Within the Margin

The finish line is finally in sight for the Democratic primary in NY-19, after dozens of candidate forums, hours of aired television ads, countless touches via doorknocking, phonebanking and Hustle texts, and the stuffing-full-of-mailers of seemingly every Democratic mailbox across eleven counties. And to my excitement, it’s really not clear who’s going to win tomorrow night. I could make a case for just about any of them pulling it off (and in most cases, deservedly so).

One could certainly imagine it being Pat Ryan. To the extent that there’s a consensus out there on where the race stands, folks tend to see him as one of the two frontrunners. He and his surrogates have argued from the start that his biography – military service, business experience, and local roots – would make him the most formidable Democrat to take on John Faso in the general election. He has grown on the campaign trail, gradually dropping an overly-cautious approach that left him saying nothing of substance and hanging everything upon his bio. In its place: a post-Parkland focus on gun safety, amplified by some striking ads including this masterpiece. In taking some of his cues from Jason Kander (using his veteran bona fides to allow him to prosecute the case for an assault weapons ban with greater authority than those who have never touched a firearm) he has charted a course that very nearly carried Kander to victory in tougher terrain in November 2016.

But that was a general election, and this is still – for one more day – a primary election. For a certain segment of the Democratic party at large, and especially in the activist-heavy Hudson Valley and Catskills, Ryan’s ads and mailers are met with suspicion as a reminder of his fundraising abilities and beltway support. Anecdotally, I know Democrats who have ruled him out for both July and November as a result of an Intercept hit piece that highlighted his onetime openness – as a datamining company’s employee many years ago – to a scheme to aid the Chamber of Commerce in spying on labor activists. In terms of prognosticating the primary, it’s important to remember that a lot of the folks most convinced by anti-DCCC messaging and a questionable Intercept (read: Glenn Greenwald’s outfit) article were never voting for Ryan anyway. But the article did give some folks an excuse to rule Ryan out in a large, closely-contested field.

Antonio Delgado is the other guy people expect to be in or around the top spot. He’s the guy who most lights up a room, with a huge smile and at times soaring oratory. The resume is there – Rhodes scholar, Harvard Law, Akin Gump, son of working-class upstaters. The money is there – Delgado has prided himself from the start on assembling the resources to win. That has included early and substantial field investments; this was never a campaign that was going to struggle with petitioning or identifying voters. He hires good people. His resume goes beyond the impressive credentials mentioned above; the man has worked in hip-hop as an artist and producer. He’s an actual person, not the creation of campaign consultants – but there is most certainly a well-molded candidate and campaign there, which like Ryan turns off a certain segment of the primary electorate. Akin Gump is as politically-connected as they come, so any hedging on policy by Delgado is perceived by some as an indicator of “corporate ties.” (I might argue that it reflects a thoughtful fellow who understands that sloganeering about different health care options is only going to end up disappointing those same corporation-fearing citizens when the time comes to evaluate what actually has 218 votes in Congress. Yelling about single payer versus Medicare-for-all versus some other path to the widest pool of insured people possible sometimes seems like an exercise in virtue-signaling.) It’s hard to dismiss his commitment to health care, though, when one remembers this his very first video was with Andrea Mitchell, the woman to whom John Faso lied through his teeth about protecting during last summer’s health care “reform” efforts.

And then there’s the race thing. It’s hard to convey the disappointment of hearing Democrat after Democrat after Democrat say “well, I just don’t know that a black man can win in that district. They’ll attack him over the hip-hop records!” Yes, it’s the whitest district in the state. It also voted twice for Barack Obama and – maybe sit down for this one – white people listen to hip-hop, too. At the risk of giving people who did indeed also vote for Trump too much credit, I think the world is chock-full of white rural white people who will vote you if they think you’re credible on jobs, farm security, and health care – regardless of what music you prefer.

The better argument against Delgado has always been the lack of in-district roots. He’s originally from upstate, yes, but he’s not from the district. He had been out of NY for a long time before moving to Dutchess County to run for this seat. A recent mailer calling touting Hudson Valley roots was an apt description of his wife (a Woodstock native) but not of him. Democrats get pummeled on the carpetbagging issue in upstate NY, and the best way to deal with that weakness is to own it – and then turn around and offer a contrast between your values and Faso’s, and ask voters which better captures the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, Catskills and Leatherstocking Region. When Delgado does that, he excels…when he tries to fudge his local credentials, he looks foolish.

Brian Flynn is the third candidate with the resources and organization for automatic competitiveness, having put plenty of his own money into the race. He has family roots in the district but offers a blurry picture with respect to how long he himself has been a full-time resident. He has carved out an effective niche as a job creator and policy wonk who starts from a set of coherent policy goals (his Plan for the American Worker) and builds his message from there, rather than checking off progressive boxes the way a lot of candidates in NY-19 and elsewhere seem to do. He also may have an additional and electorally potent niche: he has a quite a bit of anecdotal support in the western part of the district. Counties like Otsego and Schoharie are small and don’t have many registered Democrats – but winning them comfortably while the other candidates are splitting Dutchess and Ulster four or five ways might give Flynn an edge in the final tally. In a race where some of the candidates are notorious for focusing on Dutchess and Ulster, Flynn may prove to have been wise to recognize that as important as those populous, Dem-heavy counties may be, the general election requires a candidate who won’t get wiped out in the redder counties…and the primary might require that, too. None of which is to say Flynn is devoid of support in the Big Two; he has the support of a lot of Dutchess committee members as evidenced by a strong second-place showing in the committee’s March 1 endorsement vote.

Armed with fewer resources but the greatest commitment to seeking support in every corner of the district – and the useful distinction of the guy you’re most likely to run into when you’re out and about, whether at a small diner in Sullivan County or a bar in Kingston – is Gareth Rhodes. Fresh off his 163-town tour of the district, Rhodes represents those in the party who believe part of winning – indeed, part of past victories – is showing up. Not everyone in the Democratic Party is resigned to getting to 218 seats by running the table in the 218 most-metropolitan and/or non-white districts. Some folks in the party think Democrats can win in rural areas, too. Rhodes is pretty good at weaving together his biography and platform, aided by having (along with Ryan) the strongest in-district roots of the seven candidates. He shows a genuine interest in esoteric policy discussions not to check off boxes and make sure the activists know that he knows what they care about, but from a genuine place of intellectual curiosity.

The folks who need to find a reason not to trust someone point to Rhodes’ previous work as a press flak for Andrew Cuomo, back in the days when Cuomo antagonized progressives daily (before his 2018 lurch to the left that has convinced few of his good intentions, and has convinced many of his unending opportunism). As someone who has also been in the role of “young staffer to government official,” I would suggest that staffers do not necessarily embody all of the beliefs (or lackthereof) of those they staff…and the younger you are, the more likely that you’re gaining a foothold in government and need not hold a personal referendum every day on whether you are on the most perfect path to attaining progressive goals as someone else defines them.

It’s important to note, though, that Cuomo fared badly in the 2014 primary and general in this district. Rhodes has faced a stern test to earn the goodwill of primary voters who dismiss him by association – unfairly – and would face a sterner one to do the same with the general electorate. But a cascade of endorsements from major labor unions and the New York Times serves as a reminder of what anyone who interacts with Rhodes already knows: he’s not to be pigeonholed, and he’s not riding on youthful exuberance alone. He brings as much gravitas as the other candidates. But the very limited polling made available shows him barely registering, perhaps an indication that breaking through with somewhat limited funds relative to Ryan, Delgado and Flynn is simply too hard, even if you’re the guy who pops up everywhere. Democratic primary voters rightfully view the stakes as incredibly high this year, which may be clouding their ability to see youth and energy as an asset when fundamentals like fundraising and a vast ground game are missing.

At the opposite end of the age spectrum from Rhodes, and in fact most of this youthful field, is Dave Clegg. A 30-year Ulster resident and self-described “country lawyer,” Clegg has established his regional bona fides and has a career that leaves little doubt as to his qualifications and tenacity. He also has a committed base of support among some of Ulster County’s long-tenured progressive activists and elected officials. Given that Ulster County has the largest number of voters eligible for this primary – 30.5% of the total NY-19 Democratic electorate – it’s not a bad place from which to garner the bulk of one’s support. On the flipside, that he barely registers in Dutchess County beyond the “he’s a good guy” level and doesn’t seem to have secured a niche elsewhere in the way that, say, Flynn has, leaves me skeptical that he can prevail on Tuesday. Clegg methodically and cogently argues the case against Faso, and would likely make the party proud enough in a general election. It’s unlikely that he gets the chance, though, when the zeitgeist seems to call for someone who offers more superficial contrast to the older white men who have put the country where it is today.

If the starkest contrast to Faso and Trump’s base turns out to be what voters are seeking, Erin Collier is the obvious choice. She’s the only woman in the race and she’s the second-youngest candidate, behind Rhodes. As an agricultural economist, she offers a remedy to the anti-intellectual strain that, through Republican victories, dominates the federal government at this time (not to mention making her a useful asset to the district). She offers contrasts to her fellow primary candidates as well: not simply through her gender, but also through her roots in the western part of the district. She’s eighth-generation Otsego County, and claims a local hamlet is named for her family.

But her late entry into the race seems to have nullified those advantages. She was first rumored to be considering a bid late late in 2017, but didn’t officially declare until early March of this year…as petitioning was already underway. As a result, she lags in name recognition, fundraising, and organizing, though she has gotten a few mailers out.

Collier made some news last week by leaking a poll showing her far behind when preference was first gauged but closing to within a point of Delgado and Ryan after an “informed ballot” question in which voters were prompted with biographical information about some of the candidates. In a year when women are absolutely crushing it in Democratic primaries, it makes sense that the extra reminder – through informed ballot instead of just a litany of names – would lead to some voters switching over to Collier. It seems a longshot that enough people will do so in the confines of their poll sites tomorrow, but it’s worth noting that throughout the campaign men and women alike have lamented the lack of a woman in the field (Sue Sullivan dropped out in late September).

The final candidate in the race is Jeff Beals, who quickly established himself last year as the most abrasive candidate, throwing punches at his fellow candidates as corporate-owned and insufficiently liberal. In a district where Bernie Sanders triumphed in the 2016 Democratic primaries, Beals most clearly draws from the Sanders playbook. But to that strategy he adds biographical inconsistencies, resume inflation, poor fundraising and a tendency to whine about his bad breaks. There’s a certain type of angry Democrat for whom Beals is a dream candidate, and he has plenty of support among activists and some past and present local electeds. The possibility exists that in a sufficiently-splintered field, the guy who has tried to clam the Sanders mantle might succeed in a district who primary voters went heavily for Sanders and fellow crusading outsider Zephyr Teachout. It’s also worth noting, of course, that given the opportunity to send Teachout to Congress, the general electorate chose Faso decisively.

***

I’d be surprised if anyone topped 30%; I’m not sure a candidate will even manage a quarter of the vote. To some degree, that’s a testament to the strength of the field, not its weakness. The story at the outset of this campaign was that none of the candidates seemed ready for prime-time, but most of them have developed nicely and seem to be plausible Faso foes. If I had to engage in the fool’s errand of predicting the outcome, I might assign vote shares as follows:

That’s a guess with a pretty high margin of error in what still feels to me like a very tight race. It’s a fairly highly-educated guess, combining endorsements, campaign filings, extremely limiting polling data, and anecdotal information from around the district. But it’s emphatically just that: a guess.

***

Worth noting as you peruse the county-by-county results tomorrow night – the share of each county’s active Democratic voters relative to the district as a whole:

To help make those numbers a bit less abstract, some raw numbers: Ulster County had 43,203 active Democrats registered as of April 1. The district’s portion of Broome County – most of the town of Sanford, with the rest of the town and county lying in NY-22 – has 327 active Dems. But to repeat a point from above, it’s entirely possible that with four candidates residing in Ulster, the vote there will be so split that no one comes out of it with a big lead, meaning the smaller counties could prove decisive.

…that headline being the closest those items (Icahn and the American left) will likely ever come to each other.

In the midst of reading (here and here, for example) about the various travails of Trump advisor Carl Icahn, my mind wandered into consideration of the American left’s prior failures to deny its bête noir presidents a second term. Icahn has now served twice as the illustration of America’s descent into clientelism under the present administration; one of the most obvious fears of what Trump’s election would wrought seems to be coming to pass.

This got me pondering the last few decades of American presidential elections. Nixon’s reelection was dreaded on the left and managed to shock any number of people – from Hunter S. Thompson to John and Yoko – despite his comfortable polling leads. Reagan got slapped around in midterms but as 1984 dawned, his second victory seemed almost assured, even as the left saw him as a smiling but sinister threat to labor, global peace, and domestic race relations. George W. Bush engendered abject hatred and cries of fascism, and his quest for reelection offered far more suspense than the other two, but he survived. The only Republican president of the last 50 years to be denied a second term was the one who provoked the least hostility among his foes – George H.W. Bush.

Yet each of those three triumphantly-ratified presidents would see their political fortunes evaporate soon enough. Watergate began to unravel Nixon at the outset of his second term; he would resign the August before midterms and his party went on to lose 49 House seats – on top of the five lost in special elections as the scandal unfolded. Iran-Contra didn’t end the Reagan presidency, but it consumed several years and weakened his standing. Democrats retook the Senate in midterms with a net gain of eight seats. Hurricane Katrina, the Iraq War, and a foolish ploy to privatize Social Security sent Bush into freefall in his first year after reelection. Nothing improved for him the second year, and his toxicity combined with an assortment of Congressional scandals to lose his party both the House and Senate in 2006.

In all three cases, the president’s second term was at best a struggle (Reagan) and at worst an outright disaster (Nixon and Bush). In all three cases, the president and his party suffered heavy political defeats. To a certain degree, that is to be expected for most presidencies, as the public grows restless for change by the time the second midterm rolls around. What seems notable in these three cases is the rapid, steep decline following so soon after voters put their imprimatur on the administration’s work to date.

Is the left skilled, then, at sowing the seeds of political defeat, but cannot reap them in timely fashion? Is there something intrinsic to how the left prosecutes its case against these presidents? I find myself wondering if the intensity and assured nature of its argumentation is taken for granted by the so-called swing voters, who dismiss it as simply being the way of things: “Ah, yes, my liberal friends are once again foretelling the downfall of civilization. Once again, they think all is not well in the kingdom! Such alarmists.” And then Watergate, or Iran-Contra, or Iraq/Katrina happen, and all is confirmed. It seems safe to argue that the intellectual left is quite well known for being loud and abstract, and only when events prove loud enough and tangible enough to match do the political winds actually change.

How will it be with Trump, then? He started with less political capital than these others, and soon began losing ground. He is said to be “rebounding” when he occasionally manages to hit 40% in an approval poll (Gallup currently puts him at 39%). His party trails badly in generic Congressional ballot polls. More importantly, though, his administration has been beset with scandal almost immediately. He hasn’t faced and failed crises like Bush did, but the worst fears of his opposition with respect to ethics and corruption have been confirmed through various dramas and departures from the norm. Have events proven loud enough and tangible enough for the left’s arguments to be heard? Will they be forgotten if things smooth out somewhat before 2020, and the new norms – exemplified by Carl Icahn and his ilk – are fully entrenched?

Before I offer some quick thoughts on Trump and Priebus declaring war on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals this week, I present three pieces of information:

• The 9th Circuit’s overturn rate is above average, but it’s not the highest in the country; it’s third, behind the 6th Circuit (Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee) and 11th Circuit (Alabama, Florida and Georgia).
• The sanctuary city ruling didn’t even come from the 9th Circuit per se, but from a judge on the 5th District Court.  A piece of the 9th Circuit, yes – one of thirteen district courts in that circuit – but not the court itself. The 9th would hear the case on appeal. I’d be happy to excuse the imprecise language but for the fact that this administration is so fast and loose with verbiage and would do well to speak with specificity when they’re talking about unleashing massive judicial changes, such as breaking up a circuit court.
• Conservatives who are “in the know” like to reference the out-of-control 9th to excuse away rulings they don’t like as the doings of some granola-chomping eco-terrorist toiling away on a commune in northern California. The states I mentioned above in the 6th and 11th don’t quite serve the same function in their hyped-up fantasies; you don’t often hear conservatives talking about the need to rein in the un-American extremists of Kentucky and Alabama.

So when Priebus says the 9th Circuit is “going bananas,” and Trump says he is considering proposals to break up the 9th, as “many people” support, they’re speaking in code to activists on their side who accept as gospel truth that the 9th Circuit is beyond the pale and that drastic action is required. Never mind that the 9th Circuit isn’t as far out of the so-called judicial mainstream as they imply, or that changes to the 9th Circuit would shake up courts in Idaho and Wyoming that are a bit harder to caricature than San Francisco, or that it would require 60 votes in the Senate – requiring at least 8 Democrats, and possibly more if western Republicans have parochial reasons to avoid disruption, or that the country has historically held the federal judiciary sacred and it’s one of the few things I can imagine that could actually drive Trump’s approvals even lower. He is conceivably foolish enough to imagine that the successful confirmation of Neil Gorsuch means he can do no wrong when it comes to remaking the courts, but his language sounds radical and drastic (“break up” a court), and the general public may well agree.

And so what this really amounts to…is a conversation with his base. Trump is talking to the 46% of the country that voted for him, and ignoring the rest. There are no national discussions in this administration; he’s only interested in the folks that buy into certain truths about conservative activists, particularly judicial activists. He only wants to speak to those willing to speak in his language; there is no outreach to the other 54%. The framing of the 9th’s rulings as radical will bounce around the conservative echo chamber, and restructuring courts will become accepted wisdom among that 46% as a viable, necessary strategy.

I know consensus is impossible at this time, and sometimes there’s little value in going through the motions of pretending to seek or obtain it. But in the first hundred days, at least, can we uphold one of the ideals of this office? Just one?

In the end, the margin was what it should have been: a comfortable Democratic victory to hold Senate District 10 and with it control of the Delaware Senate. Stephanie Hansen captured a little more than 58% of the vote compared to just under 41% for John Marino, with the Libertarian candidate grabbing the remaining 1.12%.

As I wrote last night, Democrats held most of the advantages here and had to win. But winning the easy ones has not been the party’s forte of late, and Republicans had the strongest scenario they could ask for: a candidate with an interesting profile and background, who had nearly captured the seat for them in 2014, and who was outspent but with sufficient funds to be competitive.

This was not 2014, though: the enthusiasm gap that cost Democrats so dearly that year was not present in this campaign. Helpfully, we can quantify that: Hansen received 7,314 votes today, compared to her predecessor Bethany Hall-Long’s winning haul of 6,230 votes in 2014. Let that sink in for a moment: the Democratic candidate won over a thousand more votes in a February special election for a state senate seat, with nothing else on the ballot, than in the November 2014 election with U.S. Senate and House seats on the line. While one should never, ever read too much into an individual special election results, it seems reasonable to conclude that the Trump presidency has sharpened the focus of  Democrats at the grassroots level and helped them understand that resistance takes place up and down the ballot. That’s how you get 250 people to turn up and volunteer to canvass for a state legislative race on a wintry Saturday, as Hansen did a few weekends ago. And that’s how you blow past your last general election number in a given district.

There are many miles to go on the way back to respectability for Democrats in our state legislatures. Tom Perez and Keith Ellison, now the chair and deputy chair of the national party, have vowed a bottom-up focus that would make wins like this plenty common in the years to come. Hopefully Stephanie Hansen, her hundreds of volunteers, and over 7,000 voters have taken the first step in a very long process.

Last month, my indoor five-a-side soccer team was languishing near the bottom of the table as the fall/winter season drew to a close. A campaign that had started brightly enough with a decisive win and some encouraging draws had given way to a seemingly endless series of one-goal defeats. The defense (including me) was of middling quality at best, the offense lacked a killer instinct. It was not out of the realm of possibility that we’d finish 17th out of 18, compared to our usual hard-fought mid-table (or just under) placement.We were struggling on all fronts, but our next to last game featured a team one spot below us. Beat them, as just about everyone else had done, and we’d secure 16th with a shot to move up another spot in the final week. Lose, and risk dropping a spot and losing more momentum going into the spring season. Pride was on the line, in other words. There are games you simply have to win.

So naturally I lost my man in the penalty area after a corner and turned around with horror to see him collecting a pass and firing it past a goalkeeper who had worked so many miracles for us all season. That’s my goal, I said, but whatever class I showed in taking the blame didn’t make us feel any better about the 1-0 scoreline. The game stood that way at halftime: we were losing to one of the only two teams that had been worse than us all season.

But it’s a game of two halves, football. We equalized soon after the break and plowed forward with resolve the rest of the way until finally, with two or three minutes to spare, I intercepted a ball in midfield and dashed forward. Spotting my workhorse teammate Ronald – a man who carries the pain of his native Ecuador’s massive 2016 earthquake with him onto the pitch and inspires me to do better, or at least try harder – speeding down the left flank, I threaded a perfectly weighted ball past his marker and onto his feet. He took care of the rest with a thunderous strike. 2-1, and it was never in doubt that we’d hold on and see out the victory after that.

***

There are elections you simply have to win. Not because the Delaware legislature is regarded as one of the nation’s most innovative or influential, and not because Democrats are hurting to develop a bench in a state where they have controlled the governorship since 1992 and both U.S. senators since 2000 and the lone U.S. representative since 2010, not to mention most of the other statewide offices for over a decade – on the whole, Democrats are more or less doing just fine in Delaware. Not because the Trump White House will see the result and suspend their assault on immigrants, on health care, on the environment, on civil rights, on the free press.

But because sometimes in life – on the pitch, on the campaign trail – you need a sense of momentum. You need reliability. You need to know that your team can experience a poor run of form but still spy the winnable game…and then actually win it.

That’s Saturday’s Delaware senate special election. Control of the Delaware Senate hinges upon it. They’ve seen a 15-6 majority in 2008 eroded by one seat in each election since. That would have left them up 11-10 after the 2016 elections, except incumbent senator Bethany Hall-Long vacated her seat upon being elected lieutenant governor. So it’s 10-10 right now, pending Saturday’s outcome. Democrats are the side with everything to lose: the First State is one of only six in the country where Democrats control the governorship and both houses of the legislature. They’re the out-party in much of the nation, but this is a seat – and a senate chamber – that they actually have, or had until November.

Let’s be clear: it’s  a Democratic seat. Obama carried it 59%-40% in 2012 (and unofficial calculations show Clinton carrying it 54%-41% last year). But especially in low-turnout special elections, few seats are actually safe if hotly contested, and that’s certainly happening here. John Marino, a retired New York City police officer and current realtor and small business owner, is the GOP candidate. He’s a solid candidate and he’s been close to winning before: in a previous bid for this seat in 2014, he lost only 51%-49%. Democrats are running former New Castle County council president Stephanie Hansen. Both candidates are well-funded, with lots of outside money in the mix: Hansen is getting plenty of support from a Delaware-specific PAC called First State Strong. Marino is getting less money than her but plenty enough to run a race, and far more than the usual Delaware senate race, from the usual mix of anti-abortion, pro-gun, anti-tax groups.

Democrats are spending more because they have more to lose, and anyway it’s funny to listen to a guy complain about being outspent by PACs when his party gleefully opposes campaign finance reforms all around the country. Regardless, Marino has enough funds and existing name recognition to be competitive. What he doesn’t have is a party enthused to find some way to strike back at the party of Trump…and he doesn’t have Joe Biden campaigning for him, as Hansen does.

Democrats have everything to lose and nothing to gain…except a touch of momentum, a bit of confidence, and that little spring in their step that would come from knowing that all the resistance efforts are not for naught, and that the decline of party strength in America’s 50 state legislatures is to be arrested and down the road, reversed.

The party could use a little swagger right now.