NC-08: R+2 district, flipped to D after a lot of effort by the national Democratic party, including redistricting. The former holder Robin Hayes barely won in ’06 and lost by quite a bit in ’08; since then Larry Kissell’s voted for the ‘stimulus‘, played duck-and-cover on the health care rationing bill and has cosponsored EFCA – even though North Carolina’s unemployment rate has nearly doubled in the last year.
As you might have gathered from the above links, the NC GOP is particularly interested in taking the seat back. Hayes has declined to run again, which clears the field for new challengers; the first one to declare is Colonel Lou Huddleston, a retired Afghanistan veteran and North Carolina businessman. He’s already picked up the support of potential candidate Linwood Faulk, but Huddleston is probably going to have at least one serious primary opponent. He’s got a good background (local, career military, and businessman); his major potential problem was that he ran and lost a state race last year (I call it ‘potential’ because I don’t know what he learned from it). Huddleston also seems to be already generating a bit of venom from North Carolina Democrats, if comments here are any indication. I, of course, will not scruple to speculate as to why.
Huddleston’s site is still in placeholder mode, so if you’re interested check back on it later. In the meantime, here’s the North Carolina GOP site (donations here).
Moe Lane
Crossposted to RedState.