Michigan GOP Wants 9th Congressional Seat Back

SAGINAW, Mich. -- Oakland County Republicans are trying to win back Michigan's 9th District U.S. House seat in territory they dominated until 2008. This time they will have the Tea Party by their side.

Rep. Gary Peters, a Democrat, rode Barack Obama's coattails two years ago to oust 16-year Republican incumbent Joe Knollenberg.

Four Republicans are competing for the GOP nomination in the Aug. 3 primary for the right to take on Peters, unopposed in the primary, in the Nov. 2 general election.

Their connections with the Tea Party, short for "taxed enough already," are numerous:

* The first entrant was Paul Welday, Knollenberg's former chief of staff, who opted for a Tea Party rally as the venue for his April 2009 candidacy announcement.

* A year later, former state representative Andrew "Rocky" Raczkowski was rallying the crowd during the Tea Party's April 15 tax-day protests.

* Anna Janek, a last-minute entry in May, lists some of her top Facebook friends as "Tea Party Patriots" and Fox News commentator Glenn Beck.

* Richard D. Kuhn, retired a Oakland County circuit judge, says he will not spend as much campaign money as the other candidates, but his main concern is the federal government "going bankrupt like Greece."

* To top matters off, 9th District Republican Party Chairman Glenn Clark also is chairman of the Oakland County Tea Party.

The dean of the region's GOP politicians, Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson, predicts that either Welday or Raczkowski will receive the GOP nomination and that either of them will unseat Rep. Peters.

Some Republican activists have aired concerns that the multiple primary candidates will create division, while Peters is free to unify his base for the November general election. However, the only public spat so far was back in February. Welday's campaign manager, Brian Pierce, told The Oakland Press that Raczkowski violated federal election law by failing to identify who paid for a radio advertisement and a fund-raising letter. Raczkowski responded that the omission was a minor oversight, that the Welday campaign was trying to distract attention from "real issues" and that in the future he would incorporate the standard "My name is Rocky Raczkowski and I approve this message."

The Republican candidates all decry what they describe as excessive federal spending and a rising national debt. They say the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, also known as the economic stimulus plan, has been a wasteful venture. They oppose health care reform.

Only a few contrasts are offered. Janek, an immigrant who escaped Communist rule in Czechoslovakia during the 1960s, says the United States should withdraw from Afghanistan and Iraq, close all military bases worldwide, and not strive to be "policeman of the world." Raczkowski, meanwhile, is a U.S. Army Reserves major who has served tours of duty in Afghanistan and Somalia.

Most Republicans assert that with tax cuts, businesses will have more capital to create jobs. Janek, by comparison, points to problems with "corporate welfare," normally a Democratic lament.

Janek is a self-described veteran Republican grassroots activist and homemaker.

Welday started his political career in 1982 as an organizer for Richard Headlee, the GOP candidate for governor and author of the voter-approved 1978 Headlee Amendment for property tax limits. However, Headlee lost to Democrat James J. Blanchard. Welday became a consultant to various other Republican candidates, including the late Jack Kemp for president in 1988, before he went to work for Knollenberg in 1992.

Raczkowski was term-limited out of the Michigan House of Representatives in 2002 after a six-year tenure that included a stint as majority leader. In 2002, he challenged longtime incumbent Sen. Carl Levin, but he lost in a landslide, 61 percent to 38 percent. He says he intended to challenge Levin again in 2008 until another military call-up to Afghanistan precluded his plan.

Kuhn, through late June, had not posted a campaign website. He started his career as a delegate to the Michigan Constitutional Convention in 1962 and served 24 years as an Oakland County judge until his 2001 retirement.