Glen Urquhart Struggles To Escape Shadow Of Christine O'Donnell

It seems everyone in Delaware and across the country is talking about Christine O'Donnell, which is making it harder for Glen Urquhart, the GOP candidate for Delaware'sto even get noticed.
This post was published on the now-closed HuffPost Contributor platform. Contributors control their own work and posted freely to our site. If you need to flag this entry as abusive, send us an email.

It seems everyone in Delaware and across the country is talking about Christine O'Donnell, which is making it harder for Glen Urquhart, the GOP candidate for Delaware's lone House seat, to even get noticed. Yesterday he got some reflected glow from the relentless media glare on O'Donnell, but for the wrong reason.

Pressed by her Democratic opponent, Chris Coons, Christine O'Donnell yesterday questioned whether the First Amendment to the Constitution established the separation of church and state. The law school audience gasped.

Radio station WDEL, which sponsored the debate, has the entire event on video.

Her gaffe immediately brought to mind Urquhart's similar assertion linking the separation of church and state to Adolf Hitler. Last April, Urquhart claimed that Thomas Jefferson never used the phrase, but Hitler had, adding, "The next time your liberal friends talk about separation of church and state, ask them why they're Nazis."

See video of the incident below:

Urquhart had tried to dismiss his comment as an "April mistake," but the video lives on.

The comment, which was captured on YouTube, is now being remembered in October. Now the two Republicans at the top of the ticket in Delaware are both captured on video questioning the separation of church and state.

Urquhart had hoped to gain traction in the Christine O'Donnell media frenzy. Has there ever been so much attention showered on a candidate down twenty points in the polls? But polls have consistently shown him to be trailing former Lt. Gov. John Carney, though running slightly better than O'Donnell.

O'Donnell has achieved almost universal name recognition--97 percent according to a recent poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University poll--while Urquhart lagged at only 73 percent. Unfortunately for Urquhart, the only way to break through the media clamor is to have his most embarrassing gaffe resurrected.

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot