied that Hoffman's loss was a defeat for their agenda. To dismiss his defeat "as a lesson in the playing out of the 'conservative spoiler' in a three-way race would be to miss the real lesson completely," Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony List, said in a release. "Conservative efforts on the ground finally gave a voice to the thousands of voters in the district who believe that life, marriage, and fiscal responsibility all matter. Without these people, no GOP candidate can win, in New York or elsewhere."

Erik Erickson, of the influential conservative blog RedState.com, said conservatives scored a victory by keeping Scozzafava out of the race and alerting Republicans not to take them for granted.

Rank-and-file Republicans on Capitol Hill Tuesday were divided over whether to blame party leaders for the messy New York race.

Even before votes were tallied, Rep. Christopher Lee, R-N.Y., expressed frustration that GOP leaders weren't behind one candidate before sinking hundreds of thousands of dollars into Scozzafava's campaign. While leaders backed Scozzafava, GOP members began peeling off to support Hoffman.

"Those things need to get hammered out in advance, to get behind one candidate. That was a mistake. A lot of money was wasted that could be used for other purposes," said Lee.

Rep. Mark Steven Kirk, R-Ill., who is running for a Senate seat in 2010, launched into a more personal attack of Scozzafava, describing her campaign as "disastrous" and saying that she "personally imploded" by dropping out and then backing the candidate from the other party.

"You've been a Republican all your life and now you're endorsing a Democrat? Who are you?" asked Kirk. "The failure here was the candidate. She takes all of the blame, and then some of the [local] leaders who backed her who didn't see it."

Some moderate Republicans said they worried that the New York race reflected a trend of conservatives becoming the voice for their party.

Rep. Michael N. Castle, R-Del., who is also running for Senate next year, said he didn't fault GOP leaders for backing Scozzafava since she was chosen by county officials and "made a very good impression" when she came to meet with congressional Republicans. But he warned that party leaders need to focus on bringing moderates and conservatives together if they want to win back the majority.

"In the majority party, you can't have these splits in every district between conservatives and moderates. I think it's too bad it happened in this way" in the New York race, Castle added.