Candidate-Wise, Is The Democratic Tent Too Big? Should They Really Keep Recruiting Blue Dogs And New Dems For Congress?

Early Monday morning, the NY Times published a piece by Catie Edmondson and Emily Cochrane, In Conservative Districts, Democrats Have To Answer For Party's Left Wing, that gets off on the wrong foot right from the very start, describing reactionary Utah Blue Dog Ben McAdams as a "moderate." He isn't.

Edmondson and Cochrane started their tale in Nephi, Utah, a small city of less than 6,000 people in Juab County, western Utah. It's part of McAdam's newly won congressional district. In 2016 Democrats there went overwhelmingly for Bernie-- 55 (77.5%) to 16 (22.5%) and Trump came in second (with 14% of GOP votes) behind Ted Cruz 647 to 118. In the general election Trump triumphed in Juab County with 2,759 votes (67.7%) to 742 votes (18.2%) for independent Evan McMullin and 436 votes for Hillary (10.7%). Not exactly a Democratic Party powerhouse county. Senator Mike Lee (R) was reelected with 85.7% of Juab's vote and Governor Gary Herbert (R) got 74.6% of the Juab vote. Last year, Mitt Romney won 80% of the Juab general election vote and Ben McAdams, the GOP-lite Blue Dog was creamed in the Juab County portion of the district, which gave GOP incumbent Mia Love a mind-boggling R+59 share of the county's vote, her biggest percentage of any of the district's 4 counties.

Last week, in Nephi, the The Times reported that McAdams "was grilled by constituents about the 'socialism' and 'anti-Semitism' that they saw coming out of the new Democratic House. 'How long do you intend to ride that train with those people?' one Utahan asked." McAdams is barely a Democrat at all. He immediately joined both the New Dems and Blue Dogs and hasn't been voting with Democrats on the crucial roll calls. He's already distinguished himself as aggressively anti-progressive. And he's hardly the only conservative freshman being attacked, even though they've abandoned their party's positions.

In Michigan, Representative Haley Stevens was asked about her ability to counter what one voter deemed the bigotry of some of her freshman colleagues-- a concern fueled partly by remarks from her counterpart in nearby Detroit, Rashida Tlaib-- and “the negative attitude they bring to Democrats.”

And on a rainy Saturday in Spotsylvania County, Va., one woman stood up in a town hall to remind Representative Abigail Spanberger that while she was the first Democrat to hold that seat in nearly 50 years, the majority of the rural enclave had voted Republican.

“Since the Democrats are now the party of death and taxes,” the woman said, as Democratic supporters scoffed and grumbled, “just how do you propose to effectively represent the taxpayers of Spotsylvania?”

Stevens is also a New Dem and Spanberger, like McAdams, joined both the New Dems and the Blue Dogs. Stevens, who ran as a progressive, is tied with 10 other New Dems as the 99th most progressive member of Congress. Spanberger ran as a conservative and is tied for the 176th most progressive member, already sporting an "F" grade. So does McAdams, who's tied with 4 other Dems as the 227th most progressive. Only 5 extremely right wing Democrats have worse voting records that McAdams. He's already on the watch-list for Democrats likely to switch parties at some point. Needless to say, none of them back Medicare-For-All, the Green New Deal or any other progressive initiatives.

Conventional wisdom-- happily regurgitated by the two non-critical thinking journalist-- is that McAdams and Spanberger are "moderates." Stevens is a moderate; McAdams and Spanberger are conservatives. assert that it was the conservatives who "secured the party’s House majority."

The DCCC maneuvered to get them the nominations and then supported them. There's no reason to claim that progressives wouldn't have won those anti-Trump independent voters just as easily, just as Mike Levin did in CA-49 . Overall, the DCCC adamantly refused to support progressives. They spent almost all of their money on conservative candidates. These are 5 Blue Dog-backed candidates from last year and what the DCCC + Pelosi's SuperPAC, End Citizens United and the Patriot Majority USA dark money SuperPAC spent on each. The percentage was their share of the vote:

• Anthony Brindisi- (Blue Dog-NY)- $5,403,585 (50.9)
• Mikie Sherrill (Blue Dog-NJ)- $2,819,952 (56.8%)
• Abigail Spanberger (Blue Dog-VA)- $2,120,805 (50.4%)
• Xochitl Torres Small (Blue Dog-NM)- $1,915,894 (50.9%)
• Ben McAdams (Blue Dog-UT)- $889,742 (50.1%)

OK... and these are 5 progressive candidates the DCCC and their satellite money organizations refused to help flip red seats but who came close. The percentage is the win number for the Republican:

• J.D. Scholten (IA-04-- Steve King)- ZERO (50.4%)
• Kara Eastman (NE-02-- Don Bacon)- $90,000 (51.0%)
• Nate McMurray (NY-27-- Chris Collins)- ZERO (49.1%)
• Mike Siegel (TX-10-- Michael McCaul)- ZERO (50.9%)
• Sri Kulkarni (TX-22-- Pete Olson)- ZERO (51.4%)

None of that is part of the Edmondson and Cochrane Times story. They're trying to prove the conventional wisdom that Democrats won't maintain their House majority next year if they lose the red-leaning districts like McAdams' and Spanberger's and that it's all Ocasio's, Tlaib's and Omar's fault (for standing up so aggressively for the Democratic values and agenda that motivate the party's activist base). So should the Democratic party jettison these values and forget about this agenda to better cater to conservatives who are embarrassed by Trump? That's certainly what the Blue Dogs, New Dems, No Labels and Problem Solvers folks would love.

At the same time The Times was publishing their corporatist perspective on the Democratic Party, The intercept published an essay by Eoin Higgins about what Democratic activists-- not the Republicans and Republ;ican-leaning voters The Times reported on-- are saying about what they want Congress to do. He wrote that "In upstate New York, Utah, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania, voters who feel a much greater sense of urgency than their elected officials have been reacting furiously to politicians who say the attempt to turn the fossil fuel-based economy around in the next 12 years simply isn’t realistic."

Antonio Delgado was underwritten by the Democratic Establishment in a very big way. The DCCC spent $1,568,032 on his race. End Citizens United (a DCCC arm) spent another $408,646, Priorities USA spent $124,749, and Pelosi's SuperPAC kicked in another $2,581,029. Outside groups spent $5,387,563 attacking his opponent and $703,596 bolstering him. Anyone who imagined Delgado was going to turn out to be a good member of Congress was in for a quick shock. He talked a good, solid progressive game during the election-- though he never persuaded Blue America-- but he has already earned an "F" from Progressive Punch and is tied with McAdams for the 227th "most progressive" voter in Congress. His crucial vote score is 42.86. That sucks.

At a town-hall meeting with constituents last week, he took the "no-can-do" approach groups like the DCCC, No Labels, The New Dems, Blue Dogs and Problem Solvers are recommending to freshmen. His constituents didn't like it and he "was pressed repeatedly by constituents over his half-hearted support for the effort. He doesn’t support the Green New Deal... though he noted that there were aspects to the bill that he backed. Delgado said that he’s more interested in solutions that address the issues around climate change that can be solved now and that the bill as written does not sufficiently lay out a path for that kind of approach to the inevitability of climate crisis." There is no bill, just a resolution, so he's also full of shit-- or incredibly stupid.

Democrats, especially freshmen in the House, are having to face voters in their districts who find the lack of action on climate change to be a major issue for the new representatives. And those complaints aren’t coming from blue districts-- as with Delgado, freshmen Democrats from purple districts are facing resistance from constituents over their hesitancy to endorse progressive programs. Republicans aren’t immune either. On Monday morning, roughly 250 young activists from the Sunrise Movement occupied the office of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) with 35 getting arrested.

The main rhetorical device that Democratic skeptics of the Green New Deal have been employing begins with a confident assertion that they believe in climate science, think the crisis must be taken seriously, and admire the ambition of the Green New Deal. But, they add, the resolution just can’t pass a Republican Senate or be signed by President Donald Trump.

...Rep. Ben McAdams, the new Democratic Congressman from Utah’s 4th district, who unseated incumbent Republican Mia Love in November by a razor-thin margin, told constituents at a town hall on February 19 that while he supported the Green New Deal’s aspirations in principle, he worried that the legislation wouldn’t make it through the House.

“It seems expensive,” said McAdams. “I’m not sure it’s feasible.”

In Pennsylvania, freshman Rep. Susan Wild beat the Bernie Sanders-backed local minister Greg Edwards in the Democratic primary, before turning her red Lehigh Valley district blue. She was faced with a similar barrage of questions from constituents dissatisfied by the new Congresswoman’s lukewarm take on the Green New Deal during a town hall on February 19. Wild doesn’t support the Green New Deal, at least not yet-- she said that she was interested in seeing more details on the proposal before deciding whether or not to sign on-- and that position rankled some supporters who felt that she wasn’t representing their interests. In response to sustained criticism at the event, Wild told the crowd that she was interested in what could be done now, the same dodge that was used by Delgado.

...The environment has long been a top concern of voters in the largely rural 19th, where Delgado unseated incumbent Republican John Faso in the November midterm election with a narrow 50.2% to 47.3% margin of victory. Delgado’s victory in the overwhelmingly white district was a win for upstate New York’s liberal voters, who sent the state’s first black representative from outside of the New York City area to Washington on the back of a campaign that relied on activists and advocates for support-- and included a call for the Green New Deal on the campaign trail.

“I am only beholden to you,” Delgado said in a speech to supporters on election night. “No special interests, no outside voices.”

The voters at the town hall, however, were less than convinced, asking the Congressman whose interests he was representing by not signing onto the legislation. Environmental issues are a bipartisan affair for the 19th; Faso was a member of the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus during his time in office.

...If the reaction to Delgado’s decision to avoid supporting the Green New Deal in his rural, majority white, purple district is an indication of the mood of the electorate, then Democrats running on a more centrist or right wing platform in the next election may be in danger.

Akiva Hirsch, who asked Delgado about supporting the Green New Deal during the town hall, told The Intercept that given the severity of the problem of climate change and the possibility of irreversible catastrophe in only a decade, Delgado’s response was insufficient. Hirsch and a group of friends from Bard College, which is in Delgado’s district, told The Intercept they were registered voters in the district.

It wasn’t all for Delgado on the Green New Deal, however, as at least one of the town hall attendees expressed support for his rejection of the proposal.

“I’m 100 percent happy that you didn’t sign onto the Green new Deal,” said constituent Hillary Thomas. “I think it’s a publicity piece for the people that are promoting it.”

Thomas told The Intercept that she voted for Delgado’s Republican opponent, John Faso, in last November’s election.

Sounds like the perfect person for The Times to focus on!