VETERAN REPUBLICAN senator Arlen Specter has announced he will switch parties, moving the Democrats a step closer to an unbeatable majority in the US Senate. Mr Specter (79) has long been the most moderate Republican senator and was facing a tough primary challenge next year from conservative former congressman Pat Toomey.
“Since my election in 1980, as part of the Reagan big tent, the Republican Party has moved far to the right,” the Pennsylvania senator said in a statement. “Last year, more than 200,000 Republicans in Pennsylvania changed their registration to become Democrats. I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans.”
Mr Specter’s defection brings the Democratic Senate caucus to 59. If former comedian Al Franken is confirmed as the winner of last year’s Senate race in Minnesota, the Democrats will have a filibuster-proof majority of 60.
US president Barack Obama said he was thrilled to have Mr Specter, one of only three Republicans to support a huge economic stimulus package earlier this year, within the Democratic Party.
Mr Specter said he wanted to contest next year’s Senate election as a Democrat, adding that he would return campaign contributions to former supporters who disagreed with his move. “I deeply regret that I will be disappointing many friends and supporters. I can understand their disappointment,” he said.
“I am also disappointed that so many in the party I have worked for for more than four decades do not want me to be their candidate.”
Mr Specter said he had received overtures from Democrats to join the party for the past five years but insisted that he had hoped until recently to remain a Republican.
Republican national committee chairman Michael Steele dismissed the Pennsylvania senator’s move as an act of political expediency. “Let’s be honest – senator Specter didn’t leave the [Republican Party] based on principles of any kind,” he said.
“He left to further his personal political interests because he knew that he was going to lose a Republican primary due to his left-wing voting record. Republicans look forward to beating senator Specter in 2010, assuming the Democrats don’t do it first.”
Republicans in Congress have become increasingly conservative in recent years and the party now has no members in the House of Representatives from New England. Maine senator Olympia Snowe, a moderate Republican who often crossed party lines with Mr Specter, said his defection showed how inhospitable the party had become for moderates.