While it is unusual for a sitting member of House or Senate majority party leadership to lose a general election, more than a few Utah Republican lawmakers are worried about the race between House Majority Leader Jim Dunnigan and his Democratic challenger, Paul Schulte.
There are several twists to the Taylorsville House District 39 race this year, such as:
— Schulte is a sitting stake president in the LDS Church – and so has a clear built-in constituency of up to around 4,000 or 5,000 District 39 voters.
— Besides having to run for his seat again, Dunnigan is being challenged for his majority leader post by another member of House GOP leadership – Assistant Majority Whip Brad Wilson, R-Kaysville.
Wilson does have a Democratic opponent this year, Rich Miller, but is considered safe in a very Republican Davis County seat – giving him time to woo fellow GOP House members.
UtahPolicy interviews with a number of the 63-member House GOP caucus members gives the impression that Wilson has a good shot at defeating Dunnigan in the majority leader race – the vote to be taken soon after the Nov. 8 general election, the ballot-casters being the newly-elected House Republicans who will take office next January.
Leadership votes are secret, and it’s often difficult to count heads beforehand – as some members won’t say which leadership candidates they favor or will tell competitors they like both leadership-slot candidates, so as to not hurt feelings.
Leadership elections are not just difficult to figure out; they can be very personal – as you are defeated by the very legislative colleagues you like and trust the most.
In any case, Dunnigan has to get past Schulte before he can even hope to be re-elected as House majority leader by his caucus colleagues.
Dunnigan is a good fundraiser, and he didn’t have a Democratic opponent in 2014 – all the money he raised back then sitting in his war chest account for this year.
Dunning brought an impressive $131,000 over from his 2014 account; he’s raised enough this cycle to have $175,600 to spend this year.
Of that, Dunnigan has spent just under $41,000 – a goodly sum in a contested Utah House race. He still has $64,000 in cash.
Dunnigan has the traditionally GOP donors, including a large number of businesses and PACs, but he also has labor union contributors, totaling more than 3,200.
Schulte, a Salt Lake City School District administrator and small business owner, has raised $30,500, spent $26,500, and has only $4,000 in cash, as of the last pre-general election financial filings.
That, too, makes for a financially competitive House race.
Schulte has traditional Democratic donors, as well. One of his largest donations comes from UP, or the Utah Progressives PAC, founded by liberal state Sen. Jim Dabakis, D-Salt Lake.
But it is not just the money that helps Schulte.
Being a local lay leader in the Mormon Church provides all kinds of aid in running for a legislative seat.
Each House district has around 35,000 residents. The population size of Mormon stakes can vary considerably, but generally, there are six to eight wards in each stake, and 300 to 500 members in each ward, UtahPolicy is told. Work out the numerical spreads, and a stake in a relatively developed area like Taylorsville could see it’s members making up 5 percent to 15 percent of a House district’s constituents.
Add to the fact that a stake president may also be known outside of his stake, and Schulte could have the good reputation that comes along with a high local lay LDS position known to a large percentage of potential voters.
And don’t think that Mormon Church lay leaders don’t have a political impact on legislative races.
Years ago, the late Randy Horiuchi, a former Salt Lake County councilman, was chairman of the Utah Democratic Party, and he intentionally recruited former and current LDS bishops and stake presidents to run for House and Senate seats. With Horiuchi’s encouragement, a former stake president was elected to the Senate in a Republican area, only to find that the Mormon leader’s regional representative – the next step up in the LDS lay leadership – was a Republican elected to the Senate at the same time.
The two used to joke in floor debates that the Democrat may have had to listen to the GOP regional representative on church matters but didn’t have to in political ones.
One House GOP insider recently told UtahPolicy that Dunnigan’s tight District 39 re-election race is one reason he may lose his majority leadership post – Dunnigan hasn’t had the time to meet with caucus members asking for their support in the leadership race.
With $64,000 cash in his campaign account, Dunnigan could certainly spread some of it to caucus members and their campaigns.
But he hasn’t done so this year. Dunnigan’s financial filings show he has given to only one caucus member, Rep. Bruce Cutler ($500) in Cutler’s tough Murray/Midvale re-election contest.
It used to be that leadership races saw contenders giving $20,000 to more than $40,000 (if they had it) to caucus members’ campaigns – a good faith effort in getting those members to vote for them in their leadership races.
There are other factors, of course, in leadership races beyond donations.
But Dunnigan certainly seems to be squeezed this summer and fall – trying to win a tough re-election campaign against a Democrat with built-in advantages, while looking over his shoulder at Wilson, who seems to be a leg up on taking away Dunnigan’s leadership post.
