Anger at Bush May Hurt GOP At Polls

Republican officials acknowledge Bush's problems but predict they will not translate into significant setbacks this fall. "I don't think that intensity is going to be a problem at all" in key House races, said Carl Forti, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Both parties will spend heavily on those races, he said, "so every person who's going to vote will have seen TV ads, gotten phone calls, gotten mail." That will give them ample information to base their decision on the candidates, not on their feelings toward Bush, Forti said. He noted that polls continue to show that most Americans approve of their own House member even if they dislike Congress as a whole, and that bodes well for the party in power.

"They may be upset nationally," Forti said. "But clearly that does not mean they're not going to go vote for their congressman." House elections will turn mainly on local issues and nominees, he said.

The Post-ABC News poll found that 59 percent of registered voters approve of their own representative, a lower number than in past months. But only 35 percent approve of the way Congress is doing its job. Forty percent said they plan to vote for a Republican in this year's House elections, and 55 percent said they will vote for a Democrat.

Republicans will court voters such as Johanna Lee, an insurance customer-service representative from northeast Maryland, a state with sharply contested races for Senate and governor.

Lee, 62, describes herself as a conservative Democrat who regrets voting for Bush in 2000 and 2004. She opposes his willingness to grant guest-worker status to illegal immigrants, who she feels "should be taken out of our country." Lee initially supported the invasion of Iraq, but says now "we should come out of the war because we're not doing any good there."

Despite her discontent, Lee said she would consider voting for Republicans for Congress and governor this fall. "I don't vote party," she said. "I vote for the candidate."

Other voters are less charitable. Shirley Jackson of Woodbury, Minn., said she formerly considered herself an independent voter "and my husband used to be a staunch Republican. But now we're both Democrats."

The main reason, she said, is Bush's handling of the war. "My husband and I think he lied to us, and he won't admit he's lied to us," said Jackson, 69. She said she believes Bush launched the war to avenge Iraq's reported plan to assassinate his father.

Jackson is following the competitive race to replace retiring Sen. Mark Dayton (D), and she doesn't like Republican candidate Mark Kennedy. "I won't vote for him, I'm pretty sure," she said.

In Collierville, Tenn., school bus driver Charlotte Bruce is worried Bush will prove ruinous to GOP candidates this fall.

"He's making such fools out of Republicans that no matter what the Democrats present, that's the one that's going to get in," she said. "And that's frightening," because the country needs bipartisan balance, she said.

Bruce, 54, said she is a moderate Republican and has given money to the party, but now she is exasperated with Bush and his economic policies. She recounted a conversation with neighbors who support Bush because of "moral issues." "I said, 'While he's not killing babies, he's killing you' " with high gasoline prices, a soaring deficit and other problems, Bruce said. "He is going to bankrupt us all."

She said she will vote for Democrat Harold E. Ford Jr. in the contest to replace retiring Sen. Bill Frist (R). She called Ford, a five-term House member from nearby Memphis, "a wonderful gentleman."

Garin predicts that Bush's unpopularity will produce many voters like Bruce and Jackson in November. "The rule this year," he said, playing on an adage, "may be that all local politics is national."

Chris Cillizza, a staff writer for washingtonpost.com, contributed to this report.