Will The Anti-Red Tsunami Sweep The Democrats Back Into Control Of State Legislatures-- Yes, But Why Not Florida?

 

Florida Man x 3

Reporting for National Journal, Mary Frances McGowan and Leah Askarinam wrote about the state of the crucial-- but largely ignored-- down-ballot battles over control of state legislatures. In a tsunami-- even though it's primarily a rejection of Trump-- Republicans on all levels are staring into the wide open maw of defeat. In 2010, two years after Obama's big win, due almost entirely to Democratic Party complacency and incompetence on every level, 21 state legislative chambers flipped from blue to red. The Republicans used these wins to further gerrymander state after state into GOP bastions, particularly North Carolina, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Florida, Virginia, Ohio and Texas. (Democrats did basically the same thing in Illinois and Maryland.)

"Ten years later," wrote McGowan and Askarinam, "Democrats control 39 legislative chambers out of 98 total (excluding Nebraska, which is unicameral). Republicans are on defense, and Democratic groups are stressing the importance of having a seat at the table during redistricting, not to mention the importance of policy goals like expanding Medicaid and increasing voter access." They warn that it's no easy task. Republicans drew the boundaries of the districts being fought over and the Republican State Leadership Committee has had "a gargantuan financial war chest" to work with. Blue America is trying to boost the chances of progressive candidates across the country and you can contribute to any or all of them by clicking on the ActBlue thermometer on the right. National Journal delineates the 10 most likely chambers to flip a week from Tuesday.

The 67 seat Minnesota Senate, which currently has 35 Republicans and 32 Dems, is probably the surest bet, with 10 Republican-held districts that Governor Tim Walz carried in 2018. The Dems need to flip just 2 of them and are likely to flip at least 5.

In Arizona, both Houses are controlled by the GOP and both look flippable in a state that is trending blue and where Biden is way ahead and where Democrat Mark Kelly looks sure to beat GOP incumbent Martha McSally in a US Senate landslide. Governor Ducey is loathed because of his disastrous pandemic response and state legislators are going to get walloped because of him (and Trump). "More so than in other state legislatures," wrote McGowan and Askarinam, "the results from the two chambers are likely to reflect one another. Arizona is divided into 30 legislative districts, each of which is represented by one state senator and two state House members. Republicans hold a 17-13 majority in the state Senate and a 31-29 majority in the House. Democrats should be able to win both but, like Minnesota , this isn't going to have any impact on the redrawing of district lines. (Arizona has an independent commission doing that job.)

Texas though, is a real battle-royale where the ability of the GOP to gerrymander is very much at stake. This one is CRUCIAL. Please contribute to Lorenzo Sanchez, Eric Holguin and Erin Zwiener here. Right now there are 83 Republicans and 67 Democrats in the state House and the Democrats are heavily targeting the 9 Republican-held seats that Beto O’Rourke carried in his 2018 Senate race, focusing on blue-trending suburban areas near Houston and Dallas, where Trump has become an albatross around the neck of every Republican. If the Democrats flip this chamber, the repercussions nationally will be humongous because GOP plans to gerrymander newly blue congressional districts will have to be scrapped.

The Iowa House has a 53-47 Republican majority. The Democrats need 4 seats to take back control. The legislature doesn’t draw the legislative boundaries but it gets to approve or disapprove them. Democrats control 3 of the 4 congressional districts and the 4th is an open seat where J.D. Scholten is running the most energetic campaign in the state. It looks like Biden is going to win the state, as will Theresa Greenfield, who is leading GOP Senator Joni Ernst by 1.8 points on average.

The Michigan House looks ready to flip back to the Democrats as well. Right now the GOP holds 58 seats to the Democrats' 52 but Gov. Gretchen Whitmer carried Oakland County by 17 points in 2018 and the Democrats are fighting hard to pick up seats there and in other suburban districts.

I would call it a much longer shot, but Democrats feel they can take back both the House and Senate in North Carolina, in great part because a federal court declared the old map unconstitutional, the Democrats had a very successful recruiting season and because both Governor Roy Cooper and Biden are surging right now. The Dems need 5 state Senate seats (and 2 are sure things). "The path to netting the other three," wrote McGowan and Askkarinam, "is scattered across the state, with promising races taking place in Raleigh, Winston-Salem, and the Piedmont region. Democrats point to Senate District 24 in Alamance County, where Democratic veteran J.D. Wooten is running against Republican Amy Galey, as a bellwether. Trump carried that district by 12 points in 2016; if Wooten makes it across the finish line, the chamber is likely to follow. In the state House, Democrats need to flip six seats to take a majority. The landscape is a bit rockier than in the Senate, due to a handful of vulnerable incumbents whom the party needs to protect. However, the party has identified nine Republicans they see as vulnerable."

Pennsylvania should be easier, where the state House has 110 Republicans and 93 Dems but with plenty of suburban targets around Philly and Harrisburg for the Democrats to win in, along with Biden. The Democrats are also likely to flip 3 state Senate seats, but they need a 4th (in Lancaster) and if they win it it will mean the anti-red tsunami is bigger than most people expect.

The toughest of the 10 chambers is the Georgia state House, where Democrats need to pick up 16 seats. They'll win seats but probably more like 7 or 8 than 16.

That leaves a chamber that should be a relatively do-able pick up unmentioned: the Florida state Senate, which the top Senate Democrat, Gary Farmer, seems absolutely determined to lose. The state Senate consists of 23 Republicans and 17 Democrats, so the Dems need 3 for a tie and 4 for a majority. It's almost as if they made a deal with the Republicans to go after 2, which will leave the Senate with a 21-19 GOP majority. Early on, the Democrats tried recruiting failed gubernatorial candidate Alex Sink to run for the open SD-20 seat (parts of Hillsborough, Polk and Pasco counties). She declined but the candidate who nearly won the seat against Tom Lee, the retiring incumbent, in 2018 is in it to win it. The state party has not been welcoming, at least in part because Lewis is black and they try to prevent minority candidates from running in "white" districts. (Yes, it's the worst Democratic state party in the country-- or maybe tied for worst with Ohio's.) Right now, it looks like Lewis is going to beat far right nut-job Daniel Burgess, despite Farmer and the state party. That'll make it a tied chamber; one more seat and they have a win.

Dr. Fergie Reid of 90For90, who helped recruit so many of the Florida candidates told me this morning that "Some Democrats are on offense in Florida; many of these Democrats are playing a beautiful style of 'team electoral politics.' 2020 Florida Democrats are contesting 83 of the 84 GOP held State Legislative Districts; 11 out of 11 in the State Senate and 72 out of 73 in the State House. In the 14 GOP held congressional districts, Democrats are contesting 12. Two Republicans were given walkovers,' on the candidate filing deadline date in April, Mario Diaz-Balart in the prime swing district in the state-- CD 25-- and Neal Dunn in CD 2. Recent polling shows serious Biden strength, and serious Trump weakness in Florida. Republicans are fearful of an impending 'shellacking' and rightfully so. Their great fear is losing control. If they lose either the state House or state Senate, Florida Dems will have a say in the next decade’s electoral maps. Kathy Lewis for SD 20 is the 'rate limiting step' to this Democratic 'power possibility' in Florida. Moreover, the state Senate candidates in todo are the key drivers for a potential Biden overperformance throughout the state: Karen Butler for SD 1, Stacey Peters for SD 5, Heather Hunter for SD 7, Scott Fretwell for SD 17, Kathy Lewis for SD 20, Tony Eldon for SD 21, Katherine Norman for SD 23, Corinna Robinson for SD 25 and Rachel Brown for SD 27; the other Florida Senate candidates are already receiving max support. Help the neglected candidates for maximum effect. Sprint to the finish line. Leave no doubt.

Who's missing from this photo-- Matt Gaetz, Ted Yoho, Joe Gruters, Daniel Perez, Bill Galvano, Dane Eagle, Ashley Moody?

The most unpopular governor in America, Ron DeSantis, is not on the ballot. If voters want to make him pay for his pro-COVID/anti-Florida agenda, the can only take it out on his cronies in the legislature. And they should. DeSantis has killed 16,110 Floridians and the state's case total is 760,389-- 35,404 cases per million Floridians, far worse than any big state in the country. On Kathy Lewis' website, is a message about the pandemic: "In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Florida has seen unprecedented numbers of citizens lose their livelihoods and having to navigate an unemployment system that was seemingly designed to deter users from accessing much needed unemployment assistance. Florida’s response to COVID-19 has been disorganized and lacking in measures focused on saving lives. Kathy believes we need a robust and thorough plan developed with the expert advice of scientists and public health professionals to deal with the current pandemic and to prepare Florida for future pandemics with our citizens’ health and safety as our priority."

Bob Lynch is running for the Florida state House held by a top GOP leader-- who is protected by the Florida Democratic Party-- Daniel Perez. Bob explained that "The reason Florida is not on the list is because Florida Democrats made the calculated decision to not be on the list. This was largely led by Gary Farmer, who has a cushy gig in the minority, and he doesn’t want to rock the boat. Cutting deals with Republicans is his job. Representing Florida is not."

"There is," he continued, "a solid chance we flip Georgia, Texas, Arizona, North Carolina, and even freakin’ South Caroline Blue.  You’d think that Florida Dems would take advantage of this historic opportunity to go on a full court press to flip the Florida State Senate and House going into a redistricting year. Instead, Gary Farmer and his cronies decided to spend all of their time and money on Senate District 9 and 39 because that’s where their consultants and vendors can get paid the most and send the kickbacks all up the chain. They have not only completely ignored a historic slate of Senate candidates featuring @Butler4FLSen, @KathyLewisforFL, @Rachel_D_Brown, @NormanFlSenate, @CorinnaRobinson, @HeatherForSD7, @fretwellforfl, and @tonyforflorida, they have openly worked against some of them. Any one of these candidates could change the balance of power in Florida for a decade. Yet Gary and Juan Peñalosa have done everything in their power to abandon and torpedo these candidates. At a certain point, you have to ask yourself why?"

One very prominent candidate who is likely to be serving in the legislature next year and asked me not to divulge his name told me that "The Democrats are bringing a water gun to a bazooka fight with the Florida state legislature. Rather than help Democratic candidates win crucial races across the state, they're leaving them high and dry while actively working against candidates challenging Republican authority. It's genuinely disgusting how little party leadership actually wants to take back the state for the Democrats, especially considering Florida is a swing state with redistricting right around the corner. Republicans will fundraise and promote all of their candidates and shower them with buckets of cash to win. While the Democrats will be like 'OMG thanks for running XD' while doing absolutely nothing to help them win. It's embarrassing. One would think with the GOP's agenda sprinting towards fascism, the Dems might want to help out in critical races. But no, they'd rather be in the minority and collect a check. Holy shit what a petulant opposition party!"

Matt Rogers of Politidope-- and a legislative candidate himself in Virginia-- told me that for the last year, he's "been laser-focused on flipping Florida's 29 Electoral College votes for whomever the Democratic nominee ended up being. During that time, I've heard blood-boiling discussion of inspiring Democratic candidates being recruited OUT of races, party leaders wishing black candidates were 'more attractive' and Party 'leaders' themselves going on Twitter can saying they don't want to 'waste' resources on the brave candidates I've been so fortunate to work alongside with. Nevertheless, we persist. We've got only a few days left to raise money (until October 29th at 11:59 PM) for them. Let's do everything we can to help them and, in effect, help flip Florida's 29 Electoral College votes against the fascist in the White House.

Why Is The Florida Democratic Party Working So Hard To Lose?

 

Remember when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was bragging that his do-nothing response to the pandemic was just what the doctor ordered and how Florida would never be like New York or Italy. Today Florida has had 734,491 confirmed cases of COVID-19 (34,198 cases per million Floridians). New York has had 509,460 cases (26,189 cases per million New Yorkers) and Italy has had 354,950 cases (just 5,873 cases per million Italians). On Sunday Florida, still in the first wave, had 1,870 new cases. New York appears to be in the early phases of Wave II and reported 1,145 new cases. Like Trump, DeSantis has made every single wrong decision about the pandemic since it began, Because of DeSantis and Trump 15,365 Floridians are dead and the state currently has 284,231 active cases, more than any state other than California, which has nearly twice as many people.

DeSantis, the most hated governor in America, isn't on the ballot 3 weeks from today. He's lucky; but his party is on the ballot and voters know who the puppets in the state legislature are. The Florida state Senate consists of 23 Republicans and 17 Democrats. Four seats and the Democrats flip the Senate-- not an easy task... but not an impossible task either. Too bad the Florida Democratic Party doesn't seem interested in doing so.

"The party," former Orlando Congressman Alan Grayson told me yesterday, referring to the state Democratic Party, "should have come together and advocated a pro-survival, pro-health platform including free widespread testing, contact tracing, free state-provided PPE for everyone dealing with the public and all seniors, 'public nuisance' or 'disturbing the peace' enforcement against rule-breakers, free COVID treatment for everyone without insurance, frequent state inspection of nursing homes and senior communities for staff compliance, serious quarantining, selective restrictions tied to local outbreaks, virtual school open to all, and everything else that has been proven to work in places that have beaten the virus. Instead, crickets. Just crickets and funerals."

One of the least-covered scandals of this election cycle is how the head of the Florida Senate Dems, Gary Farmer, attempted to persuade-- rudely-- Rachel Brown into dropping out of an open state Senate race in Lee County to smooth the path for Farmer's Republican girlfriend, Heather Fitzenhagen. Luckily, Brown was not easily intimidated. Farmer's Republican girlfriend lost her primary to a neo-fascist Republican, Ray Rodrigues, and Brown is all that stands between him and another GOP extremist in the state legislature. Farmer is completely dismissive of Brown's campaign and has cut her off from state party funds.

Similarly, Farmer is protecting Trump Florida campaign Chair, Sen. Joe Gruters-- who is also chairman of the Florida Republican Party-- and has done everything he can do to sabotage the campaign of Democrat Katherine Norman, one of the best Democratic candidates fielded by the party this cycle.

Another case of Farmer working as hard as a Republican to make sure the Senate does not flip has been getting some national coverage. Joan Walsh's recent exposé in The Nation, Do Florida Democrats Want to Win the State Senate This Year? tells the story of Kathy Lewis, a distinguished African-American candidate who came close to beating the Republican incumbent last time she ran in a swing district that takes in parts of Hillsborough, Pasco and Polk counties. The Republican incumbent is retiring and the Democratic Party recognized a prime opportunity to flip a seat. They worked hard to recruit, not Kathy but failed gubernatorial candidate Alex Sink. When Sink declined, the party took the district off the map, despite Kathy's candidacy. Many observers say Farmer doesn't like black candidates running in white districts.

Last week, the Tampa Bay Times endorsed Kathy and demonstrated the short-sightedness of the state party. "Kathy Lewis," reads the editorial, "brings a compelling life story and a rich mix of professional and civic experience to this race. Her drive and clear view of the problems Floridians face would bring a fresh jolt of reality to the Senate." Gary Farmer should read the whole endorsement:

Lewis, 59, is an author, speaker and businesswoman who advocates on behalf of families with children with special needs. She was motivated to run for this Senate seat in 2018 after an ordeal with obtaining services for her daughter-- an experience that Lewis said shows the holes and indifference in the social safety net that punishes hard-hit families.

Lewis said her fight for disability rights grew beyond an interest in expanding Medicaid. And she says the coronavirus pandemic exposed the need to deal with social services across the board. She would invest more in education and public health, improve the unemployment benefits process and devise a strategy to address impacts to the budget. She also rightly wants Tallahassee to be more disciplined about preempting local control. Her agenda and infectious energy could bring average residents into the decision-making process and help restore public faith in government.

Republican Danny Burgess, 34, is an attorney and former state House member who served as executive director of the state Department of Veterans' Affairs from 2019 to 2020. Aside from supporting more reliable access to Florida’s jobless benefits system, Burgess doesn’t offer many exciting ideas or stray from the Republican playbook. He supports the costly plan for new transportation corridors, which is unfocused at best.


Lewis would bring a rich life experience to the upper chamber and a history of perseverance. She emerged from an inner-city household in Baltimore to become a financial analyst in both the public and private sectors and a civic leader in school and children’s groups. She has a command of what’s happening on the ground and what should happen at the 30,000-foot level. The Times Editorial Board recommends Kathy Lewis.

Over the weekend, Daily Kos diarist, SemDem, noted that "For the past two decades, there’s one thing the Florida Democrats have gotten really good at: losing." And, as he points out, there are far more registered Democrats in the state than registered Republicans. As of August, 2020:

• Democrats- 5,203,795
• Republicans- 5,020,199
• No Party Affiliation- 3,653,046

The Florida Democratic Party is fairly good at winning seats in overwhelmingly Democratic districts of Miami-Dade, Duval, Broward, Pinellas, Alachua, Orange, Osceola, Leon, Hillsborough, and Palm Beach counties, but would rather not contest races in districts were they need to work hard making a case to non-affiliated voters. They are lazy and incompetent as a party-- which is why it is so refreshing to have candidates up and down the ballot who are not affiliated with the party apparatus, whether state Senate candidates like Kathy Lewis, Rachel Brown and Katherine Norman, state House candidates like Joshua Hicks, Bob Lynch and Anselm Weber or U.S. congressional candidates like Adam Christensen and Cindy Banyai. (By the way, the 2020 ActBlue Florida thermometer on the right will allow you to contribute to any or all of these candidates. Please consider clicking on it.)

Yesterday Rachel Brown-- who isn't in one of those overwhelmingly blue districts-- told me that she only needs $7,000 to get her entire district's voters to click on her website from Facebook Ads. "A $100 donation," she said, "is the equivalent of a volunteer phone banker who calls for 4 hours a day for 7 days a week for 1 week. There are 132,809 registered Democrats in Lee County. I need 121,000 votes to win. This district is definitely flippable. We need help getting the word out. Please sign up for a phone bank or make a donation today. Even if I lose, the information that I put in my ads is necessary for the people to know. I give stats about livable wage, healthcare, climate, affordable housing, COVID-19 in all my ads. If people donate, the money goes to information/education based ads and conversational texting, and blast texts/robo calls reminding left leaning irregular voters to get out to vote."

One of the promising-- future of the Democratic Party-- state legislative candidates, Anselm Weber, is being actively ignored by the Florida party, despite an energetic and compelling campaign in Lee County that will be turning out votes in the presidential, congressional and state Senate races. Yesterday, Weber told me that "In the face of an openly fascist GOP administration, the gatekeepers in the Democratic Party still cede immense ground to the Republicans while actively helping them in key areas. Florida is a swing state with majority Democratic voters. It is deeply negligent in the face of a DeSantis administration that is openly trying to criminalize peaceful protests, refuses to expand Medicaid, and continues to destroy our environment, that the Democrats are not spending as much as they can to help flip the Florida State Legislature. Even if the Democrats win the Presidency and both chambers of Congress, the door is wide open for Republicans to continue their authoritarian and austerity driven agenda in Florida or any other state. The Democrats should take a page from the Republicans and fight for state and local elections as much as they fight for the Presidency."

Another candidate candidate didn't want to go on record but told me that "the party should and can do way more to help down ballot candidates and it's a shame they don't. Whoever is the chair in 2022 needs to commit to truly supporting down ballot candidates-- as many great candidates won't run again because they aren't treated well."

SemDem went on to point out that Farmer is only targeting 2 Senate seats (SD-9 and SD-39), guaranteeing that the state Senate will not flip. A vigorous grassroots movement has a bone to pick with Farmer and the state Party and has helped make sure a Democrat is running in every district. Like most people, SemDem has identified Kathy Lewis as the Democrat who has the best chance to bring the party the crucial 3rd seat that would force the GOP to share power with the Democrats. He points out that her swing district "transverses the I-4 corridor, which is critical for Biden’s Florida campaign... Supporting this race is a no-brainer. Unfortunately, not only has most of the Democratic senate caucus not endorsed her, she told me that two major donors who had pledged money were told not to donate to her campaign. What is going on?

Florida Senator Gary Farmer, who is set to be Democratic Minority Leader in 2021, oversees the Democratic Senate Victory funding. He has ensured that Senate Districts 9 and 39 are flush with money. District 9 challenger Patricia Sigman has been receiving funds from the Florida Democratic Legislative Campaign since March. More importantly, she and District 39 challenger Jose Fernandez received endorsements early on that helped big donors open their checkbooks. Sigman and Fernandez have raised half a million each.

Kathy Lewis never received such treatment. Mr. Farmer has tweeted against spending money on “long shots” that take away from races that he feels can be won. To be fair, he must spend a lot to win both Districts 9 and 39, and this year he must also spend money in District 3 (Tallahassee) and District 37 (South Florida) to ward off surprisingly strong challengers—even though they are in blue areas. The Democratic incumbents for SD-3 and SD-37 have over $300K each.

However, District 20 is far from a long shot. In fact, an internal poll, commissioned by a large donor in September, showed the race to be very competitive. The poll data showed that Lewis’ Republican opponent, Dan Burgess, had an edge until questions were posed from the GOP agenda, such as cutting Medicare, fracking and not fixing former governor, current Sen. Rick Scott and Gov. Ron DeSantis’ unemployment system-- which became an utter disaster in this state after COVID. The poll swung to Lewis by a 24-point margin! With appropriate funding, and Lewis’ plan to digitally micro-target constituents, the district could be in great shape for a flip.

Nonetheless, she not only received the cold shoulder on funding, she also has only managed to get the endorsements of five state senators as of this writing: Annette Taddeo, Lori Burman, Victor Torres, Audrey Gibson, and Bobby Powell. Endorsements are needed to bring in big donor funding. The other 12 Democratic state senators have not endorsed her, and in some cases, stated they wouldn’t. Fergie Reid, Jr. of 90for90.org revealed that Democratic state Sen. Darryl Rousen told him he had a friendly working relationship with Burgess, the Republican candidate, and thought Kathy Lewis wasn’t a strong enough candidate to beat him. I reached out to state Sen. Rousen and left messages, but they were not returned as of this writing.

If the Florida state Senate doesn't flip, it will be Gary Farmer's fault. If Florida fails to deliver its 29 electoral votes to Joe Biden this cycle it will be Gary Farmer's fault. If Florida remains a Republican hellhole it will be Gary Farmer's fault. Debbie Wasserman Schultz ran the Florida Democratic Party into a ditch; Gary Farmer is keeping it there. Whose payroll is Farmer on?

And it isn't just the venality for characters like Wasserman Schultz and Farmer that have turned Florida into such a challenge for Democrats. The party's incompetence is legendary. Adam Christensen, one of the state's rising stars, told me, regretfully that the state is far behind where it should be technologically-- at least in the rural parts of the state the party has been ignoring for years. Recently, his campaign spent $3,500 buying data from the party. "We decided to run tests on this  data to see just how effective it would be. We found that 80% of it was wrong. This included disconnected phone numbers, wrong cell numbers, incorrect addresses or emails ect… Data wins races, and right now Florida Democrats are running blind in the most critical areas-- that is if they are able to pay for this data at all. In my opinion if the Democratic Party of Florida gave out their software to everyone running and taught them how to do constant updates then they would have a phenomenal crowd-sourced operation and would win far more races than they do currently. It’s time to move into the 21st century, and we can’t afford to keep making the same mistakes."

The Country's Political Future Runs Through State Legislative Elections

 

In Florida, the Republicans have pretty close to a one-party state government. Ron DeSantis is the most disliked governor in America, but he's still the governor (and not up for reelection in November). The state House has 71 Republicans and 46 Democrats. The state Senate has 23 Republicans and 17 Democrats. The state House is going to need concerted Democratic effort for several cycles to flip it. The Florida Democratic Party is just not capable of that and is, in fact, worse than useless. Democrats would have a better chance to flip seats if the state party ceased to exist. The Senate looks more promising, right? 40 seats... just flip 3 and it's a 20-20 power-sharing tie. Flip 4 and Florida is no longer a one-party state. But there's a problem-- his name is Gary Farmer and he's a hack politician from a deep blue district in Broward County. He's slated to be Minority Leader in 2021 and desperately does not want to be Majority Leader. So he has made sure the state party is only targeting two seats. That guarantees the GOP maintains their dominance. Gary Farmer likes being dominated.

Maybe if they targeted 5 or 6 seats, they could win 3 or 4. Imagine that! It would be enough to stop the Republican decennial gerrymander plan in its tracks. The party is forever whining they have no money. Why should anyone give them any. They suck! I bet if they made a real concerted effort to win the Senate back, they'd be flooded with contributions.

A Florida political expert told me that the map drawing "will go like last time. The Senate GOP will try to gerrymander, the House GOP may or may not go along with it, and the Florida Supreme Court will end up deciding it, as it has the right to do."

Bob Lynch, the Democrat running for the Miami-Dade swing district held by Daniel Perez put the problem very clearly. "There is no other state and no other major county that has Republican leadership on down the line. We are also quickly approaching 14 thousand dead Floridians. Coupled with the disastrous unemployment system, and refusal to take the Medicaid expansion in the middle of a Pandemic and there has never been a better time for Democrats to compete for every seat. With the Census and redistricting coming up, we cannot afford to ignore any race. Any seat could be the difference between Florida being under Republican control or us having a say for the next decade. Investing in my race not only makes sense given the dynamics of my district, but it also forces my opponent to play defense and ties up resources. This is a pure return on investment for minimal capital play. One we can repeat all over the state if Democrats decide they really want to compete. So far that seems unclear."

Nationally, the DLCC-- Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee-- (and its National Democratic Redistricting Committee) aren't doing a bad job-- certainly much better than the Florida Democratic Party is. Their top targets appear to be chambers in North Carolina, Texas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Iowa and... not the most obviously flippable chamber of all-- the Florida state Senate. After Farmer failed to recruit Alex Sink to run in the 20th SD, he refused to back Kathy Lewis, a black woman who nearly ousted Tom Lee, the incumbent, in 2018, with no help from the Democratic Party. Now Lee is gone and Lewis-- with all that name recognition-- is up against a right-wing extremist. She would be the tie vote. But Farmer refuses to budge and just threatens, bullies, and blusters.

What can gerrymandering by state legislatures accomplish? Well, in 2012, House Democratic candidates won 59.6 million votes-- 1.4 million more than did House Republicans. But Republicans won 234 seats in Congress, compared with 201 Democrats. There are state legislative elections in 43 states this year-- for 86 chambers. Republicans are playing defense and worry about toxicity at the top of the ticket. Will an anti-Trump wave turn into an anti-Republican wave that wipes out scores of political careers across the nation?

Next year 17 states are using bi-partisan redistricting commissions instead of state legislatures to redraw the post-census maps:

• Alaska
• Arizona
• California
• Colorado
• Hawaii
• Idaho
• Iowa (although the state legislature gets to approve or reject it)
• Michigan
• Missouri
• Montana
• New Jersey
• New York (although, like Iowa, the state legislature gets to approve or reject it)
• Ohio (a new plan that is probably unworkable)
• Pennsylvania (for the state legislature-- which still draws the congressional districts)
• Utah
• Vermont (must be approved by the state legislature)
• Washington

Writing for Roll Call last January, Jacob Fischler reported that "The state legislative campaign arms of both parties said wins in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin would help win congressional majorities for the next decade. Those six states send a total of 116 representatives to the U.S. House-- more than a quarter of the entire voting body. Republicans outnumber Democrats in their combined delegations, 70-46. Both chambers of the legislature in all six states are now held by Republicans, and all empower their legislatures to draw congressional district lines." He rates Pennsylvania as the likeliest target, Georgia as the toughest.

The DLCC is spending $50 million to flip chambers and at least one allied group, Swing Left, is also spending. Fischler wrote that "Flipping a chamber in Texas, as in Florida, Georgia or Wisconsin, would break a Republican trifecta-- control in both legislative chambers and the governor’s office. In all states but Minnesota, one party controls both legislative chambers going into the 2020 elections. Similar, for redistricting purposes, is North Carolina. The state doesn’t give its governor, Democrat Roy Cooper, the power to veto maps drawn by the Republican-controlled legislature. [National Democratic Redistricting Committee spokesman Patrick] Rodenbush called the path to flipping a chamber in Tar Heel State 'tough but doable,' pointing out that the legislative elections will use new maps drawn after a 2018 state court ruling that found the North Carolina lines represented an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.

Yesterday Politico's Ally Mutnick equated the race to turn the state legislatures with the presidential race! "Far away from the glare of the presidential campaign," she wrote, "a competition rivaling it in importance is playing out across the country: for power over the redistricting process-- and potentially control of the House for the next decade." And she honed in on North Carolina and Texas. "Both parties are funneling millions into the battle for the Texas state House and the North Carolina legislature, eager to have a greater say in the crafting of what could be as many as 53 congressional districts between the two states combined. Republican mapmakers locked in a GOP advantage there over the past decade: Before 2018, the GOP held 69 percent of House seats in Texas and 77 percent of seats in North Carolina. 'North Carolina and Texas have a history of some of the worst gerrymandering in the country,' said Kelly Ward Burton, the president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, an initiative formed to break the GOP's hold on the map-drawing process. 'And so the ability to move from extreme gerrymandering into fair maps is incredibly notable.' Thanks to curbs on gerrymandering forced by voter initiatives and public pressure, along with the 2018 midterm elections, Democrats have already made up some of the ground they lost to Republicans after 2010. That year's wave election helped keep the GOP in the House majority for eight years and in control of many state legislative chambers for the entire decade."

North Carolina and Texas are so important because they are large, growing states entirely under GOP control-- and many of the other maps Republicans drew a decade ago have stubbornly endured, blunting Democratic gains. Privately, many Democrats concede they have no chance to flip any chamber in Ohio or Wisconsin, and only a narrow path to gaining control of the Florida state House.

Democratic strategists in Texas say 15 to 20 GOP-held seats will host competitive races, most of which lie in the quickly diversifying suburbs. Several of those are open seats, thanks to Republican retirements, and nine of them were carried by then-Rep. Beto O'Rourke in his 2018 Senate bid. Texas Democrats have mimicked the national party’s successful 2018 strategy, recruiting several women of color and veterans who are capitalizing on suburban disgust of President Donald Trump.

"In all these districts, in the polls I’ve seen, the president is definitely upside down in terms of his favorable rating. And that is hurting the entire Republican ticket," said Texas state House Democratic Caucus chair Chris Turner. "This is definitely the biggest battlefield for the state House that I can remember at least since my election, which was in 2008."

...Democratic operatives see the greatest opportunity in areas where rapid demographic change is diluting the GOP’s edge. Forward Majority is funneling its resources toward four growing states: Texas, North Carolina, Florida and Arizona-- largely abandoning the Rust Belt targets it went after in 2018.

“Democratic performance in state legislative races underperformed the congressional wave of 2018, and a lot of pundits said, ‘Well that’s gerrymandering,’” said Vicky Hausman, a co-founder of the group. That’s true, she agreed, in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, where the population is static.

“It’s not true in the Sun Belt, where we’ve just seen so much population growth and diversification in the suburbs essentially blur the lines of the gerrymanders,” she said. “They just don’t hold.”

The Blue America 2020 state legislative thermometer above has some of the most progressive candidates running for state legislatures around the country. Please consider chipping in what you can. This is the future of the Democratic Party and the future of the country.



UPDATE: Katherine Norman is one of the progressive Democratic state Senate candidates who could help flip that chamber. And she's running against one of the most toxic Republicans in Florida politics, Republican Party chair and Trump campaign co-chair Joe Gruters. This morning she told me that her opponent "represents the very worst about the GOP, and dare I say, the FLGOP which is an even more cultish group. He claims that he wanted to get dark money out of politics and shares an office with the registered agent of 76 Republican Super PACs Eric Robinson. He inflames race issues by calling the coronavirus the ‘Wuhan’ virus at the RNC, falsely claiming the McCloskeys were threatened by BLM protesters on CBS News with Jim DeFede. He embraces the candidacy of self-proclaimed Islamaphobe Laura Loomer. He is a Trump fixture that embodies and represents the administration above all else." 

Every day I am connecting with voters through my outreach on social media. Often, I find that there is someone running against this entrenched Republican is enough to garner major support. Many people I have spoken with haven’t felt represented or hopeful in decades.

I am so proud to be a part of the movement for real, transparent, government in the face of deliberate deception under our current leadership. It is clear that the voters do not trust the FLGOP and I would love to reach and engage as many voters as possible.

I have so much data and intel on my opponent. I have been working diligently to understand the needs and motivations of voters in my district. If I had the funding I could hammer the message home to voters here in my district and certainly about the FLGOP across the state for Biden.

With more money my campaign could take on the kind of strategic large scale operation necessary to send a serious message to this very powerful incumbent, to the FLGOP as a whole, and to Democratic Voters in my district and beyond. I would be proud to do so and am critically invested in making sure that I have exerted all measures humanly possible to prevent a FLGOP victory in November.

 

Is Gary Farmer's Abject Fear Of Winning Going To Cost Biden The State Of Florida?

 

Florida is the ultimate 50-50 swing state. After FDR died-- and Florida had given him over 70% of its votes in each of his 4 runs-- Florida became a purple state. Truman won and then Eisenhower won there twice. After that, it went like this:

• 1960- Nixon 51.51% to JFK 48.49%
• 1964- LBJ 51.15% to Goldwater 48.85%
• 1968- Nixon 40.53% to Humphrey 30.93% to Wallace 28.53%
• 1972- Nixon 71.91% to McGovern 27.80%
• 1976- Carter 51.93% to Ford 46.64%
• 1980- Reagan 55.52% to Carter 38.50%
• 1984- Reagan 65.32 to Mondale 34.66%
• 1988- Bush I 60.87% to Dukakis 38.51%
• 1992- Bush I 40.89% to Clinton 39.00% to Perot 19.82%
• 1996- Clinton 48.02% to Dole 42.32% to Perot 9.12%
• 2000- Bush II 48.85% to Gore 48.84%
• 2004- Bush II 52.10% to Kerry 47.09%
• 2008- Obama 51.03% to McCain 48.22%
• 2012- Obama 50.01% to Romney 49.13%
• 2016- Trump 48.60% to Clinton 47.41%

Very few votes-- just a handful anywhere in the state-- can tip a statewide election, and often does. And there are 29 electoral votes at stake-- same as New York and more than any other states other than Texas (38) and California (55). Trump can't win a second term without and it's such a major target for Biden because of that more than because he needs it himself. In Politico yesterday, Matt Dixon noted that Florida Democrats have built a vote-by-mail lead. But there is more than that at stake: control of the state legislature and at least 3 or 4 congressional seats. Dixon pointed out that Florida Democrats "have requested roughly 730,000 more election ballots ahead of the general election than Republicans, who have seen their traditional vote-by-mail dominance eroded by the president’s efforts to brand it as a vehicle for widespread fraud."

As of Thursday morning, Democrats in the nation’s largest swing state had requested 2.3 million mail ballots, compared with 1.5 million requests from registered Republican voters. That’s a departure from four years ago, when a million Republicans requested ballots compared to fewer than 882,000 Democrats.

It’s a good-- but not conclusive-- early sign for Democrats less than six weeks from Election Day in a state where every vote counts. Trump and Democrat Joe Biden are all but deadlocked in the state, where Trump defeated Hillary Clinton by just 166,911 votes.

...[But a] request for a mail ballot does not equate to a ballot cast.

During Florida primaries last month, Democrats failed to return nearly 800,000 mail ballots. Republicans, by contrast, had fewer than 562,300 requested ballots unaccounted for. Florida voters in all mailed 4.2 million ballots in the primary.

...Florida Republicans also tend to turn out in much larger numbers on Election Day, which can swamp Democrats’ mailed ballots and early in-person voting advantages. During the August primary, 576,875 Republicans voted on Election Day, compared with 325,961 Democrats, an advantage that the GOP expects to maintain in November.

...Trump this year has made mailed-ballots a partisan bogeyman with baseless accusations that have hurt his own chances in the battleground state. While on a tirade about remote voting, Trump appeared to encourage North Carolina residents to illegally cast two ballots-- by mail and in person-- prompting a fresh spate of worries among his allies. But Republicans close to the president so far have been unable to persuade him to stop equating vote by mail to fraud.

The persistent attacks already have hurt Republican voter turnout in Florida, where the party long has had an edge in vote by mail. During the August primaries, 1.9 million people cast ballots by mail. Of those, nearly 60 percent were Democrats, a shift from past performance.

In the 2016 primary, for instance, of the 1.1 million vote-by-mail ballots cast, 57 percent came from Republicans.

“Republican numbers are tanking for sure, due almost exclusively to Trump’s false claims of rampant fraud,” said incoming state Senate Leader Gary Farmer, a Fort Lauderdale Democrat running his caucus’ 2020 campaigns. “Historically, the Republicans have kicked our butts with vote by mail. Not this year.”

Republicans may lose the state because of Trump... Democrats may lose because of Farmer, whose ambition is to be Senate Minority leader. The Florida state Senate consists of 40 members. Right now, 23 are Republicans and 17 are Democrats. If the Republicans lose 4 seats (net), the Democrats get a say in state government. Farmer is so panicked about the idea of a Democratic majority that he has worked-- not something he is known to do much-- to sabotage Democratic candidates running for the Senate! Joan Walsh, reporting for The Nation last week, told the story elegantly yesterday of how Farmer has undermined Kathy Lewis' campaign. Just as bad, Farmer demanded that progressive Democrat Rachel Brown drop out of her race and cede her district to the GOP without a fight, a move that could cause Biden to lose enough votes to lose the state and perhaps the presidency. That's who Gary Farmer is-- the worst of the Democratic Party anywhere.

The Rachel Brown story is an interesting one. Farmer was eager to see his girlfriend, Heather Fitzenhagen, a Republican state Rep, win the Lee County-based Senate seat (Fort Myers, Cape Coral, Sanibel). GOP incumbent Lizbeth Benacquisto is termed-out of office and Fitzenhagen is a vaguely mainstream Republican compared to another state House member, neo-fascist Ray Rodrigues, who was also running for the Republican nomination. Farmer demanded-- on several bullying phone calls-- that Brown drop out, insisting that somehow that would help his lover. Brown demurred and is now the Democratic nominee-- who Farmer-- in control of all institutional state Senate campaign funds-- adamantly refuses to back. The Trumpist neo-fascist Rodrigues slaughtered Farmer's girlfriend in the GOP primary, 47,935 (74.8%) to 16,115 (25.2%).

A couple of days ago, Brown told me that "Compromise is something I am familiar with. My university (Florida Gulf Coast University) has sanctions on the percentage of university owned land they can develop on, so every year they buy more land so they can build on more of it and still remain in the required percentage agreement. This is exactly what we are doing when we bend the knee to people who don't think healthcare, clean air and clean water should be a basic human right. When we accept compromise, we lose land we will never regain. Farmer and friends handed the nomination to a Republican who, like Gary Farmer, voted against allowing folks to purchase prescription drugs at lower prices from Canada. They saw Heather having a heart once because she voted against parental consent for abortions because "in many cases the parent is the cause of the pregnancy" (Heather's words). She has a level of personhood but under pressure from her party she will always vote against the needs of working people." She continued, bending over backwards to be "fair" to Farmer. Please read her whole statement and consider contributing to her campaign by clicking on the 2020 Florida thermometer below.

It can be easy to feel defeated, which is why I sympathized with Gary when he called. He sounded scared. The Republicans are the party of the rich, and to win an election you need to buy ads. The person with the most money usually wins because they can buy the most ads. I'm sure Gary has lost plenty of times, and he is forced into a rigid way of thinking... how can I do my job... who can I get in who can help me do my job... So he starts to empathize with the enemy and graciously accept any crumb they give him.

I am on the outside and I see the big picture. If we leave vacant seats uncontested across Florida, we are handing over democracy to the Republicans in exchange for 40 lashes instead of 41. We have to fight because our entire nation depends on the way Florida votes this year. Yes, I have a personal fear of Ray Rodriguez winning and destroying Florida but the heart of the matter is what the public knows. If the public knows that an awful man is in control, and they don't like him and they revolt, great. If the public thinks everything is fine when in reality it is not, well that's even more dangerous.

Also, when you don't support a candidate financially you are sending them into battle with nothing. Yes I can get creative, but I'm going to need at least $20,000 to reach all the voters I need to reach and that's still incredibly low for a Senate race.

The fact that Gary at this point cannot work with Heather to join me, the way he joined her to take me down is pretty nasty. I offered a hand of unity to Heather when she lost. I asked her to join me in my fight against Ray. Surely she cares about beating him a little bit (even though she never showed up to forums with the two of us, I cannot imagine she gave up her congressional race to go after the party's chosen future governor for nothing) I thought surely a good political move for her even would be to join a young emerging female in politics, but no. She and Gary and the rest of the state Senate Dems chose to shun me like an Amish community. I have never felt more unwelcome. I, someone who is putting my life on hold to save Florida from a tyrant... the Trump of the Florida Senate.

Florida Democratic Party-- Exposed!

State Senate candidate-- and passionate environmental leader-- Katherine Norman will change Tallahassee in ways that will be a transformational joy for the entire state of Florida

 

Congratulations are due Joan Walsh for her powerful and cogent exposé of the crooked, worthless Florida Democratic Party in the new issue of The Nation: Do Florida Democrats Want to Win the State Senate This Year? "Party leaders’ reluctance to support promising challengers, and a penchant for punishing those who complain about that lack of support," she wrote, "provokes the question." Too bad she missed the one about Gary Farmer trying to bully Rachel Brown, a Democrat out of an open seat race because he was screwing the Republican (who lost her primary anyway). Now Farmer refuses to back Brown in the race.

"Florida Democrats," wrote Walsh, "are locked out of state-level power by a GOP trifecta that runs the governor’s office, the House, and the Senate. But they only need to pick up three Senate seats to achieve at least a tie in that chamber, and thus reach a power-sharing arrangement with the GOP, which is especially important as the state takes up redistricting next year. Party leaders and local observers seem to agree that two Democratic candidates have a decent chance to flip GOP-held open seats, in the Miami-Dade and Orlando areas. But a 21-19 balance gets the party very little in terms of legislative clout, particularly when it comes to redistricting. That’s why observers and activists are increasingly perplexed that Florida Democratic leaders and donors haven’t coalesced around at least one or two more Democrats whom concentrated support might push across the finish line, especially if November turns into a blue wave election. Which it could. The once-popular Governor Ron De Santis now has the second-worst Covid-approval rating of the nation’s governors, right behind Iowa Republican Kim Reynolds. Meanwhile, Joe Biden is running ahead of Donald Trump in a state Hillary Clinton lost by only one point, largely on his strength with seniors. Billionaire Michael Bloomberg just announced plans to pump $100 million into Florida to elect Democrats."

As you may be aware by now, Blue America is supporting some of the most promising challengers in Florida, including three amazing women running for the state Senate, the aforementioned Rachel Brown, the amazing Katherine Norman, who is taking on Joe Gruters, the chairman of the Florida Republican Party and a top Trump lackey, and the candidate Walsh concentrated on in her piece, Kathy Lewis. Clicking on the ActBlue thermometer on the right will show you all of our Florida candidates and allow you to contribute to all or any of their campaigns. Building the Florida progressive bench is incredibly important.

Most of the confusion about why the state Democratic Senate leadership isn’t championing more challengers converges on Kathy Lewis, a writer and disability-rights activist who ran in a red district in 2018 and came closer to winning than anyone expected, taking 46.5 percent of the vote in this traditionally Republican, rural, urban, and suburban district, even though she was outspent more than 10-1 by a longtime GOP incumbent. Now he’s stepping down, prompting a special election for an open seat in this Tampa–St. Petersburg area district anchored by Hillsborough County. With more money and experience behind her, Lewis and her supporters believe she has a solid chance of victory this time, but party leaders don’t seem to see it that way.

And pointing out her lack of party support is, confoundingly, making it harder for her to raise money, Lewis told me. At least two major donors told the Senate District 20 candidate directly that party leaders warned them away from her campaign, because she has talked to local and national news outlets, including The Nation, about her struggles to get state Democrats to take her campaign seriously. More than one Florida Democrat has suggested she stop talking to the press about her travails, if she wants to gain support.

“Nobody’s gonna tell me what to say,” Lewis told me. “I can’t be bought.”

Lewis is not the only Florida Democratic candidate to feel abandoned by party leaders. After the State Democratic Environmental Caucus and the voter-access group 90 for 90 collaborated on recruiting 36 challengers for state House and Senate races-- one for all but one seat-- Senate Democratic minority leader Gary Farmer, who drives official caucus spending on 2020 races, belittled their efforts.

“I’m guided by science & reality,” Farmer tweeted. “Contesting every race is great if you have $ to do so. We simply don’t & won’t until we achieve majority. When you spend on races that are long shots you take $ from races that can be won.” Beth Matuga, a consultant for Senate Victory, a group representing Florida Senate Democrats, also replied defensively on Twitter, arguing that “the caucus has grown in 10yrs from 12 to 17, with very real opportunity to get to 19 this cycle…I’m tired of people pretending like contesting downballot seats is a new idea when they’ve been ignoring it for 10yrs.” It’s true that the caucus has clawed back seats, but if it only gets to 19 this cycle, critics note, it cedes redistricting entirely to the GOP, which will then draw new maps unlikely to give the Democrats a chance to win the Senate anytime soon. (I got pushback on that notion from one Florida source, who says that with a slim two-vote majority, Republicans won’t be able to sacrifice any incumbents to change district lines, which they did in 2011, after the GOP landslide of 2010, because they had a larger edge.)

Down With Tyranny blogger Howie Klein, long a pull-no-punches advocate for the party’s progressive insurgency, retorted in a post, “If There Was No Florida Democratic Party, It Would Be Easier For Democrats To Win.” Klein specifically cited Lewis’s lack of support, among others, as an example.

There is clearly major friction, in Florida and elsewhere, between a new wave of outside groups plus longtime activists who believe Democrats should be contesting many more, if not every, state legislative seat, and party leadership, which tends to fight to protect incumbents. “This is a real tension,” a leader of an outside group working in Florida told me. “Running in every district, if it doesn’t come with the necessary support, isn’t strategic.” On the other hand, party leaders tend to be over-concerned with protecting incumbents, along with their own leadership positions, and thus often define “winnable” races too narrowly, this person said, adding, “Kathy Lewis is exactly the kind of candidate we should support.”

I watched this play out in Virginia in 2017, where by most accounts Democratic House Caucus leaders, and even some progressive activists, thought they could pick up roughly eight GOP seats in the House of Delegates, though they were down by 16. Yet many more Virginia challengers argued, loudly, that they deserved support. Ultimately, Democrats won 15 seats, almost taking over leadership, thanks to brave insurgents, the intervention of new outside groups, and the emerging blue wave that in 2019 gave Virginia a Democratic trifecta, with control of the State House, Senate, and governor’s office.

Florida Democrats indeed look to be outmatched in terms of fundraising this year. The Florida Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (FDLCC), the arm that supports Senate candidates, had raised just under $2 million by the end of August, compared to $7.1 million hauled in by the Florida Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee, according to the Tampa Bay Times. In 2018, the Democrats were outspent $46 million to $18 million.

So the party is investing in flipping two Senate seats, also, like Lewis’s, left open by the departure of GOP incumbents. Leaders backed Representative Javier Fernández to pursue an open seat in Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, and put money behind him. In the Orlando area, officials recruited and invested heavily in labor attorney Patricia Sigman. In that Orlando race, the two parties have already spent more than $1 million, combined. Senate Democrats are also defending incumbent Jose Javier Rodríguez of northeastern Miami-Dade, who won narrowly in 2016 and faces a well-funded GOP challenger, as well as an open seat in greater Tallahassee, recruiting Representative Loranne Ausley.

In Lewis’s District 20, party leaders tried to recruit Alex Sink, the state’s former chief financial officer and 2014 candidate for governor. Sink declined, and has endorsed Lewis. Lewis is beginning to rack up other meaningful endorsements, including four Senate incumbents-- but Florida’s Senate has a 17-seat Democratic delegation, which means that with only seven weeks before the election, 13 of them are still AWOL. And she has received nothing from the official Senate Victory funding arm, the FDLCC.

Meanwhile, Lewis’s GOP opponent, former state representative Danny Burgess, has raised more than $270,000 so far to Lewis’s $44,000, and just went on television with his first ad.

Weirdly, even some of Lewis’s supporters are reluctant to talk about her struggle for funding. Several Lewis backers ignored my outreach. One incumbent senator referred me to Senate minority leader Gary Farmer, instead of returning my call. Farmer, who controls Democratic Senate spending and has not endorsed Lewis, did not return two messages. A representative from Senate Victory stressed that decisions about individual races are based on data, adding, “While Kathy Lewis is a great candidate, the numbers show better opportunities for pickups in other areas of the state.”

Most disturbing, Lewis, who is African American, says she’s been criticized for making race an issue, when she herself has, as far as I know or can determine via Google searches, done no such thing. The issue of race did move front and center in July, when a local white Democratic leader said on a Zoom call with Black Democrats that Lewis’s race was “not high on our list because of where the polling was. What we do is, we prioritize based on our overall goals. White, Black, brown—it doesn’t matter who that candidate is, it’s where they fall on our election priority list.” A local Black Democratic activist protested: “I just think any Black woman in the race right now stands a chance and should be given a little more money than you might think they need. I just feel that you should give them more money!”

It must be said: After this conversation drew national attention, Lewis’s endorsements by local Democratic leaders began to surge. Money, not so much.

Lewis supporter Dr, Fergie Reid Jr., of the group 90 for 90, has no qualms about discussing the role of race in the lack of support for Lewis. During his many phone calls advocating for recruited candidates, he intermittently heard the phrase “minority-access district,’’ which he took to mean majority-black (which Lewis’s district is not, though the number of nonwhite voters is continually climbing). And he said so, explaining that he understood that to be a Jim Crow euphemism for a “Black District”-- or, alternatively, an “acceptable district for a Black person to pursue.” He received no pushback, he says, “only embarrassing affirmation.”

Whatever the role of race, many smart Democrats are increasingly questioning the Senate caucus’s neglect of Lewis’s campaign.

One Democratic operative who has worked in Florida said, “If you don’t compete, you can’t win. Senate District 20 should be a top target. It’s in the heart of the I-4 corridor that has seen strengthening support for Democrats this year, it saw strong Dem performance in 2018, and it could be the key to winning the Senate, when few competitive seats are up.”

This morning Rachel Brown reminded me that "Kathy Lewis won over 87,000 votes last time, more than 46%, without any help from the state party... That's what showed me that grassroots candidates like myself can give the Republicans a run for their money without state party help... We have to fight because our entire nation depends on the way Florida votes this year. Yes, I have a personal fear of Ray Rodriguez winning and destroying Florida but the heart of the matter is what the public knows. If the public knows that an awful man is in control, and they don't like him and they revolt, great. If The public thinks everything is fine when in reality it is not, well that's even more dangerous. Also, when you don't support a candidate financially you are sending them into battle with nothing. Yes I can get creative, but I'm going to need at least 20,000 to reach all the voters I need to reach and that's still incredibly low for a senate race." I'll just leave off here with another reminder that readers can support Rachel Brown, Kathy Lewis and Katherine Norman in their state Senate races by clicking on the thermometer above or right here. Every voter they contact and persuade in their own races, is another voter-- whether they win or lose this year-- against Trump in November. If Rachel, Kathy and Katherine win their races, the GOP no longer controls the state of Florida. That simple.