2 races leave Maine Senate control in limbo

AUGUSTA – In the aftermath of an election with some hotly contested races, tempers are likely to flare today when Senate leaders meet with Gov. Angus S. King in preparation for next week’s special session on the budget.

As the result of Tuesday’s balloting, Republicans fell short of making major gains in the House and Democrats managed to retain a single-vote margin in Senate by winning an 18-17 majority.

That majority may not hold, however, as a recount already has been requested in the Brunswick area for Senate District 16 where Chris Hall, the Democratic winner, collected only two more votes than Republican Leslie Fossel, 8,898-8,896, according to unofficial results tabulated by the Bangor Daily News. A second recount request is expected in Oxford County’s Senate District 24 where Bruce Bryant, a Democrat, bested challenger Robert Cameron by just 48 votes, 6,630-6,582.

“I would guess that recounts will happen in those two,” said Senate Majority Leader Beverly Daggett of Augusta. “Recounts usually hold up. Occasionally, it doesn’t happen, but that’s rarely the case.”

The second-place finishers in the legislative races have until Nov. 13 to file recount requests with the Secretary of State’s Office.

Maine Senate President Rick Bennett, R-Norway, was not convinced the Democrats would prevail in the expected recounts. He said Democrats had more on the line since they needed to win both recounts to maintain the majority while Republicans only needed to win one to take over. The Senate president had hoped the election would have produced a clearer conclusion to the question of which party would hold the majority.

“Still, our candidates did a great job,” he said. “We defeated two of their incumbents and we did so without losing any of our incumbents. So I think the recounts should begin next week and be concluded within days.”

Two years ago, with the election of Bar Harbor independent Jill Goldthwait, the Senate was evenly divided between the political parties at 17-17-1. That led to a power-sharing agreement between the parties, which made Democratic Sen. Michael Michaud president of the Senate during the first year of the session and Bennett president during the second year. While the agreement remained intact, a death and a party-switch during the session gave the Democrats a 19-15 majority over the Republicans, with one independent.

The Senate race recounts likely will overlap with the scheduled Nov. 13 special session called by King that will have outgoing House and Senate members returning to Augusta to deal with a $240 million budget deficit. Members of the new Legislature won’t be sworn in until Dec. 4.

While budget negotiations would have been contentious under any circumstances, Daggett expects meetings between the two parties will be even more strained “because of the negativity that came out in legislative races.”

Some members of Daggett’s caucus have even called for Bennett’s resignation as presiding officer of the Senate for allegedly taking a lead role in organizing a barrage of negative attack mailings on Democratic candidates in the final days before the election. But Daggett said Wednesday she wasn’t ready to entertain those kind of requests, at least not yet.

“We’re meeting Thursday with [Gov. King] on the budget and talking with [Gov.-elect John] Baldacci later today about the budget, so that’s not something that I’m going to be looking into immediately,” she said. “And whether I even look at it or not is a decision I’m not prepared to consider right now. I’m too busy staying focused on things I have to do. I was working with someone who’s used the bipartisan issues that both parties worked on together against [us]. There was a level of trust there and now it’s gone.”

Bennett said Daggett and others were misjudging him and had jumped to conclusions about his role in the political mailings to voters. He also questioned how Daggett could assume the moral high ground in assuming the role of victim when Senate Democrats were allegedly actively “attacking me personally.”

“Bev and I need to talk,” Bennett said. “But she’s trying to have her cake and eat it, too. She’s been engaging in this stuff. Personally, I find it offensive when people want to portray themselves as victims of negative campaigning when they’ve been engaging in it for months. Personally, I’m nothing short of offended and outraged at her attitude.”

In the Maine House, Democrats maintained their majority with 80 members. Republicans increased their number by six for a total of 67 members. The House also will feature a Green Independent Party member and three independents. One recount has been requested in the District 81 Belgrade region and officials at the Secretary of State’s Office said it was possible others could follow.

House Republican leader Joe Bruno of Raymond said the representatives had not been torn apart by partisan politicking like their counterparts in the Senate.

“Well, the Senate’s the Senate – I worry about the House,” Bruno said. “It got pretty nasty in the Senate, but it never got that nasty in the House. But we’re going to be dealing with issues that require a lot of negotiating and we look forward to working with the Democrats.”

Speaking for the Democratic caucus in a prepared statement, House Speaker Michael V. Saxl, a Bangor native and Portland Democrat barred from seeking re-election by term limits, shared Bruno’s sentiments.

“We look forward to working with our Republican colleagues to strengthen Maine’s economy, increase access to quality affordable health care and remove barriers to higher education,” he said.