Cautionary Tales for Blue State Democrats
Tuesday night was rough for Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey
UPDATE: This post was created on Thursday, Nov. 4 before all votes were counted in either gubernatorial election. For finalized results, election data and analysis check out the “Certified” series on Virginia and New Jersey.
Phil Murphy’s “paranoid” campaign may have saved him.
Despite polls having him ahead by double digits in a state Biden won by 15 points, Phil Murphy described his campaign’s approach as “paranoid.” With the way the race has ultimately shaken out, this approach was the correct one. As of now (9:30am PT on Nov 4) his Republican opponent, Jack Ciattarelli, was barely 40,000 votes away from unseating the current governor. This 1.6-point win for Murphy is dwarfed by his original election where he won a whopping 15 points. Much of this shift comes from South Jersey: many of these counties swung by as much as 15 points toward Republicans between last year’s election and Tuesday night.
Over 2.4 million votes have already been counted (it’s currently estimated that this is 92% of the total vote), surpassing the 2.1 million votes cast in the 2017 gubernatorial election. What’s most surprising is that the 300,000 vote difference breaks fairly cleanly in Ciattarelli’s favor. Phil Murphy’s current vote total matches his 2017 performance, scoring 1.2 million votes in both years. The 2017 Republican candidate, Kim Guadagno, just barely missed the 900,000 vote mark while Ciattarelli sits at 1.2 million as of now. Most of these new voters seem to come from those same southern New Jersey counties that lurched violently to the right. A preliminary run of the data shows that many of these counties saw significant rises in turnout compared to the last gubernatorial election, as much as 25% in some cases when compared to 2017.
Virginia’s blue hue turns purple thanks to CRT.
*sigh* okay….
To take a personal aside for a moment, the results of Virginia’s governor race are frustrating to see after such a divisive campaign. The way Youngkin weaponized Critical Race Theory for political purposes was incredibly disgusting to watch as a Black voter and it’s demoralizing to see just how many voters fell for his gambit. But what’s most upsetting to me is that this will be the campaign blueprint for Republicans nationally in 2022. The tactic of spreading white-lies about Critical Race Theory to gin up anger in the Republican base is drenched in bad-faith arguments that Democrats will be forced to answer. After the racial reckoning that was the summer of 2020, the political conversation around race will shift from defending Black lives to reassuring White people that they aren’t being threatened. Black people across the nation will be forced to convince White people that they don’t hate them, reiterate that White people shouldn’t be called “evil”, and convince them that their goddamned feelings matter just as much as Black lives. It’s sickening. If this rhetoric can flip a state that has one of the most educated and diverse electorates in the nation, it will be employed everywhere because it can work just about anywhere.
Okay, enough with the soapbox, putting my data hat back on for ya… 🧢
Republican challenger Glenn Youngkin was able to defeat former Democratic Governor Terry McAulliffe by recapturing the suburbs. Pretty much all of the Nothern Virginia localities saw Democratic support drop by 10 points or more when compared to last year’s presidential election. That immediately put McAulliffe on shaky ground as every Virginia Democrat relies on big margins in NoVa to offset the Republican base in the western portions of the state. Even worse for McAulliffe, Virginia’s Republican base voted even more forcefully for Youngkin than Trump, with many of those counties in the Southwestern tip of the state shifting even further toward Republicans with winning margins in the 60s and 70s. The win was clinched for Youngkin in the exact places he needed to flip: suburban counties in the southern half of the state. Youngkin managed to flip Montgomery county, a suburban county that hasn’t voted for a Republican candidate in a statewide election since 2009. It also looks like he’ll cement flips in Chesterfield county, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake; all localities that Republicans had lost during the Trump era.
The turnout picture is a bit murkier since there are still votes to be counted, but the overall vote shows that both parties managed to increase turnout amongst their bases when compared to the last gubernatorial election in 2017. McAuliffe has already surpassed current Gov. Ralph Northam’s total by about 170,000 votes. Youngkin absolutely blasted through Ed Gillespie’s total, besting him by over 500,000 votes.
Minneapolis says “No” to the Defunding the Police
One local election that I wanted to throw an extra spotlight on was a ballot initiative put to a vote in Minneapolis. The ballot question asked voters if they supported removing the Minneapolis Police Department from the city charter, replacing it with a public-health oriented Department of Public Safety. This move would have allowed more progressive policing reforms to be implemented as the current city charter holds limiting requirements for how the city’s police department is structured and operated. City residents ultimately rejected the measure, with 56% of voters in opposition. Despite the racial reckoning of the summer of 2020, many residents and local politicians stepped back from the Defund the Police movement as violent crime increased throughout the pandemic. Opponents also claimed that the measure was a springboard into darkness as they believed that supporters did not present a clear plan for the new Department of Public Safety. While the measure’s defeat is surely a setback for the Defund the Police movement, its advocates are committed to the cause and new proposals are still likely to emerge in the future.