“If you’re the Brown campaign looking at this, this is a bit of a new world,’’ said Peter Ubertaccio, director of the Martin Institute and professor of political science at Stonehill College. “They probably have been caught off guard, as have we all with this juggernaut of the Warren campaign.’’
Brown’s underdog claim is debatable. He is still an incumbent, and handicappers call the race with Warren, the likely Democratic nominee, a tossup.
The race is also expected to be among the most expensive Senate face-offs in the country, and possibly the most compelling.
Not only is control of the US Senate at stake, but both sides also want bragging rights on the seat held by liberal icon Edward M. Kennedy for five decades. Liberals, hit hard by Brown’s surprise victory in the 2010 special election, see Warren as an ideological warrior who can articulate a progressive agenda for the Democratic Party. Republicans see Brown as a national star, from a region of the country that has been nearly impossible to penetrate in recent years.
But for Brown to win, he will need to run a different campaign than he did two years ago. In 2010, he benefited from the cautious campaign run by his opponent, Attorney General Martha Coakley. Democrats failed to get voters to the polls; Republicans were energized by anger with President Obama; and independents and conservative Democrats gravitated to Brown’s upbeat personality.
The 2010 special election campaign lasted a matter of weeks, a sprint compared with the current campaign that will allow 10 more months of scrutiny on both sides before ballots are cast in November. The last presidential election drew about 3 million voters, 700,000 more than the special election. That’s considered a significant edge for Democrats, who have an advantage in voter registration and are expected to mobilize for Obama.
