Tennessee

Bredesen fights against red wave in Tennessee

The former governor’s path to victory depends on convincing voters that they wouldn’t be handing power to national Democrats.

By JAMES ARKIN

Phil Bredesen wants Tennesseans to know one thing: He won’t be the one to flip the Senate for Democrats.

It’s not pessimism but self-preservation that tinges Bredesen's assessment of the Senate landscape. An upset win in Tennessee could, in fact, put Bredesen’s party in the majority if Democrats run the table elsewhere, and the former governor’s path to victory depends on convincing voters that they wouldn’t be handing power to national Democrats and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Tennessee has grown downright hostile to Democrats since Bredesen, an avowed centrist, served two terms in the governor’s mansion: President Donald Trump won the state by 26 points in the last election, and Democrats haven’t won a Senate race there since 1990. Early polls show Bredesen running close against GOP Rep. Marsha Blackburn, but he needs a massive swell of independent and Republican support to actually win in the fall. And Bredesen knows his personal popularity could well crack under the strain of the rising partisanship that decides most Senate races.

“If the question on the ballot were, Do you want to send a Democrat or Republican to Washington? I would lose. If it's, Do you want to send Phil Bredesen or Marsha Blackburn to Washington? I think I can win that,” Bredesen told POLITICO in an interview.

Polling shows that his biggest negative by far is the “D” behind his name. “My job is to keep making it about Tennessee and Tennesseans, and not picking a fight with Donald Trump over everything that comes along,” Bredesen added.

Yet Trump is likely to bring a fight to Bredesen, whether he wants it or not. The president has already traveled to the state once to give Blackburn a boost, and the Republican nominee said she’s invited him back, hoping Trump will make multiple trips to the state to warn voters about the national stakes.

Republicans are counting on Blackburn to consolidate support in the party and deliver a win in a state few expected to be competitive a year ago. A win here cuts off Democrats’ path to the majority unless they carry every other competitive race on the map.

In an interview at a local bakery in Brentwood, a wealthy and educated suburb of Nashville, Blackburn ticked off the potential fallout from a Bredesen victory: Schumer as majority leader; Dianne Feinstein, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders as committee chairs; and Lamar Alexander, Tennessee’s senior senator, losing his grip on the health committee.

“Chuck Schumer has said he will spend tens of millions of dollars to win this seat and that his path to be the majority leader runs through Tennessee,” Blackburn said. “[Voters] know that Phil Bredesen, as part of Chuck Schumer's team, would support those changes. That's not what they want."

Bredesen wouldn’t say whether or not he would back Schumer as leader. He dismissed the notion that he would be beholden to anyone, and questioned the effectiveness of using Schumer as a bogeyman, saying he’s not as polarizing as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. At a candidate forum in Nashville last week hosted by the local Chamber of Commerce, Bredesen acknowledged most people in the crowd were probably Republicans. But he said he viewed the Democratic Party as an organization, “not a religion.”

"I do not believe if Chuck Schumer gets mad at me I will go to hell automatically,” he said to a chorus of laughter.

Some Republicans worry that simply polarizing the race around control of the Senate isn’t enough, given Bredesen’s deep well of support. “I don’t think that's the winning message,” said one Republican strategist with experience in Tennessee, who requested anonymity to speak candidly. “That's the message that shores up your base Republican voters, but it doesn't move your swing voters, which is where [Blackburn] has to win.”

Bredesen’s ease with business-oriented Republicans, in particular, has been a major boost so far. Some top GOP donors in the state have donated to his campaign, including Raja Jubran, an ally of Gov. Bill Haslam; and Pitt Hyde, the founder of AutoZone, and his wife Barbara. Tom Cigarran, chairman of the Nashville Predators and an outspoken supporter of Bredesen, donated to his campaign and plans to host a fundraiser at his home on Sept. 24. Cigarran estimated 90 percent of attendees would be Republicans.

“I can't even go to a fundraiser there aren't Republicans at anymore,” Bredesen said in the interview.

Blackburn allies dismiss those Republicans as a vocal minority. She’s been one of her party’s most prolific fundraisers and had a $7 million war chest as of mid-July. She’s also won over key backers: The Koch political network plans to support her, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce endorsed her last week.

“Why vote for a Democrat who's liberal on a lot of issues and says, ‘Well, I'm for business,’ when you've got Marsha Blackburn?” said state Rep. Bill Dunn, who served a term as Republican leader when Bredesen was governor. “Why get the cheap knockoff when you can have the real deal?"

Asked how she could chip away at Bredesen’s support among the business community, Blackburn cited her support for the Trump tax cuts and brought up an April New York Times interview where Bredesen referred to the cuts as “crumbs,” an echo of a Pelosi comment that has been pilloried by Republicans.

Bredesen told POLITICO he hadn’t realized Pelosi used that particular phrasing and wasn’t trying to echo the minority leader’s comments; he apologized for using the phrase. But he also stood by his characterization of the law and said he was disappointed there wasn’t more reform alongside the cuts, and that not enough went to the middle class.

So far, the race has been surprisingly lacking in negative ads compared with other battleground states. Bredesen has aired $3.5 million of positive ads about his tenure as governor and his willingness to work with Trump in certain areas. Blackburn has aired two positive ads, one introducing herself and another highlighting her work combating human trafficking. Nonprofits associated with Schumer and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell are both on the airwaves with positive ads.

Blackburn said the race is close mainly because of Bredesen's high name ID from his time as governor. She argued that once she and her allies begin attacking his record more thoroughly, the numbers would tilt things back in her favor. Republicans hope to knock Bredesen for raising taxes and fees on the state; diverting money from the road fund to help balance the budget; and his failure to fully solve the crisis with TennCare, the state’s Medicaid system.

Blackburn also attacked Bredesen on illegal immigration, saying that Tennessee voters want a senator who will prioritize immigration issues — building the wall and opposing "sanctuary cities" — as “top-tier” issues, tying them to the opioid crisis and human trafficking. “[Voters] want the border secured; they want sanctuary city policies ended,” she said.

Bredesen pushed back on the attacks, saying he rarely hears from voters about immigration as a top issue and pointing out there are no sanctuary cities in Tennessee. He dismissed Blackburn's focus on the issue as part of her "tea party playbook."

Bredesen also said the raised taxes and fees were just a technical corrections bill, and that he gave the government much-needed breathing room to fix TennCare. He added that overall, he didn’t expect attacks on his time as governor would be persuasive to most Tennesseans.

That time is the biggest thing Bredesen has going for him.

"In a Senate race, the party affiliation is more meaningful than it is in a governor's race," Bredesen acknowledged. "But I certainly have a nice reservoir of credibility and so on with a lot of the people I need to convince. My job is to convince them."