Politico Pro
By Heather Caygle and Elena Schneider
March 21, 2018
House Democrats are trying to hit the reset button a day after Illinois Rep. Dan Lipinski eked out a win in a nasty primary battle that had several of his own colleagues publicly rooting for his defeat.
Lawmakers from the progressive and conservative wings of the party insisted on Wednesday there were no hard feelings after Lipinski’s narrow triumph over his liberal challenger, Marie Newman.
But it’s clear that some of the residual feelings about Lipinski’s politics — as an anti-abortion Democrat who has opposed marriage equality and Obamacare, he’s one of the most conservative members of the caucus — still linger.
And the outside groups that sided with Newman, including NARAL Pro-Choice America, MoveOn and Progressive Change Campaign Committee, said the slim margin should send a signal to other Democrats that they’re not backing down.
“This was a district where some of us as individuals decided to get involved,” said Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “I would like my husband and I to be considered equal by colleagues in our caucus.”
Pocan is one of a half dozen House Democrats who endorsed Newman, a rare public rebuke of an incumbent from the same party.
Now Democratic members insist they’re trying to turn the page. In interviews Wednesday, lawmakers on both ends of the caucus highlighted their embrace of apparent winner Conor Lamb, the conservative Democrat whose upset victory in Pennsylvania Trump country last week has energized the party.
Lamb was welcomed by the House Democratic Caucus with a standing ovation Wednesday and had trouble leaving the room as several members wanted to personally congratulate him.
But the Lipinski primary caused a nasty rift within the caucus with lawmakers publicly taking sides in a race that became as much about the party’s ongoing ideological messaging battle as the candidates themselves.
Lipinski, a co-chairman of the Blue Dog Coalition, represented moderate Democrats’ efforts to carve out a home for themselves on social and economic issues in a party that continues to move steadily to the left.
Newman embodied the liberal wing’s emboldened effort to force the party to embrace a national progressive message, in line with the populist politics pushed by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and a half dozen other Senate Democrats eyeing the White House.
Newman supporters insist that Lipinski’s victory, “by the hair of his chiny chin chin,” is proof that he’s “definitely not the future of the Democratic Party,” said Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America.
Lipinski beat Newman by a little more than 2,000 votes, or about 2.4 percentage points, according to the Associated Press, with some ballots left to be counted.
“People on the ground in Illinois’ 3rd [congressional district] and nationally are willing to play the long game and say, ‘We fell short, but change doesn’t happen in one cycle,'” Hogue said. “We’re not taking our ball and going home.”
What’s less clear is how those bad feelings, exposed in the Illinois race, will manifest in the months ahead, as Democrats look to several crowded primaries in districts that are considered must-win if they want to take back the House.
Progressive, pro-Newman groups have already waded into dozens of House Democratic primaries — but not against other Democratic incumbents. NARAL has endorsed 28 House candidates, including Newman, while MoveOn hasn’t yet endorsed more House candidates, but is still evaluating options, such as New Jersey’s 2nd District.
Spokesman Nick Berning said the group is watching the open seat, where state Sen. Jeff Van Drew, a conservative Democrat, entered the race after GOP Rep. Frank LoBiondo announced his retirement. Van Drew is one of more than a dozen candidates the Blue Dogs are backing this cycle.
“We’re aware he’s had a 100 percent rating from the NRA and he fairly recently voted against marriage equality,” Berning said. “That’s a race we’re tracking and may endorse in.”
And some progressives are already setting the stage for another showdown later this spring.
The PCCC announced four new House candidate endorsements on Wednesday, including Kara Eastman, a progressive Democrat who’s running against former Rep. Brad Ashford, a Blue Dog, in a May primary for an Omaha, Nebraska-based seat.
“There are two schools of thought on this race — the old, more moderate white guy who’s already had his chance and was swept out of office, or lean into the type of candidate who’s going to inspire people to the polls,” said Sarah Badawi, a spokeswoman for the PCCC.
Hogue said that Democratic candidates across the country should take Newman’s narrow loss as a “really clear signal that, to the extent Democrats retake the House and the Senate, they’re doing it on a mandate to defend their base.”
Like Lipinski, Ashford is to the right of many in the Democratic Party on abortion. He backs abortion rights but has said he’s open to some restrictions late in pregnancy. Unlike Lipinski, Ashford has the public support of the DCCC, which refused to endorse Lipinski, infuriating Blue Dogs.
Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.) said he hopes the House Democratic caucus has “learned our lesson” after the Lipinski race and won’t come out publicly against Ashford, who served one term before being knocked off by Republican Don Bacon in 2016.
Schrader, chairman of the Blue Dog PAC, said it wasn’t so much Pocan and leading voices of the progressive caucus — including Reps. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) — endorsing Newman that burned.
For Schrader and other Blue Dogs, it was liberal Rep. Jan Schakowsky’s (D-Ill.) decision to back Newman against her own in-state colleague, while maintaining her leadership position at DCCC, that really inflamed tensions between the two ideological poles of the caucus.
“I’m not going to throw stones at my progressive colleagues for trying to back progressive candidates, I think most every Blue Dog member understands that,” Schrader said. “What I don’t want to see is someone in DCCC leadership on the committee lend their weight in a campaign against an incumbent.”
Schakowsky’s office did not respond to a request for comment. But she insisted in an interview last month that her opposition to Lipinski was unique and she wouldn’t be using her leverage at the DCCC to oppose Blue Dogs or other candidates backed by the coalition ahead of the midterms.
“This has nothing to do with going after people who differ in positions from me around the country,” Schakowsky said.
Facing a deeply entrenched candidate whose family had dominated the district for more than three decades, Newman had much to overcome and not much time to do it.
Bridget Gainer, a Cook County commissioner who also helped with fundraising on Newman’s campaign, said momentum behind Newman may have come too late.
Six months ago, few thought Newman was a viable candidate to try to unseat Lipinski, Gainer said. But once polling showed a path, money flowed to her, allowing her to get out her message.
“I think the late entry of EMILY’s List and some of the pro-choice groups into this race — it’s always speculation — but if they had come on earlier, could that have made the difference?” Gainer said. “Some of the people came in very late. It was hard to gain traction.”
For now, progressives are taking solace in forcing Lipinski to the left on several issues, including immigration and the minimum wage. And while Lamb said he personally opposed abortion, he also campaigned on some of the economic populist ideas progressives tout as key to winning back the House.
“I think what that showed,” Pocan said, “is there is a populist, progressive economic message that [resonates] anywhere.”
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
No comments:
Post a Comment