4 House races in 2007

Special election needed if Utah gets a 4th seat
By Lisa Riley Roche and Suzanne StruglinskiDeseret Morning News
If Utah succeeds in getting approval for a fourth seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, a special election would need to be held next year for all of the state's U.S. House seats, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said Thursday. "It would mean all sitting members would have to run again, just to reaffirm their status in a newly carved district," Huntsman said during the taping of his monthly KUED news conference. Utah's three U.S. House seats are already on the November ballot. Squeezing an election some six months into the two-year term would require more campaigning and more money for both incumbents and challengers. "It's a headache but worth it to get a fourth seat," said Charles Isom, a spokesman for Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah. Cannon, Isom said, would have no problem running again in a few months. Scott Parker, chief of staff for Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, said Bishop isn't thinking yet about the possibility of another race next year. "I'm not sure anyone would be too excited but would go through the process because of the fourth seat," Parker said.

The Republican Party, which holds two of the state's three U.S. House seats and would have a majority of voters in the new district, would limit intra-party challenges in a special election, according to Jeff Hartley, executive director of the Utah Republican Party. He said potential candidates for a fourth-district seat are already surfacing, including several members of the Legislature. One is Rep. LaVar Christensen, R-Sandy, who is running against U.S. Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, in this election. But Todd Taylor, executive director of the Utah Democratic Party, said he wasn't sure there would be a special election to worry about. Still, he said, although incumbents would have the advantage in such a race, "anytime you roll the dice, they can pop up in a different way." Nothing can happen, of course, until Congress approves the new seat. That could occur when Congress returns after the November elections, but only if the Utah Legislature is ready with a final map of the new districts. The new Utah seat is part of a political compromise that would give the largely Democratic District of Columbia a vote in the House. But House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., has made it clear he wants Utah lawmakers to establish four distinct geographical U.S. House districts before he'll support the bill. Huntsman said Thursday that he's willing to call lawmakers into special session to consider a map, but not until after Election Day. "This should not happen in a political environment," the governor said. He said there's "a better than 50-50 likelihood" that Utah will get the new seat. If Congress doesn't agree that the state deserves a fourth seat now, Huntsman said, it could take another seven years, "a heck of a long time to be waiting." A map unveiled by the governor last week showed the new fourth district would include the southern portion of Salt Lake County as well as six of the seven counties along the state's western border. "Mine was only a rough-draft attempt," Huntsman said, describing it as "a very fair map." It's not clear yet what Matheson, the lone Democrat in Utah's congressional delegation, thinks of the proposed new boundaries. Matheson's spokeswoman, Alyson Heyrend, said his opinion on the map is irrelevant. Heyrend said Matheson would prefer to see the new districts set up and approved by an independent commission rather than by the Legislature. But Huntsman said that would take too long. "We don't have time to re-create the process, sadly," he said. The governor, a Republican, said he wasn't trying to play politics with the redistricting. "All I'm doing is trying to argue in favor of doing what I think is in the best interests of the states," he said. "No politics; we just need a fourth district."
E-mail: lisa@desnews.com; suzanne@desnews.com