Progressive and Netroots favorite Barry Welsh, who is running against the noxious Mike Pence in the 6th District of Indiana, will be at a meet and greet on Capital Hill tonight. Barry is in town seeking to develop support for his run against Pence. Below the fold I will offer some details about the race, and about the response Barry was able to develop yesterday.
We really want you to come and meet Barry. Like Tom Perriello, he is a person of faith (Barry is an ordained minister) who is also a strong progressive, yet capable of winning a district currently held by a Republican.
We will be at Hawk 'n Dove, 329 Pennsylvania Ave SE, from 5-7:30 this evening. We will be in the 1st floor party room. This is your chance to come and meet Barry, if you do not already know him. The event is free (cash bar), because we want to encourage you to come.
Please keep reading.
IN-06 is a district Bush carried by only 8% four years ago, even though Kerry did not contest the state. The district in its previous configuration was represented by Democrat Phil Sharp, whose campaign manager is now running Barry's campaign. The district is 94% white, but the African-American community is quite active.
Yesterday I took Barry to the National Democratic Club in order to introduce him to Members of Congress and strong Democratic supporters. He drew a positive response, with Members from a variety of states around the country offering to help him. He got invited to a union meeting in Indianapolis later this week. And he was able to be pointed in the direction of some additional resources that can be of help.
In 2004 the Democratic candidate took only 28% of the vote. Last cycle Barry ran a low-budget campaign, spending only 50,000, while the incumbent spend about 1.5 million. Barry did not have a headquarters office, operating out of his home and virtually. And with no money he raised the Democratic support to 40%. He has developed name recognition, and Pence has continued to damage himself, among other things by describing the famous Baghdad market visited by a Congressional Delegation led by John McCain as
like a normal outdoor market in Indiana in the summertime, which makes sense if Indiana markets require one to don flak jackets and be accompanied by 100+ heavily armed soldiers while Blackhawk helicopters fly over head.
Barry is also personally courageous: perhaps you heard about when a Republican voting registration official tackled a reporter - Barry came to the reporter's assistance and for his troubles himself got assaulted. You can read about that here in Blue Indiana
This trip seems productive for Barry. His wife wrote about it last night, in a piece entitled Guess who's coming to dinner IN-06? Former Congressman Lee Hamilton, now very busy with policy for the Obama campaign, promised a letter of support. The DCCC set out the criteria for giving the campaign assistance (and yes, raising money is an important part of it). He got a meeting for today with Rep. Maxine Waters, and met yesterday with Senator Bayh.
We learned last cycle that we should always challenge even supposedly safe Republican seats. And a number of candidates who had previously lost by substantial margins were able to win their seats - Nancy Boyda, Jerry McNerney, and Paul Hodes, for example. We have high hopes that several of last cycles close losers - for example, Charlie Brown, Eric Massa and Larry Kissell - will expand the Democratic majority in the House this cycle.
IN-06 is not an easy race. But it is doable. We saw the increase in Democratic turnout during the recent primary. Barry says they have 70,000 new voters in the District. His elect target is around 127,000, and he drew 94,000 in an uncontested primary. With sufficient resources he WILL win this race.
And on top of all that, he is a very nice man!
So if you can, come and join us tonight at Hawk 'n Dove. We look forward to seeing you.
Peace