Republican Scott Brown’s victory in the Massachusetts Senate race was lifted by strong support from union households, in a sign of trouble for President Barack Obama and Democrats who are counting on union support in the 2010 midterm elections.
A poll conducted on behalf of the AFL-CIO found that 49% of Massachusetts union households supported Mr. Brown in Tuesday’s voting, while 46% supported Democrat Martha Coakley. The poll conducted by Hart Research Associates surveyed 810 voters.
“If you lose Massachusetts and that’s not a wake-up call,” said moderate — and sentient — Democratic Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana, “there’s no hope of waking up.”
Let them sleep!
In the City of Boston, roughly 150,000 people voted in the special election on Tuesday, approximately the same number that voted when Ted Kennedy was re-elected in 2006. By comparison, approximately 200,000 people voted in the 2008 election that re-elected John Kerry. Not only did Kerry and Kennedy win higher vote percentages than Coakley, 85-15 v 70-30, despite a last minute campaign trip by Obama and millions of dollars in campaign contributions and a massive infusion of political operatives, but Obama was unable to turn out any additional voters for Coakley despite the intense national interest in the race.
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In a state where unaffiliated voters outnumber Democrats, listen for the sound of the backlash on Tuesday!
Martha Coakley’s (D) internal poll for Thursday night showed her trailing Scott Brown (R) by three points, 47% to 44%.
President Obama will travel to Massachusetts Sunday to try to save Martha Coakley’s flagging campaign from an upset loss to Scott Brown, the Republican whose surging candidacy has stripped away the sense of inevitability Coakley once had in the race for the late Sen. Ted Kennedy’s former seat.
Joel Pollak 