Ashley Judd getting a divorce. Does that make a Senate run more likely?
| Washington
Actress Ashley Judd and her husband, race car driver Dario Franchitti, are getting divorced after 11 years of marriage. We鈥檙e sure this is sad for both of them, but we鈥檙e going to jump ahead to the question every bored aide in the Hart Senate Office Building asked themselves Wednesday when they read the news: Does this mean she鈥檚 going to run for Senate in Kentucky?
[Editor's note: The original version of this story gave the wrong first name for Mr. Franchitti.]
Maybe you didn鈥檛 know that was a possibility. But it鈥檚 true: Some Kentucky Democrats are talking up Ms. Judd, an eighth-generation Kentucky native, as an ideal candidate to run against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in 2014.
Judd was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention this summer and is something of a political activist, so it鈥檚 not exactly like this is a wacky idea. Plus she鈥檚 been noncommittal in an encouraging kind of way when asked if she鈥檚 interested.
鈥淚 am incredibly honored and frankly overwhelmed by the outpouring of support 鈥� that the people of Kentucky are interested in having me represent them is the greatest honor of my life so far and I am certainly taking a close look at it,鈥� said Judd before the Kentucky Society of Washington鈥檚 Bluegrass Ball in Washington on Jan. 19, according to a .
OK, then. Does her impending divorce indicate she鈥檚 more likely to do this, or less?
Over at The Atlantic, Michael Catalini thinks it means Judd will take a pass.
鈥淕iven this development, there鈥檚 a chance Judd won鈥檛 want to jump into a messy political campaign,鈥� he writes.
Catalini adds that this is 鈥渂ad news鈥� for Senator McConnell, since Judd would be politically weaker than other Democrats he might face. After all, Kentucky is a conservative state, and Judd鈥檚 own grandmother called her a 鈥淗ollywood liberal.鈥� Plus, while she was a DNC delegate, she didn鈥檛 represent Kentucky. She represented Tennessee 鈥� the state she and Franchitti called home.
For the sake of argument we鈥檒l take the other side. We believe the impending divorce means it鈥檚 more likely she鈥檒l try electoral politics, not less. Her husband is Scottish, which might not exactly have won her votes, and the couple also lived part-time in Scotland, which is inconvenient if you鈥檝e got to campaign in Lexington on Tuesday next. Now she can bill herself as making a clean sweep of things, including her non-Kentucky residencies, and say she鈥檚 coming home to the place she belongs.
(Yes, that鈥檚 a John Denver reference. Please keep reading anyway.)
After all, it isn鈥檛 like McConnell鈥檚 a steamroller. His recent polls numbers have been so-so, which is either surprising in light of his national status, or the result of it, depending on which expert you ask.
A recent found that 17 percent of voters said they would vote for McConnell, while 34 percent said they would vote against him. Forty-four percent said they would wait to see who McConnell runs against before deciding.
Tea party supporters in the state remain angry over McConnell鈥檚 role in the recent fiscal agreement with the Obama administration that kept the nation from plunging off the so-called 鈥渇iscal cliff.鈥� Some Democratic donors have even discussed teaming up with tea party groups to fund a primary challenge to McConnell from the right.
Why? Because someone to McConnell鈥檚 right would be a weaker statewide candidate, that鈥檚 why.
But Judd is going to have to stop acting coy and make her intentions plain fairly soon is she鈥檚 really going to run. Some state Democrats think her statements against mountaintop coal mining 鈥� a big issue in a state depending on coal jobs 鈥� would drag her down in a Senate race. Yet by toying with a run she鈥檚 blocking other, possibly more viable candidates from getting in themselves.
鈥淓very day that the Democrats don鈥檛 settle on someone to run against McConnell is a day lost,鈥� Nathan Smith, a former Kentucky Democratic Party vice chairman, in late January.
