Giffords, Bee stake out center turf in Tucson battle

Call it a game of guilt by association. U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Tucson) wants to paint her challenger as a slave to the Republican Party, and Arizona Senate President Tim Bee (R-Tucson) wants to flip the accusation back on Giffords and the Democrats.

Since announcing his intention to run for Congress in January, Bee has fundraised and campaigned with such Republican Party bigwigs as Karl Rove, Steve Forbes, Elaine Chao, Grover Norquist, and George W. Bush. And Democrats want to make sure voters know it.

“Having the president campaign for you is a very big deal,” Giffords said of Bush’s July fundraiser in Tucson which reportedly netted Bee’s campaign coffers $600,000. “I think it’s important for the people of southern Arizona to know if the Senator supports the president of the United States on issues.”

“He has embraced one of the worst presidents in American history,” said Emily DeRose, a spokeswoman for the Arizona Democratic Party. “It seems to me a reasonable assumption to make that who your friends are would dictate where you are on policy.”

The criticism says a lot about how Giffords is approaching her first re-election race since winning the 8th Congressional District seat two years ago.

In a moderately conservative district which narrowly favored George Bush in 2000 and 2004, Giffords is touting her centrist credentials while suggesting her opponent is out of the mainstream.

“Everything I do here in D.C. has a bipartisan approach,” Giffords said in a recent telephone interview in which she stressed her support for second amendment rights and her background as a business owner and former Republican.

In a similar fashion, Republicans are accusing the Tucson Democrat of being too far left on issues like taxes while playing up Bee’s bipartisan achievements in the Senate.

“Tim Bee has earned a stellar reputation for getting things done on a bipartisan basis,” said Ken Spain, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Margaret Kenski, who is working as Bee’s pollster, suggested the two sides’ similar strategies drew upon the nature of the district.

“It’s a moderate district,” explained Kenski, a longtime observer of Arizona public opinion. “A political moderation is accompanied by social moderation. And candidates who appear too shrill, too harsh, appear out of the mainstream.”

Republicans learned that lesson last cycle when Giffords soundly trounced Randy Graf, a firebrand conservative who campaigned as an immigration hardliner. Graf ran in place of the retiring Jim Kolbe, a pro-choice moderate who was a member of the centrist Republican Main Street Partnership.

Republicans argue that Bee is more in the mold of Kolbe, who held the seat for six terms, than Graf. They point to Bee’s reaching across party lines in the state legislature during budget negotiations. They also say that, as Senate President, Bee has stature and can point to a record of successes in the state capitol.

Democratic strategists concede Bee brings strengths to the campaign.

“What Republicans have going for them in the district is that they have an A-list candidate who is the senate majority leader,” said David Waid, a Phoenix-based political consultant who is a former chair of the Arizona Democratic Party.

“I think Bee will do better (than Graf) because he’s a lot better known and a lot more moderate then the individual who ran last time,” said Barry Dill, who has served as an adviser to Gov. Janet Napolitano (D-Phoenix).

But knocking off Giffords will be no easy task.

For one, there is Giffords’ fundraising which even Republicans acknowledge has been nothing short of torrential. Giffords has raised just short of $2.5 million over the course of the cycle and has about $2.1 million in cash on hand.

“She’s a tenacious fundraiser,” noted Dill. “She’ll probably outraise (Bee) three-to-one.”

Democrats also say that Giffords, who sits on Armed Services and Science & Technology subcommittees, has been scrupulous not to give Republicans targets in her voting record.

“She hasn’t taken on anything overtly controversial that she can be attacked on,” said Dill. “I don’t see how Republicans go after her in any major way.”

Democrats say that Giffords has sidestepped a potential hurdle by showing she is attentive on the immigration issue, soothing the concerns of voters in the district’s border communities. Most recently, Giffords sponsored a measure seeking a renewal of the immigration enforcement program E-Verify. Republicans have called Giffords’ support for the measure a flip-flop.

“Early on she wisely made the calculation that immigration could be a problem for her,” said one Arizona-based Democratic strategist.

But Republicans say they have fertile ground when it comes to Giffords’ record on taxes. They argue that Giffords has been a backer of massive pork-barrel spending and one of her first votes upon entering congress was in support of a tax-hike.

Republicans also contend that they can tag Giffords on the issue of energy and oil. They say that she has voted against developing domestic oil shale reserves and supported the House’s five-week recess instead of staying in Washington to vote on oil legislation.

"Gabby Giffords apparently thinks that Arizona voters are willing to sit around and wait while their representative goes on vacation as the cost of gasoline continues to soar," said the NRCC’s Spain.

In the interview, Bee didn’t dispute Giffords’ fundraising skills. But he said he would have more than enough money to compete in Tucson’s media market, which he pointed out happens to be significantly less expensive than Phoenix’s market. Through June Bee had raised over $1.1 million and had just short of $700,000 in cash on hand.

“She’s one of the top fundraisers,” Bee said. “In our conversations with those who have worked with Congressman Kolbe, we’ll have enough.”

A Republican strategist with knowledge of Bee’s campaign echoed that sentiment. “In Tucson you can do a lot of message delivery with $2 million,” the strategist said.

Bee cautioned that Giffords faces a risk if she bombards the airwaves.

“You can reach a saturation point,” he said.

Giffords said she is prepared for a competitive campaign. “It’s going to be an interesting race. It’s going to be a competitive race,” she said, noting, “The district swings back-and-forth.”

She indicated Bee’s fundraising with Bush would continue to be an issue. “Having the president campaign for you is a very big deal,” she said.

Bee said the charge was designed to distract voters from his bipartisan record.

“I’m going to be running on my record and not the president’s record,” said Bee. “They’re trying to use those issues to distract from the issues of the campaign and that’s the bottom line.”