U.S. House
By Eric Ostermeier on July 22, 2009
A Smart Politics analysis of FEC data for the 2nd Quarter of 2009 finds 6th District Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachmann raised more individual itemized contributions in the home districts of two of her fellow DFL colleagues, and nearly as much money in the home districts of two other DFLers. Representative...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 21, 2009
In April 2009, Smart Politics reported on Keith Ellison's unusual campaign fundraising numbers that found the 2-term DFL Congressman raising the vast majority of his large donor individual contributions from out of state. That reporting period was not an aberration. The new Federal Election Commission (FEC) data for the second...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 20, 2009
Of the many benefits that come with being a Committee Chairman and one of the longest serving members in the U.S. House, is a certain national renown that enables a U.S. Representative to more easily raise campaign funds from out of state. Eighteen-term DFLer Jim Oberstar (MN-08) has perfected...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 17, 2009
Last Spring, Smart Politics explained how while the headline coming from the Federal Elections Commission Q1 2009 reports on the fundraising by Minnesota's U.S. House delegation was that Republican Michele Bachmann outraised all of her Gopher State colleagues by nearly $100,000, the story beneath the headline was that Bachmann was...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 9, 2009
Last month a Smart Politics analysis of the most conservative members of the U.S. House (as determined by National Journal's annual rankings) found Representative Michele Bachmann to have received the smallest margin of victory of the 44 most conservative Republicans who won reelection in 2008. That blog explained how none...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 8, 2009
Congressional Quarterly's vote study for the first half of 2009 is in the books, and finds that House Democrats overall supported Barack Obama 91.1 percent of the time in which the President stated his clear policy preference on legislation that received a floor vote. But what about the Blue Dog...
By Eric Ostermeier on July 7, 2009
A recent article at CQ Politics profiled the potential competitiveness of Minnesota's 3rd Congressional District race in 2010. That district's Representative, freshman GOPer Erik Paulsen, is one of several dozen new faces elected to D.C. during the past two election cycles. Overall, 114 Representatives, or more than 25 percent of...
By Eric Ostermeier on June 29, 2009
The U.S. House of Representative's 219-212 vote last week in favor of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (HR 2454) passed in part due to the defection of a handful of Republicans, while more than half of the Blue Dog Democratic coalition voted in opposition to the bill. Eight...
By Eric Ostermeier on June 22, 2009
With the DFL winning a string of 9 consecutive presidential elections, 4 out of 5 U.S. Senate contests (counting Al Franken), and netting 35 state House and 11 state Senate seats since 2002, Minnesota has been frequently characterized as an increasingly "Democratic-leaning" state. The outputs of the DFL's electoral success...
By Eric Ostermeier on June 19, 2009
U.S. Representative John Kline's (MN-02) election this week as the Ranking Member of the House Committee on Education and Labor further established the Gopher State's House delegation as one of the most powerful in the nation. Minnesota now has 3 of its 8 U.S. Representatives holding chairmanships or the...
By Eric Ostermeier on June 16, 2009
Continuing to serve as a lightning rod for the political left in the Gopher State, the month of June has seen Representative Michele Bachmann maintain her remarkably high profile among not only the Minnesota Congressional delegation, but also nationally among her GOP colleagues throughout the U.S. House. Earlier this...
By Eric Ostermeier on June 9, 2009
Last Thursday the South Dakota Republican Party launched a new website called "Stop Stephanie," designed to attack 4-term At-large Democrat U.S. Representative Stephanie Herseth Sandlin. Herseth Sandlin - a virtual lock for a 5th term should she decide to run again in 2010 - is also a rumored candidate...
By Eric Ostermeier on May 5, 2009
Congresswoman Michele Bachmann is seemingly a fixture in the state and national media these days, and in particular on WWTC 1280 AM's Northern Alliance Radio Network. The Minnesota U.S. Representative appeared once again on Brian Ward and John Hinderaker's "The Headliners" program last Saturday morning to discuss excessive government spending,...
By Eric Ostermeier on April 28, 2009
The arrest of Minnesota Representative Keith Ellison and four other members of Congress Monday morning for crossing a police line at the Sudanese Embassy in Washington, D.C. brought front-page attention to the humanitarian crisis and atrocities occurring in the Darfur region of Sudan, but is not likely to bring any...
By Eric Ostermeier on April 26, 2009
Last Friday, Congressman Keith Ellison's communications director Rick Jauert responded to recent data unearthed and analzyed by Smart Politics that Ellison was receiving an unusual amount of itemized individual contributions from out-of-state, both in Q1 2009 (when he had the highest percentage of such contributions among Minnesota's delegation), and ever...
By Eric Ostermeier on April 23, 2009
The FEC's Q1 2009 campaign finance data reveals several interesting facts about how Minnesota's U.S. Representatives fund their campaigns. Earlier in the week, Smart Politics documented that GOP Representative Michele Bachmann received the largest percentage of contributions from individuals and small donors among the state's U.S. House delegation, and...
By Eric Ostermeier on April 21, 2009
Heads turned last week upon the release of Congresswoman Michele Bachmann's impressive Q1 2009 fundraising data - outpacing all her Gopher State colleagues by nearly $100,000. Eyes rolled on some liberal blogs yesterday after Smart Politics characterized Representative Bachmann's fundraising efforts as a sign of her success at tapping into...
By Eric Ostermeier on April 20, 2009
When the Federal Election Commission (FEC) released its Q1 2009 campaign fundraising data at the end of last week, the Minnesota media largely focused on how Michele Bachmann lead the Minnesota U.S. House delegation in contributions received. But reports on Representative Bachmann's fundraising success, and growing national profile, missed the...
By Eric Ostermeier on March 27, 2009
Congressional Quarterly recently identified Congressional districts that split their ticket in the 2008 U.S. House and presidential contests. Almost one-fifth of the current Republicans in Congress were elected without the help of John McCain. In total, 34 of the 178 GOPers elected in 2008 (19.1 percent) carried districts that McCain...
By Eric Ostermeier on March 22, 2009
During a Saturday afternoon interview on WWTC 1280 AM with The Northern Alliance's John Hinderaker and Brian Ward, Minnesota Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachmann discussed her staunch opposition to several Democratic-led efforts on Capitol Hill this session - such as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the recently passed HR 1586...
