Sarbanes Retires: Target Maryland

Sen. Paul Sarbanes announced on Friday that he will not seek reelection to the Senate. This is a rare opportunity for Republicans to pick up a seat in a state that seldom offers such opportunities. I'm over two days late on this, so other sites have some good run downs on the possibilities. David Wissing offers two good articles here and here. Also, check out the analysis on the possibility of an Mfume race from this site in December.

While certainly not giving the GOP the advantage here, I'm more bullish than Wissing. Contrary to what some have suggested, Republicans would not be smart to cede the Senate race, which they would do by nominating anyone other than Gov. Bob Ehrlich or Lt. Gov. Michael Steele, and trying to just win one of the two, which would normally be considered a victory for the Party in this state, our best bet is to have Ehrlich run for reelection and Steele run for Senate. In this scenario, Ehrlich would be the slight favorite for Governor and Steele would have an uphill, but winnable, fight for the Senate seat. Ehrlich running for Senate would cede any advantage he'd have as an incumbent, as he would have to debate national instead of state issues. This would allow Democrats to tie him to national Republicans and make tip the advantage to the Democrats in both races. Further, not having a competitive nominee in the Senate race would allow the Democrat nominee's team to focus on fraud, er, "turnout" in Baltimore City. While Ehrlich would be a slight favorite in a reelection bid, the advantage of having a major candidate focus on nothing other than turnout would probably be too tough to overcome.

So, if Ehrlich runs for reelction and Steele runs for Senate, what are Steele's chances? Even though Steele is more conservative than Ehrlich on social issues like abortion, it would be much tougher for Democrats to tie him to national Republicans. The simple fact that he's a reasonable black conservative, unlike Alan Keyes, means that Democrats will have to tread carefully. It's always smart for Democrats to tie GOP candidates to the national Party in this deep blue state, but Democrats may make the mistake of calling Steele an Uncle Tom. If they do so, Steele's work on improving the inner city and working on education will get even more attention than he'll bring to it without such accusations. When that happens, Steele is likely to cut into the black vote in Baltimore City and might even depress turnout by showing him to be concerned with every day citizens. This would frustrate Democrats to no end because their whole campaign will depend upon morphing the Republican candidate into Tom DeLay. A low Baltimore City turnout coupled with big margins of victory in the rural parts of the state just might be the right formula for a Republican pick-up.

Republicans have to be realistic about this seat. It's an uphill climb, but it is possible that a conservative could actually be elected from this bastion of liberalism. Move this from "Safe Democrat" to "Leans Democrat". Depending on which candidates emerge, that's likely to change either way.