Heath Haussamen
In the last week, Democratic U.S. Senate hopeful Hector Balderas has established himself as a serious candidate, but Martin Heinrich is formidable and remains the favorite to win the primary race – at least for now
When State Auditor Hector Balderas entered the U.S. Senate race in April, some excited Democrats said he might be their Susana Martinez.
Meaning, of course, that he might be their underdog candidate who defies the odds to become one of the most prominent Hispanic elected officials in America.
At the time, I thought such talk was premature. Sure, it’s possible, but there are differences between this year’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary and last year’s Republican gubernatorial primary. For starters, there was no superstar in that GOP race, so there was lots of room for Martinez.
The challenge is different for Balderas. He has to elbow superstar U.S. Rep. Martin Heinrich out of the way. Heinrich showed surprising strength in winning re-election last year, defeating his opponent by almost 7,000 votes against the tide of a GOP wave. In fact, Heinrich won thousands of votes in his House race that Martinez won in the gubernatorial race.
Unions and other groups with money love Heinrich. He’s articulate. His policy stances are well defined and he knows how to defend them. Heinrich is formidable.
But as of this week, talk of Balderas as a serious candidate is justified.
‘A very credible campaign’
The good news for Balderas started last week when a Public Policy Polling survey found that he is as strong as Heinrich against the GOP candidates in potential general election matchups. And while, in a poll of Democratic primary voters, Balderas trailed Heinrich 47 percent to 24 percent, that’s exactly where you’d expect an underdog candidate to be 11 months before the primary election.
The good news kept coming. On Tuesday, Balderas announced that he raised more than $400,000 in his first two months in the race. Heinrich raised $485,000, but it took him three months to do it.
On Wednesday, former Lt. Gov. Diane Denish endorsed Balderas. It may have been the most significant endorsement in the race to date. Though she lost last year’s gubernatorial race to Martinez, Denish remains influential in her party and has an active following.
In the span of a week, Balderas went from a candidate who might need to be taken seriously to one who has to be taken seriously. The D.C. media was suddenly oohing and ahhing.
“Balderas’ ability to fundraise was one of the biggest question marks on his campaign – that’s not the case any longer,” an article in the National Journal’s Hotline On Call stated. “And Heinrich’s near half-million haul is a little underwhelming, given that he’s a sitting member of Congress with the fundraising perks that position entails. With Hispanics making up a majority of the state’s Democratic electorate, Balderas looks like he’s putting together a very credible campaign.”
A Politico article stated that the races presents “a difficult decision for a party eager to place more Hispanic faces at the top of the ticket. A subtle signal of the importance of Latinos: After indicating it was on the verge of backing Heinrich, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee said it will remain neutral. On the margins, neutrality is a win for Balderas.”
I’m not going to ooh and ahh about Balderas. Yes, he has established himself as a serious candidate, as I suspected he would. Now the hard work really begins. A candidate raises his easiest money during his first quarter in the race. He has to do it again. And again. And again. And again.
The Denish endorsement will help with that. So will the D.C. media attention.
Time to start talking about policy
But there’s a deeper issue Balderas must address. It’s the same issue Martinez had to tackle to move from being a serious candidate to being governor. He has to start articulating a clear and cohesive understanding of policy issues.
Balderas is a former state legislator who served a little more than one term, so he sponsored legislation and voted on issues, but not for long before he became auditor in 2006 and shifted his focus to rooting out waste, fraud and abuse.
Martinez focused her primary and general election campaigns on fighting corruption. But running in a Democratic primary and for a federal office is different. While Balderas is focusing early on accountability and fiscal responsibility, those issues alone won’t win a Democratic primary.
As Public Policy Polling said of its survey of the Balderas-Heinrich contest last week, “since a majority of Democratic voters are still unwilling to give an opinion of Balderas, Balderas has more room to grow.”
It’s time to grow. Balderas needed to spend his first quarter in the race proving he could raise money. Now he must do more. While continuing to raise money, he also has to start telling voters where he stands on the nation’s most pressing issues and what he would do as a U.S. senator.
Heinrich remains the candidate to beat, and he’s very good at what he does. Unlike Martinez’s toughest primary opponent last year, Allen Weh, Heinrich isn’t likely to make mistakes that give Balderas openings to climb.
Balderas is going to have to earn every single one of those 23 points by which he currently trails Heinrich on his own.