For Democrats, any hope of getting the majority of Senate seats — or even just tying the Republicans — next year hinges on winning District 26 this November.
Yet the race in this district, which straddles the counties of Pinal and Pima, has more to it than just tilting the number in one caucus’ favor.
The Democratic and Republican candidates bring diametrically opposing views to the table; the winner’s ideological moorings will impact how the Senate resolves the budget deficit, the biggest problem lawmakers will face next year.
It seems like a familiar race. Al Melvin, the Republican candidate two years ago, is again running this year after a hard-won primary in September.  He beat incumbent lawmakers in the last two primaries, but lost in the 2006 general election.
The Democrats’ goal is to repeat their 2006 success, when their candidate, Charlene Pesquiera, defeated Melvin by a narrow 455 votes out of 71,683 votes cast.
It was a huge upset. The district, after all, has a sizable Republican voter registration advantage, a lead that the GOP has virtually maintained to date.
But the Democrats won’t have an incumbent’s built-in advantage — Pesquiera, a college instructor and consultant, has decided not to seek a second term. Instead, Cheryl Cage, a small-business owner, is hoping to retain the seat for Democrats.
And with Sen. John McCain on top of the ticket, the current political climate could favor Republicans in close local or statewide races.  
The District 26 contest, however, is far from decided. It is “competitive,” said one GOP official.
Rep. Linda Lopez said it’s the seat that Democrats have the “most opportunity” of keeping.
Senate Assistant Minority Leader Jorge Luis Garcia said the Democrats’ chances of defending it are “excellent.”
The contrast between the two candidates is clear. For example, on energy, Melvin favors building a nuclear power plant, saying it is safe and clean. Cage prefers developing alternative energy, saying it would take at least 10 years to build a nuclear plant, not to mention the cost.  Melvin is pro-voucher; Cage is not. He is pro-life; she is pro-choice. He supports Prop 102, the marriage amendment; she does not.
Melvin’s challenge
The challenge for Melvin, a retired U.S. Navy reservist and a university teacher, is to define his candidacy before his opponent does, according to Sean McCaffrey, executive director of the Arizona Republican Party.
“In the last time that he ran, he was portrayed as very brash, very outspoken but not in a positive way,” said McCaffrey. “And in a race where you only have a certain number of days to meet or connect with a lot of people, first impressions can be very powerful. So if your opposition is meeting your voters before you do and that message is incredibly, incredibly negative, it can be hard to overcome that.”
The 2006 general election was Melvin’s to lose. Running against a little-known opponent meant the electorate voted against him rather than for Pesquiera.
McCaffrey said this time around, Melvin is “not letting his detractors define him beforehand.”
Hershberger, who lost to Melvin in the September primary, said Melvin is trying to come across as “kinder, gentler.”
Another challenge for Melvin is to quickly unite his party after a particularly bruising primary, when Melvin had called Hershberger an “off-the-chart-to-the-left-liberal” and Hershberger, in turn, had described Melvin as an “ideological extremist.”
Intra-party wounds yet to heal?
At a debate in Tucson on Sept. 23, there was a sign that intra-party wounds have yet to heal.
When Melvin and Cage were asked about Child Protective Services during the debate, Melvin said he would seek Hershberger’s advice and try to take advantage of the outgoing representative’s expertise on children’s issues.
Hershberger, who was in the audience, said that left him feeling “a little bit used.”
“Now he is turning around trying to associate himself with me and my support for children,” Hershberger said. “That’s a double-standard, and that’s unacceptable.”
If Melvin fails to get the bloc of voters who supported Hershberger in the primary, he could be in trouble this November.
District has sent moderates to Senate
The Republicans have an 8,800-voter registration advantage in District 26. But nearly 30,000 independent voters make the district a wild card.
The district historically has elected moderates to the Senate; Toni Hellon, whom Melvin defeated in the 2006 primary, was a moderate Republican. She had run unopposed in the primary and general elections in the previous election cycles.
GOP official McCaffrey said, “Between the partisan advantage and the conservative-versus-liberal split among independents, it’s a district where if we turned out our vote, we win.”
The political climate also will help Melvin, according to McCaffrey. McCain is on top of the GOP ticket, and it’s not 2006, which was a “bad year for Republicans.”
Hershberger said the McCain factor will add percentage points to any Republican running in November.
“And that’s going to give Mr. Melvin a benefit that he didn’t’ have two years ago,” Hershberger said. “But… he represents a part of the Republican Party that is going to have trouble reaching some others.”
The goal of Democrats is to sway independents and moderate Republicans to vote for Cage, a small-business owner who successfully managed Rep. Lena Saradnik’s bid for the House two years ago.
During the Tucson debate, Cage urged voters to “think about the type of atmosphere that you would like us to have in Arizona.” And in a not-so-subtle swipe at her opponent, she added: “I feel very strongly that there are too many ideologues in the state Legislature and I hope that moderates from Republican and Democratic parties and the independents will come forward and say enough — no more wedge issues.”
Cage’s statement underscores her campaign’s central argument against Melvin: Send him to the Senate and you would have a divisive figure. Lopez, who is running unopposed for the District 29 Senate seat and is helping Cage and the House Democratic candidates in District 26, reinforced that view.
“I’m very concerned about the Republican contender for the Senate and the ideologies that he would bring to the Legislature,” she said.  
During the debate’s closing remarks, Melvin directly addressed concerns, if any, about what kind of representation the voters can expect from him.   
“I’d like to pledge here in front all of you,” he said, “that when elected I will represent everyone — every man, woman and child in LD-26 regardless of political affiliation, whether they be Republican, Democrat, independent or no official party.”
Describing the current mood of the country, Melvin later told the Arizona Capitol Times he doesn’t see “anger or angst or apathy” or people “pulling out of the process” as he did in 2006. He said he senses that people are fired up.
“It’s totally different,” he said. Melvin said he is knocking primarily on independent voters’ doors. “I feel in my gut, at 63 years old, that we are going to have a Republican sweep this year. Under McCain’s leadership, we are going to have at least a 40-state sweep, and it’s going to go from the top all the way to the bottom, including — I believe we are going to have 18 Republican senators in the Arizona Senate and 36 Republicans in the House.&rdquo
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Cage said she has been knocking on doors since April, targeting independents and Republicans.
“I feel as though again the moderate Republicans are not happy. I don’t think any of us are really happy with what’s going on for the last eight years… not only nationally, but here in Arizona,” she said. “I think everybody is ready for a change, and I think there is a clear difference between myself and Mr. Melvin.”  
Asked how she intends to overcome the GOP registration advantage in the district, Cage noted the huge number of independents in the district — 28,954 to be exact.
“The bottom line is,” she said, “no one thought that a Democrat could win in this district and we won two seats last time.”