With Bunning Out, KY GOP Prospects Rise

Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning’s decision not to seek reelection significantly improves Republican chances of holding the seat in 2010.  The gaffe-prone Bunning barely won in 1998 and 2004, both times requiring considerable tactical assistance from Mitch McConnell to do so.  His prospects looked even worse in 2010 (despite the fact that his years of consistent criticism of Federal Reserve Chairmen Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke now look prescient).

Secretary of State Trey Grayson, a longtime Bunning friend also from the Cincinnati suburbs, deftly handled the situation by forming an exploratory committee after the incumbent inexplicably gave him the go-ahead.  Grayson has run impressively statewide, including winning reelection in 2007 against a Democratic tide.  Former Ambassador to Latvia, Cathy Bailey, may also enter the race.  She is a fundraising dynamo with somewhat more conservative credentials than Grayson.  Rand Paul, son of U. S. Rep. and former presidential candidate Ron Paul, could also jump in.

Bunning leaves the race angry at McConnell, which poses some risk of a split within a Kentucky GOP that can ill-afford it.  Some state Republicans were already upset with McConnell for what they saw as insufficient support for former Governor Ernie Fletcher, who lost in ‘07 after surviving a primary challenge from former U. S. Rep. Anne Northup.  The split does not fall neatly along ideological or geographic lines, but is very roughly between non-Louisville conservatives who place a premium on doctrinal purity and are resentful of what they see as McConnell’s excessive influence, on the one hand, and slightly more moderate urban Republican pragmatists who are grateful for McConnell’s leadership and electoral successes, on the other.

Holding the seat is McConnell’s absolute top priority, which is why he influenced events leading up to Bunning’s withdrawal.  While McConnell will not endorse any candidate in a primary, it is fair to conclude that he sees Grayson as the best bet for doing so.  The Republican candidate will likely face a well-funded foe in state Attorney General Jack Conway, a favorite of trial lawyers whose last quarter fundraising far eclipsed that of Lieutenant Governor Daniel Mongiardo.

McConnell is finally feeling some traction in both the Senate and the country against the Obama-Pelosi statist agenda.  The GOP likely must win in Kentucky to have any hope of regaining a minority sufficient to sustain a filibuster.  With the cantankerous Bunning finally out to pasture, the sun is shining a little more brightly on Republicans in the socially conservative Bluegrass State.