The Cook Political Report

Tight Senate races loom in Colorado and Kansas

COLORADO
OPEN: HANK BROWN (R)

(Sept. 11, 1996) -- While most political observers were focused on the Republican National Convention, Colorado voters on August 13 selected their Senate nominees. In the Democratic primary, lawyer/lobbyist Tom Strickland trounced former University of Colorado law school dean Gene Nichol, 66-34 percent. In the Republican primary, Rep. Wayne Allard defeated Attorney General Gale Norton by a wider than expected margin of 57-43 percent.

Current Electoral College Projections

Many originally believed that Norton was the nominal frontrunner in the GOP primary as she was the only candidate who had run and won statewide, providing her with statewide name recognition and a base of support. But her campaign was disorganized, and she failed to raise the kind of money necessary to communicate her conservative message. Allard outspent Norton on television by almost 3:1, which made up for any deficit in name identification that he brought to the race. The keys to Allard's victory were beating Norton in the all-important El Paso County (Colorado Springs) with 57 percent of the vote, then defeating her in four of the six metro Denver counties, losing only Denver and Arapaho counties to Norton. Allard sealed his victory by winning the state's Western Slope with 53 percent.

Ultimately, Strickland's victory over Nichol was not terribly surprising. Although Nichol had gained considerable momentum between the party's convention in early June and the primary, he made some mistakes in the final weeks that cost him support. In addition, Nichol simply did not have the funds to compete with Strickland on television. Strickland spent about $330,000 on the air in the final four weeks during the Olympics, and virtually buried Nichol and his populist message. Strickland performed well throughout the state, losing only Boulder and Aspen.

The primary results set up a very competitive general election contest. A poll taken just before the primary by Mason-Dixon Political/Media Research (August 4-6 of 805 likely voters) showed a very tight race between Allard and Strickland. According to the survey, the race was a statistical dead-heat, with Allard pulling 43 percent to Strickland's 42 percent.

It is expected that Strickland will attempt to label Allard as a conservative extremist and a clone of House Speaker Newt Gingrich in the general election, using the congressman's six-year voting record in Congress, as well as his voting record in the state legislature, as fodder. For Allard's part, he is likely to remind voters that Strickland has spent much of his career as a lobbyist and power broker. The Allard camp contends that all roads regardless of the issue will lead back to lobbying and Strickland's law firm, Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Strickland. Strickland is a moderate, DLC-style Democrat, making it difficult for Allard to tag him as a liberal. Instead, he will have to raise questions about Strickland's professional and personal character.

In light of Strickland's personal wealth, the closeness of the race as reflected in pre-primary polling, the personality differences between the two candidates, the fact that the state has traditionally elected both Republicans and Democrats, and that Colorado is in play at the presidential level, this race is a toss up.

KANSAS "B"
OPEN: BOB DOLE (R)

Conservatives won a very contentious battle for the heart and soul of the Kansas Republican party when freshman Rep. Sam Brownback defeated moderate former Lieutenant Governor and appointed Sen. Sheila Frahm in the August 6 primary, 53-42 percent, with minor candidates getting 4 percent.

Brownback did begin the race with something of an advantage. Bucking the wishes of the more moderate wing of the party and its leaders, Brownback got into the race just days after then-Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole announced his resignation, and quickly put a statewide campaign organization in place. Even before Frahm was appointed to the seat, Brownback was on television. Frahm accepted the appointment and began the primary race facing daunting obstacles. Not only did she need to put together a campaign, but she also had to raise significant funds and learn her way around the Senate. Any one of these tasks is challenging in and of itself, but to attempt to do all three proved impossible.

From an ideological perspective, Brownback managed to mobilize the conservative wing of the party, which turned out to support his conservative philosophy.

In the Democratic primary, stockbroker Jill Docking trounced former Gov. Joan Finney, 74 percent to 26 percent, breaking Finney's streak of winning six statewide elections. Docking started her race with a familiar name, as her husband was once the state's lieutenant governor and her father-in-law and grandfather-in-law were both popular governors, but she had little personal name identification. Still, her candidacy quickly caught fire. Her approachable manner and moderate message were very appealing to voters, and she has now become one of the Democrats' best hopes to capture a Republican-held seat.

This race is now one between a conservative Republican male and a moderate Democratic female, which will create an interesting choice for voters, who are expected to turn out in large numbers to support favorite son Bob Dole at the top of the ticket. There are a couple of questions to be answered here. First, has Brownback alienated moderate Republicans and independents with his conservative message and willingness to buck the party leadership? Second, will voters split their tickets? To win, Docking will have to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans, and thus ticket-splitting becomes an important part of the race.

There is no recent polling available to show where this race is today, though it is believed to be very close.

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