The search is on for the next Republican political success story, and party operatives are turning their focus and efforts to those running for office on the state legislative level and building the next generation of national candidates.
The Republican State Leadership Committee, a committee focused on supporting campaigns for state legislative races and state attorney general races, launched a campaign earlier this month called the “Right Leaders Network” that seeks to encourage women and minority candidates to run for office.
“It will be a mentoring program for all those candidates that may be thinking about running or may need a push to run hard, but may actually want to talk to someone that has done it before,” RSLC board member and former Puerto Rico Gov. Luis Fortuno said of the new initiative.
An RSLC panel last week that focused on candidate recruitment featured congressional GOP stars Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida, Tim Scott of South Carolina, and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, along with Reps. Ashley Hinson of Iowa and Young Kim of California. All five of them started in politics at the state level and fit the profile of a unique background that has led to Republican electoral success in recent years.
Having a different background helped them reach voters in a different way, they said. White and male politicians still make up the majority of Republicans at the national level as the country and workforce become more diverse in terms of gender and ethnicity.
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“Sometimes we as Republicans are really, really good on the technical, but where we dropped the ball is on that emotional tie,” Blackburn said.
She used the example of how Republicans talk about President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate by simply scolding Biden and saying the mandate is unconstitutional. Blackburn offered an emotional alternative argument: “Having a federal vaccine would take away the ability of thousands of young women in this country to provide for their family, put food on the table.”
In order to flip seats and win majorities in state legislatures and in Congress, Republicans know that choosing the right candidates is key to success.
Republicans netted 15 seats in the House in 2020, vastly outperforming many analysts’ forecasts that Democrats were on track to gain seats.
The quality of candidates and their backgrounds was key. In each seat that Republicans flipped, the Republican winner was either a woman, of a minority ethnicity, or a veteran.
Panelists Hinson and Kim of California are two freshman members who won swing-district races in 2020. Kim, who was born in South Korea, said that her personal background helps her talk to voters about some issues.
“I came here through the legal process, so I talk about the legal and fair and compassionate reform that we need,” Kim said. “Coming from somebody like me talking about immigration reform, it relates to the people and gives, I guess, the credibility. So I think having a good message is important, but the messenger is just as important.”
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Seeking to build on and recreate the success of 2020, Republicans are working to recruit similar types of candidates for 2022. And they are well on their way to doing so, having more of the kind of candidates they seek at this point in the election cycle than they did in 2020.
The National Republican Congressional Committee, the GOP’s campaign arm for House races, says that 794 Republicans have filed their candidacies in House races, compared to 516 at this time in 2020.
Of those, 181 are women, 160 are from minority communities, and 165 are veterans. At this time in 2020, there were 127 women candidates, 99 from minority groups, and 111 veterans.
Many of the Republican contenders challenging Democrats in key Senate races also have the kinds of backgrounds and profiles that Republicans are looking for. Former President Donald Trump endorsed black former football player Herschel Walker to take on incumbent Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock. Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, who is challenging Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly in 2020, is an Army National Guard veteran.
“A strong field of Republicans has emerged in crucial states across the country. The NRSC is confident that the eventual Republican nominees for U.S. Senate will have the winning message and ample funding to flip the Senate and build a strong majority,” NRSC national press secretary T.W. Arrighi said in a statement.
But before candidates reach the national level, those who start at the state and local level often have no idea where to begin. That is where the RSLC and mentorship come in.
“There’s no guidebook, other than raise money and knock on doors,” Hinson said. “Nobody understands what it’s like to run for office more than someone else who’s done it, and there’s a wealth of knowledge that can come from people who’ve been there and done it themselves.”
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But as Republicans focus on women and minority candidate recruitment, they are trying to be careful not to fully embrace the kind of left-wing identity politics that has overtaken the Democratic Party.
“What they’re looking for really is the content of your character and not the color of your skin. They want to hear your story because it should hopefully reflect their story,” Scott said. “And so, when we’re looking for the right messenger, what we’re really looking for someone who when they finish talking, your head is saying, ‘Yeah.’”
“This whole notion of identity has become a big issue in American politics,” Rubio said. “What’s so unique about American identity is it’s never been a skin color. Never has been, never should have been. It’s not an ethnicity … We are literally people from every corner of the planet, or their descendants, who somehow can share the common identity of America. And we take that for granted.”
