Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) in losing her primary last night became the third incumbent during this campaign year to fall to an intraparty challenger and similarities are present in each of the situations.
In addition to Rep. Bush, Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and Bob Good (R-VA) also lost their primary elections. All three were members of the most extreme caucuses within their respective party conferences. Reps. Bush and Bowman were members of the Socialist Democrat “Squad” ad hoc coalition, while Rep. Good was chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus.
Opposition resources were key factors in each race, and most of the funding to defeat the incumbents came from outside groups. In fact, the Bowman and Bush races became the most expensive primaries in campaign history. In both of these cases, the United Democracy Project, the political arm for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, was the big spender.
In each race, the UDP used the identical tactic, attacking the incumbent for not being a strong enough supporter of President Biden’s legislative initiatives. Though the reason for the UDP’s involvement was because of Reps. Bush and Bowman’s anti-Israel sentiments and public comments, that particular issue was never even portrayed in a campaign ad.
While the message was geared to the two incumbents opposing the Biden agenda in their heavily Democratic districts, the designed negative image stuck because the challengers’ coalitions spent massive amounts of advertising dollars in the respective media markets.
The combined total of reported outside spending, according to the Open Secrets organization, was just over $7 million against Bush as compared to $2 million in support. Once the final reports are published the outside spending number will rise to the $10 million range.
These figures are in addition to the individual campaign figures. While Rep. Bush raised $2.9 million for her campaign according to the pre-primary campaign finance disclosure report, former St. Louis County prosecutor Wesley Bell raised over $4.7 million for his campaign committee. Therefore, the resource imbalance was clearly in the challenger’s favor.
We see a similar pattern in the other races. The United Democracy Project used the similar tactic of attacking the incumbent, in this case Rep. Bowman, as being weak in supporting the Biden Administration’s economic objectives, particularly in relation to the infrastructure spending legislation. Both he and Rep. Bush opposed the various funding packages because they said the legislation did not go far enough in supporting the inner city constituencies of their districts.
In the Bowman race, just about $14 million was spent from outside sources, and the imbalance here was even more substantial in the challenger’s, Westchester County Executive George Latimer, favor. The outside dollars broke 12:2 against Rep. Bowman, and the Latimer campaign outraised Rep. Bowman’s political effort by more than $1 million.
The campaign to defeat Republican Rep. Good was obviously different. Mr. Good was one of the House leaders that led the effort to oust then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, so the outside coalition came largely from organizations loyal to the ex-Speaker, and with his assistance.
Here we see smaller spending totals, but the imbalance still favored challenger John McGuire, a state Senator. The Open Secrets tally finds Rep. Good on the short end of a 2:1 outside spending ratio, with the pro-McGuire/anti-Good coalition spending just under $4 million and the pro-Good Super PACs spending just under half that amount.
One other key to defeating the incumbents was recruiting strong challengers. Wesley Bell, who defeated Rep. Bush, was a St. Louis County prosecutor. He was originally planning to become a US Senate candidate against Sen. Josh Hawley (R), but instead saw the opportunity to run for the House against Rep. Bush.
George Latimer is the Westchester County Executive. Prior to his service in local government, Mr. Latimer was elected to the New York State Senate and Assembly. Likewise in Virginia, Mr. McGuire was an elected veteran of both Virginia legislative chambers.
The combination of strong challenger candidates and huge resource advantages both inside the campaign and most particularly from outside sources, along with crafting strong messages against an extreme incumbent were the key components for all three challenge efforts to achieve success.
Next week in Minnesota, Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minneapolis) faces the Democratic voters. No such result is expected here since the outside money did not materialize. Though she only won renomination by two percentage points in 2022, this year’s campaign did not develop. Therefore, we saw no major outside spending commitment, her fundraising is strong, and polling suggests that she will win easily next Tuesday.
In a year when it appears incumbent defeats in the general election will again be few and far between, these three primary challenge victories will prove a significant part of the 2024 election cycle’s post-election analysis.
We offer this political insights report for your information and not as a predictor or representative of opinions of HBS or its employees.
