Chabot, Stivers Counting on Low African-American Turnout

Roll Call has a nice piece on the 1st and 15th Congressional races this morning discussing the possible rematches of Driehaus v. Chabot and Kilroy v. Stivers.

In the piece, Republicans seem fairly confident (delusional might be a better word) that without Barack Obama on the ballot in 2010, Mary Jo Kilroy and Steve Driehaus are going to burst into flames and be ushered out of congress. The deeper logic is that without "BO" in the race, African-American voters will stay home and not be as energized to vote.

My favorite Stivers mumble...

"Without Obama boosting turnout among urban and Ohio State University voters, the former state Senator is confident he can win the seat if he decides to run.

“The urban turnout would be much lower, the university would be much, much lower and the suburbs would stay about the same,” Stivers said.

Oh yes, the suburbs stay the same. Of course.

While both Kilroy and Driehaus did benefit from larger than normal African-American turnout, I'm not sure the GOP should assume an entire bloc sits a mid-term election out. What's more, I'm not convinced they aren't facing the same problem on their own side. With traditional GOP voters switching their allegiances or becoming independent, it's a bit of a reach to assume their base is air tight. Assuming Democrats fight to energize the base, while actively courting new voters, it's entirely possible that Chabot and Stivers could face an even greater loss now that they are challengers to incumbents. And incumbents of a fairly popular party right now.