ShareThisBy RACHEL GORDON and GREG LUCAS
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Jerry McNerney, the Democratic mathematician-turned-political conqueror who defied odds-makers and defeated seven-term California GOP Rep. Richard Pombo, said the turning point in the race came about five weeks ago when President Bush made a campaign stop in Stockton to stump for the Republican incumbent.
The visit fired up Pombo's opponents, chief among them environmental activists who made the San Joaquin County Republican their No. 1 target and spent more than $1 million in their battle.
"I knew then that I was going to win," McNerney said in an interview. "I just didn't have any idea how big the margin would be."
The margin was significant. By the time polls closed Tuesday night, McNerney, a wind energy consultant from Pleasanton, won with 53 percent of the vote, besting Pombo by more than 10,000 votes.
He crushed Pombo in the district's three Bay Area counties and, perhaps most surprising, almost took San Joaquin County, the 11th Congressional District's anchor and Pombo's conservative home turf.
Not only did the president's visit signal that Pombo was in trouble _ Bush was only stumping in districts where the contests were tight to raise money and motivate the party faithful base _ but more importantly, McNerney said, it kicked the anti-Pombo contingent into high gear.
"It jelled things," he said. "All of a sudden there was a lot of media interest. At the same time, we had poll numbers that showed we were neck-and-neck, and we also broke the $1 million mark in our fundraising."
McNerney's campaign issued a press release asking Bush to come back.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which backed one of McNerney's rivals in the June primary, began spending on the race in late October, and offering strategic advice during daily briefings. A veteran field organizer from the health care workers union jumped aboard and former President Bill Clinton added his gravitas to the campaign, holding a late-night, get-out-the-vote rally with McNerney at the Stockton airport last week. Then the celebrity endorsements came in: Michael J. Fox and Ben Affleck among them.
The Republican Party sent first lady Laura Bush to the district last week to rally support for Pombo, and seasoned GOP campaign workers flew in from Washington to lend a hand. The National Republican Congressional Committee spent more than $1 million on the race, most of it on efforts attacking McNerney.
But in the end, none of it was enough to save Pombo.
The Democrat's national message calling for a change resonated.
Tracy resident Michelle Bettencourt, 21, said she voted for Pombo two years ago. But not this time.
"He just got too used to being in office," she said.
