Utah GOP Rep. Cannon Defeated in Primary

By Michael Teitelbaum, CQ Staff Wed Jun 25, 1:52 AM ET

Six-term Utah Republican Rep. Chris Cannon on Tuesday became the third House member unseated in a primary election this year, losing by a wide margin to first-time candidate Jason Chaffetz in the state's 3rd District.

Chaffetz -- the owner of a corporate communications and marketing firm who was formerly a campaign manager and chief of staff to Utah Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. -- had 60 percent of the primary vote to 40 percent for Cannon with roughly 93 percent of precincts reporting.

The victory virtually assures Chaffetz of a seat in the upcoming 111th Congress, as the central Utah district is one of the nation's premier Republican strongholds. President Bush was favored for re-election by 77 percent of 3rd District voters in 2004.

The result was less a massive surge to Chaffetz than a failure of Cannon to generate the kind of turnout typically enjoyed by House incumbents. With more than 90 percent of the vote recorded, Cannon had just 16,252 votes to 24,009 for Chaffetz, a total of just more than 40,000. By comparison, Cannon alone drew nearly 33,000 votes in a 2006 Republican primary in which nearly 60,000 3rd District residents participated.

This outcome occurred even though Cannon greatly outspent his opponent. Cannon raised more than $760,000 -- including more than $100,000 in the past three weeks -- while Chaffetz gathered just over $176,000. Chaffetz, who had no paid staff or polling, vowed that he would win by attracting grass-roots supporters in all of the 3rd District's precincts.

The contrast between this year's contest and the primary two years ago was illustrated in the district's populous portion of Salt Lake County, which takes in suburbs of Salt Lake City, the state's capital. Cannon in 2006 eked out a narrow but crucial win over challenger John D. Jacob with 51 percent of that county's vote. This year, Chaffetz trounced Cannon there with 63 percent.

Cannon is the first incumbent defeated in a primary since two fell on Feb. 12 in Maryland. Nine-term Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest lost the Republican primary in Maryland's 1st District to state Sen. Andy Harris. Eight-term Democratic Rep. Albert R. Wynn lost his seat in Maryland's 4th District to Democratic activist Donna Edwards, who subsequently won a June 17 special election to take over the seat after Wynn resigned in May.

The problems Cannon faced in the primary campaign were signaled at the Republican state convention May 10. Chaffetz received 59 percent of the delegate votes for the 3rd District contest, falling just short of the 60 percent threshold needed under state law to clinch the nomination outright without a primary.

Still, Cannon had been bruised by opposition at past Utah Republican conventions and survived serious primary opposition in both 2004 and 2006. The latter race, which Cannon won with 56 percent of the vote, had a higher national profile than this year's primary, as Jacob and outside interest groups excoriated Cannon for his relatively moderate views on immigration.

But Chaffetz, running in a less vitrolic campaign environment, parlayed a bit of celebrity -- he was the football placekicker for Utah's Brigham Young University in the mid 1980s -- and a theme of change that resonated in a year when many voters are expressing dissatisfaction with political "insiders." Chaffetz overcame the support Cannon drew from the Republican Party establishment, including Bush and Utah's two Republican senators, Orrin G. Hatch and Robert F. Bennett.

Chaffetz argued that Congress needs new blood, repeatedly stating that he wasn't the guy for voters who want the status quo. Calling himself results-oriented, he portrayed Cannon as an incumbent who has little to show for his 11 and a half years in Congress.

The challenger did not neglect the longstanding argument made by Cannon's critics within the party that he is not enough of a steadfast conservative.

It speaks to the degree of conservatism prevalent in the 3rd District that this argument could be made credibly against Cannon, who -- according to Congressional Quarterly's vote studies -- sided with most Republican House members on all but a tiny handful of legislative votes over the years.

But Chaffetz went after Cannon for approving Bush's "No Child Left Behind" program that expanded the federal government's oversight of local school systems, something Chaffetz said a "true" conservative would never support. He said he would advocate repealing the law and favors abolishing the U.S. Department of Education, arguing, "The federal government should not be in the public education business."

He also criticized Cannon for supporting the 2003 measure that greatly expanded Medicare by creating a prescription drug benefit program, and associated the incumbent with what he described as fiscal irresponsibility practiced by Congress.

And while he did not make immigration the central issue of his campaign, as did challenger Jacob in 2006, Chaffetz did echo the well-aired arguments made by critics of the congressman's position.

Cannon's stance, similar to that voiced by Bush, is that immigrants are essential to the nation's economy, and he countenanced proposals to assimilate a number of the immigrants who currently are in the country illegally while toughening border security. But Chaffetz said Cannon has cosponsored legislation that would provide "amnesty" for illegal immigrants.

Chaffetz pledged, if elected in November, to cosponsor legislation to make English the official U.S. language as one of his first acts in Congress.

Cannon countered by saying that his challenger supports an idea that would provide illegal immigrants with a temporary visa on a path to deportation, saying that is a plank put forth by the Democratic-dominated Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Cannon's main emphasis was on his experience. He said his knowledge of how Congress works prompted him to co-sponsor a 2007 law extending for seven years a ban on Internet access taxes, as well as a 2008 law that would authorize money to reduce recidivism by helping former prisoners obtain housing, employment, education and health care.

Cannon says his influence can be measured in simple ways. While he said he may not be as flashy or talkative as other members, he noted that he regularly attends hearings, offers amendments helpful to Utah at bill markups and speaks occasionally on the House floor.

Chaffetz' political path to Congress has an unusual twist. Chaffetz' father's first wife was Katherine "Kitty" Dickson. After their divorce, she married a Democratic politician named Michael S. Dukakis who went on to become governor of Massachusetts and the 1988 Democratic nominee for president. The family breakup must have been amicable, as the younger Chaffetz -- while a student and football player at Brigham Young -- was a Utah co-chairman of Dukakis' 1988 presidential campaign.

That contest ended as presidential races typically do in Utah, with Republican nominee George H.W. Bush carrying the state in a landslide. And Chaffetz soon shed his connection with the Democratic Party. He says after converting to the Mormon faith practiced by most Utah residents and getting married, he became a Republican, and describes Ronald Reagan, the late president and conservative Republican icon, as his political hero.

Chaffetz does not live in the 3rd District, but in the city of Alpine located about two miles outside of it. He says, though, that he lived in the 3rd before the lines were shifted in a redistricting plan drawn prior to the 2002 election.

The 3rd consists of the western part of Salt Lake County, meanders south through most of Utah County, and then goes south and west through five sparsely populated counties.

Chaffetz will be the overwhelming favorite for his November general election contest against Bennion L. Spencer, a former television reporter who was unopposed for the Democratic nomination. CQ Politics rates the general election race as Safe Republican.