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  GOP Feels Sting of Candidates' Rejection
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ContributorArmyDem 
Last EditedArmyDem  Oct 10, 2005 08:26pm
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CategoryNews
MediaNewspaper - Los Angeles Times
News DateTuesday, October 11, 2005 02:00:00 AM UTC0:0
DescriptionBy Janet Hook And Peter Wallsten, Times Staff Writers
October 10, 2005
Latimes.com : National News

WASHINGTON — For months, North Dakota Gov. John Hoeven had received the red carpet treatment in the nation's capital: President Bush invited the popular Republican to spend the night at the White House, gave him a ride on Air Force One, arranged prime seats at the inauguration and dispatched his political guru, Karl Rove, to meet with him.

It was all part of a high-profile campaign to persuade Hoeven to run against Sen. Kent Conrad, a Democrat up for reelection in 2006 in a strongly pro-Bush, conservative state.

But at a time when Bush and Rove have been buffeted on a number of fronts, Hoeven added to their woes by declining to run.

His decision is a symptom of a broader problem bedeviling the vaunted Bush-Rove political machine as it gears up for the 2006 midterm elections. A confluence of problems that are driving down Bush's public approval ratings — high gas prices, ongoing violence in Iraq, Hurricane Katrina, the ethics problems hounding Rove and GOP congressional leaders — is also making it harder to persuade Republicans to seek Senate seats in 2006, strategists say.

Promising candidates in states as disparate as Florida, West Virginia and Nebraska have spurned pleas from the White House and party officials. The latest came last week, when Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) decided not to run for the Senate against the longtime Democratic incumbent, Robert C. Byrd, despite an intense drive to recruit her.

"The wind is not at our back, it's in our face," said Glen Bolger, a GOP pollster. "If you're a candidate making an assessment about challenging an incumbent, having wind in your face is clearly a negative factor in the decision."
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