Two anti-establishment candidates — one on the left, one on the right — scored major victories in political primaries in the latest signs of voter anger that has jolted US politics.
Senator Arlen Specter, a five-term incumbent who switched from Republican to Democrat last year in hopes of keeping his Pennsylvania seat, lost Tuesday’s primary to Congressman Joe Sestak, a retired Navy admiral, who defied party leaders in pursuing the nomination.
The vote was a setback for US President Barack Obama, who supported Specter, but Sestak might give Democrats a better chance of retaining the seat in the November election given the anti-incumbent sentiment.
In Kentucky, Rand Paul, a political novice supported by the conservative tea party movement, won his party’s nomination for the Senate seat being vacated by retiring Republican Jim Bunning. Paul defeated Trey Grayson, a state official. Grayson had been backed by Kentucky’s senior senator, Mitch McConnell, the top Republican in the US Senate.
POLARIZATION
The results reflect the growing polarization in US society, where politicians in both parties are being pushed away from the center. They also reflect the anti-incumbent, anti-Washington mood of voters who believe that entrenched politicians have lost touch with the public, bailing out wealthy bankers while middle-class Americans struggle to keep their jobs and their homes.
“This is what democracy looks like,” Sestak yelled at supporters. “A win for the people over the establishment, over the status quo, even over Washington, DC.”
“This particular race needed new blood,” 60-year-old Denise Lamar said.
Lamar voted against Specter, saying: “It’s time for him to retire.”
Perhaps indicating that voters were expressing their frustrations at the ballot box, turnout appeared to be up in Pennsylvania, Arkansas and Kentucky from the most recent previous statewide primary elections.
The tone for the party nominating season was set on the busiest primary night of the year. However, it’s difficult to say whether this early season trend will hold true during the general election; much could change between now and November, especially given the uncertainty of economic recovery after the worst recession in generations and an unemployment rate hovering at 10 percent.
Tuesday’s primaries came a little less than five months before the November elections in which Obama’s Democrats are trying to preserve their majorities in both chambers of Congress. With the most seats to defend, Democrats seem the most vulnerable to the anti-incumbent sentiment.
However, Democrats received an important boost as they won a closely watched special congressional election in Pennsylvania to fill the seat of the late representative John Murtha.
Though the winner, Mark Critz, will serve only the final months of Murtha’s term, a defeat would have been discouraging in a heavily working-class district held by Democrats for four decades.
MODERATE
In Arkansas, Senator Blanche Lincoln, a moderate who was first elected in 1998 and is considered among the most vulnerable Senate Democrats this fall, was the top vote-getter in her party’s primary.
However, she failed to win the majority of votes needed to avoid a costly run-off against Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter — who was backed by labor unions and progressives — for the nomination.
The winner of the June 8 run-off will face Republican Representative John Boozman, who won the Republican nomination.
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