A New National Republican Congressional
Committee ad targeting Democratic Ohio Rep. Betty Sutton is taking on the
Keystone Pipeline theme and highlighting the White House’s political strategy
to favor pro-democratic constituencies at the expense of organized labor.
This ad highlights how the Keystone
Pipeline project has the support of “labor unions like the Teamsters and
segments of the AFL-CIO.” The president’s political team likely determined that
labor was energized enough by efforts by Republican governors (and
less-publicized efforts by Democratic Governors) to rein in the collective bargaining
rights of public sector unions, so they held off on the decision to allow the
Keystone Pipeline to move forward to curry favor with liberal interest groups
like environmentalists.
Rep. Sutton faced her toughest challenge
in last year’s election against car dealer Tom Ganley since her election to
Congress in 2006. Her deeply-Democratic 13th district was eliminated
in the redistricting process which required Ohio eliminate two of its 20 House
seats. Sutton has filed to run against freshman GOP Rep. Jim Renacci in his newly
Republican-leaning northeastern Ohio district.
NRO’s Jim Geraghty reports that the
NRCC “ads and robocalls will run in the districts of
Reps. Betty Sutton (D-Ohio), Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.),
Jason Altmire (D-Pa.) and Mark Critz (D-Pa.).” All moderate
Democrats in depressed districts jam-packed with those white, working-class
voters that the White House has sought to abandon.
If nothing else, the NRCC
has shown these embattled representatives that their party’s president has put
them in a difficult electoral position ahead of 2012.
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