The early bird favorite for the Republican nomination for president in 2012 – Mitt Romney – is wasting no time weighing in to the Maine political scene this year. Today, Romney’s “Free and Strong America” political action committee (which, for those non junkies out there, serves as his political machine in preparation for his run) issued a round of endorsements as well as PAC contributions for various offices in Maine.
Specifically, Romney’s PAC threw its weight behind gubernatorial candidate Paul LePage and congressional candidates Dean Scontras and Jason Levesque.
Ordinarily, something like this would not really attract my attention, and I would not write about it (it wouldn’t be the first endorsement I completely ignored).
The reason I am talking about this is simple.
First – relevence, and scope. Romney – one of the highest profile national figures in this country – himself is actually a pretty popular figure in Maine, especially in Republican circles. From nearby Massachusetts, Republicans in the Pine Tree State seem to have something of a kinship with Romney, giving him a decisive (and for many people, an unexpected) win in the 2008 caucuses. Romney making a high profile endorsement of the three biggest ticket Republicans in the state won’t hurt any of them, and may bring some additional national attention to these races.
More important, however, is identifying what Romney is up to by playing here. Though one might dismiss these endorsements as “Republican endorses Republicans” and move on – the simple fact is that these candidates, and Romney specifically, simply don’t play in that many races. They pick their battles strategically based on self interest.
Free and Strong is the highest profile PAC and most prolific fundraising machine of any of the 2012 candidates, and as I just said, he doesn’t exactly hand out endorsements and money to every Republican running. In fact, he has been pretty stingy overall, picking his battles across the country and trying to make the most effective use of his voice and money.
He doesn’t waste money on races that are uncompetitive, and there is a simple reason why. Romney (and any other serious contender worth their salt) is trying to build a political base that can help him later on. Thus, he is pushing for candidates who he thinks have the ability to win, because if they do win, they – now owing him a favor – are then in a position to activate their political machines on his behalf when he runs later on.
Despite Maine going for Barack Obama by seventeen points in 2008 and having voted for a Democrat president every year since 1992, it is in actuality a swing state. Its history of going Democrat nationally since 1988 is a long collection of extenuating circumstances: Perot’s presence in 1992 wiping out George H.W. Bush, a popular incumbent who won in a landslide in 1996, a southern, socially conservative Republican running in 2000 (yet it was still close that year), that same Republican (and now terribly divisive) running again against a nearby state’s Senator in 2004, and the most significant Democratic wave election since 1964 in 2008. In other words, Republican failure to compete in Maine in presidential elections is less about the state and more about the nature of the last five races.
One only needs to look at the fact that – despite his brand of conservatism not suiting the state – Maine was targeted heavily by President Bush in both 2000 and 2004, and the campaign truly thought they could win the state.
Which is just a really long way of saying that Mitt Romney considers Maine’s four electoral votes as possible to acquire, and he would love to see some kind of established base of support that he could tap into to help churn out not only another win in the 2012 primary, but also a possible win in the general election. Don’t kid yourselves into thinking he (and others) aren’t thinking that far ahead. They are.
Looking at Romney’s history of weighing in, he has picked these types of states to play in over and over again. As a great example, Romney was one of the earliest and most enthusiastic backers of my favorite governor in America (not named Mitch Daniels), New Jersey’s own Chris Christie.
Back when most national figures considered Christie to be a squishy moderate fraud (!!!!), Romney came to town and stumped hard, gave money and directed his supporters to fight for his victory in the GOP primary. This was against what you could probably consider a “tea party candidate” – though no such concept existed at the time. Romney thought Christie could win, and today is sitting pretty with an ally in New Jersey who may potentially help him try to pick off the electorally significant state of New Jersey. Yes, other national figures endorsed Christie as well – but Romney did it sooner and more enthusiastically than most.
And that brings up the other piece – none of the other oft-mentioned candidates for the 2012 nomination (Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, John Thune, Gary Johnson and the entire nest of ambitious politicos making noise in this space) have (as far as I have seen) dipped their toes into Maine – not even for token endorsements.
So, long story short, Romney is attempting to get out ahead of the field and set himself up for a small – but potentially very helpful – win in this state in both the primary and the general election in Maine. He wouldn’t be doing this if he didn’t believe (to varying degrees) that each of these candidates could potentially be elected this November (he isn’t wasting his time, energy or money in races that are forgone conclusions), and potentially help him later on.
This is nice for all three candidates – but is most helpful to the two congressional candidates, Scontras and Levesque. We all already knew that LePage has the potential to win, and most observers believe as much already. There are, however, still many people who doubt the ability of either of the congressional candidates to beat their respective incumbents. The NRCC has not made either seat a top priority (though Levesque seems to be sneaking into their radar as time continues to pass), and as a result of this widespread doubt, money is very hard to come by and institutional support has been weak.
A statement of support from Romney is far less significant to the voter as it is to the machine. Romney’s blessing and statement of support should signal to insiders around the party that these two candidates are at the very worst worth a look, and at their best, potential sleepers who could actually pull something off given the right resources.
It is not – by itself – enough to open up the floodgates of money, attention and infrastructure. But it is most certainly a start that should get some attention for these candidates, and make it just a little easier to milk some PACs, political organizations, and national donors for money. These two candidates then hope that the small snowball of attention and money that will hopefully accompany this endorsement can continue to roll down the hill, and slowly gain more snow, turning into an increasingly imposing snowball, until an avalanche ensues. This is, of course, what happened next door in Massachusetts with now Senator Scott Brown.
Maine is not Massachusetts, this is not late 2009/early 2010, and these candidates are not Scott Brown. But, those things don’t need to be duplicated for any of these three candidates to win their respective races.
All these candidates need is for momentum to build, people to start to believe, and resources, talent and attention to accumulate around them. In Maine, in this environment, and in Scontras’ and Levesque’s case what I would argue two very strong candidates, if they can make people both statewide and nationally believe that they can win, they could potentially ride a wave and surprise a lot of people.
That is why this endorsement is important enough for me to write about.
No Maine voter will really care about this, and very little will perceivable change because of this. But it could be the first step toward an impending move to legitimize the entire Republican slate, which could end up paying dividends this November.
So tonight, all three candidates – but particularly Dean Scontras and Jason Levesque, have a lot to be thankful for in Mitt Romney’s personal ambition. It may very well have started that snowball down the hill for them.
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