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Dem House Incumbents Who Have Lost to Republicans Since 1994

by: DavidNYC

Tue Apr 29, 2008 at 1:00 PM EDT


Since the disaster year of 1994, very few House Democrats have failed to win re-election against Republicans. Below is what I think is a complete list of those who did. If I'm missing anyone, please let us know in comments.

Year Incumbent District
1996 Mike Ward KY-03
1996 Harold Volkmer MO-09
1996 Bill Orton UT-03
1998 Jay Johnson WI-08
2000 Sam Gejdenson CT-02
2000 David Minge MN-02
2002 Jim Maloney CT-05
2002 Karen Thurman FL-05
2002 David Phelps IL-19
2002 Bill Luther MN-06/MN-02
2002 Ronnie Shows MS-04/MS-03
2004 Baron Hill IN-09
2004 Max Sandlin TX-01
2004 Nick Lampson TX-09/TX-02
2004 Charlie Stenholm TX-17/TX-19
2004 Martin Frost TX-24/TX-32

Every Dem who lost in 2002 and 2004 except for Baron Hill was a victim of redistricting. For those with two districts listed, the second one is the seat they were running for after redistricting. (For Sandlin & Thurman, their district numbers didn't change.) Note that I am not including Dems who lost in primaries to other Dems on this chart.

I must say, that's a pretty darn good track record - only seven losses not attributable to redistricting through six election cycles. And I think only one of these incumbents (Mike Ward) was a freshman. (Update: Jay Johnson was also a freshman. -- JL) What's more, we've regained a lot of these seats (though some of the districts have changed since 2000): KY-03, WI-08, CT-02, and IN-09. Plus, Nick Lampson is back in a district that (TX-22) that partially overlaps his old one.

So what do you know about the names on this list? What lessons, if any, can be drawn from these few elections where Democratic House incumbents lost to Republicans?

Update (James): Looks like we missed one -- David Phelps in IL-19.  Thanks to brittain33 in the comments for the catch.

Later Update (James): I added two more redistricting victims (Jim Maloney and Ronnie Shows), thanks to jeffmd in the comments.
DavidNYC :: Dem House Incumbents Who Have Lost to Republicans Since 1994
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Dem House Incumbents Who Have Lost to Republicans Since 1994 | 40 comments
David Minge
The lesson there is dont ever think you are a safe-incumbent if you are in a swing district.  You need to campaign or someone (Kennedy) may come up from behind all of a sudden and barely win.  Kennedy only won by I think a few hundred votes there in a swing/Repub. leaning district.  Minge didn't run as hard as he should have until the end when he realized this was going to be close.  So dont take incumbency for granted!
Redistricting
Lesson number 1:  state house and senate races matter.
Lesson Two
When the legislature can't agree on a map or outside parties sue, it matters what judge(s) is/are on the bench.
[ Parent ]
Also
Just because your legislature is split, that's no excuse to draft the Speaker of the House (Illinois) or the Vice President (New York) to draw your maps for you and pretend they're bipartisan.  
[ Parent ]
2002 and other comments
David Phelps (IL-19) lost in an unfair redistricting match with a Republican, John Shimkus. His hometown of El Dorado was spitefully drawn into a district based a few hundred miles away on Bloomington-Normal and most of the new district had been represented by Shimkus in the preceding Congress, and it was a rural district in 2002, so he never had a chance.

1996:
The first two races were essentially do-overs from the 1994 Republican wave. Mike Ward barely won the district as an open seat in a three-way race in 1994. Without the third party, the Republican was able to win it the following year. Harold Volkmer was an entrenched incumbent who barely defeated Hulshof in 1994. With more funding and attention, Hulshof was able to finish te job.

Bill Orton was a victim of sagebrush rebellion against Bill Clinton's changing Grand Staircase-Escalante in his district into a National Monument. Since it was already of the most Republican districts in the country, even more Republican than Matheson's district, one wonders how much time he had left anyway.

2000:
Sam Gejdenson had poor constituent services and was more focused on international issues than potholes. He had a very close call in 1994 that was decided, I think, by 4 votes. What did him in in 2000 was a few towns turning against him en masse over land issues with one of the tribes involved with casino gambling. With an ear to the ground, he might have been able to avert it.  

24 or 21 actually
per wiki

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
gave bush 77%
of the vote in 2004, which makes you wonder how he got elected period. Becuase they didn't make it any more republican with trying to draw out Matheson in 2002.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
Get cracking on state legislatures for 2010
As soon as the current races are over.  That is the group who will redistrict after the 2010 census.  We need to id states where one or more houses can be flipped.  And if there are some happening now (NY?) get on that as well.  

This is yet another reason why prolonging the Pres primary is destructive.  

Here you go
A little Google goes a long way.

http://www.ncsl.org/statevote/...

[ Parent ]
More simply put...
Both Legislatures = Blue

AL, AR, CA, CO, CT, HI, IL, IA, LA, ME, MD, MA, MS, NH, NJ, OR, VT, WA, WV

Split Legislatures (What we would need to win to turn the split legislature)
Deleware (2 assembly seats)
Indiana (9 senate seats)
Kentucky (2009)(4 senate seats)
Michigan (3 senate seats)
Montana (2 house seats)
Nevada (1 senate seat)
New York (2 senate seats)
Oklahoma (7 house seats)
Pennsylvania (5 senate seats)
Tennessee (1 senate seat)
Virginia (2009) (7 house seats)
Wisconsin (3 assembly seats)

I can tell you right off the bat, that I know Wisconsin is going to flip their assembly in 2008 and redistricting won't be a problem.  
Deleware also isn't a problem in regards to redistricting, since they only have one house seat.  

[ Parent ]
Michigan
We absolutley have to win those 3 senate seats and maintain majorities in both and also win the gubernatorial election in 2010.  That is one state that needs some major redistricting to favor the Dems again.  

and as a correction, MN also has both state houses in Dem control.  (Won't do much good unless we win the gubernatorial election though)

[ Parent ]
Woops.
I don't know how I missed it, but I did.  Thanks.  
[ Parent ]
6 House seats in Virginia now
Democrat Albert Pollard picked up Rob Wittman's old seat. The House is currently 53-45-2, with both independents siding with Republicans.
[ Parent ]
Delaware's Dem-controlled Senate not so great
The GOP-controlled house passed a wind power initiative that the Dem-controlled Senate has stalled, thanks to a trio of corporate-crony Democrats who are even worse than Tom Carper. Democratic Senate President pro tem Thurman Adams is infamous for using a "desk drawer veto" to kill any bill he doesn't like. We're going to need more and better Dems in the state senate here.

Delaware Liberal - biggest and best blog in Delaware.
[ Parent ]
NY state senate
Wasn't the margin down to one with the recent by-election victory?  

[ Parent ]
Then you'll want to check out...
my diary from last June on all the state legislatures, and what the numbers were for each one.  Obviously, that was before the Virginia and Kentucky 2007 elections, but it should hold true for all the other states.
[ Parent ]
it's weird that there are 2 MN seats on here
It's proabably right that Minge didn't run hard enough in MN-2.  

Luther has the oddity of being the only freshman democrat (winning an open Republican seat) of 1994.  His district's good parts were surgically removed leaving him between two districts that were pretty deeply republican.  He then ran a cautious campaign and made the silly mistake of having a volunteer run as the No More Taxes Party candidate.  The volunteer was clearly identified as a democratic supporter and was even a national delegate in 2000.

nope
Kennedy in Rhode Island is also a Dem freshmen from 1994, and he actually beat an incumbent, the only Dem to do so that year.
[ Parent ]
13 Democratic freshmen from 1994
All won in open seats.  Remember, incumbents could cash in unspent balances of their campaign funds up to 1994 but the money was not available after 1994.  One reason for all the changes was this Republican induced procedural reform.

The 13 Democratic freahmen from that class were:

Zoe Lofgren, CA-16
Mike Ward, KY-3 (lost to Anne Northrop in 1996)
John Baldacci, ME-2 (elected Governor in 2002)
Lynn Rivers, MI-13 (Did not run, 2002)
Bill Luther, MN-5 L to Ron Kline
Karen McCarthy, MO-5
Chaka Fattah, PA-2
Mike Doyle, PA-14
Frank Mascara, PA-20 Did not run 2002
Patrick Kennedy, RI-1
Lloyd Dogget, TX-10
Sheila Jackson Lee, TX-18
Ken Bentsen, TX-25 Did not run 2002

The districts and the district numbers have changed over time.

In comparison, quite a few Republicans that year defeated sitting Democrats, 34 by my count.

Btw, 10 new Republicans were elected to the Senate in 1994 with eight filling open seats.  Five of the eight open seats were held by Democrats (counting Al Gore's seat as "open").  The only full term Democrat to go down was Jim Sasser.  The large scale turnover in Republican seats for 2008 presents the possibility of a mirror image of 94 in the Senate elections.

[ Parent ]
Fattah (PA-02)
Not an open seat.  He beat Lucien Blackwell, the incumbent, in the 1994 primary.  Blackwell had won it as an open seat in 1991 during a special election following Bill Gray's retirement -- beating Fattah, who was running on a third party ticket.
[ Parent ]
Not quite
Patrick Kennedy did not beat an incumbent Republican in 1994; no Democrat did.  (John Tierney of Massachusetts came closest do doing so; he lost 53-47 to Pete Torkildsen, then beat him in 1996.)  Kennedy's seat was previously held by a Republican, Ron Matchley, who left the seat open to run for governor (and lost in the primary).  

There were four Democrats who took over Republican seats in 1994, but they were all open seats:  Kennedy, Luther, Mike Doyle of Pennsylvania (Santorum's old seat; hope he got the office fumigated) and John Baldacci of Maine (Olympia Snowe's old seat).  

[ Parent ]
Hard to tell, cause defeated incumbents are only part of the picture.
I certainly get why you put together this post, and it's a really great and valuable one.  Still, without including forced retirements (our versions of Jim Walsh and Mary Jo Kilroy), it's hard to see the full map of seats that the GOP wrestled out of our hands, whether through campaigns or the threat of campaigns.

Party flips would probably be an important element too.  Ralph Hall in Texas flipped after the redistricting, cause he knew he couldn't win in his new district as a Dem but could win as a Republican.  He hadn't been voting his party for Speaker anyway, so it wasn't a big jump.

I don't know if Virgil Goode or Rodney Alexander were under electoral pressure or not when they flipped.

Still, this is a pretty good indicator of some things, including that we haven't lost many incumbents to actual elections in a long time.

I'd like to see a list of GOP incumbents who have lost since 1996 (leaving out 2006 of course; who has time to read a list that long!) and then compare its length and regionality to ours.  I'm really surprised we didn't lose more incumbents to the awful 2001 round of redistricting, but I think most of them just retired instead of get humiliated in a failed re-election.  That group at least really needs to be factored in somehow.

28, gay guy, Democrat, CA-08

what texas dem said
I'd be interested to see a similar list of seats that flipped D-to-R after a retirement. IN-2 (Roemer as the D, then Chocola as the R) comes to mind - although we picked up that one in 06 as well.
[ Parent ]
R to D (running)
From the Wikipedia links listed below:

1996:

CA-10:  Bill Baker (to Ellen Tauscher)
CA-22:  Andrea Seastrand (to Walter Capps)
CA-46:  Bob Dornan (to Loretta Sanchez)
CT-05:  Gary Franks (to Jim Maloney)
IL-05:  Michael Flanagan (to Rod Blagojevich)
MA-03:  Peter Blute (to Jim McGovern)
MA-06:  Peter Torkildsen (to John Tierney)
ME-01:  Jim Longley (to Tom Allen)
MI-08:  Dick Chrysler (to Debbie Stabenow)
NC-02:  David Funderburk (to Bob Etheridge)
NC-04:  Fred Heineman (to David Price)
NJ-08:  Bill Martini (to Bill Pascrell)
NY-04:  Daniel Frisa (to Carolyn McCarthy)
OH-06:  Frank Creamans (to Ted Strickland)
OH-10:  Martin Hoke (to Dennis Kucinich)
OR-05:  Jim Bunn (to Darlene Hooley)
TX-09:  Steve Stockman (to Nick Lampson)
WA-09:  Randy Tate (to Adam Smith)

1998:

KS-03:  Vince Snowbarger (to Dennis Moore)
NJ-12:  Mike Pappas (to Rush Holt)
NM-03:  Bill Redmond (to Tom Udall)
PA-13:  Jon Fox (to Joe Hoeffel)
WA-01:  Rick White (to Jay Inslee)

2000:

AR-04:  Jay Dickey (to Mike Ross)
CA-27:  James Rogan (to Adam Schiff)
CA-36:  Steve Kuykendall (to Jane Harman)
CA-49:  Brian Bilbray (to Sue Davis)

2002:

MD-08:  Connie Morella (to Chris Van Hollen)
NY-01:  Felix Grucci (to Tim Bishop)

2004:

GA-12:  Max Burns (to John Barrow)
IL-08:  Phil Crane (to Melissa Bean)

[ Parent ]
Look at the '96 list
Those are some of the nuttiest of the '94 landslide.  High tide brings in a lot of driftwood!
[ Parent ]
R to D (retirement/vacancy)
1996:

IA-03:  Jim Ross Lightfoot (ran for Senate, won by Leonard Boswell)
LA-07:  Jimmy Hayes (ran for Senate, won by Chris John)
WI-03:  Steve Gunderson (retired, won by Ron Kind)
WI-08:  Toby Roth (retired, won by Jay Johnson)

1998:

CA-01:  Frank Riggs (ran for Senate, won by Mike Thompson)
KY-04:  Jim Bunning (elected to senate, won by Ken Lucas)
MS-04:  Mike Parker (ran for Governor, won by Ronnie Shows)
NV-01:  John Ensign (ran for Senate, won by Shelley Berkley)
WA-03:  Linda Smith (ran for Senate, won by Brian Baird)
WI-02:  Scott Klug (retired, won by Tammy Baldwin)

2000:  

CA-14:  Tom Campbell (ran for Senate, won by Mike Honda)
NY-02:  Rick Lazio (ran for Senate, won by Steve Israel)
OK-02:  Tom Coburn (retired, won by Brad Carson)
UT-02:  Merrill Cook (lost primary, won by Jim Matheson)
WA-02:  Jack Metcalf (retired, won by Rick Larsen)

2002:

CA-39:  Steve Horn (retired, won by Linda Sanchez)
GA-03:  Saxby Chambliss (elected Senator, won by Jim Marshall)
LA-05:  John Cooksey (ran for Senate, won by Rodney Alexander)
MD-02:  Bob Erlich (elected Governor, won by Dutch Ruppersberger)
TN-04:  Van Hilleary (ran for Governor, won by Lincoln Davis)

2004:

CO-03:  Scott McInnis (retired, won by John Salazar)
NY-27:  Jack Quinn (retired, won by Brian Higgins)

[ Parent ]
Of the 2002 seats
The incumbents in CA-39 and MD-2 were essentially redistricted out of their seats. CA-39 in particular.  
[ Parent ]
D to R (retirement/vacancy)
1996:

AL-03:  Glen Browder (ran for Senate, won by Bob Riley)
AL-04:  Tom Bevill (retired, won by Bob Aderholt)
IL-20:  Dick Durbin (elected to Senate, won by John Shimkus)
LA-05:  Cleo Fields (retired, won by John Cooksey)
MS-03:  Sonny Montgomery (retired, won by Chip Pickering)
MT-AL:  Pat Williams (retired, won by Rick Hill)
OK-03:  Bill Brewster (retired, won by Wes Watkins)
SD-AL:  Tim Johnson (elected Senator, won by John Thune)
TX-05:  John Bryant (ran for Senate, won by Pete Sessions)
TX-12:  Pete Geren (retired, won by Kay Granger)

1998:

CA-03:  Vic Fazio (retired, won by Doug Ose)
CA-36:  Jane Harman (ran for Governor, won by Steve Kuykendall)
KY-06:  Scotty Baesler (ran for Senate, won by Ernie Fletcher)
NC-08:  Bill Hefner (retired, won by Robin Hayes)
PA-15:  Paul McHale (retired, won by Pat Toomey)

2000:

MI-08:  Debbie Stabenow (elected Senator, won by Mike Rogers)
MO-06:  Patsy Danner (retired, won by Sam Graves)
PA-04:  Ron Klink (ran for Senate, won by Melissa Hart)
VA-02:  Owen Pickett (retired, won by Ed Schrock)
WV-02:  Bob Wise (elected Governor, won by Shelley Moore Capito)

2002:

IN-02:  Tim Roemer (retired, won by Chris Chocola)
MI-10:  David Bonior (ran for Governor, won by Candice Miller)
MI-11:  James Barcia (elected State Senator, won by Thad McCotter)
OH-03:  Tony Hall (retired, won by Mike Turner)
PA-06:  Robert Borski (retired, won by Jim Gerlach)
PA-18:  Frank Mascara (ran/lost in different district, won by Tim Murphy)

2004:

KY-04:  Ken Lucas (retiring, won by Geoff Davis)
LA-07:  Chris John (ran for Senate, won by Charles Boustany)
TX-02:  Jim Turner (retired, won by Ted Poe over Nick Lampson)

[ Parent ]
Bob Borski retired from PA-03
which was a Philly district removed by the Republicans for 2002. Jim Gerlach ran and won in a different, new, district on the other side of the city.  
[ Parent ]
Let's unpack that
Borski was in the 3rd in NE Philly. He retired. The 3rd was assigned to the former 21st over in Erie, which Phil English kept. (The old 3rd was dispersed into the 2nd, 8th, and primarily the 13th.) Tim Holden used to be in the 6th, which was centered on Reading. He was districted into the Harrisburg-based 17th, where surprisingly he defeated incumbent R George Gekas. Nobody was left in the now mostly suburban 6th, so Gerlach jumped in there.

Frank Mascara was in the 20th in the SW corner (which was eliminated, dispersed into the 18th and 12th), not the 18th. Bill Coyne retired from the Pittsburgh-based 14th, and Mike Doyle decided to run in the much safer 14th instead of the suburban 18th, which he'd previously represented. Inexplicably, Mascara, instead of moving into the 18th, challenged John Murtha in the primary in the Johnstown-based 12th and got stomped. Republican Tim Murphy showed up and helped himself to the open 18th.

[ Parent ]
Correct on all counts
Maps documenting the Republican Gerrymander responsible for what you describe can be seen here at the Map Center.  
[ Parent ]
Do y'all have the same gerrymandering in the state senate/assembly?
I'm 98.6% confident that the answer is 'yes', but would like to hear it from someone with an iron in that fire.
[ Parent ]
My recollection is that the State Senate/House maps
do favor the Republicans, but that's mostly because there were more of them in 2001 when they were drawn. It was, I think, a bipartisan gerrymander. (Different rules for drawing those maps).
[ Parent ]
Alexander was under no pressure at all
Rodney Alexander was unopposed for re-election, so he'd have run into no trouble at all running as a Democrat.  That, coupled with the fact that he literally switched parties at the last minute (i.e. just before the filing deadline for the seat) is why his switch got under Dems' skin as much as it did.  
[ Parent ]
Wikipedia
Wikipedia has a list of U.S. House election results going back through the 1990s.  Seats that flipped to R or D are highlighted in red or blue, respectively.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U...

Jim Maloney of Connecticut
Maloney represented CT-05 until 2002, when redistricting stuck him in the same district as Nancy Johnson, then of CT-06. Johnson beat him 54-46, if I recall correctly.
oh, and Ronnie Shows of MS
Shows was in MS-04 until 2002, when Mississippi also lost a seat and he ran against Chip Pickering of MS-03 in the new 3rd, losing 60-40.
[ Parent ]
Jay Johnson
was a freshman, in Green Bay, becoming the only Democratic incumbent to lose in 1998, by a large margin to Mark Green.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
This is Steve Kagen's seat now n/t


Liberty Avenue Politics - a place for politics in Southern Queens
[ Parent ]
MO-9
Harold Volkmer was a very conservative Democrat whose base was in Northeastern Missouri (where most of the district is).  He barely staved off Kenny Hulshof in 1994, but Hulshof came back running an even stronger campaign in 1996.

The fact that Hulshof won Boone County (the strongest Democratic part of the district) by 9,000 votes and St. Charles county near St. Louis by 3,000 allowed him to run even or a little behind Volkmer in the rest of the district.

Hulshof's strong base in Boone was ultimately what helped him take out Volkmer the second time around.  Thankfully Hulshof has vacated the seat and Boone County State Rep Judy Baker is leading the race to replace him (as she was the first one in the race before Hulshof retired).  

Dem House Incumbents Who Have Lost to Republicans Since 1994 | 40 comments

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