Braley plans to be vocal

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By Ed Tibbetts | Thursday, November 9, 2006 1:36 AM CST | () comments

Kevin E. Schmidt/QUAD-CITY TIMES Democrat Bruce Braley, who won election Tuesday to Iowa’s 1st Congressional District seat, greets supporters Wednesday at The Hat Lounge on West Locust Street in Davenport. Braley, of Waterloo, defeated Republican Mike Whalen of Bettendorf.

For Bruce Braley, Tuesday’s election win was the gift that kept on giving.

On a trip around the district to thank supporters Wednesday, Braley got the surprise news that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was resigning.

He had called for it months ago, and the winner of Iowa’s 1st Congressional District race took it as a sign the White House got the Election Day message that people want change.

“I think what you’re seeing the president talking about right now in this press conference is exhibit A that your vote counted last night,” Braley, a Democrat, told a cheering group of supporters at The Hat restaurant as a large television screen showed President Bush explaining the resignation at a news conference.

All in all, it was as if the campaign hadn’t ended.

Cheering crowds, a frenzied pace.

But, the atmosphere at The Hat notwithstanding, the campaign is over, and analysts are deciphering the result — and Braley, now a congressman-elect, is stepping into the fast-paced world of a new member of a newly minted Democratic House.

On Sunday, he’ll be off for a week of orientation for new members in Washington, D.C., and he’ll be asked to cast a vote for party leadership. He said it will be an “honor” to vote for Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., as speaker, the nation’s first female in that job.

Braley also said he would make his views known about the Iraq War.

He’s called for a prompt withdrawal of troops, and when asked how he would work toward that goal, he said he wouldn’t be a “presumptuous freshman” who pretended to know all the answers. But he added, “if you talk to my mother, I’ve also never been the type of person who holds my tongue when I feel I have something to contribute.”

He said he would talk with other members, including reaching across party lines to such people as U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Rep. Jim Leach, R-Iowa, who lost a re-election bid Tuesday.

Braley said Wednesday he hasn’t decided who will take top staff posts yet, nor has he decided yet which committee assignments he’ll seek (although he mentions energy, education and appropriations as possibilities).

Still, the Waterloo lawyer told supporters he does know he will be a constant presence here.

“You were there with me ... to carry me through some very rough times,” he said.

Looking back, Braley’s victory Tuesday was solid across the 12-county district that hugs the Mississippi River from the Quad-Cities to Dubuque and juts west to Waterloo.

He lost just two counties, according to unofficial results: Butler by 500 votes and Delaware by less than 400.

However, he more than made up for it by winning Black Hawk County by a wide margin, which was expected, but he also won Dubuque County by a wider margin, which wasn’t expected.

Republicans hoped the county’s pro-life leanings would help Republican Mike Whalen.

Braley won 58 percent of Black Hawk County’s vote and almost 60 percent of Dubuque County’s.

Scott County may have been the biggest surprise of all, however.

Braley won the biggest-voting county in the district by almost 4,300 votes, with a 53 percent majority of the vote. He won by 2,800 in absentees and by 1,500 on Election Day, traditionally a day when the GOP dominates.

Braley won all across Davenport, with the exception of the east side. He even picked off four of Bettendorf’s 11 precincts.

With all the precincts reporting districtwide, Braley got 112,432 votes, according to unofficial results. That’s more than what incumbent Rep. Jim Nussle, R-Iowa, got four years ago.

Whalen tallied 88,120 votes, with two other candidates splitting 3,364 votes. In percentage terms, Braley won by a 55-43 margin overall.

Braley said that voters sent a message for change. Whalen’s campaign agreed the national Democratic sweep brushed them out of contention.

For his part, Whalen started the day after the election with breakfast at the Machine Shed, according to his campaign manager Russ Perisho. Otherwise, he was talking with supporters and well-wishers but wasn’t granting media interviews.

Some Republicans had suggested Whalen distance himself from President Bush, particularly on the Iraq War, but Whalen called that Monday-morning quarterbacking Tuesday night. And Perisho said doing so out of political calculation, and not on principle, would be out of character for Whalen.

“He’s not cold and calculating,” Perisho said.

Ed Tibbetts can be contacted at (563) 383-2327 or etibbetts@qctimes.com.

Raw video: Braley post-election