Former Rep. Jim Thompson of Dallas has launched his comeback bid for state representative, filing a third-party bid with the Independent Party, which will have its first publicly funded partisan primary election in May along with the Democrats and Republicans.
“I’m going after the middle,” Thompson told The Lund Report. “The two parties have gone so far to the left and the right that there’s no middle.”
Thompson waxed nostalgically on the 2011-2012 sessions, where the Oregon House of Representatives was divided, and he shared the House Health Committee chairmanship with Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland. “We counted the votes from the middle,” he said.
Politicos gathered at the state capitol Tuesday for Filing Day, where Secretary of State Jeanne Atkins and her staff posted all the candidates for the May primary election on a huge board in the House chamber.
Most legislators will be vying for re-election, many of them unopposed, like Portland Democrats Rep. Alissa Keny-Guyer and Rep. Rob Nosse as well as Canby Republican Rep. Bill Kennemer. Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, drew a Republican opponent for the fall election, while Rep. Brian Clem, D-Salem, will have a primary opponent, as will Sen. Jeff Kruse, R-Roseburg.
Clem will face Salem resident Robert Rader while Kruse will try to fend off Jessica Kensinger, who in 2014 briefly served on the board of directors of the League of Women Voters of Curry County.
Thompson’s candidacy marks one of the most high-profile races for the fledgling Independent Party. His ability to make a viable run may largely be dependent on his ability to solicit campaign donations, particularly from the local healthcare industry.
The former Republican was ousted in a bitter primary battle in 2014, when now-Rep. Mike Nearman came at him from the right for Thompson’s support for gay rights and moderate positions on Obamacare.
In an interview two years ago with The Lund Report, Nearman opposed even the most popular aspects of the Affordable Care Act, including the provision that health insurers must sell policies to people with pre-existing medical conditions, comparing such a fiat to requiring auto insurers to cover junk cars -- a position he later retracted.
Since in office, however, Nearman and fellow right-wing firebrand, Rep. Bill Post, R-Keizer, have toned down their rhetoric and operated in the low-key manner of other Republican freshmen. Nearman was among 14 chief sponsors of House Bill 4071, the program which offers free health insurance to low-income Pacific Islanders.
Besides Thompson, Nearman also faces a May Republican primary challenge from Dallas City Councilor Beth Jones. The November general election will be a three-person race, with Thompson and the Republican victor facing Democrat George Neujahr, an Independence resident.
The district has a clear Republican base -- Nearman toppled Democratic opponent Wanda Davis by a 52-37 margin in 2014, with several hundred votes siphoned off to each of the challengers from the Green and Libertarian parties as well as a write-in campaign from Thompson.
A true three-way race in the fall may throw the outcome into doubt, but Greenlick told The Lund Report that Thompson would have an easier time one-on-one in the general election with Nearman.
“I’m sorry to see a Democrat up there. If there hadn’t been, he’d get a lot of Democratic votes,” Greenlick said. “I’d like to see him back in the House.”
Greenlick appointed Thompson last year to a special prescription drug task force to tackle the escalating cost of speciality biological drugs, which offer groundbreaking medicinal cures but at an exorbitant cost that could lead healthcare to take an even greater bite out of the economy.
“That’s a nightmare,” he said. “All of these new drugs are biologicals. We’ve got cures for rich people, but other people can’t afford them.”
Thompson said he was interested in a special assessment on health plans that would create a pool similar to the old Oregon Medical Insurance Program for people who need these high-cost drugs without having to suffer the full cost of enormous copayments.
Correction: Jessica Kensinger no longer serves on the board of the League of Women Voters of Curry County, having only been on the board for one month in 2014.
