Brad Ellsworth represnts Indiana's famous (or is it infamous) "Bloody Eighth" Congressional District. The District covers the southern half of Indiana's western border and includes Evansville, Terre Haute and Vincennes. It's a classic blue collar, white district: 94.2% white, 3.7% black, 0.9% Hispanic and 0.6% Asian. While the percentage of high school grads is slightly above the national norm, college degrees and graduate degrees are somewhat rare (15.6% for college vs. over 21% nationally; 3.7 for grad degrees vs. over 6%). The result is fewer "poor" people but family and per capita incomes some 10 to 15% below the national average.
Ellsworth's father was a crane operator for Alcoa. Ellsworth worked his way through a local college by working in the paint and hardware department of the local Sears. This was not "Grease" territory or anything like it. Ellsworth entered the County Sherriff's office and began working his way up the ladder. This meant getting a masters degree in Criminology at Indiana State (in the district at Terre Haute; best known as Larry Bird's school although John Wooden started his college coaching career there). It also meant, eventually, being elected the local sherrif (1998, re-elected in 2002), in Ellsworth's case as a Democrat.
In 2006, the Sherriff took on the local Republican Congressman, John Hostettler. Hostettler was kind of unusual. He voted against the Iraq War Resolution (AUMF) and refused to take PAC funds, In fact, he generally spent small sums and relied on a network of churches and anti-abortion types to turn out the votes. Ellsworth, in a sense, was the perfect candidate. Where Hostettler was not much of a fundraiser, Brad proved to be good at it. He was Catholic, anti-abortion, anti-drug, and the personification of law and order. Brad Ellsworth not only won, he won the largest victory of any of the 30 Democrats who took over a Republican seat with 61.5% of the vote in a district carried by George W. Bush with 61.02%.
All of that makes Ellsworth a pretty poor candidate to be primaried. And should make him pretty safe over the long term. According to the racetracker wiki, Ellsworth's leading "opponent" swore off the race. He's most likely to be opposed by an assistant to the President of Indiana State. Not exactly red meat and not, seemingly, the equal of the deputy who became sherrif and then went to Congress. A principal goal for Ellsworth has been to bring back as much pork as possible and he's already secured some big funding.
So, how does Brad Ellsworth vote. Pretty poor. He has the seventh lowest Loyalty Score of any Democrat in the House at 84.2%. His Progressive Punch Score of 73.58 is actually boosted by a lot of routine votes. Brad Ellsworth is one of the few Democrats to vote against Stem Cell Research. He's staunchly anti-abortion. Votes for agriculture subsidies but votes against spending for other, less local, topics.
Brad, as a life long Catholic and a long term succerssful police officer, believes in the hierarchy and in "supporting the troops." Could we get better from this district? Surprisingly, yes, although not a full-fledged progressive. Brad is supported by the Unions. Votes for Housing. Votes for workers rights. But shockingly voted against a Hate Crime bill intended to extend protection to gays, lesbians, bis and transgenders. Brad does not mention on his web site that he's a Democrat. He does mention the bacon he's brought home.
Brad Ellsworth strikes me as a "vote for Speaker", a safe seat from a nominally Republican area, and someone who may be a good target for lobbying in some areas but not in others. Let him run and win. Just don't spend a lot of resources on him from the national level.
One last thing. Many years ago in college I read a book looking at the election returns from the border counties in states like Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Kentucky. It turned out that people on both sides of the Ohio River shared more in terms of attitudes with each other than with people from the rest of their state. They favored slavery and unionism at the same time and as late as 1860 they were still Whigs even after the party had died. In 1860, they voted not for Breckinridge, Lincoln or Douglas but for Bell and the Constitutional Union party. It seems they still belong in a strange nowhere land.
I can't get much more of a hold on Brad Ellsworth. I think he is the kind of man many of the readers on this blog would have trouble connecting with but many of the voters in his own community find him a natural.
P.S. For much of last year I couldn't think of Ellsworth without playing "Who Shot the Sherriff." The fact that he was alo a Deputy makes the song thing complete. Kind of "I was the Sherriff and I also was the Deputy."
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