This page is part of an undergraduate assignment at Davidson College.
The Benefits of Sticking to Message
From his entry into the race up until November 2nd, John Thune stuck to the same message: Senator Daschle had become too liberal and had strayed too far away from the concerns of South Dakotans. By focusing on the need for change, Thune hammered voters with campaign ads and stump speeches that called for Daschle’s defeat to put South Dakotan voters’ concerns back atop representative priorities. Sticking to this message, Thune pulled out a close 51%-49% victory in what some voters claimed to be the ugliest that South Dakota has ever seen (Kafka 2004).
Almost all political commentators agreed that Thune used one simple and effective message. Commenting on Thune’s central theme, Dick Wadhams, Thune’s chief campaign strategist, summarized the campaign’s overall strategy: “This was a simple message, Tom Daschle had steadily become more liberal over the 26 years that he represented South Dakotans in Congress. Our campaign was to point out that Daschle would say one thing in Washington, but something else here in South Dakota” (Colorado GOP Strategist 2004). Columnists agreed that South Dakotans absorbed this message and that Thune’s victory was a direct result of his crafting the campaign around a need for change (Brokaw 2004). Exit polls showed that a quarter of voters thought South Dakota values were the most important part of the campaign, and 8 of 10 in this group voted for Thune (Lammers 2004). Both campaigns resorted to similar negative attacks, but upon interview, South Dakotans for Thune overwhelmingly responded that it was time for change that pushed them to Thune’s side rather than negative attacks (Kafka 2004).
Regarding campaign consistency, Thune did a better job of staying consistent in his attacks of Daschle. Where Daschle “argued that South Dakota needed his clout in Washington,” Thune spotlighted Daschle’s weaknesses (Voters Buy Argument 2004). Hoping originally to model historical SD politics, Daschle began by spotlighting issues, but soon moved to Thune's camp of attacking the opponent. From July until late October, Thune stuck to advertisements that negatively portrayed Daschle as losing South Dakotan values. July ad, “Fired,” focused on Daschle’s attachment to Washington Democrats, and by the release of the October ad, “In His Own Words,” the tactics stayed the same (Group Tries & DSCC Jumps 2004). It was this consistency, contrasted with Daschle's strategy shift, that made Thune’s appeal grow and pushed the challenger to victory.
Copyright Davidson College, 2004, Department of Political Science, Davidson College, Davidson, NC 28035
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Created: 9/9/2004. Last Updated 12/2/2004.
Political Science 318 - Strategy and Ethics in Election Campaigns
