Dems using hourly wage issue against GOP rivals
2006-10-18
Source: USA Today
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rss feedDemocratic challengers in more than two-dozen House and Senate races are attacking Republicans in Congress for taking pay raises while voting against a minimum wage increase.
The attacks are contained in television and radio ads running from Washington state to Virginia. In some races, such as House contests in Indiana and Connecticut, Democrats also link pay raises to Republican votes against combat bonuses for U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
While some of the ads may fudge the facts, political analysts say the message appeals to the pocketbook concerns of voters.
"It's a classic theme," says Michael Wolf, a political scientist at Indiana University-Purdue University in Fort Wayne, Ind. "It always plays well because of the perception that these are people sent to Washington, earning a lot of money and turning their backs" on voters.
Jonathan Collegio of the National Republican Congressional Committee says, "Throwing the pay raise into congressional campaigns is an election-year stunt."
Most members of Congress currently earn $165,200 a year; top leaders earn more. That's $31,600 more than in 1997, when the federal minimum wage was raised to the current $5.15 an hour. Unless legislators act during a lame-duck session after Election Day, lawmakers who will be part of the Congress that convenes in January will get an automatic 2% raise to $168,504.
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