Economy Plays Major Role Governors' Races

RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

Now let's bring another voice into our coverage. NPR news analyst Juan Williams is in New York City and joins us from our bureau there. Good morning, Juan.

JUAN WILLIAMS: Good morning.

MONTAGNE: Why don't we start there in New York. No surprise that Mayor Bloomberg won, but did anyone see such a narrow victory coming?

WILLIAMS: No. The polls really had him winning by double digits, and it turns out he wins by about 5 percent. And you know what's interesting here is sort of the anti-incumbent fervor that's evident throughout last night's results. And in the case of New York City, Mayor Bloomberg had really reversed a term-limit issue here to allow himself the opportunity to run for that third term. And he was running against an opponent - Bill Thompson - who had little money and little in the name of name recognition. But he blasted Mayor Bloomberg as an elitist who had abandoned the middle class and broken the promise on term limits. So apparently, it had much more impact than anybody knew, especially given the amount of money that Mayor Bloomberg spent.

MONTAGNE: And looking more broadly at yesterday's elections, what stood out for you in these results?

WILLIAMS: I think Bob McDonnell's victory in Virginia, Renee. You know, that was a victory for a man who's a social conservative for almost all of his political career, but he ran here as a pragmatic politician focused on solving the state's problems with regard to the economy, jobs and transportation.

This is a year after Virginia supported Barack Obama and?

MONTAGNE: And of course we're talking about the governor race here.

WILLIAMS: Right. But again, what you see is that independents had split in that state. It's typically - traditionally been a Republican state. Last year, independents split. Yesterday, Bob O'Donnell was able to get a two-to-one victory among independent voters in Virginia. So he raised the money, stayed on message and was able to lead a GOP sweep of - not only governorship but lieutenant governor and attorney general. This is really a big victory for Bob McDonnell.

MONTAGNE: Well, also in New Jersey, also a governor's race there, also won by a Republican. These voters told exit pollsters that they approved of President Obama. I mean, a contradiction there?

WILLIAMS: Well, you know what, in Virginia, 56 percent of the voters said Obama was not a factor. In New Jersey, 60 percent, Renee, said Obama was not a factor. In fact, if you look at it, in New Jersey, 57 percent of them who came out yesterday said they approve of Barack Obama. And in Virginia, again, 51 percent said President Obama has their approval.

The Democrats in both races were not able to get Barack Obama's supporters to absolutely support them. In New Jersey, for example, only about 75 percent, according to exit polls, of people who approved of President Obama then went on to vote for Jon Corzine.

Obama and his standing right now are not the issue in both cases - in Virginia and New Jersey. Eighty-five percent of voters in Virginia said they're worried about the economy; in New Jersey, 89 percent. Those were the dominant issues of the night. And in terms of President Obama's legislative agenda, again, it wasn't health care, it wasn't cap and trade, the climate bill. It was all about the economy last night for these voters.

MONTAGNE: Although let's speak briefly - we just have a few seconds here -about a congressional race in upstate New York that turned out very differently, attracted national attention - Sarah Palin, other prominent Republicans backing the conservative candidate who in the end, lost the seat for the Republicans. What lesson there, if any, is to be learned?

WILLIAMS: Well, GOP chaos. This is a very interesting race because in that 23rd district, you had Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska, Fred Thompson, former Tennessee senator, coming in at the last minute backing Doug Hoffman, the conservative. Dede Scozzafava, who was the Republican nominee, pulling out, then supporting Bill Owens, the Democrat, who eventually won.

But what you see here is the kind of anger and rage and especially, the energized base among Republicans. And yesterday, we saw Republicans turning out in big numbers. But in that district it didn't work for them.

MONTAGNE: Yeah, and losing the seat. Juan, thank you very much.

WILLIAMS: You're welcome, Renee.

MONTAGNE: NPR News analyst Juan Williams. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.