Republican Congressional candidate Ken Timmerman claims his race with heavily favored incumbent Chris Van Hollen (D) is competitive, and a group of Tea Party supporters is coming to try to prove it.
In an email to supporters last night, the Kensington investigative journalist said his campaign’s internal polling shows that since May, Van Hollen has never polled above 48 percent.
No independent polls have been released for the race, according to The Gazette. Despite a reconfigured district that includes traditionally conservative areas in Frederick and Carroll Counties, Van Hollen is expected to cruise to a sixth term.
Since defeating incumbent Connie Morella in 2002, the ranking member of the House Budget Committee has never won less than 73 percent of the vote and has assumed a national leadership role in the Democratic party with a stint as the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
Timmerman, though, has managed to raise Van Hollen’s ire.
At an Oct. 14 candidates event, Van Hollen said he’s “never seen such gutter politics in our community,” according to The Gazette.
After a debate on Sept. 28 in Gaithersburg, Van Hollen could be heard telling Timmerman to “stop lying” as the two shook hands.
Van Hollen is also a resident of Kensington, where a Tea Party group called the 2012 Tea Party Express will stop on a bus tour on Monday, Oct. 29 to support Timmerman.
“The Tea Party Express organizers told us that they picked up my challenge to entrenched borrower and spender Chris Van Hollen because they consider Maryland’s 8th District to be a competitive race,” Timmerman said in the Tuesday night email.
