by Julia Shumway, Oregon Capital Chronicle
August 9, 2024
Former Republican gubernatorial nominee Knute Buehler will back Democratic Bend City Councilor Anthony Broadman in his attempt to flip control of a key state Senate seat.
Buehler’s endorsement, shared first with the Capital Chronicle, is of particular importance in Bend, an increasingly Democratic outpost in the vast red sea east of the Cascades. Buehler represented the city for four years in the state House and won Deschutes County in his ultimately unsuccessful campaigns for governor, secretary of state and Congress.
This year’s election isn’t likely to change the partisan balance of the Senate, where Democrats now hold 17 of 30 seats. But with state leaders working toward an overhaul of transportation funding in the next legislative session, Democrats are aiming to expand their majority. Creating or raising taxes requires a three-fifths supermajority – 18 votes in the Senate – and Broadman winning could help Democrats pass their preferred spending plan without needing Republican support.
Buehler praised Broadman, an attorney for tribal governments and member of the Bend City Council since 2020, as pragmatic and independent in a statement.
“We need leaders who look past party and serve all Oregonians. That’s the kind of city councilor Anthony has been and the type of legislator he will be,” he said.
Current Sen. Tim Knopp, the former minority leader, lost his ability to run for reelection after leading nine other members of his caucus in a six-week-long walkout over bills on abortion, transgender health care and guns. The protesting senators were barred from reelection because of a voter-approved constitutional amendment that bars lawmakers with 10 or more unexcused absences from seeking reelection.
Knopp first tried to recruit the owner of a firearms training company to run in his stead, but that plan was foiled when state election officials determined she didn’t live in the district. He and other Republicans are now backing Michael Summers, chair of the Redmond School Board.
The 27th Senate District includes Bend and Redmond, and Democrats outnumber Republicans by about 10,000. The district’s nearly 39,000 nonaffiliated voters are its largest bloc.
Broadman has courted support from Republican and independent voters along with Democrats. He counts endorsements from former Republican state Sen. Neil Bryant, who represented the area from 1992 to 2000, as well as Tammy Baney, a moderate Republican member of the Deschutes County Commission from 2006 until 2018. He was cross-nominated by the Independent Party of Oregon.
And former state Sen. Betsy Johnson, a conservative Democrat who left the party to run for governor as a nonaffiliated candidate in 2022, gave $500 to Broadman’s campaign through her Betsy PAC. Johnson, who represented the northwest coast but grew up in Redmond as the daughter of a Republican state representative, has primarily supported Republicans since leaving office.
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