Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean says last week's win by his party's candidate in what had been a strongly Republican Mississippi district shows that his "50-state strategy" of strengthening his party is working.
In special elections so far this year, Democrats also have picked up congressional seats in Louisiana and in the Illinois district that former Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert held for two decades.
Dean -- the former Vermont governor -- has worked to beef up staffing and resources in states that had been considered so strongly Republican that they were difficult for Democrats to contest.
Since he took over as national chairman in 2006, the Mississippi state Democratic Party went from one staffer to five, and two of those worked on the campaign that ended last week.