Former Rep. Britt Raybould seeks to reclaim seat from Rep. Ron Nate. Watch this race
Former Rep. Britt Raybould, R-Rexburg, has announced that she’s running to take her seat back from Rep. Ron Nate, R-Rexburg.
Watch this race. It’s far from the Treasure Valley, but its impact will be felt statewide. And it’s likely to be very close.
The election is more than a battle for one seat in the House. It’s part of an ongoing battle for the soul of the Republican Party in eastern Idaho.
Eastern Idaho was long seen as perhaps the most moderate region for the GOP, along with the Magic Valley. It is the home of U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson, former Senate Pro Tem Brent Hill and former Senate Majority Leader Bart Davis.
But over the last several years, that’s changed. In that time, voters have elected Rep. Chad Christensen, R-Ammon; Rep. Karey Hanks, R-St. Anthony; and Rep. Julianne Young, R-Blackfoot. Most significantly, this is the region that sent Nate, a Brigham Young University-Idaho economics professor and the far-right’s intellectual leader, to the Statehouse.
Nate was a lightning rod for controversy during his first stint in the Legislature. He was among the lawmakers who voted to kill a bill that allowed Idaho to participate in the federal child support collection system, over ludicrous concerns that it would somehow lead to Sharia law. It took a special session to fix that.
A hot mic on the House floor also caught Nate saying teachers were overpaid, as lawmakers were working toward the career ladder pay raises for teachers.
The nail in his 2018 re-election bid’s coffin came when a mailer attacking former GOP chairman and lieutenant gubernatorial candidate Steve Yates, using private emails Yates’ wife had sent to Sheila Olsen about personal financial difficulties. The emails had been turned over to campaign operatives by Maria Nate, Ron Nate’s wife, after she had taken them from Olsen’s computer around the time of Olsen’s death.
Nate lost his seat to Doug Ricks that year.
Raybould, whom Nate unseated in 2020 by fewer than 300 votes to return to the Capitol, is a traditional conservative in Hill and Davis’ mold, and that of her grandfather, Rep. Dell Raybould, who represented the district from 2000 to 2018. Raybould is quite brilliant, a CFO and the first female president of the National Potato Council. Unlike Nate, her focus has always been on bread-and-butter issues rather than ideologically charged ones: education funding, agricultural policy and taxes.
The rematch will take place in Madison County, one of the reddest in Idaho. There, 69% of registered voters are affiliated with the GOP, and less than 5% are Democrats. As in much of the state, the GOP primary is the only election that matters.
The race is likely to be very close. Doug Ricks came within 200 votes of ousting Nate in 2016, during his first stint in office. And Ricks beat Nate by fewer than 200 votes in 2018. Nate ousted Raybould by fewer than 300 votes in 2020.
Redistricting will add another wrinkle to the race because Nate hasn’t won an election in Madison County since he was first elected in 2016.
The current District 34 includes all of Madison County and a small slice of rural north-central Bonneville County. The votes in that strip of land tipped District 34 to Nate during the 2020 election cycle. The legislative district map adopted by the redistricting commission removes this crucial strip of land from Nate’s district. In other words, if the 2020 elections occurred under the new districts, Raybould would still be in the Statehouse.
Expect this race to draw a lot of heated campaigning and a lot of money.
This primary is likely to be a bellwether that will not only indicate the future of the region but the future of Legislature as a whole.