North Carolina Democrat Roy Cooper Won't Challenge GOP Sen. Richard Burr
In a blow to national Democrats in their effort to reach 60 seats in the U.S. Senate, North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper has announced that he will not challenge GOP Sen. Richard Burr in 2010.
"While I am honored by the encouragement I've received, I don't want to go to Washington and serve as a U.S. Senator at this time," Cooper said in a statement. "I am committed to public service and I want to serve here in North Carolina rather than in Washington."
Polls had shown that Cooper could beat Burr, who for his own part has very weak approval ratings. That said, Democrats could still potentially find a good candidate. The state is trending Democratic and voted for Barack Obama for president in 2008, and few people would have ever guessed at this point in the 2007/2008 campaign cycle that GOP Sen. Elizabeth Dole would have lost re-election by nine points against Democrat Kay Hagan.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Crap!
May 15, 2009 2:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Who else ya got on your bench Steve?
May 15, 2009 2:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why not John Edwards? His prospects for national office are certainly nil now, but if Elizabeth has forgiven him, I could see him being forgiven by the citizens of the state.
I do wish Elizabeth was healthy enough to run herself though.
May 16, 2009 12:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
It would be tragic to blow this ripe-for-the-picking opportunity. Surely some prominent NC Dem would like to be a Senator?
May 15, 2009 3:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, the only good thing is Democrats have a way of popping up out of nowhere and into office here. In most states, it always seems like the senatorial and gubenatorial candidates are people who've been hanging around the state capitol forever. But whoever heard of Kay Hagen outside Raleigh two years ago? Who had ever heard of John Edwards, other than lawyers, before he ran? They just seem to kind of pop up out of nowhere.
Plus, the Republican Party here blew itself up in a big, ugly civil war between the far right and the extreme far right factions a few years and it still hasn't recovered, so we got that going for us.
But I really don't know what Cooper's deal is. He's into his second term as AG. He passed by an open Governor's seat and let the very obscure Lt. Gov and the State Treasurer duke it out, which was odd given that AG is usually considered the stepping stone to the governor's mansion. Now he's passing on a Senate seat that's looking like easy pickins. There's no other higher office that's going to be open any time soon.
I'm really starting to believe that he actually truly does dig being AG, as he constantly claims, and he's planning just to stay there as long as he wants. I'm not quite cynical enough to begin speculating about skeletons in still-hidden closets, which is the only other explanation I can see.
May 15, 2009 5:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good thing Burr is the 3rd weakest incumbent in the nation, hopefully another Dem will step up.
May 15, 2009 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink