Three States Hold Primaries
Idaho's four-term lieutenant governor has won the Republican primary and the right to run for the seat held by ultraconservative GOP Rep. Helen Chenoweth-Hage, who is retiring.
Lt. Gov. Butch Otter received nearly twice as many votes as Dennis Mansfield, 44, who co-founded the religious-right Idaho Family Forum with Chenoweth-Hage. The GOP primary winner is favored to win this fall.
With all precincts reporting early Wednesday, Otter had 41,523 votes, or 48 percent of the total, to 23,554 votes, or 26 percent, for Mansfield. Six other Republicans split the rest.
Meanwhile, Arkansas Democrats hoping to challenge embattled GOP Rep. Jay Dickey went to a runoff Tuesday and Kentucky also held congressional primaries. All three states held presidential primaries, though Al Gore and George W. Bush have already wrapped up their parties' nominations.
Otter, a 58-year-old millionaire businessman, was attacked about his personal life and legislative voting record. Independently financed ads included one spot accusing Otter of supporting pornography and potentially "another bad example for our children."
"This is probably the most negative and toughest campaign I've ever had to participate in," Otter said. "I hope as we look at the figures we can interpret this as Idaho rejecting all of this outside influence, Idaho rejecting the negative side of the entire campaign."
Most Republican leaders backed Otter in a campaign that focused on who would inherit Chenoweth-Hage's conservative mantle. Though she did not endorse anyone, she did not object to a national term limits organization's ads linking her politics to Mansfield's.
Mansfield is a staunch opponent of abortion. Otter, who won his third and fourth terms as lieutenant governor even after a drunken driving conviction, opposes abortion but says he takes a more libertarian approach that keeps government out of people's lives, and prefers to talk about land rights issues and opposition to gun control.
Chenoweth-Hage, who fulfilled a campaign pledge to retire after three terms, built her career on her opposition to big government and what she called environmental extremism. Her remarks after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing were viewed as sympathetic to the militia. She also once claimed that minorities don't like northern Idaho because it's too cold.
In Arkansas, a crowded field in the Democratic primary ensured a June 13 runoff.
With 99 percent of precincts reporting, state Sen. Mike Ross was the leading vote-getter, with 44 percent, or 41,340 votes. Second-place was less clear: former TV reporter Dewayne Graham had 22 percent, or 20,838 votes, while former state Rep. Judy Smith, who lost to Dickey in 1998, also had 22 percent and 20,288 votes. A fourth candidate got 11 percent of the vote.
To avoid a runoff, the winner had to get more than 50 percent.
"We've said from the beginning there would be a runff, and we welcome that opportunity," Ross said. "It allows us to continue to talk about the issues of putting children and families first."
None of the candidates hoping to challenge Dickey made his vote for impeachment an issue, though Dickey said he expected it to come up in the campaign. GOP Rep. Asa Hutchinson one of the House prosecutors in Clinton's trial faced no opposition from either party.
Dickey is seeking his fifth term in the traditionally Democratic district, which includes Clinton's hometowns of Hope and Hot Springs. Dickey, who has no Republican opposition, was criticized this year after he told black farmers he could do little for their efforts to seek federal help for discrimination because they didn't support him politically. He later mended fences with one group of farmers who recently endorsed him.
In Kentucky, state Rep. Eleanor Jordan defeated two candidates to win the Democratic nomination to challenge two-term GOP Rep. Anne Northup in a district that is 2-1 Democratic. Jordan, the only black woman in the state Legislature, hopes to become Kentucky's first black member of Congress.
Northup had no opposition in the primary.