Little Rock, Arkansas - The fight for the Democratic Senate nomination in Arkansas has turned into a pitched battle between one of the most vulnerable incumbents in the country and a challenger backed by some of the groups on the left that she's angered.
Early voting for Arkansas' May 18 primaries begins Monday, and the Democratic Senate primary matchup has turned into one of the most closely watched races in the country.
The unknown factor in the race between Sen. Blanche Lincoln and Lt. Gov. Bill Halter is whether a third candidate D.C. Morrison of Little Rock could force a runoff on June 8 by siphoning off enough votes.
Even before Halter announced in early March that he would challenge Lincoln in the Democratic primary, she was viewed as a ripe target for Republicans. As Lincoln's approval numbers fell to their lowest numbers, eight Republicans lined up seek the GOP nomination for her seat.
Lincoln had faced criticism from conservatives for her support of a proposed health care overhaul, while groups on the left such as MoveOn.Org targeted her for her opposition to climate change legislation and to a public option as part of the health reforms.
Lincoln has presented herself as the victim of special interests on the right and the left.
"Outside special interests on both extremes are plotting today to gain control of this Senate seat representing you, the people of Arkansas," Lincoln told supporters in March at a rally before filing for re-election. "I know it, because I am the rope in the tug of war, folks."
The pressure has put Lincoln in the most precarious position of her Senate tenure. Lincoln, who served two terms in the House in the early 1990s, was elected to the Senate in 1998 after defeating Republican nominee Fay Boozman the brother of Congressman John Boozman, who's seeking the GOP nod for Lincoln's post.
Lincoln won re-election in 2004 by defeating Republican Jim Holt, a former state senator who is also seeking the Republican Senate nomination. Halter defeated Holt in the lieutenant governor's race two years later.
The University of Arkansas' annual Arkansas Poll in November reported that that just 43 percent of those polled approve of the job Lincoln is doing as senator, the lowest rating she has seen since she took office in 1999.
The pressure came as Lincoln earned a more prestigious role in the Senate. She was picked in 2009 as the chairman of the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, making her the first woman to lead that panel and the first Arkansan.
One of Lincoln's most high-profile victories in that role was the committee's passage of her proposal to limit banks' ability to profit from derivatives which are complex financial tools.
Halter, a one-term lieutenant governor, is a former Clinton administration official, having served as a deputy commissioner and acting commissioner of the federal Social Security Administration. He was elected lieutenant governor in 2006 after briefly considering a run for governor against Mike Beebe, who won the post.
Halter ran for the state's No. 2 job primarily on his idea to establish a state-run lottery to raise money for college scholarships. When lawmakers balked at the proposal, Halter spearheaded a campaign for the lottery amendment, which voters approved in 2008. Arkansas began selling lottery tickets last year, and will award the first scholarships funded by the games this fall.
Halter's bid has the backing of labor unions and other groups that said they grew dissatisfied with Lincoln, particularly over her opposition to a key union-organizing legislation. Though Lincoln ran in 2004 with the backing of the Arkansas AFL-CIO, the national union and its state arm are both backing Halter over Lincoln.
The union support has become part of the fight between the two, with Lincoln claiming Halter isn't being straightforward on what he promised the unions for their support.
"D.C. labor unions have made themselves an issue in this election by spending over $4 million of their workers' hard-earned dues in Arkansas on behalf of Bill Halter attacking me," Lincoln told Halter in a debate in April.
Halter countered that the unions had soured on Lincoln.
"They felt that you have turned your back on working men and women in Arkansas," Halter said.
The fight between the two has turned into a high-stakes battle marked by a barrage of attack ads and a daily string of dueling news releases and statements between the two camps.
Both have bemoaned the increasingly negative tone of the campaign. Halter at a recent debate said he had asked his campaign to shut down a Web site that referred to Lincoln as "Bailout Blanche," and asked Lincoln to stop ads and campaign materials calling him "Dollar Bill Halter."
"I think it's beneath the dignity of a United States senator," Halter said.
Lincoln said she wanted a more positive campaign, but that Halter's business ties were fair game for criticism.
"In terms of ads, it's important, I have a record and I'm proud of my record in Arkansas. ... The point is, Bill doesn't have that kind of a record," Lincoln said. "But he does have a record, and it's important for people to know about that record."
The two have also tangled over Social Security and over Lincoln's acceptance of contributions from Goldman Sachs, the major investment bank facing federal fraud charges.
Lincoln last week began sending mailers out criticizing Halter for advocating a plan to invest a "small share of Social Security" revenues in the stock market.
Clinton had called in 1999 for spending 62 percent of government surpluses an estimated $2.76 trillion to bolster Social Security's cash reserves. He wanted the government to invest about $700 billion of the cash in the stock market to try to increase its value. The mailer by Lincoln referred to Halter's "dangerous plan for Social Security."
Lincoln, however, had expressed support for the same idea. Lincoln had told the Lincoln Journal-Star in Nebraska in 2000 that she supported looking at investing some of the trust fund, but said it was risky to invest part of the payroll tax privately.
Halter has targeted Lincoln over the Goldman Sachs contributions. Lincoln recently announced she would return $7,500 she received from the bank's political action committee, and Halter has called on her to return $29,000 in contributions she's received linked to Goldman Sachs while in office.
While he has little chance of winning the nomination, Morrison has benefitted from the battle between Lincoln and Halter. A farm loan consultant who describes himself as a conservative Democrat, Morrison has called for a national sales tax and for a repeal of the federal health care overhaul.
While confounding Democratic voters with those statements, he's simultaneously amused them. He earned the loudest applause of the three at their first debate when he quipped: "I used to think talk was cheap, but then I saw what Channel 7 charges for ads."
Morrison has defended his credentials as a Democrat, but his rhetoric has often sounded more at home in a GOP primary.
"(President Barack Obama) is a socialist," Morrison said in a recent interview. "If I'm elected, I intend to criticize him every day of the week."
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