Larry Kissell has got to be lovin’ it.
A Democrat from the conservative-leaning Eighth
Congressional District in central North Carolina, Kissell has
spent the latter half of his freshman term wringing his hands.
His fundraising numbers are dismal, he faces reelection in a
wildly anti-incumbent year, and his liberal base has all but
deserted him. To beat him, Republicans had only to field a
qualified candidate.
There’s only one problem: they can’t. A six-way primary in
early May led to a splintered
result with no clear winner. Since then, the GOP appears
eager to do everything in its power to ensure that Kissell has an
easy ride going into November.
It’s factious squabbling that could end up crippling the
party’s eventual nominee. A runoff election is slated for late
June between businessman Tim D’Annunzio (who won 37 percent of
the vote, just short of the 40 percent needed to avoid a runoff)
and former sports broadcaster Harold Johnson (who won 33
percent).
Depending on the final results, the GOP might have shot
itself in both knees and feet. That’s because state and national
Republicans have ripped D’Annunzio and rallied to Johnson in
recent weeks, even though D’Annunzio was the top vote getter in
the primary.
The reason can be summed up in two words: he’s crazy. “What
[D’Annunzio] could do to the party as our nominee is secondary in
my view to what he could do to the country if he got elected,”
Tom Fetzer, chairman of the North Carolina GOP,
told the Charlotte Observer Sunday. “If he got
elected, for crying out loud, that would be a disaster.”
Never one to be outdone, D’Annunzio has
called on Fetzer to resign. But Republicans have good reason
to be wary of D’Annunzio’s colorful past, which includes a bitter
child-custody dispute, a trespassing conviction, an admission
that he took drugs, and some unorthodox beliefs.
“In Hoke County divorce records, his wife said in 1995 that
D’Annunzio had claimed to be the Messiah, had traveled to New
Jersey to raise his stepfather from the dead, believed God would
drop a 1,000-mile high pyramid as the New Jerusalem on Greenland
and found the Ark of the Covenant in Arizona,” the Associated
Press
reported.
GOP operatives see such claims as dynamite in a potential
match-up between D’Annunzio and Kissell —- who, for all his
political trouble, has a squeaky clean personal record.
True to form, the dominos have begun to fall. Two of the
three Republican governors to serve in North Carolina since
Reconstruction have both endorsed Johnson. As has Robin Hayes,
the Republican who held onto the 8th district for four terms
before Kissell beat him in 2008.
The problem is that D’Annunzio, despite his past, remains
popular with a good portion of the Republican electorate, even if
he doesn’t curry favor with the party bosses. If he prevails in
the runoff, the party’s establishment will appear laughable as
they tread water on their past statements.
That factor alone could doom the GOP’s chances in this
swing district, where the party has the best shot in North
Carolina of offing an incumbent and contributing to a takeover in
the House.
Republicans are betting the farm — and the cars, savings
bonds, kids’ trust account, and everything else — on a Johnson
victory in June. If nothing else, it shows how eager, even
desperate, they are to avoid a D’Annunzio candidacy. That factor
alone might give primary voters pause before they pull the lever
for D’Annunzio.
But the strategy could backfire, too, particularly in an
election season dominated by mistrust of incumbents and party
regulars. Polls show the revulsion isn’t confined to one party,
either, so an establishment endorsement could miscarry
easily.
D’Annunzio is playing off that. Even before the May 4
primary, he had cast himself as an outsider, once holding
a machine-gun fundraiser. Now, he’s even more eagerly claimed the
mantle of party outsider. That could benefit him in the
runoff.
Regardless of who wins, Republicans have done irreparable
harm to their chances. Whether that will be enough to ensure a
Kissell victory remains to be seen. If the tidal wave of
anti-Democrat sentiment continues into the fall, a heated primary
in the spring and early summer won’t mean much. If Democrats’
political fortunes are less dire, it could mean a lot.
