Once again, Democrats think they have a chance to avenge their dramatic loss to George W. Bush in the Great Recount War of the 2000 presidential election. And this time, they will have the vote counter herself to kick around.

Rep. Katherine Harris, who was Florida’s Secretary of State nearly five years ago when Bush inched his way to victory over Al Gore, is running for the Senate in a midterm election battle that is destined to keep the president at center stage in a way he might not prefer. Despite her fierce loyalty to the Bush team in 2000, she announced her candidacy for the Republican nomination last week over the objections of White House political operatives, who fear that she could revive recount demons that would harm not only her own chances but GOP candidates around the country.

For most campaigns in the 2006 battle for control of Congress, it is tough to measure how the president will play. With his approval ratings sagging and White House action items such as the Social Security overhaul getting nowhere, some Republicans on the ballot might even hope Bush takes a back seat. Yet keeping his party in power on Capitol Hill will be critical to the success of his own second-term agenda, and he will surely be hitting the campaign trail.

It is not difficult to see how Bush could play in the Florida Senate race if Democrats succeed in their aims to make the 2000 election dispute Topic A — assuming that Harris, as expected, becomes the GOP nominee to challenge Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson, who wants a second term. They hope to again make the woman who was the state’s chief elections officer in the Bush-Gore standoff a rallying point for party activists in races all over the country.

“Go to any Democratic gathering in any state and just mention her name, completely out of context, and you will get a thunderous round of boos and catcalls,” said Bob Poe, who was Florida’s Democratic Party chairman during the recount fight, which ended when the U.S. Supreme Court overruled a state court order for another count.

Poe and other Florida Democrats are champing at the bit to unleash memories of Harris’ role in steadfastly maintaining Bush’s 537-vote margin out of nearly 6 million votes cast in the state that year. “She will ignite the passions of the Democratic base,” he said.

Like many Democratic activists, Poe vividly recalls his belief that Harris used every tool at her disposal to benefit the Bush campaign. But are there enough like-minded voters to significantly hurt Harris, or Republicans running elsewhere?

Democrats have been beating this drum for a long time, but it has not made a difference in any major race in the past five years. Last year, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry and his Florida supporters did their best to revive 2000 memories and turn out their party’s base voters. But he lost the state by more than 100,000 votes. And in 2002, Jeb Bush handily won his second term as governor with 56 percent of the vote despite persistent Democratic attacks on his role two years earlier as the state’s chief executive during his brother’s live-or-die balloting war.

But even a few Florida Republicans think things might be a bit different next year with Harris on the ballot. Not because she’ll turn out those phantom angry Democrats who never seem to make the difference everyone expects, but because the president’s growing unpopularity could give Harris a case of guilt by association among voters who are not partisan Democrats but getting disillusioned with the national state of affairs.

“Even diehard Republicans might think to themselves, ‘Hmmm, she helped put in a guy who is not as good as I thought he was,’ ” said Oscar Juarez, an Orlando-based veteran of GOP statewide campaigns. Juarez said other Republicans on next year’s Florida ballot “are not looking forward to sharing the stage with her.”

Gov. Bush made no secret of his desire to see a different Republican run against Nelson, whether out of concern that she could not win the race or whether he shared concern in Washington that her high profile could hurt the GOP in close races elsewhere. But on the day Harris announced her candidacy, Jeb Bush ended his highly publicized efforts to recruit an alternative to her, saying “my job is done,” and expressing hope that Harris “runs a strong race.”

National Republicans are not so eager to give in. You’d think Bush and his team would be more supportive of the woman who did so much to ensure his 2000 election. But hours after Harris launched her campaign, the National Republican Senatorial Committee issued a pointed statement saying it was “too early” to rule out other contenders for the party nomination.

For now, it seems that Democratic leaders are far more eager than their Republican counterparts to see Katherine run.

Contributing Editor Craig Crawford is a news analyst for MSNBC, CNBC and “The Early Show” on CBS. He can be reached at ccrawford@cq.com.