It’s not news that LuAnn Bennett wants to claim the seat in Congress currently held by Barbara Comstock. As the NRCC discovered weeks ago, Bennett was spotted with a “VA-10” name tag at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s candidate school.
What else isn’t surprising is that this former spouse to the very liberal Rep. Jim Moran, the Democrat who formerly represented Virginia’s 8th District (and a man with a long history of anti-semitism that would have been well known to Ms. Bennett) is a very liberal Democrat herself.
What is surprising, though, is that she continues to have absolutely no connection to Virginia’s 10th District. After all, she moved to Washington, D.C. just last year.
She does own property in Virginia, but outside the 10th District, in Delaplane. For those of you unfamiliar with Delaplane, it’s in Fauquier County…in the 5th Congressional District. It is the residence from which Ms. Bennett has donated over $70,000 to various Virginia Democrats over the years, until her move to Washington.
Nonetheless, Bennett’s former husband—never known for his mental acuity—is quoted by the Washington Post today saying that, despite having moved out of state, “She would be a terrific fit for the 10th District.”
Yes, just terrific. I wonder, was John Foust unavailable to run again? What about Jill McCabe?
The fact is, selection of this kind of fundamentally flawed candidate is a sign of tremendous weakness. That the DCCC can’t even scrape the barrel from within the 10th District, but instead must find some outsider with no roots or personal network in the 10th District does not augur well for the Democrats, who will have to start from scratch to build the kind of network necessary to be competitive against the presumptive GOP nominee, Barbara Comstock.
So, in the absence of a positive record of public service, of any personal grounding in the district, and of any personal narrative that will be compelling to voters of the 10th District, this creature of the DCCC will no doubt run the same tired playbook (“War on Women!”) that has so badly backfired of late in the 10th District.
This transparently cynical schtick is already old, before it’s even started.
