Report: Nevada GOP wary of Ensign comeback

With Sen. John Ensign no longer targeted by a Justice Department criminal investigation, Roll Call reports this morning reported on the reaction among Nevada Republicans to the prospect that the still-weakened incumbent will press to be on the ballot in 2012.

In a word: awkward.

“I think he’s going to have trouble,” Heidi Smith, a Republican national committeewoman from Reno, told the Capitol Hill newspaper and newsite. “Everybody is being very cagey right now, but I think that John Ensign is going to have a lot of competition.”

"Smith said some activists have already set up political action committees targeting Ensign and that some 'big-money groups' are strategizing against him," Roll Call said.

Ensign's ability to raise money for re-election may recover, Roll Call said.

"The question will more likely be whether Republicans can stomach voting for him despite the scandal," it said.

Smith said Ensign told her over dinner a few months ago his biggest fear is that women are still mad at him for his extramarital affair with his wife's best friend.

"And he’s absolutely right about that," she told Roll Call, adding the money aspects of the controversy "hits both genders." That was an apparent reference to Ensign's parents cutting a $96,000 check to mistress Cindy Hampton and her family after learning of the affair.

Over at the Washington Post, blogger Chris Cilizza cites influential Nevada Republican Sig Rogich as saying Ensign's acknowledged affair and the $96,000 "still puts Ensign in significant political peril"

"The Justice ruling provides Ensign 'some relief,' Rogich said," according to Cilizza. "The overriding issue still remains and (Ensign) could expect it to be exploited in a campaign."