Edwards Tightens Up Race Against Van Hollen

[brooklynite]

Source: Roll Call

A survey of Maryland voters last week found that despite his campaign’s financial advantage, Rep. Chris Van Hollen has only a slight lead over Rep. Donna Edwards as the two Democrats vie for their party’s nomination to replace outgoing Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski in an April primary.

The poll, conducted by the Maryland firm Gonzales Research & Marketing Strategies, shows Edwards might be seeing “dividends” from the $1 million television advertising campaign paid for her by EMILY’s List that has targeted Baltimore, home to about half of the state’s Democratic electorate, the pollster wrote.

“The more voters hear about Donna Edwards, the more they know she’s a voice that’s desperately needed in the U.S. Senate at exactly the right time,” said Mary Stetch, a spokeswoman for EMILY’s List, a group whose mission is to elect Democratic women who support abortion rights. She said the “ads have shown, Donna’s been taking on the tough fights her entire career — and she’s not backing down anytime soon.”

The EMILY’s List ad campaign in Baltimore ended just before the latest survey was taken and showed Edwards leading Van Hollen, 50 percent to 24 percent there, with about a fifth of the voters still undecided. At the same time, Edwards is trailing Van Hollen in the city’s suburbs by 16 points, where more than 37 percent of voters remained undecided as the race entered its final 100 days.

Read more: http://atr.rollcall.com/tight-maryland-senate-race-edwards-making-gains-baltimore/?dcz=emailalert

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I'm happy with either, and am staying out of a race for a SAFE D seat.

[BlueMTexpat]

1. The sad thing about this race, IMO,

is that there are two excellent Dem Reps running against each other, which means that we will lose at least one of them in Congress, no matter how this turns out. If God forbid, Marylanders go insane and elect an R for this Senate seat, we will have lost both.

As a MD voter, I favor Donna Edwards and have contributed to her campaign. I'm glad that the race has gotten closer. For a while it looked as if Van Hollen would be a shoo-in. I will be very happy with either as my Senator.

[FrodosPet]

2. Edwards vs Van Hollen!

NOT Edward Van Halen.

Note to self: Coffee, THEN DU.

[swilton]

3. As a former resident of Van Hollen's 8th District

I also favor Edwards. I was involved with many progressive groups trying to move Van Hollen to the left. He was and is a corporate Democrat....I saved a lot of word documents on my computer and I still have copies of our 2008 draft letter to Van Hollen on why we made the decision not to endorse him. In fact, Van Hollen was lucky our group didn't endorse the Green Party Candidate....- anyway we debated long and hard on the advantages and disadvantages of this controversial move...Eventually, the argument that we could better influence Van Hollen by NOT endorsing the Green Party candidate won out...Anecdotally, that candidate repeatedly asked Van Hollen to a debate, Van Hollen would agree and then cancel out at the last minute. For the record:

Dear Rep. Van Hollen:

Progressive Neighbors, a nonprofit, grassroots organization of voters who mostly live and work in District 8, appreciates your willingness to meet and correspond with us concerning the issues that we are passionate about. Over the next eight months leading up to the election we monitored your work in the House and in the DNC. As we stated in our October 26, 2008, email to you, we were unable to endorse any candidate for Congressional District 8.

Many Progressive Neighbors members have worked for you and applaud your rise to a leadership position in the House. But many have been disappointed by your failure to take a leadership role on a wide range of progressive legislation, particularly since you represent a solidly progressive, Democratic district.

Progressive Neighbors understands your frustration with the Bush administration’s positions and Bush’s veto power, along with the Senate Republicans’ ability to block legislation. Nevertheless, many of our members believe you have too often chosen to be a voice of conciliation and compromise within the Democratic Party instead of representing your constituents’ progressive voice in Congress. These members wish you had:

• Taken a strong position urging the immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq.
• Advocated alternatives to military solutions as tools of foreign policy in Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan.
• Taken a leadership position to restore constitutional civil liberties to American citizens and foreign detainees.
• Exercised proactive leadership to challenge repeated efforts to dismantle environmental protection, and to implement effective policies to combat global warming and reduce dependence on fossil fuels.
• Supported impeachment of the President and Vice President for their criminal activities and violations of the constitution over the past seven years (even if impeachment was impossible to achieve.)
• Voted against the Economic Rescue/Bailout Bill which set no conditions for the bailout of major financial institutions and which gave no protections to homeowners against mortgage defaults and foreclosures.
• Articulated a clear, public position in support of single payer healthcare.
• Made a greater effort to attend local community meetings to interact with your constituents.

Progressive Neighbors is proud of how quickly you have risen to such a lofty position in the House. In many ways your rise reaffirmed our early and dedicated support for your candidacy. It is our ardent wish that in the future we will continue to support your candidacy. We look forward to your championing the causes that you and we hold so dear.