By Erin McPike and Ben Schneider
May 15, 2008

While months offhand-wringing have marked GOP campaign efforts in the House, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Ensign of Nevada and his team remain unfazed by the National Republican Congressional Committee’s woes.

But Republican Greg Davis’ loss to Democrat Travis Childers in a special House race in the GOP district Tuesday in Mississippi sent signals to both parties about the Senate map.

With 23 seats to defend and three retirements, Republicans’ Senate prospects seemed even dimmer than those in the House at the beginning of the cycle. The NRCC says repeatedly that democrats have to defend 60 seats in the district President Bush carried in 2004 while Republicans have only eight districts to defend that Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry carried.

But while four of Ensign’s most endangered incumbents are in New Hampshire, Minnesota, Oregon and Maine, which Kerry carried, three of them are still polling even with or ahead of their Democratic challengers.

So Far those four Republicans are running on a much different message than what NRCC Chairman Tom Cole of Oklahoma has suggested to his candidates, which is to drag down Democratic House candidates by making the case they will be doing the biding of liberals such as Speaker Pelosi and Democratic presidential frontrunner Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois.

Instead, Republican Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon has run a television ad stating his willingness to work with whomever becomes president. His campaign even points out that Smith was the leading Republican to co-sponsor a bill with Obama to raise economy standards, and he worked closely with Obama before the presidential campaign on a bill addressing health care for small businesses.

Asked who Smith’s best surrogates are this cycle, campaign spokesman R.C. Hammond said Democrats. Former Oregon Democratic Rep. Elizabeth Furse announced her support for Smith in a news conference that is one of three videos embedded on Smith’s campaign Web site.

Like Smith, Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine is touting her centrist record, while GOP Sen. Norm Coleman is prominently touting his bipartisan work with Minnesota colleague Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat. Republican Se. John Sununu’s campaign is just beginning to ramp up, but preliminary efforts suggest he will run with a distinctly New Hampshire-independent kind of message.

“I always tell people, ‘Run on your principles” Ensign said, outlining a much more hands off approach than the central control push used by Cole.

Ensign declined to comment specifically on how the NRCC’s problems and tensions between Cole and House Minority Leader Boehner have complicated the situation in the Senate.

Former NRSC Chairwomen Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina “didn’t leave me with nearly the debt they had over there” he said. He also acknowledged that the NRSC has been free of the kind of internal problems the NRCC has had.

“I ordered an audit right away when I started” he said. And he later added I will work very well with [Minority Leader] Mitch McConnell.

The only overarching message that’s fueling Senate Republicans and earning them better fundraising numbers, according to several strategists, is to keep Democrats from achieving a filibuster proof majority.

“The Senate is the Firewall” said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah. “We need 41 solid votes to keep from passing [Democrats] heinous legislation.”

Hatch and Sen. Roger Wicker, R Miss, both said Ensign is doing well in his campaign post. But Wicker said he does not know how the upper rungs of the Senate GOP have managed to keep things together while House Republicans have fumbled.

“I’m just rowing my own boat over here,” said Wicker, who has been in the Senate for fewer than five months. “I’m watching the proceeding as a new guy.”

But Wicker might find himself more in need of the NRSC as the cycle rolls on. Rep. Artur Davis, D-Ala, was enthusiastic about results of Mississippi special election and confirmed his earlier prediction that it would direct more attention to Wicker’s Senate race.

A Democratic operative pointed out that blacks represent 27 percent of the vote in Mississippi 1st District but 37 percent of the statewide vote, suggesting that former Gov. Ronnie Musgrove, a Democrat, has a even better opportunity to beat Wicker this fall.

Asked Wednesday about the effect the special election outcome might have on Senate races in general this fall, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee Chairman Charles Schumer of New York crowed, “Mississippi was a sea change.” In addition to the Senate race in that state, Schumer said it could mean good things for Democrats in Senate races in Alaska, North Carolina and Kentucky.

Asked if he agreed with Schumer or was worried whit the Mississippi results might mean in his own race in Kentucky, McConnell snapped, “Not at all. It was a house race in Mississippi. This is a United State Senate. We run statewide, you know.”

Still Ensign had a sobering message for GOP candidates.” Needless to say, if you’re a Republican, you’d better not be complacent this year,” he said. “You better run your rear end off and run scared.”

He is not rethinking his strategy, but his is not downplaying the serious implications of what has happened so far this year.

“There are no easy races this year,” Ensign said. “There just are none.”