Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
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Poweshiek County Republican Mike Mahaffey, who in 1996 lost by only 2 percentage points to Democratic Rep. Leonard Boswell in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, is contemplating another run against his old rival, Congressional Quarterly reports.
Mahaffey told the Washington, D.C.,-based newspaper he plans to make his decision by Labor Day.
The former state Republican Party chairman suggested that family considerations had deterred him from again pursuing a seat in Congress since his try in 1996. But with his youngest son now going into his junior year in college, Mahaffey — a lawyer in the small city of Montezuma and part-time Poweshiek County attorney — said he is “seriously considering” challenging Boswell again.
He also noted that the momentous debates and decisions being made these days, following the 2008 election of Democrat Barack Obama as president, have piqued his interest in rejoining the political fray. “The thought of being part of that process has made me think about it again,” Mahaffey said.
The original Boswell-Mahaffey showdown was over a Congressional seat left vacant by Republican Jim Ross Lightfoot, who left office to unsuccessfully challenge Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin.
Boswell won 49.3 percent to 47.6 percent after a campaign that drew national attention in its early stages — more for its tenor than the substance. Mahaffey and Boswell initially said voters were sick of negative politics and agreed not to attack each other on the campaign trail or on the airwaves.
As the race came down to the wire, though, there were complaints that voters were having difficulty distinguishing between the two and the race got significantly more abrasive, with Boswell trying to link Mahaffey to the then-unpopular U.S. House Speaker, Newt Gingrich, and Mahaffey charging Boswell was a traditional liberal who favored higher taxes and bigger government.
The race took place before a round of redistricting that saw Iowa lose a Congressional seat and Boswell forced to move to Des Moines in order to run for re-election. In 1996, the 3rd was a sprawling 27-county, mostly rural district that ran the entire southern part of the state across but also included college towns Ames and Grinnell. The district had about 118,000 registered Democrats and about 113,000 registered Republicans.
Today, the district is made up of only 12 counties and includes the state capitol and Democratic stronghold of Des Moines. More than 65 percent of the district’s voters live in Polk County, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by nearly 40,000 registered voters.
Mahaffey’s name has also been mentioned as a potential gubernatorial candidate in 2010.
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