State Party Chairs Disagree on Obama Effect in Arkansas

The two chairmen of the state’s major political parties in Arkansas continued an ongoing debate regarding the effect of the national Presidential race on Arkansas elections.

Chairman Will Bond for the Democrats and Chairman Doyle Webb for the Republicans engaged in a good-natured debate at this month’s lunch meeting of the Political Animals Club at the Governor’s Mansion.

Bond emphasized Gov. Beebe’s popularity and Webb focusing on President Obama’s unpopularity.

“There is going to be a lot of differences between 2010 and 2012. (Republicans) are going to have Gov. Romney on the ticket it looks like, who has his own issues with regards to healthcare,” said Bond. “Of course, we would love to have President Obama polling at 75 percent approval in Arkansas. He’s not, but I think Arkansas voters have long made decisions on the candidates in these particular races. ”

Bond said that he has been told not to expect President Obama to visit Arkansas as winning the state is not a part of any of the strategies the Obama campaign has laid out for their race.

Webb said he believes that if Romney is the nominee he will do very well in Arkansas pointing to the latest Talk Business/Hendrix College poll which showed Romney beating Obama by over 23 points, which is similar to McCain’s wide margin in 2008.  Webb said he doesn’t expect Romney to visit the state much, if any, since Arkansas is not a targeted swing state, but Republicans would certainly welcome a visit if he would be able to make it.

The other subject that bubbled up during the forum was whether local candidates will embrace President Obama or move around from him in their campaigns.

Earlier this week, The City Wire/5News reported that Sen. Pryor will not actively campaign in Arkansas for President Obama. But Bond took exception that this meant Pryor is distancing himself from the President due to his unpopularity in Arkansas.

“Let me say this about Sen. Pryor just to be clear – I think the comment about him not supporting the President may have been some editorial comment. He has in the past said that I think in the Kerry Campaign, in previous Presidential races that he is concerned with working for Arkansans and working with whoever the President is. I don’t think he said anything explicitly about Obama except that he is focusing on Arkansas and focusing on working with the President.”

The issue also came up during the forum when Webb made a point at the lack of Democratic candidates that turned out for the opening of President Obama’s headquarters in Arkansas a few weeks ago.

Interestingly, Second Congressional District Democratic candidate Herb Rule, who was in the audience, went out of his way to point out that he was there. I covered that event and can tell you that Rule was the only Democratic candidate with a November opponent that was in attendance.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-qHhXTAUiU]