Incumbents paying for backing bailout

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By David R. Sands

The $700 billion Wall Street rescue package isn't playing favorites on the campaign trail: Both Republican and Democratic incumbents are under fire for backing the bailout.

While presidential rivals Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama both supported the Bush administration's rescue plan, the congressional vote on the bailout is figuring prominently in a large number of close House and Senate races this fall, with supporters of the bill in the hot seat in race after race.

In Kentucky, for example, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell faces a strong challenge from Democrat Bruce Lunsford, a millionaire businessman from Louisville, whose television ads have hammered the four-term incumbent for his leading role in helping pass the $700 billion rescue package.

"How did we get into this mess? Career politicians like Mitch McConnell," says the narrator of one of Mr. Lunsford's campaign ads.

But in the state's 3rd Congressional District, it is freshman Democratic Rep. John Yarmuth on the defensive for his bailout vote in a tight rematch with Republican Anne M. Northup, whom he narrowly defeated in 2006.

In a letter to constituents, he called his vote for the package "one of my most difficult decisions since being elected."

"I was faced with two awful choices: voting for a bill I hate or doing nothing to stop an economic meltdown that would lead to massive job losses in Louisville and throughout the country," he said.

But Mrs. Northup has hammered away at her opponent's bailout vote in three debates.

"I am completely against the bailout," she said. "I think it is the worst thing we could have done."

Although the vote was bipartisan, the fallout is particularly felt in more conservative districts.