Many Dems supporting Rodriguez

Rep. Henry Cuellar (Texas) has the official support of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) in today’s Democratic primary in Texas’s 28th District, but Democrats from coast to coast are backing his challenger, former Rep. Ciro Rodriguez.

Sen. John Kerry (Mass.) and Reps. John Murtha (Pa.), Lloyd Doggett (Texas) and Loretta Sanchez (Calif.) are among the scores of Democratic officeholders backing Rodriguez, who lost his seat to Cuellar in the 2004 Democratic primary.

Cuellar has alienated many members of his party for his conservative views, particularly on trade. He is endorsed by the conservative Club For Growth, led by former Rep. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.).

Rodriguez spent his last full day of campaigning walking precincts. Today, 125 volunteers will join the candidate as they work to get his supporters to the polls.

In the last week of campaigning alone, Rodriguez has spent approximately $100,000, his field director, Gina Castaneda, estimated.

Cuellar, for his part, will field roughly 100 volunteers in addition to his paid staff of about 30, who will help get out his backers in the district which stretches from Laredo, on the Mexico border, to Austin’s suburbs.

Cuellar’s campaign manager, Dan Wright, said 90 percent of the political debate has pivoted on the congressman’s vote for the Central America Free Trade Act (CAFTA).

“For an individual in Ohio to disagree with Henry on his vote on CAFTA, they have every right to,” Wright said. “However, you have to focus on your district. If there was one person that CAFTA was a good vote for, it was Henry Cuellar.”

DCCC spokeswoman Sarah Feinberg noted that the campaign committee is dedicated to incumbent protection.

A Democratic campaign aide said of Cuellar: “I don’t think anyone takes a Democratic endorsement seriously. He’s worse than [Iraq war supporter Sen. Joe] Lieberman [D-Conn.]. If I had to guess, if we almost took back the House, he would flip on us.” Referring to a Louisiana congressman who switched party affiliation in 2004 from Democrat to Republican, the aide added: “He’s a Rodney Alexander.”

The Democratic primary comes on the same day that Republicans head to the polls in Rep. Tom DeLay’s 22nd District, about 200 miles east of the 28th, in the Houston suburbs.

While DeLay appears all but certain to win that primary and take on Democratic former Rep. Nick Lampson in the general election, the campaign of DeLay’s chief GOP rival, attorney Tom Campbell, says he has a real shot at unseating the former House majority leader.

Campbell’s campaign manager, Michael Stanley, said the candidate, a former attorney at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency appointed by the first President Bush, had put together a coalition of Arab-American, Pakistani and Vietnamese supporters. He also enjoys many teachers’ backing, Stanley said.

Stanley’s biggest selling point among Republicans may be that Democrats want DeLay, wounded by the Jack Abramoff scandal, to win in the overwhelmingly GOP district.

Shannon Flaherty, DeLay’s campaign spokeswoman, said Democrats should be happy just to have a candidate in the race. “They had to go all the way to Beaumont to get him,” Flaherty said yesterday, referring to Lampson. “We’re very confident about tomorrow.”