Democratic Secretary of State Kate Brown says she'll limit spending to $1 million in this year's re-election campaign. Republican challenger Knute Buehler says he supports limits but not for this race this year.Before a standing room only crowd in Bend,
took criticism from her right and her left. When her turn came to answer whether she thought Oregonians should show a photo ID before casting their ballots, Brown went on the offensive, noting how her opponent likes to say Oregonians "have to show more ID to rent a video from Blockbuster than to vote."
The audience booed.
Brown was not having an easy night. In fact, it has not been an easy campaign for the Democratic incumbent nor for
who has the best chance among the challengers of beating Brown.
, the Pacific Green Party's candidate, and
from the Progressive Party, are also in the race.
Buehler, a Bend physician and first-time candidate, has raised about $1.1 million, was the first to air television commercials and, so far, has received endorsements of five Oregon newspapers.
Without a governor's race or a U.S. Senate seat up this fall, partisans are watching the campaign for secretary of state with keen interest. Republicans have not won a statewide seat in more than a decade.
Buehler's challenge
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Buehler is a native Oregonian, raised in Roseburg. He persuaded his wife, Patty, to move to Oregon after they both graduated from Johns Hopkins University Medical School.
Neither Patty, who is an ophthalmologist, nor Knute, an orthopedic surgeon, have been lifelong Republicans. In 1992, while working 100 hours a week as residents at Oregon Health and Sciences University, the couple also worked for independent candidate Ross Perot's presidential campaign. Sometime after that, Knute Buehler says, he joined the GOP.
But that didn't keep the couple from holding a primary fund-raiser at their home for Democrat John Kitzhaber when he was making a campaign for a third term.
Ruth Williamson, a Democrat from Bend who has known the Buehlers for at least 10 years, says she wrote a piece for The (Bend) Bulletin "about how we need more Mark Hatfield-style leaders.
"We need to look at new and creative ways to get Oregon back to work," she said in an interview.
Brown frequently talks about how the secretary of state's job is not for newcomers. Buehler counters that he has plenty of real-world experience.
He is a managing partner of a medical practice with 170 employees. He was part of a team that developed and patented products used in computer-assisted knee replacements. Buehler serves on the board of directors for St. Charles Health Systems in Bend, and is chair of the strategy committee that determined performance measures.
Buehler says the transition from physician to politician has made him less reserved and "more comfortable walking up to a table and introducing myself to people."
The other thing he learned, he says with a smile, is how much he misses home.
Brown's record
In her tenure as secretary of state, Kate Brown has drawn mixed reviews and, so far this campaign, no newspaper editorial endorsements.
She is criticized for moving the election of the labor commissioner from May to November. She is blamed for making it tougher to gather signatures on ballot initiative petitions. And she is chided for not enforcing voter-endorsed campaign finance limits, at least until the Supreme Court ruled them unconstitutional.
Her critics include Ralph Nader and conservative Republicans. Brown takes that as a sign that she must be doing something right.
"Sometimes in this job you're going to make decisions that make people unhappy," she says.
Raised by Republican parents in Minnesota, Brown came to Oregon to attend law school at Lewis and Clark. She studied environmental law but says she quickly decided "there were other, better fits for my skills."
She was working as an advocate for the Women's Rights Coalition when she was appointed to a vacant position in the Oregon House in 1991. She moved to the Senate in 1997 and was Democratic majority leader when she left the Legislature to run for her current job.
Janice Thompson, the former executive director for Common Cause Oregon, credits Brown with forcing her colleagues to pass a 2007 package of ethics reforms that included bans on lobbyist-paid entertainment and increased fines for violations.
Another supporter, Steve Drunkenmiller, Linn County clerk and a self-described "conservative Republican," says he was warned about Brown even while she served in the Legislature.
"People said she was a partisan. That basically there'd be some special interest groups running the secretary of state's office," he says. "I worked with her for four years and can tell you there's nobody better."
Brown has raised about $900,000 and spent far less than Buehler.
Her husband, Dan Little, says he's seen Brown face campaign challenges before. Politics is in her blood, he says, noting that they spend Friday nights watching "Washington Week" on public television.
But, he adds, "I've seen politics eat people alive. A campaign like this they never recover from it."
Could that happen to Brown?
Little was quick and unequivocal: "No way."
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