HOWEY: Coats took high road with campaign trade-offs

FRANKLIN — When Dan Coats re-emerged on the Hoosier political scene last Feb. 2, he had already made the decision to run on the merits of his career that included two Senate victories, four U.S. House terms, an ambassadorship to Germany, and a close brush with history when President George W. Bush nearly made him secretary of defense just months before Sept. 11, 2001.

Coats refused to attack his primary opponents, figuring that he would need to close ranks with supporters of State Sen. Stutzman, Richard Behney, John Hostettler and Don Bates Jr. That paid a dividend two days after the primary when Coats and the challengers came together for a unity session. If the mud had been slung, such a unity event would have taken more time, which is already a fleeting commodity.

Such restraint on the mud is becoming a hallmark of Indiana’s most successful political figures. Sen. Dick Lugar, Gov. Mitch Daniels have won by staying positive. So has Secretary of State Todd Rokita, who won the 4th CD nomination by not following his opponent into the ditch.

There was a dearth of public opinion polls during the campaign, but internal Coats polling by Public Opinion Strategies showed Coats with as much as a 30 percent lead. The campaign, however, tried not to raise expectations and refused to go negative, choosing to trade a blowout victory for party unity.

“He pledged to support whoever won and he said that from the very beginning,” said Coats campaign strategist Kevin Shaw Kellems. “The conventional wisdom in Washington was that the Indiana Senate primary would be a nail-biter. Washington was wrong again.”

On Tuesday, national pundits and Republican pollster Christine Matthews told Politico, “If I were the Coats people, I would say anything less than 55 percent is unacceptable. If he comes out with less than 55 percent and manages to squeak by, he looks bad.”

He ended up with 39 percent, still 10 percent more than his closest competitor in Stutzman.

The campaign wasn’t buying that and Coats squarely looked toward a race with U.S. Rep. Brad Ellsworth. He traveled to Evansville the day after the election for an “in-your-face” swat at the Democrat, who will be handed the nomination May 15 by the Indiana Democratic Central Committee in a power play orchestrated by lame duck Sen. Evan Bayh.

“In light of the damage that President Obama’s policies have already done to the United States of America, as Hoosiers, we cannot afford to be any part of this,” Coats told a somewhat subdued crowd at 9:45 p.m. at the Downtown Marriott on Election Night. “We cannot and we will not stand idly by and watch as our personal liberties are diluted, our national security diminished, and our fiscal health destroyed. And we absolutely cannot afford to elect someone to the United States Senate who will enable this radical move to the left.”

Coats then delivered a broadside at Ellsworth, saying, “Folks, anyone who has voted to reappoint Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House cannot be trusted to protect Indiana’s interests. This is going to be a pivotal and a healthy exercise in democracy because the choice will be very, very clear – the differences between the two philosophies are indeed dramatic.

“Congressman Brad Ellsworth and I are going to offer Hoosiers two very different views of the direction our country should be taking.”

The Ellsworth campaign released this statement Thursday night: “I know Hoosiers are frustrated with Washington,” Ellsworth said. “I am too. That’s why I’m running, because we need folks who will listen and work together to get things done no matter what party you’re from - that’s been my approach as Sheriff, in Congress, and it’s what I’ll do in the Senate. Over the next six months, I’ll keep listening and give Indiana a clear choice in this election. I’ll keep working for everyday Hoosiers and their priorities and not the big special interest lobbyists in Washington.”

Stutzman attempted to ride a wave of endorsements from the American Conservative Union and U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint and came close to matching Coats’ TV buys in the final week.

But it was the anemic fundraising by Stutzman and Hostettler — who reported only $37,000 on his first quarter FEC report — that alarmed state and Washington Republicans and drew Coats into the race.

Coats’ entry may have been enough to force a dispirited Bayh to retire. Bayh allies said he had pondered retirement after his presidential and vice presidential bids faltered between 2006 and 2008, only to find President Obama’s dynamic change creating a potential political firestorm back home. Bayh managed his father’s 1980 campaign that lost to Dan Quayle. He also faced the prospect of his wife becoming a campaign issue after she made $2 million by sitting on the boards of companies like Wellpoint, which had dramatically raised insurance rates just as the Obama health reforms entered the homestretch into law.

Now with Coats the GOP nominee, he will directly challenge the Obama presidency and take aim at a Democratic Senate seat that, going into 2010, many assumed was safely on the ruling party’s ledger.

Brian Howey is publisher of Howey Politics Indiana at www.howeypolitics.com

Election 2010: Indiana Senate

Newly chosen Republican nominee Dan Coats earns 51% support while his Democratic rival Brad Ellsworth’s attracts 36% in the first Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of the Indiana Senate race following Tuesday’s GOP Primary.

Six percent (6%) of likely voters in the state favor some other candidate. Eight percent (8%) remain undecided.

Coats, who previously served in the U.S. Senate from 1989 to 1999, captured 39% of the vote in a five-way race on Tuesday to win the state Republican Senate nomination. His four opponents have now endorsed his candidacy. Ellsworth, a U.S. congressman, is unchallenged for his party’s nomination.

In surveys since Democratic Senator Evan Bayh’s surprise announcement that he would not seek reelection, Coat’s support in match-ups with Ellsworth has grown from 46% in February to 54% last month. Ellsworth’s support in those same surveys has remained in the narrow range of 32% to 34%.

Ellsworth voted in favor of the recently-passed national health care plan, but 59% of Indiana voters favor repeal of that plan. The Indiana finding includes 48% who Strongly Favor repeal. Thirty-eight percent (38%) oppose repeal, with 26% who Strongly Oppose it. Those figures are similar to the national average.

Eighty-one percent (81%) of those who Strongly Favor repeal support Coats, while 80% of those in the smaller group who Strongly Oppose it support Ellsworth.

The survey of 500 Likely Voters in Indiana was conducted on May 5-6, 2010 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4.5 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Thirteen percent (13%) of Indiana voters have a Very Favorable opinion of Coats, while nine percent (9%) regard him Very Unfavorably.

Ellsworth is seen Very Favorably by nine percent (9%) and Very Unfavorably by 13%.

At this point in a campaign, Rasmussen Reports considers the number of people with a strong opinion more significant than the total favorable/unfavorable numbers.

Sixty-one percent (61%) of Indiana voters support a law like Arizona’s that authorizes local police to check the immigration status of anyone they suspect of being an illegal immigrant. Twenty-nine percent (29%) oppose such a law. Again, those figures are close to the national average.

But 52% of voters in Indiana are at least somewhat concerned that such a law will violate the civil rights of some U.S. citizens. Forty-seven percent (47%) are not very or not at all concerned.

Sixty-five percent (65%) favor a welcoming immigration policy that excludes only “national security threats, criminals and those who would come here to live off our welfare system.”

Most Indiana voters think it is at least somewhat important for Congress to pass energy legislation this year to reduce global warming, but just 38% favor such an energy bill now. Forty-one percent (41%) oppose it.

Most voters know the GOP has been identified as the Party of No for its unified opposition to President Obama’s legislative agenda, but they’re narrowly divided over whether that’s a good place for the Republicans to be.

In line with the view among voters nationally, 65% in Indiana say America is overtaxed.

Forty-three percent (43%) of voters in the state approve of how Obama is handling the role of president, up four points from a month ago. Fifty-six percent (56%) disapprove. Indiana voters are more critical of Obama’s job performance than voters nationwide in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.

Again this month, 60% approve of how Republican Governor Mitch Daniels is doing his job. Thirty-eight percent (38%) disapprove.

In 2008, Rasmussen Reports projected nationally that Obama would defeat McCain by a 52% to 46% margin. Obama won 53% to 46%. Four years earlier, Rasmussen Reports projected the national vote totals for both George W. Bush and John Kerry within half-a-percentage-point.

In Indiana during the 2008 campaign, Rasmussen Reports polling showed a close race with McCain edging Obama 49% to 46%. Obama won 50% to 49%. In the Democratic Primary, Rasmussen Polling showed Hillary Clinton defeating Obama 46% to 41%. Clinton won 51% to 49%.