As Democrats streamed to the polls Tuesday, their party’s leaders were beginning to ask themselves: Is it possible to have too much of a good thing?
That thing is boundless liberal enthusiasm, matched by antipathy for President Trump and the Republican congressional majorities. Despite the Resistance, the Cook Political Report moved four races back toward the GOP.
Last week’s primaries produced two Democratic congressional nominees, one in Nebraska and the other in Pennsylvania, the party fears might be too liberal to prevail in the general election. Now they are worried they won’t be able to get their best candidates out of nonpartisan “jungle” primaries in California in June, potentially sacrificing winnable seats in their bid to erase the Republicans’ 23-seat House majority.
“It’s ironic that one of the most progressive states in the country could damage Democrats’ prospects of winning a House majority,” writes National Journal’s Josh Kraushaar.
Some Democratic strategists the Washington Examiner spoke with believe pundits and Washington party leaders are overreacting. They argue that only a few races will be compromised by ineffectual progressive nominees, that Trump is sufficient to unify the Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders wings of the party after most primaries, and that what Democrats will lose in centrist Republican crossover votes they can make up for in grassroots turnout on the Left.
Nevertheless, it is something to watch as the results trickle in Tuesday night. In Kentucky’s 6th Congressional District, there is a pitched battle for the Democratic nomination to challenge incumbent Republican Rep. Andy Barr.
Lexington Mayor Jim Gray is coming off a statewide defeat at the hands of Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., in 2016, but boasts substantial establishment support. If Gray has the political experience Democrats are looking for, Lt. Col. Amy McGrath has the resume: She’s highlighted her background as a former combat pilot.
Rounding out the field is state Sen. Reggie Thomas. This isn’t much of a pitched ideological battle, although many anti-Trump progressives across the country have been impressed by McGrath. There is a minor identity politics component to the contest, however: Gray is gay, McGrath is a woman, and Thomas is African-American. Democrats see the seat as a pickup opportunity in November. [UPDATE: McGrath won the primary with 48.7 percent of the vote to Gray’s 40.5 percent.]
A similar dynamic is at play in Texas’ 7th District, where Democrats hope to knock off Republican Rep. John Culberson. Houston attorney Lizzie Pannill Fletcher finds herself in a runoff against progressive activist Laura Moser.
The race made national headlines when the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee tried to sink Moser, a former journalist who had written about her disdain for living in Texas, during the first round of voting. This arguably consolidated liberal support behind Moser and helped her make the runoff.
Georgia’s Democratic gubernatorial primary is the battle between two Staceys. Stacey Abrams, a former state house minority leader, is favored to win over sitting state lawmaker Stacey Evans. But Evans, who is white and more centrist-friendly, is running according to a more traditional Georgia Democrat general-election playbook than Abrams, who is black and an unapologetic liberal.
How much will the outcomes of these primaries matter in November? If the blue wave is as big as Democrats predict, maybe not much. But the Democrats’ generic ballot lead has been slipping recently, with one polling firm Tuesday giving Republicans the edge, and Trump’s numbers appear to have stabilized.
Past midterm electoral history still argues in the Democrats’ favor, especially on the House side, and Trump remains weak in suburbia. But from their failure to capture the Senate in the Tea Party wave election of 2010 to the election of Democratic Sen. Doug Jones in Alabama last year, Republicans can tell the party out of power something about missed opportunities due to unfavorable primary outcomes.
