The Democrat who displeases Democrats

Which way on spending?
McSweeney isn’t shy about assailing his own party on federal spending (up 8 percent so far this year, compared to last): “We’ve lost our way as a party on spending,” he said.

As for Bean, even though she’s concerned by the federal deficit, she says she would not support an increase in income tax rates for the top one percent of households (those with incomes above $300,000) in order to help reduce the deficit. “I don’t know that’s even being proposed,” she said. “I’m not looking at that at all right now.”

She added: “I do support stimulative (tax) cuts. I’ve supported every tax cut that’s come before me since I’ve been in Congress.”

Immigration: A dividing issue
On immigration Bean said she opposes “a blanket amnesty,” but also opposes “mass deportation” and suggests that “somewhere in the middle ground” there ought to be penalties against illegal immigrants, but also ought to be “a way to integrate folks that are here and bring them out of the shadows.”

FREE VIDEO Sensenbrenner opposes citizenship provision May 28: Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., tells Tim Russert of NBC's "Meet the Press" that he will not accept any path to citizenship in the Senate's immigration bill. Meet the Press

McSweeney says he opposes the Senate bill’s provision of giving a pathway to legal status for illegal immigrants.

Bean’s vote for the tough House border control bill, championed by Rep. James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has alienated some in organized labor.

“We represent a lot of people in the meatpacking and processing industry,” said Kenneth Boyd, the president of Local 1546 of the United Food and Commercial Workers union. “A lot of those people are immigrant workers. Her vote on the Sensenbrenner bill really turned us off.”

Boyd said about 3,000 UFCW members live in his Bean’s district. (Bean’s margin of victory in 2004 was about 9,000 votes.)

Boyd, who lives in Bean’s district, said her vote for the Sensenbrenner bill “was a vote against our members. We have a very large Hispanic membership and Polish membership and that vote goes against all immigrants.”

How will this affect the Bean campaign?

“We’re not going to work against her, but I also can’t go to my members and say ‘We need to support somebody who voted against you and your families.’”

Despite this, the UFCW political action committee has chipped in $10,000 to Bean’s campaign, with most recent installment coming in April.

Several other unions contributed to her campaign before her vote last July for CAFTA.

Bean faces an independent challenge
Three unions, the Teamsters, the Machinists, and UNITE, which represents garment workers and hotel and casino employees, have funded independent Bill Scheurer, who is trying to muster the nearly 14,000 signatures by June 26 that he needs to get on the ballot as a third-party candidate.

“She’s essentially a corporate candidate,” Scheurer said of Bean, adding that “her voting record on progressive values is horrendous.”

Scheurer, a lawyer, lay minister and self-described “peace activist” is a political eclectic: he opposes both the Iraq war and “abortion as a method of birth control.” He also says, “We should bring our troops home from around the world and deploy them to protect our borders.”

One of his daughters is a captain in the Army; one of his sons just got back from a year tour of duty in Iraq.

“The vast majority of people out here don’t give a **** about the political parties,” Scheurer said. “People understand that these parties cannot address the problems that we face as a nation.”

And with part of this, Bean agrees: “I represent a district which is very independent by nature…. They don’t wear hard ‘R’s’ or hard ‘D’s.’ They’re proud of their independence and they vote for the person they think represents them best.”

If enough voters in her district are independent enough to put Scheurer on the ballot, it will make this race a more complicated one.

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