The DCCC Has One Thing Going For It: Republicans Are Worse
In New York State, 2020 saw Biden beat Trump 60.9% to 37.7%— not as good as Obama’s 63.3- 35.2% win over Mitt Romney— but still selective of New York’s status as a state with a D+10 PVI. Two years later, Chuck Schumer, NY’s not very beloved senior senator, was elected with 56.8% of the vote. He generally did worse everywhere but he actually lost 5 counties that Biden won: Nassau, Broome, Saratoga, Clinton and Essex. On the same miserable day for Democrats, the state’s dreadful unelected governor, conservative Kathy Hochul, was at the top of the ticket. She did even worse than Schumer, 53.2% of the vote, with over 300,000 fewer votes. She even lost 3 counties that Schumer won: Rensselaer, Dutchess and Rockland.
Her dreadful performance contributed to 5 congressional seats that were held by Democrats— Robert Zimmerman and Laura Gillen in Nassau County, Sean Patrick Maloney (partially in Rockland and Dutchess counties) and Josh Riley (partially in Broome County). The Democrats also blew their chance to retake the open seat in the Syracuse area, where Francis Conole, a shitty conservative much like Hochul (as were Zimmerman, Gillen, Maloney and, to a lesser extent, Riley) was beaten by MAGA lunatic Brandon Williams.
There’s a consensus that Hochul’s speech was the worst prime time speech of the whole convention— total dud from a disliked dud of a governor.
Candidate quality in New York was dreadful in 2022— uninspiring Republican-lite corporate garbage candidates, as if it was actually designed to turn off progressive voters. Gillen and Riley are running again and the Syracuse district has a candidate just as bad, if not worse, than Conole, right-of-center state Sen. John Mannion. Possibly the worst fake-Democrat running anywhere in America, John Avlon, is running for the Suffolk County seat (Nick LaLota's) targeted by the DCCC.
Pelosi, reported Sarah Ferris, “believes the path to retaking the House runs through New York. The former speaker said she is intently focused on battleground seats in New York, and in fact spoke to her successor, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, as recently as earlier Thursday morning about the fight there. She has also informed at least one New York Republican— whose name she did not mention— that she plans to beat him this year, and, relatedly, turned down his invitation to a recent event for an Italian American group. ‘I had other plans for dinner, like a hot dog at home,’ Pelosi said to raucous applause in the room. She added: ‘I have told him on a number of occasions to prepare for defeat.’” [That would be Molinaro, D’Esposito or LaLota.]
Two years ago, New York was a key reason Democrats lost the House. The party lost roughly a half-dozen competitive races, including then-campaign Chair Sean Patrick Maloney's ouster in the Hudson Valley. Pelosi blamed at least some of the party's problems on incumbent Gov. Kathy Hochul, who won in 2022 by a closer-than-expected margin that has been blamed for dragging down other Democrats downballot.
Pelosi, while no longer officially at the leadership table, said she has been deeply engaged in the fight to win back the House. That was particularly true several weeks ago, when Democrats, including Pelosi, privately feared they could be forced even deeper into the House minority.
“It’s a horrible thought— should there have been a situation where we didn’t win the White House and the Republicans had the House— it would've been a horrible thing,” Pelosi said.
… “What’s going to be hard is just keep everybody focused on winning the election, because there’s so much euphoria. But there’s nothing automatic here,” Pelosi said.
Then she ticked off some of her political mantras: “Resting is rusting. No wasted time. And no regrets the day after the election,” she said, with a warning: “This is all close.”
Pelosi didn’t mention her own state, California, which has the same electoral situation as New York. In 2022, dismal candidate quality, dreadful DCCC decisions about where to invest funds and a disliked, shitty Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, running for reelection, led to the loss of 5 seats the Democrats should have won:
CA-13 (Duarte vs Gray)- D+4
CA-22 (Valadao vs Salas)- D+5
CA-27 (Garcia vs Smith)- D+4
CA-40 (Kim vs Mahmood)- R+2
CA-45 (Steel vs Chen)- D+2
Gray and Salas, easily the two worst California congressional candidates, and possible as bad as New York's Avlon, are running again in the districts that rejected them in 2022. Want to help flip Congress blue and elect progressives rather than the Republican-lite corporate shills the DCCC hs gotten behind again? The candidates on this Flip Congress page can all use some financial support, only one of whom, Sue Altman, will see any help from Pelosi or the DCCC.
The only way to get rid of the corporate Democrats is to vote Republican and then start over. Justice Democrats strategy is well-intentioned but a failure. AOC is selling out before her 35th birthday.
Again, candidate quality as measured by what?
The only standard your party cares about is how corruptible a candidate is. Measured by that yardstick, your DCCC gives you OUTFUCKINGSTANDING candidates. And since you all don't care, you keep voting for them.
you want good? quit voting for shitty. that's exactly how democracy is supposed to work.
AIPAC and other republicon money help pick our candidates. As long as we have unlimited corporate contributions and, more important, people believe the ads they see, we're stuck.
The DCCC's approach largely reflects the party approach as a whole. That has arguably been the case since Rahmbo ran the DCCC in 2006. The DSCC takes a similar approach.
We are going to war with the army we have, not with the army that we want.