GOP's Djou wins Hawaii special election for Congress

[Valin]

Honolulu Advertiser:

5/22/10

Honolulu City Councilman Charles Djou has won the special election in urban Honolulu's 1st Congressional District, the first Republican sent to Washington, D.C., to represent the Islands in two decades.

According to final count from the state Office of Elections, Djou had 39.4 percent of the vote, followed by 30.8 percent for state Senate President Colleen Hanabusa and 27.6 percent for former congressman Ed Case. The remaining 11 other candidates attracted the rest of the vote.

The results are for ballots mailed in or dropped off through Friday and ballots received today, accounting for all of the votes cast in the winner-take-all special election.

Djou would serve out the remaining months of former congressman Neil Abercrombie's term in Congress, which ends in January 2011. Abercrombie resigned in February to concentrate on his campaign in the Democratic primary for governor.

(Snip)

Case and Hanabusa split the Democratic vote, as public and private polls had predicted.


Campaign Spot: I Said He Could Djou This, And He Did It!
Jim Geraghty
5/23/10

In a unique set of circumstances – two major Democrats on the ballot, and only one Republican – the GOP’s Charles Djou wins the special House election in Hawaii’s 1st Congressional District. It is not a surprise, but I am sure, to many Republicans, it is a relief and a welcome bit of good news.

® Charles Djou: 67,610 votes, 39.4 percent

(D) Colleen Hanabusa, 52,802 votes, 30.8 percent

(D) Ed Case 47,391 votes, 27.6 percent

National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) Chairman Pete Sessions (R-TX) issued the following statement:

“I congratulate Charles Djou for his victory and a successful campaign based on the widely-shared values of cutting spending, shrinking government and creating real, permanent American jobs. I have no doubt that Hawaii families will be well-represented in Congress as he joins our fight to return common sense economic policies and fiscal sanity to Washington.

“Eighteen months ago, President Obama carried this district with seventy percent of the vote, which makes Charles Djou’s victory an impressive one......(Snip)

One of my guys on the ground looks at the preliminary numbers on the ground and concludes:

Likely rematch in Nov between Djou and Hanabusa. I don’t think Case can beat her one-on-one, and the fact that she rallied to beat him in the late balloting when the early polls had him up over her, shows he won’t be able to beat her in August. But, between the two, I think Djou would like to have Hanabusa as his opponent rather than Case. She’s got baggage, and she’s completely tied to the Dem. machine. Independents are more likely to go for Djou with her as his opponent, than they would be if Case was an option. I think among Case’s 27.6% are a ton of independents. The minor candidates got less than 3% total — good news for Hanabusa since it shows that Djou is going to have to mine Case’s voters for most of the 11% more he’ll need in Nov., and the biggest portion of those voters are Democrats.

[Valin]