Raise You Hand If You Think Trump Worried About The Climate Crisis And Aquifers When He Gave The OK For The Keystone XL Pipeline

The Ogallala Aquifer is crucial to Nebraska and to the whole country

Jane Kleeb is the chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party and is also a Bold Nebraska activist. Her letter urging all the Democratic Party presidential candidates to take the NoKXL Pledge yesterday was on behalf of Bold Nebraska. This is the pledge:

• If elected, I pledge to take executive action on Day One to stop any construction on the Keystone XL pipeline-- no matter what-- and revoke the existing presidential permits issued unilaterally by President Trump for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, sending both projects back to relevant federal agencies to undergo legitimate environmental review and Tribal consultations.
• I pledge to direct all federal agencies (State Dept., FERC, Army Corps) to submit these two projects, as well as all new pipeline and energy infrastructure projects to a true climate test, and reject permits for any project that would exacerbate our climate crisis.
• I pledge to protect the property rights of farmers and ranchers from eminent domain abuse, and to honor the treaties the U.S. Government has signed with sovereign Tribal Nations.

"Presidential candidates, she wrote, "are asked many questions about what they'll do if they are elected. Many of those questions focus on reforming vast structural problems-- which in most cases will also require a separate effort launched by Congress. But we have a question for the Democratic presidential candidates that a newly elected President will have full authority over on Day One in office: Will you reverse President Trump’s reckless, unilateral action to approve a permit and stop the Keystone XL pipeline?"

President Trump took an unprecedented and unilateral action in March 2019 to approve a single pipeline with the stroke of a pen, on an "Executive Memorandum" granting a permit for TransCanada's proposed Keystone XL tarsands export pipeline project.

U.S. Presidents are not empowered to write up proclamations that give Big Oil a free ride, and bypass our nation's bedrock environmental laws written to protect our water, land, clean air and a livable climate.

While Bold and other landowner, environmental and Indigenous groups have filed new challenges to Trump's illegal KXL pipeline permit in federal court, we are asking the 2020 Democratic presidential contenders to pledge now to revoke Trump's unprecedented, unilaterally issued permit for KXL.

If a Democratic president is elected, we ask they pledge to take executive action on Day One in office to revoke Trump's issuance of pipeline permits-by-presidential-fiat for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, and immediately restore a true "climate test" for further review by federal agencies (Army Corps, FERC) of these projects-- and all new energy projects-- like Enbridge's Line 3 tarsands pipeline, fracked gas pipelines in Appalachia, and vast expansion plans for LNG exports.

We further ask candidates to end eminent domain abuse, and to honor our treaties with sovereign Tribal Nations.

The President of the United States should stand with the sovereign rights of Tribal Nations, the property rights of farmers and ranchers in rural communities opposed to the pipeline, and everyday Americans who care about a livable planet for our grandchildren who have been fighting together to stop KXL for nearly ten years.

This morning, Jane told me that Elizabeth Warren and Jay Inslee signed the pledge immediately and that so far, no one had refused. The pledge is for presidential candidates but Jane is thinking about one for candidates running for Congress. Mark Gamba is the progressive mayor of Milwaukie, Oregon, running for a congressional seat occupied by reactionary Blue Dog Kurt Schrader and he would, no doubt, be a Day One signer. "It is unconscionable that eminent domain is used to steal private property for the profits of oil and gas companies," he told us just now. "Eminent domain is meant to be used for the public good-- a new public road, a new city hall etc. Not a pipeline that won't even provide much in the way of taxes since the American oil and gas companies pay a fraction of what they should pay, and many of those pipelines serve one foreign corporation moving their product for shipment to another foreign corporation. When I'm elected I will work to pass a bill making this behavior illegal."

Yesterday He Was A Republican State Senator; Today's He's A Democrat-- And Running For Governor

Until this morning, Nebraska Republican state Senator Bob Krist was running for governor as an independent. Although it's been leaking for a couple of days, today he announced he was quitting the Republican Party and running as Democrat against Governor Pete Ricketts.

It probably has more to do with the desire to automatically appear on the May 15 primary ballot without having to collect petition signatures than anything to do with a transformation to the ideals and values that some Democrats still believe in, although Krist often crossed the aisle and voted with Democrats against official GOP positions, driving the Republican leadership up the wall.

After Krist switched his voter registration Monday, Democrats said he will be a competitive candidate, while Republicans criticized his path to becoming a Democrat.

Krist had previously said he planned to create a new political party and gather the 5,500 signatures necessary to do so. Then, earlier this month, he filed a lawsuit to challenge a state law that says nonpartisan candidates who want to run for statewide office need to collect more than 100,000 signatures to appear on the ballot.

Krist also struggled to raise funds as an independent-- he ended 2017 with $14,000 in the bank.

Krist on Monday confirmed that he had switched parties but declined to comment further. He has scheduled a press conference Tuesday with Lincoln Mayor Chris Beutler and current and former state senators.

Krist was appointed by former Gov. Dave Heineman as a Republican. He has often bucked his own party leaders on issues such as prenatal care for illegal immigrants but has said that his opposition to abortion separates him from the Democratic Party.

Ricketts’ campaign manager, Jessica Flanagain, said: “Krist has had a drama-filled pathway to registering with the (Democratic) party he’s voted with for years.”

And at a Monday press conference, Nebraska Republican Party officials tried to paint him as disingenuous for the party switching.

“I think what we’ve seen today is more flopping around than a catfish on a sandbar,” said Republican National Committeeman J.L. Spray.

In response, Krist’s campaign released a statement: “Voters are fed up with this kind of constant partisan politics from Gov. Ricketts and his party bosses that divide us rather than unite us. I pledge to bring all of us together and to focus on unity and problem-solving, not ideology to move our great state forward.”

State Sen. Burke Harr of Omaha, a Democrat, said Krist has a good record.

“I’m glad that he’s finally come home to his roots, which is representing the working-class person,” he said.

Nebraska Democratic Party Chairwoman Jane Kleeb declined to comment Monday.

Two other Democrats have announced that they’re seeking the seat: Vanessa Ward, a pastor from Omaha, and Tyler Davis, a University of Nebraska at Omaha instructor.

Today Kleeb told us that "The Democratic Party welcomes Sen. Krist and his strong leadership with the disability community, veterans and years of working across the aisle for Nebraska’s families. We have over 130 Democrats running this cycle and are offering Nebraskans a real choice at the ballot box to end one-party rule." Krist is a retired Air Force Lt. Colonel and the fact that he flew over 100 combat missions probably means more to most establishment professional DC Dems than where he stands on issues like Medicare-for-All and other factors that are driving the energy of the resistance and the determination of the grassroots to take back the government from Trump and his enablers.

I know this is mean, but I do want to mention that when former Florida Governor Charlie Krist switched parties and "became" a Democrat, he won a congressional seat. He now votes with the Republicans about as frequently as with Democrats on the crucial issues the House takes up. ProgressivePunch rates him an overall "F." Just sayin'. As for the Nebraska Krist, he's been fairly anti-Choice, was given an "A" by the NRA, is good on marijuana policy and switched from being anti-LBGT to being a good voter on gay issues. Planned Parenthood has graded him a couple of zeroes but their latest grade for him was 50%. I wonder how he'd be on the cutting edge agenda Bernie will be running on in 2020, things like Job Guarantee and cancellation of student debt. What do you think?

Nebraska Public Service Commission Approves Keystone XL Pipeline

As you probably know, the Blue Dogs, New Dems and DCCC are all furiously pushing Brad Ashford on Omaha voters again. Ashford, an opportunist who changes parties like normal people change underwear, was one of the 3 worst Democrats in the House for his one miserable term. Having been fired from his new job, he decided to jump into a race he can probably win in an anti-GOP wave, but not hold in a normal midterm. He's a big Keystone Pipeline proponent and normal Douglas County Democrats are happy to have a progressive alternative, Kara Eastman. This morning, after the pro-pipeline ruling, she told us that she's "opposed to today's decision by the Nebraska Public Service Commission approving the Keystone XL Pipeline." So are an awful lot of other Nebaskans, especially in the Omaha area. Kara:

For the last eleven years, I've has worked with Omaha Healthy Kids Alliance combating the devastating effects of lead poisoning, among other environmental hazards, in Omaha, Nebraska. Why was the organization started, you might wonder? Omaha has the nation’s largest residential superfund site where lead poisoning has affected thousands and has had an especially adverse impact on children. We now know what lead can do to water because we’ve seen the tragedy unfold in Flint, Michigan. In Omaha, the community has rallied around an organization to deal with lead-contaminated soil and a long-term health crisis. It was started because funds from a legal settlement from a large corporation had to be used to clean up a toxic, polluted Superfund site. The EPA also had to come in and spend hundreds of millions of dollars to clean up what a big corporation left us with-- lead poisoned soil. I know firsthand what unregulated industries do to our environment, our citizens, and our most vulnerable population-- our children. I know what can happen when concerned activists lose out to the possibility and allure of corporate profits and their well-funded campaigns to persuade people that their big business will benefit the community in the long run. I also understand that short-term thinking like that can and does lead to long-term catastrophic consequences and decades-long clean-up projects like the Superfund site in Omaha.

I oppose the Keystone XL Pipeline and its limited economic benefits to Nebraskans-- maybe 50 full-time, permanent jobs created in the long run. I oppose the pipeline because it will mostly benefit a large Canadian oil company. We don’t even need the oil in America-- we’re now exporting our oil surplus! We need to invest in renewables and new technology and not the old regime of dirty energy. I've seen regular people forced to cede their land and their rights to a foreign company so that construction can begin. I support the 10% of landowners on the proposed route in Nebraska who are still standing up for the property rights and won’t sell to TransCanada. But most of all, I oppose this project because of the potential for environmental destruction and the poisoning of our water due to small and large spills that can and do happen regularly-- about every other day on average in the US. An Iowa pipeline leaked over hundred thousand gallons of diesel fuel last year, and when a farmer found an undetected leak on Keystone 1 in South Dakota around the same time, the pipeline had to be shut down for 3 months! Finally, we've just seen 210,000 gallons of dirty tar sands oil leaking out of Keystone this past week in Amherst, South Dakota. Having dirty, tar sands oil seep into our soil and water-- as it will have 56 river crossings and be built over one of the nation’s largest aquifers-- is not a risk worth taking so that a multinational corporation can ship oil to Texas to refine and process for export overseas.

A few months ago, the Omaha World-Herald headlined a letter to the editor, Ashford's flip-flop on Keystone pipeline by Trent Cooper: "Former Rep. Brad Ashford’s change on the Keystone XL pipeline is the perfect example of why Democrats lose congressional seats and lost the presidency. I will never support him again. We need Democrats who will do the right thing for our state and country, not what it takes to keep their seat." No one likes a flip-flopper or an opportunist.

A couple of years ago Bold Nebraska was far harsher towards Ashford, when Jane Kleeb, now Nebraska Democratic Party chair, wrote that Ashford was siding "with a foreign oil corporation over Nebraska farmers and ranchers." Ashford, she wrote, "voted for a second time to approve the risky Keystone XL tarsands export pipeline, despite strong opposition from his constituents and a promised veto of the wrong-headed bill by President Obama."

“Rep. Ashford continues to support eminent domain for private gain with his vote for the risky Keystone XL pipeline,” said Bold Nebraska director Jane Kleeb. “To pretend this massive, foreign tarsands pipeline somehow does not impact climate change or risk our water discounts science and common sense. Farmers and ranchers can only breathe a sign of relief because President Obama will veto this reckless bill.”

Over 3,500 concerned citizens signed a Bold Nebraska petition urging Rep. Ashford to vote against the Keystone XL bill, and dozens braved a freezing January day to show up at his Omaha offices to protest and register their disappointment with Ashford’s staff after his first vote in support of the pipeline.

Rep. Ashford recently stated in a response to a constituent’s letter critical of his support of TransCanada’s Keystone XL that he “will be an active voice in Congress seeking to decrease our energy dependence on foreign sources of energy.”

Last time we checked, Canada is a foreign country. Furthermore, the tarsands piped through Keystone XL would be exported to China and the world market and do nothing to serve U.S. energy independence.

Rep. Ashford is also spreading misinformation to his constituents, claiming in a letter that TransCanada “would be held legally and financially liable for any damages incurred as a result of a spill at any point along the route.”

In fact, TransCanada advises landowners to take out liability insurance at their own expense, and does not have a bond in place in Nebraska to cover spill clean-up. Further, since this is a tarsands (vs. traditional oil) pipeline, TransCanada is exempt from paying into the U.S. Oil Spill Liability Fund. Facing huge costs from a spill, the company could conceivably file for bankruptcy in the U.S. and the federal government, landowners and the State of Nebraska would be left holding the bag.

Finally, Ashford makes a false claim in his letter that the 2011 re-route of the pipeline now “avoid[s] the environmentally sensitive Sandhills,” when the State Department’s environmental review of the pipeline even acknowledges this to be untrue.

Rep. Ashford’s constituents and Nebraskans fighting to protect our land, water and climate are deeply disappointed that Ashford has again opted to toss them under the bus and side with the Koch Bros., the GOP and a foreign oil corporation.

In The Trump Era, Who Needs Ethics Rules?

Ro Khanna is holding PhRMA's feet to the fire in the House

Former Congressman Chaka Fattah started his 10 year prison sentence yesterday, after being convicted last June for fraud and bribery charges. Wednesday was a busy day for corrupt lawmakers. Nebraska's most heinous Republican state legislator, Senator Bill Kintner finally announced he is resigning... just as his colleagues were about to kick him out of the Senate. He called a press conference and told the media "To paraphrase Richard Nixon, you won't have Bill Kintner to kick around anymore." He had been fined for having cybersex on state-owned computers with various women. His response to that was to get on twitter and carry on about how the 2 million-plus women who participated in the anti-Trump marches last weekend are two ugly to be sexually assaulted.

Although his resignation doesn't go into effect until Monday, Jim Scheer, the Speaker of the legislature, asked him to stay off the floor and refrain from participating in any debates or votes.

Kintner is a longtime woman hater, having attracted attention in 2013 by responding to a non-political question in a newspaper about what the biggest mystery in the world is: "Women. No one understands them. They don't even understand themselves." But, of course-- as is often the case with right-wing bigots-- women aren't the only group he's disdainful of. Two years ago the Nebraska Latino American Commission condemned him for routinely using racist slurs against Hispanics during debates in the legislature.

In his resignation announcement he portrayed himself as a fighter for the far right crackpots who sent him to the legislature. "[A]s much as my heart says to fight," he said, "my head says it is time to step away from the Legislature... I hesitate to do so as I know my resignation will be hailed as a victory to the progressive and aggressive liberal movement. However, one of the most gifted leaders of all time was King Solomon in ancient Israel-- a man of many gifts and many challenges. In the Bible, King Solomon’s writing in the book of Ecclesiastes, sets forth that: 'To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill and a time to heal; a time to break down and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to come together.'"



Our old friend Jane Kleeb is now the chairman of Nebraska's Democratic Party. Her statement must have driven Kintner out of his narrow mind: "The Women's March just took down their first politician. The Nebraska Democratic Party welcomes the resignation of Bill Kintner and looks forward to electing a candidate who stands up for women and working class families."

Unfortunately, the governor will appoint another Republican nitwit to the seat and there won't be an election to fill it until 2018.

Now let's skip over to Florida and check on what's up with another typical corrupt conservative 4th Judicial Circuit Mark Hulsey III, who just resigned rather than face an impeachment trial the following day. Like Kintner, Hulsey felt entitled to voice his ugly racist and misogynistic sentiments whenever they popped into his crazy right-wing head. The Jacksonville judge is best known for telling African Americans who came before his bench to get on a boat and go back to Africa.

A sample of the complaints from the Judicial Qualifications Commission reveals a minefield of issues.

“Among other comments: a. You referred to the prior lead Staff Attorney as a “bitch” and a “cunt." b. You have demeaned female Staff Attorneys by referring to them as like cheerleaders who talk during the national anthem. c. You berated a Staff Attorney who failed to remain in the courtroom while a jury was deliberating. During this capital trial, you required the Staff Attorney to provide you with basic information about capital trial procedures, and then, at the end of the two-week trial, you unfairly berated, and blamed the Staff Attorney for mistakes you made during the course of the trial,” the JQC alleged.

Grace-Marie Turner is a far right ideologue working furiously against healthcare. Tuesday, Diane Black (R-TN), one of Congress' most extremist Republicans and chair of the House Budget Committee, had her testify as the president of a crackpot anti-healthcare think tank, the so-called Galen Institute she stated 20 years ago to help the GOP undermine Medicare. Her "Institute" is almost entirely funded by Big PhRMA and she is the go-to lunatic for the Republicans when they want a witness to babble nonsense about preventing Congress from passing legislation that would give American consumers fair drug prices.

Tuesday's Budget Committee hearing was about repealing the Affordable Care Act. There are 22 Republicans on the committee and just 12 Democrats. It hasn't been seen as a likely place for much resistance. But last week, Pelosi appointed two freshman firecrackers to the committee, Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Ro Khanna (D-CA) and suddenly all bets are off. Watch Khanna go after Turner in the video up top. It's well known in DC that Turner is a highly paid lackey of the pharmaceutical industry and that she carries their water but she doesn't admit it publicly and the public isn't aware of it. Khanna wanted to make sure that her deceitful, misleading testimony is seen through those lenses. He asked her to disclose her Big PhRMA donors and admit how much she's taken from them in return for repeating their self-serving messages. She refused. "If you're giving testimony to the United States Congress," he reminded her, "the public should have a right to know what financial interests your organization has."

I asked Khanna about the hearing yesterday. He told me that "[b]y pursuing an aggressive line of questioning, I was hoping to inspire Democrats to be bold and fearless in speaking truth to power. We won't win by being polite or philosophical. We will win by taking on special interests and exposing the ulterior and financial motive of the dark forces in American politics. Let's learn from Sanders. Our party needs more young Turks willing to challenge the status quo and stand on conviction."

Populists Can Win In Rural America-- Too Bad The Democrats Insist On Running Corporatists

Aside from having pursued moderate suburban Republican women instead of working class Democrats, one of the reasons for why Hillary lost was widely believed to be the Democratic Party's abandonment of rural America which was almost entirely won by Trump and by Republican candidates for... well, for just about everything. We took a little stab at understanding that last month but an old friend, Jane Fleming Kleeb, who was just officially named the chair of Nebraska's Democratic Party on Saturday, did a much better job in explaining it in a post called Let’s Get Rural: Middle America Wants Less Establishment, More Populism. One can only prey the brainiacs at the DCCC, DSCC and DNC reader it and take it seriously enough to stop repeating the mistakes they're so firmly wedded to.

In fact, if Keith Ellison wins the DNC chair, it's only the DCCC and DSCC I'll have to worry about. That picture up top is Jane with her husband, rancher Scott Kleeb, and Keith, when he was in Nebraska on a party-building mission a few years ago. Most Democrats don't bother. Keith did and so did Bernie. In fact, Bernie held his own there, winning 14 delegates to Clinton's 16 and taking 37,714 caucus votes to her 41,829. "As a proud Democrat in a 'red' state," wrote Jane, "I support Rep. Keith Ellison for the DNC Chair. It’s not just that he’s the only DNC candidate to visit Nebraska for party-building this year. It’s not just that he led with a small handful of heroes on the Hill the opposition to both Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines on grounds of climate change but more importantly to us in the Heartland property rights of ranchers and Sovereign rights of Native allies. It’s not just that he has, time and time again in his role on the Financial Services Committee, stood up against Wall Street when Republicans (and many fellow Democrats) would not. It’s because he actually understands our rural identity and gets how economic populism can help Democrats win in all states including the Heartland."

While the middle of the country looks very red on all the electoral maps, we are fighters here on the prairie. We look to our neighbors to help get cattle back when a fence breaks or pick up our kids at daycare if we are running late. Our sense of community runs deep. We hate Big Corporations. Water is cherished. Families have a tradition of hunting. And while cliché for some at this point, reality is many rural voters simply do not trust Democrats will protect Second Amendment rights and yearn for stiffer backbones when standing up against the establishment.

There are a couple of things about my home that most of my friends in blue areas don’t quite get. I sit in lots of meetings with national groups. Nebraska and other red states are rarely on the short list for resources for candidates or issue campaigns. Folks in DC usually look at the surface for check boxes like registered Republicans or Democrats or can a candidate “self-finance.”

What establishment types don’t get is in rural America, we deeply believe when you stand up and fight, you win.

Nebraska is the birthplace of the modern Democratic Party. It was William Jennings Bryan in 1896 that introduced populism into the Democratic Party, fought the banks, and laid the basis for the New Deal and the 20th century’s strong American middle class. Farmers, ranchers, small businesses, and community banks built the Democratic Party. It was a movement of populists, a movement of people who went to the farm auctions run by Big Banks during the Great Depression and figured out a way to save the family farm together. Willie Nelson did something similar in the 1980s with his first Farm Aid showing how Big Banks were screwing family farmers. It’s time for the Democratic party to do our part and to start building political power in rural America.

A movement of We the People, in the Heartland of America, still exists and is one of the big reasons we stopped a pipeline while everyone in DC told us we would fail.

At a basic level, people vote for those who offer them something. In Nebraska, we have a lot of farmers and ranchers. Democrats simply do not do enough to protect our water and property rights--  an area where Republicans are chosing Big Oil over families. Michael Moore recently pointed out, in our rural towns baseball caps are part of our uniform. We like to vote for people who can come out here and not look awkward in a ball cap or boots. Some farmers turned to Trump, not just here, but everywhere. There still is a chance to bring rural voters into the blue column by showing up in our small towns, standing up for our property rights and basically telling us you give a damn about us even though we are “red” and “small” in numbers compared to the coasts.

Over the years, Democrats have unfortunately been offering unequal politics. Identity is not just your gender or race, it’s how you engage in commerce, it’s your economic relationships, and your job--  whether that is climbing into a combine or putting on a suit. When Democrats sneer at farmers or rural areas, it’s an attack on our identity. An attack on who we are as people. You may not believe that party leaders sneer at farmers or rural areas (think about the campaigns against beef or ethanol), but they do all the time, and we hear it loud and clear.

I beleive if Democrats stood up and fought alongside us to protect our land and water, you would see a more purple rural America. A quick reminder for anyone naysaying this is possible. Democrats once held statewide and national offices in places like Nebraska. Moderate Democrats like Ben Nelson and populist, progressive Democrats like Bob Kerrey. Both ensured the state’s economic base was equal and that urban voters had just as much say as rural voters. Folks who live in small towns were not told to go sit at the kids’ table, we were at the main table treated as equals.

To win, Democrats must reform and expand our party. Yes, we have to compete everywhere, and put up candidates at every level. Yes, we have to organize. But it’s more than that. We simply cannot win if people at the top of the ticket ignore something that cuts across all identities--  economic populism. We cannot win if the same circle of consultants and pollsters that live on the coasts tout the same tired messages and the same tired tactics of TV ad buys. We cannot pass off the governance failures as messaging or candidate failures. The big tent that Democrats talk about has to be accessible for those of us with cowboy boots on instead of Prada heels.

Democrats are often out talking about the latest tech tool and how some voting algorithm is the silver bullet to winning elections. Technology is critical. So is old-fashioned relationship building with people at their doors and where they hang out. So is inviting people to come to the DNC and state party meetings we hold throughout the year so it is not some secret cabal. So is actually giving budgets to the College and Young Democrats and various caucuses so long-term organizing is happening that is also institutionalized and lessens the “hair on fire” plans to “target young voters” or target some other constituency group that a consultant writes a plan for and pays people who have no long-term connection to the party.

We have to look at the collapse of our party over the last eight years not as a repudiation of the values of equality, justice, and liberty, but as the American people firing us because they saw that we did not stand for those values. As Democrats, we have a lot of work to do. The first step is to recognize what went wrong (and no it was not just Comey) and then we must rebuild on fundamentally different foundations than what we have right now.

All of this starts with putting a genuine populist, an organizer, in charge of the DNC. That’s why I support Keith Ellison for Chair and see him as the only choice to bring our party together and forward. I encourage anyone who wants Democrats to win elections, and who wants a more progressive and populist America, to join me in the streets and in the voting booth because that is how we will show folks in rural America we are finally ready to give a damn.

Hillary's suburban-oriented strategy kind of worked for her in the two most populous counties in the state-- Douglas (Omaha), which she won 105,207 (47.9%) to 102,151 (47.5%) and Lancaster (Lincoln), which she won by 77 votes, 60,533 (46.6%) to 60,456 (46.6%). Obama didn't win either of those counties in 2012. Overall, statewide, Obama-2012 outpolled Hillary-2016-- 289,154 (38%) to 273,858 (34%) and that's because she lost the rural counties-- i.e.., the rest of the state-- by even greater numbers than he had. The Democrats lost the one congressional seat they had in the state, Brad Ashford's. Ashford managed to get more votes in Douglas County than Hillary did and won it 110,557 to 103,938. But his Republican opponent, Don Bacon, managed to run up a greater margin in much smaller and more rural Sarpy County, the only only other county in the district, 30,353 to 18,182, giving Bacon a 49.4% to 47.3% win over Ashford, about 5,500 votes out of over a quarter million cast. Ashford, a former Republican, had the single most conservative voting record for any Democrat in the Congress. Progressive Punch gave him an "F" rating and his 30.77 crucial vote score was actually lower than that of 4 libertarian-oriented Republicans.

But Ashford had an opportunity to lead on Dakota Access, KXL and TPP-- all issues in the important to the base and he did not engage on those issues. He needed the Democratic base to be excited and turnout for him; playing to the right-of-center was the wrong move for him.

Meanwhile, I asked Jane Kleeb if there was any hope for the Democrats in the unicameral state legislature (which is technically non-partisan, but just technically). She told me the Democrats had just flipped 5 Republican seats to Democrat-- two in rural Nebraska: Fremont (where a teacher name Lynn Walz won) and Grand Island (where a union member and family farmer won, a town will be close to 40% Latino soon). In two Dem v Dem races the more progressive-- both people of color-- won. Tony Vargas is now the first Democratic Latino to represent his community in the Unicam and Justin Wayne is a young African American. The Establishment opposed them both (though not Jane).