Posted: Oct. 23, 2012

RACES-2-WATCH: LEGISLATIVE UPDATE

By Celia Cohen
Grapevine Political Writer

The fiercest legislative races are at either ends of the state.

Upstate across a wide swath of northern New Castle County, the Democrats are trying to cling to a Senate seat they never should have won in the first place.

Downstate in a sweep through central Sussex County, the Republicans are in a fight for a Senate seat they never in their wildest imaginings thought they could lose.

The race upstate is the sort of bruising smackdown to be expected when there is a sitting Democratic senator defending himself against a sitting Republican representative being shorn not just of his own seat, but a leadership post, because of redistricting. Neither wants to go home.

The race downstate is a nobody-could-make-this-up monstrosity that may be the weirdest Delaware has ever seen.

Upstate it is Mike Katz, a first-term Democrat in the Senate, against Greg Lavelle, the Republican majority leader in the House of Representatives, in the 4th Senate District.

They have been pummeling the tar out of each other in a district long regarded as the cradle of genteel, upstate Republicanism, a site that includes the area known as Chateau Country where the du Ponts settled and prospered.

Katz, a doctor with an MBA, was able to take advantage of a Republican primary in 2008 to steal it away, and Lavelle, a financial consultant with 12 years in the legislature, wants to return the district to its natural leanings. It is very much in play.

Downstate it is, well, it has been hard to keep track of who is running in the 19th Senate District.

This political freak began with a Republican primary that was supposed to settle the election in these conservative reaches of Sussex County. Eric Bodenweiser, a Tea Party provocative, took out Joe Booth, the senator who did himself in with a clumsy political move by appropriating a school administrator's job and thereby double dipping.

The Democrats recruited Jane Hovington, the county vice-chair of the party, just in case the primary was bitter enough for the Republicans to self-destruct.

For Bodenweiser, the Senate seat was his, his, his, until slowly but surely he had to let it slip away, first suspending his campaign, then withdrawing his candidacy, all before he was indicted Monday on 113 counts of sexually abusing a child about 25 years ago.

As Bodenweiser was backing away, the Republicans took the precaution of filing Brian Pettyjohn, a past mayor of Georgetown, as a write-in candidate. There are few tasks in politics harder than winning a write-in campaign, but the party is going to try.

For years and years, this district was tediously stable, represented by Thurman Adams, a conservative Democrat who became the Senate president pro tem, from 1972 until the day he died in 2009. Now this.

GENERAL ASSEMBLY

Current Senate: 14 Democrats, 7 Republicans

Current House of Representatives: 26 Democrats, 15 Republicans

All seats are up because of redistricting

Incumbents in bold

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