This year's Congressional Baseball Game—the 84th iteration of the renowned partisan pastime—is less than a month away (specifically, on June 14—buy a ticket, it's for a good cause!), so it's time to update my database of statistics for the annual charity game. Yes, that's right—I'm so obsessed with numbers that I have some that show how good or bad members of Congress are at baseball.
This Google spreadsheet is based on the leaderboards page over at FanGraphs. It has not only the "Standard" stats like hits and RBI, but also FanGraphs's "Advanced" and "Value" stats, calculated the exact same way the sabermetric site defines them. If you want to know Tim Ryan's wRC+ or Rand Paul's WAR, this is the place to go. The spreadsheet goes back through the 2009 Congressional Baseball Game, thanks to box scores generously provided to me by the game's official scorers. It's not comprehensive—for instance, there are no batted-ball stats, and fielding is too hard to measure in a game whose defensive alignments change more often than the softball match at your latest family reunion—but it's enough to show us who's just playing for fun and who the truly feared players should be on June 14.
The highlights: Cedric Richmond, Congress's Shohei Ohtani, is now up to 2.3 WAR, eight times higher than anyone else's total. Seven of the game's nine best players by WAR are Democrats. And you'll notice a lot of lineup fixtures are leaving Congress after this year: the Democrats' Jared Polis, the Republicans' Jeff Flake, Tom Rooney, Ryan Costello, and Bill Shuster. (And Democrats' Joe Donnelly may very well lose his re-election bid.) By this time next year, the leaderboards could look very different: it's possible that John Shimkus, Chris Murphy, and Kevin Brady will be the only pre-2009 players left.
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Sunday, May 20, 2018
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
What I Didn't Expect in Politics in 2017
It's snowing out and nothing else is really going on, so I'm taking care of some site housekeeping today. Every year, I make a certain number of predictions on these webpages, and every year I try to look back at how I did. This is the first of two posts on that subject—the one that will focus on politics.
Every fall, I issue race ratings, inspired by those at Inside Elections, for every downballot constitutional office up for election. For those types of elections (not so much for politics in general), 2017 was a pretty quiet year: only the Virginia lieutenant governor, Virginia attorney general, and Louisiana treasurer were on the ballot. Here were my ratings for those three races, originally issued in October and kept current (although they never changed) through November 6. They predicted a status quo election, with Democrats holding onto the two offices they already owned, and Republicans successfully defending their one seat.
The small number of races meant I had fewer opportunities to make a bone-headed mistake, and as a result the ratings validated quite nicely.
In a well-calibrated world, the Virginia average of D+6.2 is probably right on the border between Lean Democratic and Likely Democratic. Likewise, the Louisiana treasurer margin of R+11.5 is on the Solid side of Likely Republican. All in all, pretty close, though.
As I mentioned, getting these races right is no great achievement: last year offered a small number of fairly predictable races. The big challenge will be 2018; midterm cycles are the absolute busiest for downballot constitutional offices. My goal this year is to merely handicap all 142 of them before November, let alone get them all right. Wish me luck!
Every fall, I issue race ratings, inspired by those at Inside Elections, for every downballot constitutional office up for election. For those types of elections (not so much for politics in general), 2017 was a pretty quiet year: only the Virginia lieutenant governor, Virginia attorney general, and Louisiana treasurer were on the ballot. Here were my ratings for those three races, originally issued in October and kept current (although they never changed) through November 6. They predicted a status quo election, with Democrats holding onto the two offices they already owned, and Republicans successfully defending their one seat.
The small number of races meant I had fewer opportunities to make a bone-headed mistake, and as a result the ratings validated quite nicely.
- Democrats won two out of two races I rated as Lean Democratic.
- Republicans won the one contest I rated as Solid Republican.
In a well-calibrated world, the Virginia average of D+6.2 is probably right on the border between Lean Democratic and Likely Democratic. Likewise, the Louisiana treasurer margin of R+11.5 is on the Solid side of Likely Republican. All in all, pretty close, though.
As I mentioned, getting these races right is no great achievement: last year offered a small number of fairly predictable races. The big challenge will be 2018; midterm cycles are the absolute busiest for downballot constitutional offices. My goal this year is to merely handicap all 142 of them before November, let alone get them all right. Wish me luck!
Wednesday, January 3, 2018
State of the State Schedule 2018
Got any New Year's resolutions? Fifty governors do too. This is the time of the year when each state's chief executive gives his or her State of the State address, setting forth an ambitious (usually too ambitious) agenda for the year ahead. As we head into an election year that could usher in massive changes to state government, it's worth paying attention to the issues that those elections will be fought around. To that end, as Baseballot has provided every dang year since 2013, here is a full schedule of 2018's State of the State speeches. As each date passes, links will be added to the transcript of each speech; dates will also be updated as new orations are announced.
Alabama: January 9 at 6:30pm CT
Alaska: January 18 at 7pm AKT
Arizona: January 8 at 2pm MT
Arkansas: No speech in even-numbered years
California: January 25 at 10am PT
Colorado: January 11 at 11am MT
Connecticut: February 7 at noon ET
Delaware: January 18 at 2pm ET (State of the State); January 25 at 1pm ET (budget address)
Florida: January 9 at 11am ET
Georgia: January 11 at 11am ET
Hawaii: January 22 at 10am HAT
Idaho: January 8 at 1pm MT
Illinois: January 31 at noon CT (State of the State); February 14 at noon CT (budget address)
Indiana: January 9 at 7pm ET
Iowa: January 9 at 10am CT
Kansas: January 9 at 5pm CT (Brownback State of the State); January 31 at 3pm CT (Colyer inaugural); February 7 at 3pm CT (Colyer joint address)
Kentucky: January 16 at 7pm ET
Louisiana: February 19 at 5pm CT (special-session address); March 12 at 1pm CT (State of the State)
Maine: February 13 at 7pm ET
Maryland: January 31 at noon ET
Massachusetts: January 23 at 7pm ET
Michigan: January 23 at 7pm ET
Minnesota: March 14 at 7pm CT
Mississippi: January 9 at 5pm CT
Missouri: January 10 at 7pm CT
Montana: No speech in even-numbered years
Nebraska: January 10 at 10am CT
Nevada: No speech in even-numbered years
New Hampshire: February 15 at 10am ET
New Jersey: January 9 at 3pm ET (Christie State of the State); January 16 at 11am ET (Murphy inaugural); March 13 at 2pm (Murphy budget address)
New Mexico: January 16 at 1pm MT
New York: January 3 at 1pm ET (State of the State); January 16 at 1pm ET (budget address)
North Carolina: No speech in even-numbered years
North Dakota: January 23 at 10am CT
Ohio: March 6 at 7pm ET
Oklahoma: February 5 at 12:30pm CT
Oregon: February 5 at 9:30am PT
Pennsylvania: February 6 at 11:30am ET
Rhode Island: January 16 at 7pm ET
South Carolina: January 24 at 7pm ET
South Dakota: December 5 at 1pm CT (budget address); January 9 at 1pm CT (State of the State)
Tennessee: January 29 at 6pm CT
Texas: No speech in even-numbered years
Utah: January 24 at 6:30pm MT
Vermont: January 4 at 2pm ET (State of the State); January 23 at 1pm ET (budget address)
Virginia: January 10 at 6:30pm ET (McAuliffe State of the Commonwealth); January 13 at noon ET (Northam inaugural); January 15 at 7pm ET (Northam State of the Commonwealth)
Washington: January 9 at noon PT
West Virginia: January 10 at 7pm ET
Wisconsin: January 24 at 3pm CT
Wyoming: February 12 at 10am MT
National: January 30 at 9pm ET
Alabama: January 9 at 6:30pm CT
Alaska: January 18 at 7pm AKT
Arizona: January 8 at 2pm MT
Arkansas: No speech in even-numbered years
California: January 25 at 10am PT
Colorado: January 11 at 11am MT
Connecticut: February 7 at noon ET
Delaware: January 18 at 2pm ET (State of the State); January 25 at 1pm ET (budget address)
Florida: January 9 at 11am ET
Georgia: January 11 at 11am ET
Hawaii: January 22 at 10am HAT
Idaho: January 8 at 1pm MT
Illinois: January 31 at noon CT (State of the State); February 14 at noon CT (budget address)
Indiana: January 9 at 7pm ET
Iowa: January 9 at 10am CT
Kansas: January 9 at 5pm CT (Brownback State of the State); January 31 at 3pm CT (Colyer inaugural); February 7 at 3pm CT (Colyer joint address)
Kentucky: January 16 at 7pm ET
Louisiana: February 19 at 5pm CT (special-session address); March 12 at 1pm CT (State of the State)
Maine: February 13 at 7pm ET
Maryland: January 31 at noon ET
Massachusetts: January 23 at 7pm ET
Michigan: January 23 at 7pm ET
Minnesota: March 14 at 7pm CT
Mississippi: January 9 at 5pm CT
Missouri: January 10 at 7pm CT
Montana: No speech in even-numbered years
Nebraska: January 10 at 10am CT
Nevada: No speech in even-numbered years
New Hampshire: February 15 at 10am ET
New Jersey: January 9 at 3pm ET (Christie State of the State); January 16 at 11am ET (Murphy inaugural); March 13 at 2pm (Murphy budget address)
New Mexico: January 16 at 1pm MT
New York: January 3 at 1pm ET (State of the State); January 16 at 1pm ET (budget address)
North Carolina: No speech in even-numbered years
North Dakota: January 23 at 10am CT
Ohio: March 6 at 7pm ET
Oklahoma: February 5 at 12:30pm CT
Oregon: February 5 at 9:30am PT
Pennsylvania: February 6 at 11:30am ET
Rhode Island: January 16 at 7pm ET
South Carolina: January 24 at 7pm ET
South Dakota: December 5 at 1pm CT (budget address); January 9 at 1pm CT (State of the State)
Tennessee: January 29 at 6pm CT
Texas: No speech in even-numbered years
Utah: January 24 at 6:30pm MT
Vermont: January 4 at 2pm ET (State of the State); January 23 at 1pm ET (budget address)
Virginia: January 10 at 6:30pm ET (McAuliffe State of the Commonwealth); January 13 at noon ET (Northam inaugural); January 15 at 7pm ET (Northam State of the Commonwealth)
Washington: January 9 at noon PT
West Virginia: January 10 at 7pm ET
Wisconsin: January 24 at 3pm CT
Wyoming: February 12 at 10am MT
National: January 30 at 9pm ET
Sunday, December 31, 2017
Follow Every Election in 2018 with This Calendar
In the year that is now almost complete, people took a practically unprecedented interest in politics. Granted, it was generally concentrated on one side of the political spectrum, but in 2017 people demonstrated in our nation's capital, called their congressmen and congresswomen, and voted. Boy, did they vote. Turnout in inconveniently timed special elections for GA-06 and the U.S. Senate seat in Alabama surpassed that of even regularly scheduled midterm elections. And people—again, mainly on the left—who had never before felt a stake in their local races began religiously following legislative election results—even in districts all the way across the country.
This was a welcome development to me as a charter member of Election Night Twitter. I've always enjoyed following minor special or local election results as idle entertainment on a Tuesday night, the same as I might sit down to watch a random A's-Twins game when my teams have an off day, but this year I was joined by so many engaged netizens eager to see "the Resistance" strike its next blow. Suddenly, it wasn't idle entertainment anymore; every week's elections became appointment viewing.
To keep to those appointments, I found I needed a calendar—so I started one. To my knowledge, no one has tried to create a comprehensive schedule of obscure elections before. Each state's election office has a listing of upcoming elections, but you have to visit 50 different websites to find them all. Fellow psephology nerds like Daily Kos Elections and Ballotpedia—both of whom I am indebted to in the compilation of my own calendar—have admirably assembled calendars of different types of elections but haven't taken the final, ultimate step.
So I present to you, election-obsessed people of the internet, this Google Calendar for all to view. My calendar will track every federal, state, and local* election in the country from January 1, 2018, all the way through the midterm general election—and beyond. If you find that I'm missing any, please let me know on Twitter. Enjoy!
*In localities of significant size; I draw the line at the Union City, Pennsylvania, school board.
This was a welcome development to me as a charter member of Election Night Twitter. I've always enjoyed following minor special or local election results as idle entertainment on a Tuesday night, the same as I might sit down to watch a random A's-Twins game when my teams have an off day, but this year I was joined by so many engaged netizens eager to see "the Resistance" strike its next blow. Suddenly, it wasn't idle entertainment anymore; every week's elections became appointment viewing.
To keep to those appointments, I found I needed a calendar—so I started one. To my knowledge, no one has tried to create a comprehensive schedule of obscure elections before. Each state's election office has a listing of upcoming elections, but you have to visit 50 different websites to find them all. Fellow psephology nerds like Daily Kos Elections and Ballotpedia—both of whom I am indebted to in the compilation of my own calendar—have admirably assembled calendars of different types of elections but haven't taken the final, ultimate step.
So I present to you, election-obsessed people of the internet, this Google Calendar for all to view. My calendar will track every federal, state, and local* election in the country from January 1, 2018, all the way through the midterm general election—and beyond. If you find that I'm missing any, please let me know on Twitter. Enjoy!
*In localities of significant size; I draw the line at the Union City, Pennsylvania, school board.
Tuesday, November 7, 2017
Your Complete Guide to Election Night 2017
Tuesday marks the first regularly scheduled elections of the Trump era—and, probably in a related development, interest in this year's off-off-year campaigns has reached unprecedented highs. Democrats are eager to strike a blow for "the Resistance" by winning the high-profile Virginia gubernatorial race, but they also sit on the verge of taking complete trifecta control of two more state governments (no small feat when they started the year with only six). Tonight's 214 legislative elections will be the best bellwethers yet of the 2018 midterms. Maine may become the first state in the nation to popularly vote to implement a key provision of Obamacare, or New York may decide to tear up its constitution and start from scratch. Some of the biggest cities in the country face stark choices between sending their city halls leftward or rightward—or choosing which vision for the future of the Democratic Party to put their faith in.
In all, 34 states will decide governorships, congressional seats, ballot measures, mayor's offices, constitutional offices, legislative seats, and much, much more. To help guide those who haven't been following these hyper-local campaigns but are interested in tracking them on election night, I've created this viewer's guide for Tuesday night. Sorted by poll-closing times (all times Eastern), it's a state-by-state rundown of what's on the ballot on November 7, 2017.
Florida: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Miami (unofficial results) and mayor of St. Petersburg (unofficial results), where the Rays-supported Democratic incumbent faces a stiff Republican challenge.
Georgia: Special all-party primary elections in SD-06, SD-39, HD-04, HD-26, HD-42, HD-60, HD-89, HD-117, and HD-119 (unofficial results); municipal elections other than Atlanta's.
Massachusetts: Municipal elections in four cities.
New Hampshire: State House special elections in Hillsborough County District 15 (unofficial results) and Sullivan County District 1 (unofficial results); most municipal elections, including a Manchester mayoral race that has drawn some big names.
South Carolina: A special general election in HD-113 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
Virginia (unofficial results): A well-publicized governor's race, but also close lieutenant governor and attorney general elections; all 100 seats in the House of Delegates; municipal elections.
North Carolina: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Raleigh (unofficial results) and a close partisan contest for mayor of Charlotte (unofficial results).
Ohio: Two ballot issues, one to strengthen crime victims' rights and another to require the state to pay the same prices for prescription drugs as the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (unofficial results); judicial and municipal elections, including mayoral races in Cleveland (unofficial results), Cincinnati (unofficial results), and Toledo (unofficial results).
Connecticut (unofficial results): Judicial and municipal elections.
Georgia: Municipal elections in Atlanta (unofficial results), where the battle to succeed Mayor Kasim Reed has gotten divisive.
Kansas: Municipal elections across most of the state.
Maine (unofficial results): Four ballot questions, including Question 2, which would expand Medicaid in Maine after multiple vetoes by Governor Paul LePage; a special general election in HD-56; municipal elections, including one ballot initiative instituting rent control in Portland and another asking whether Maine's second- (Lewiston) and fifth- (Auburn) largest cities should merge.
Maryland: Municipal elections in 13 cities and towns, including a close mayoral election in Annapolis.
Massachusetts: State House special general elections in the First Berkshire District (unofficial results) and Third Essex District (unofficial results); a State Senate special primary election in the Worcester and Middlesex District; municipal elections in 69 cities and towns (unofficial results), including a sleepy race for mayor of Boston.
Michigan (unofficial results): Special general elections on opposite ends of the state, in HD-01 and HD-109; municipal elections across most of the state, including for mayor and city clerk of Detroit and an attempted recall of the mayor of Flint.
Mississippi: Nonpartisan special elections in SD-10, HD-38, and HD-54; judicial and municipal elections.
Missouri: Special general elections in SD-08, HD-23, and HD-151 (unofficial results); municipal elections, including referenda on building a new terminal at Kansas City International Airport and increasing St. Louis's sales tax to give raises to police and firefighters.
New Hampshire: Municipal elections in cities with extended voting hours.
New Jersey (unofficial results): A gubernatorial/lieutenant-gubernatorial race that's looking like a blowout; all 40 State Senate seats; all 80 General Assembly seats; two ballot questions on fiscal issues; municipal elections, including a mayoral race in Jersey City that's been rocked by scandal and elections for Edison school board and Hoboken mayor that will test whether racist campaign tactics are effective.
North Dakota: A local referendum to raise the sales tax in Grand Forks.
Pennsylvania (unofficial results): A state constitutional amendment to allow the legislature to allow local governments to exempt residents from property taxes; judicial elections, including for three state Supreme Court seats that some angrily claim that Democrats have ignored; municipal elections, including a nationally watched race for Philadelphia district attorney and the tight re-election campaign of Allentown's indicted mayor.
Rhode Island: Local ballot initiatives in East Providence, Lincoln, and Scituate.
Tennessee: An uncontested special primary election in SD-17 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
Texas: Municipal elections across most of the state, including six city propositions in Houston (unofficial results).
Arizona: Municipal elections.
Colorado (unofficial results): Municipal elections, including for the Douglas County school board, the latest of Colorado's local school elections to be turned into a national referendum on education reform.
Kansas: Municipal elections along the western edge of the state.
Michigan (unofficial results): Municipal elections in parts of the Upper Peninsula.
Minnesota (unofficial results): Municipal elections, including for mayor of Minneapolis and a chaotic open-seat race for mayor of St. Paul.
New Mexico: Judicial and municipal elections in Las Cruces.
New York (unofficial results): Special general elections in SD-26, AD-27, and AD-71; three ballot measures, including Proposal 1, the vicennial referendum on holding a new constitutional convention for the State of New York; judicial and municipal elections, including mayorals in New York City and Syracuse as well as spirited county-executive races in Westchester and Nassau.
Texas: Seven proposed constitutional amendments; municipal elections in the western tip of the state.
Wyoming: A local referendum to raise the sales tax in Campbell County.
Idaho: Municipal elections in the southern part of the state.
Iowa: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Cedar Rapids.
Montana: Municipal elections, including the open Billings mayoral election.
Utah: The special general election for UT-03 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
California: Municipal elections in 31 counties, including for mayor of Santa Barbara.
Idaho: Municipal elections in the Panhandle.
Oregon (unofficial results): Municipal elections.
Washington (unofficial results): Three nonbinding advisory votes; State Senate special general elections in LD-07, LD-31, LD-37, LD-45 (a Republican-held seat in Democratic territory that, if flipped, would give Democrats control of the State Senate and therefore all of Washington state government), and LD-48; State House special general elections in LD-07 (Position 1), LD-31 (Position 2), and LD-48 (Position 1); judicial and municipal elections, including a Dem-on-Dem race for the open Seattle mayor's office (unofficial results) and a ballot initiative to overturn Burien's sanctuary-city status, where proponents accused immigrants of crimes in a widely criticized mailer.
In all, 34 states will decide governorships, congressional seats, ballot measures, mayor's offices, constitutional offices, legislative seats, and much, much more. To help guide those who haven't been following these hyper-local campaigns but are interested in tracking them on election night, I've created this viewer's guide for Tuesday night. Sorted by poll-closing times (all times Eastern), it's a state-by-state rundown of what's on the ballot on November 7, 2017.
7pm ET
Florida: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Miami (unofficial results) and mayor of St. Petersburg (unofficial results), where the Rays-supported Democratic incumbent faces a stiff Republican challenge.
Georgia: Special all-party primary elections in SD-06, SD-39, HD-04, HD-26, HD-42, HD-60, HD-89, HD-117, and HD-119 (unofficial results); municipal elections other than Atlanta's.
Massachusetts: Municipal elections in four cities.
New Hampshire: State House special elections in Hillsborough County District 15 (unofficial results) and Sullivan County District 1 (unofficial results); most municipal elections, including a Manchester mayoral race that has drawn some big names.
South Carolina: A special general election in HD-113 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
Virginia (unofficial results): A well-publicized governor's race, but also close lieutenant governor and attorney general elections; all 100 seats in the House of Delegates; municipal elections.
7:30pm ET
North Carolina: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Raleigh (unofficial results) and a close partisan contest for mayor of Charlotte (unofficial results).
Ohio: Two ballot issues, one to strengthen crime victims' rights and another to require the state to pay the same prices for prescription drugs as the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (unofficial results); judicial and municipal elections, including mayoral races in Cleveland (unofficial results), Cincinnati (unofficial results), and Toledo (unofficial results).
8pm ET
Connecticut (unofficial results): Judicial and municipal elections.
Georgia: Municipal elections in Atlanta (unofficial results), where the battle to succeed Mayor Kasim Reed has gotten divisive.
Kansas: Municipal elections across most of the state.
Maine (unofficial results): Four ballot questions, including Question 2, which would expand Medicaid in Maine after multiple vetoes by Governor Paul LePage; a special general election in HD-56; municipal elections, including one ballot initiative instituting rent control in Portland and another asking whether Maine's second- (Lewiston) and fifth- (Auburn) largest cities should merge.
Maryland: Municipal elections in 13 cities and towns, including a close mayoral election in Annapolis.
Massachusetts: State House special general elections in the First Berkshire District (unofficial results) and Third Essex District (unofficial results); a State Senate special primary election in the Worcester and Middlesex District; municipal elections in 69 cities and towns (unofficial results), including a sleepy race for mayor of Boston.
Michigan (unofficial results): Special general elections on opposite ends of the state, in HD-01 and HD-109; municipal elections across most of the state, including for mayor and city clerk of Detroit and an attempted recall of the mayor of Flint.
Mississippi: Nonpartisan special elections in SD-10, HD-38, and HD-54; judicial and municipal elections.
Missouri: Special general elections in SD-08, HD-23, and HD-151 (unofficial results); municipal elections, including referenda on building a new terminal at Kansas City International Airport and increasing St. Louis's sales tax to give raises to police and firefighters.
New Hampshire: Municipal elections in cities with extended voting hours.
New Jersey (unofficial results): A gubernatorial/lieutenant-gubernatorial race that's looking like a blowout; all 40 State Senate seats; all 80 General Assembly seats; two ballot questions on fiscal issues; municipal elections, including a mayoral race in Jersey City that's been rocked by scandal and elections for Edison school board and Hoboken mayor that will test whether racist campaign tactics are effective.
North Dakota: A local referendum to raise the sales tax in Grand Forks.
Pennsylvania (unofficial results): A state constitutional amendment to allow the legislature to allow local governments to exempt residents from property taxes; judicial elections, including for three state Supreme Court seats that some angrily claim that Democrats have ignored; municipal elections, including a nationally watched race for Philadelphia district attorney and the tight re-election campaign of Allentown's indicted mayor.
Rhode Island: Local ballot initiatives in East Providence, Lincoln, and Scituate.
Tennessee: An uncontested special primary election in SD-17 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
Texas: Municipal elections across most of the state, including six city propositions in Houston (unofficial results).
9pm ET
Arizona: Municipal elections.
Colorado (unofficial results): Municipal elections, including for the Douglas County school board, the latest of Colorado's local school elections to be turned into a national referendum on education reform.
Kansas: Municipal elections along the western edge of the state.
Michigan (unofficial results): Municipal elections in parts of the Upper Peninsula.
Minnesota (unofficial results): Municipal elections, including for mayor of Minneapolis and a chaotic open-seat race for mayor of St. Paul.
New Mexico: Judicial and municipal elections in Las Cruces.
New York (unofficial results): Special general elections in SD-26, AD-27, and AD-71; three ballot measures, including Proposal 1, the vicennial referendum on holding a new constitutional convention for the State of New York; judicial and municipal elections, including mayorals in New York City and Syracuse as well as spirited county-executive races in Westchester and Nassau.
Texas: Seven proposed constitutional amendments; municipal elections in the western tip of the state.
Wyoming: A local referendum to raise the sales tax in Campbell County.
10pm ET
Idaho: Municipal elections in the southern part of the state.
Iowa: Municipal elections, including for mayor of Cedar Rapids.
Montana: Municipal elections, including the open Billings mayoral election.
Utah: The special general election for UT-03 (unofficial results); municipal elections.
11pm ET
California: Municipal elections in 31 counties, including for mayor of Santa Barbara.
Idaho: Municipal elections in the Panhandle.
Oregon (unofficial results): Municipal elections.
Washington (unofficial results): Three nonbinding advisory votes; State Senate special general elections in LD-07, LD-31, LD-37, LD-45 (a Republican-held seat in Democratic territory that, if flipped, would give Democrats control of the State Senate and therefore all of Washington state government), and LD-48; State House special general elections in LD-07 (Position 1), LD-31 (Position 2), and LD-48 (Position 1); judicial and municipal elections, including a Dem-on-Dem race for the open Seattle mayor's office (unofficial results) and a ballot initiative to overturn Burien's sanctuary-city status, where proponents accused immigrants of crimes in a widely criticized mailer.
Monday, October 16, 2017
2017 Downballot Race Ratings for Louisiana and Virginia
The year following a presidential election is often the sleepiest time for elections (although certainly not for politics). Indeed, this November will feature only three of this blog's favorite races to analyze: downballot constitutional offices. As always, Baseballot will be the only site on the World Wide Web handicapping these under-the-radar yet multi-million-dollar campaigns. As my colleagues at Inside Elections do for congressional elections, I rate each state executive race on a Solid-Likely-Lean-Tilt scale, with the very closest of races earning the coveted label of "Toss-up."
According to my Big, Bad Chart of Constitutional Offices, the seats on the ballot this year include one lieutenant governor, one attorney general, and one treasurer. As it turns out, all of these elections will probably continue the status quo in the two states where they are taking place. Below are my initial ratings for the three seats; in the future, these ratings can be found on the "2017 Ratings" tab in the menu above, where they will be updated through Election Day.
According to my Big, Bad Chart of Constitutional Offices, the seats on the ballot this year include one lieutenant governor, one attorney general, and one treasurer. As it turns out, all of these elections will probably continue the status quo in the two states where they are taking place. Below are my initial ratings for the three seats; in the future, these ratings can be found on the "2017 Ratings" tab in the menu above, where they will be updated through Election Day.
Louisiana
- Treasurer: Solid Republican. After Treasurer John Kennedy was elected to the U.S. Senate in December 2016, a statewide special election was called to fill the remaining two years in his term. After six candidates squared off in the low-turnout October 14 jungle primary, Democrat Derrick Edwards (31%) and Republican John Schroder (24%) finished first and second to advance to the November 18 runoff. Democrats might have once had an outside shot at winning this seat: the party has overperformed in special elections thus far this year (probably due to the unpopularity of President Donald Trump), and the treasurer election just so happens to coincide with a competitive open mayoral race in dark blue New Orleans, meaning Democrats may constitute a disproportionate share of the electorate. However, it has quickly become apparent that Edwards isn't taking his campaign seriously. Despite an inspiring backstory (the wheelchair-bound Edwards was paralyzed by a brutal collision in a high-school football game; after doctors told him he would have to be cared for in an institution for the rest of his life, he instead got two graduate degrees and is now a practicing lawyer), Edwards has barely campaigned, missed campaign-finance deadlines, skipped debates and media events, and refused to talk about his plans until after he is elected. As a result, the Louisiana Democratic Party isn't even supporting his campaign, effectively ceding the race to the Republican Schroder, a former state representative. Schroder was the only candidate able to accrue significant funds from a tapped-out Louisiana donor class in the first phase of the campaign, raising more than all of his opponents combined ($436,954, compared to only $9,678 for Edwards). Now that he's the only Republican in the race, he'll use that dough to consolidate support and win easily.
Virginia
Sometimes, a state's downballot races are decided by turnout at the top of the ticket, and it looks like that will be the case in Virginia this year: so far, the commonwealth's two constitutional-officer elections have tracked extremely closely with its hard-fought gubernatorial race. That contest is rated Lean Democratic by Inside Elections, but if it ends up being more Democratic or Republican than predicted, the two elections below will too. (All three elections take place on Tuesday, November 7.)- Lieutenant Governor: Lean Democratic. With a truly batty Republican primary behind us (which State Senator Jill Vogel might have won by spreading rumors that her opponent had an affair), the general election for lieutenant governor has been as uninteresting as the actual post, which is part-time and mostly consists of breaking ties in the State Senate. Vogel has struck an interesting balance between distancing herself from the rest of the Republican Party on issues like gay rights and also not showing any of Ed Gillespie's hesitance to embrace President Trump. Meanwhile, Democrat Justin Fairfax, who lost a close primary for attorney general in 2013, is attacking Vogel for her legal defense of various dark-money groups and a bill she sponsored to require women to have an invasive ultrasound before getting an abortion. Vogel also caused a mini-stir by saying Fairfax, who is black, couldn't "talk intelligently" on the issues. Ultimately, though, that gaffe is unlikely to make a splash in an ocean of daily Trump tweets, and, with each candidate having only about $300,000 in the bank, the LG race has been the quietest of Virginia's three campaigns on TV thus far. Polling shows Fairfax with a lead comparable to Democrat Ralph Northam's in the governor's race.
- Attorney General: Lean Democratic. Instead, all the downballot action in Old Dominion is here. The Republican Attorneys General Association has poured $2.75 million into the campaign coffers of Republican candidate John Adams—and yet he still trails Democrat Mark Herring in total fundraising by $2.8 million. In response, the Democratic Attorneys General Association has given Herring $1.7 million, helping to fund a major TV blitz by the incumbent AG. Adams's campaign has responded in kind, and he is further buoyed by the air support of the NRA's political action committee, the only outside group advertising in a downballot race so far this year. Adams and his Republican allies are accusing Herring of politicizing the attorney general's office (Herring has sued the Trump administration over immigration and tried to prevent out-of-state gun permits from being used in Virginia), but this light blue state might actually be on board with that: Herring leads polls by as wide a margin as any of Virginia's three Democrats on the 2017 ballot.
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
Previewing Florida SD-40: Three Questions That Will Tell Us the Most About 2018
There's a special legislative election almost every week, but today we have a special special. Ever since Florida State Senator Frank Artiles called a fellow state senator a "fucking asshole" and a "bitch," called the Senate President a "pussy" who was only elected with the help of "six niggas," hired a Hooters calendar girl and a Playboy model as "campaign consultants," and resigned from office in disgrace, the race to replace him has been circled on my calendar—not for any reason related to the Florida-man antics on display from its former occupant, but rather due to the district itself.
Florida Senate District 40 covers Kendall and other dense suburbs southwest of Miami, stretching from South Dixie Highway (U.S. 1) near Dadeland Mall in the east to Krome Avenue in the west. According to Florida data consultant Matthew Isbell, it voted 57.1% for Hillary Clinton and 39.5% for Donald Trump in 2016 yet preferred Republican Marco Rubio to Democrat Patrick Murphy in that year's U.S. Senate race, 50% to 47%. At the same time, Artiles, a Republican, defeated Democrat Dwight Bullard 50.6% to 40.7% for what was (like it is today) an open State Senate seat.
Why the wide variation in results? A plurality of Florida SD-40's voters belong to the difficult-to-pin-down community of Cuban Americans. This historically Republican bloc has edged into competitiveness as young Cuban Americans (who are more liberal) come of age, the national parties have become more racially polarized, and/or President Trump has alienated the Hispanic community writ large. That explains why SD-40 largely rejected Trump in the 2016 presidential election while still supporting Rubio and Artiles (who are both Cuban American themselves). According to Isbell, an estimated 38% of the district's population is Cuban American. Overall, as of the 2010 Census (and, fair warning, South Florida is a rapidly changing area), the district was 74.6% Hispanic, 14.5% non-Hispanic white, and 8.0% non-Hispanic black.
Today, Democrat Annette Taddeo (who is half Italian American, half Colombian American) faces off against Republican José Felix Díaz (who is Cuban American). It's been an expensive campaign (political committees have spent $4.1 million on the race on top of the $1.8 million spent by the campaigns), and the outcome is legitimately in question (the only poll of the race, a three-month-old Democratic internal, gave Taddeo a 42–38% lead). The final results, which will trickle in starting at 7pm ET tonight, will be a particularly useful data point in our never-ending quest to figure out what's going to happen in 2018. There are three crucial questions that we need answered in order to understand how and whether Democrats can take back a U.S. House majority in next year's midterms, and, more than most special elections this year, Florida SD-40 will hold a clue to each of them.
This is pretty simple. Unlike more uniform legislative and congressional districts, Republicans have recently done much better here downballot than at the top of the ticket. If voters cast their ballots based on their feelings toward Donald Trump and what is happening in Washington, it's good for Democrats. If they consider the two candidates in a vacuum, it's good for Republicans. Knowing this, Taddeo has tried to tie Díaz (who is a former contestant on The Apprentice!) to Trump with a contrastive TV ad, while Díaz has attempted to play up Taddeo's weaknesses, such as her support for the Colombian peace accord with the FARC and her alleged tolerance of the communist regimes in Cuba and China.
The final result will tell us which candidate was successful. If Taddeo approaches or even exceeds Clinton's 57% here, it could be a sign that this election was decided along national battle lines. That could bode well for Democrats in 2018 if everyone goes to the polls with the unpopular Trump in mind, not their local congressman. If Díaz wins, it's pretty solid evidence that local considerations can still win out in the age of Trump.
The conventional wisdom about midterm elections is that the electorate is older, whiter, and more Republican than in presidential elections. But most of that conventional wisdom is rooted in the Obama midterms of 2010 and 2014, and the longer-term trend is that the president's party tends to suffer in midterm elections. Indeed, an enthusiasm gap in favor of the Democrats has been apparent lately in measures from the generic ballot to demonstrations. Democratic overperformance has also been a crystal-clear pattern in special-election results so far in 2017, but it'll be important to see whether it holds in SD-40 in particular. Because SD-40 is so heavily Hispanic, there is greater danger than usual of midterm dropoff voting harming Democratic chances. If Taddeo tonight follows in the footsteps of other Democratic special-election candidates across the nation and exceeds the typical Democratic performance in her district, it's a good sign for the party that the typical demographic forces of midterm elections can be overcome. If Díaz does better than expected, it'll suggest that Democrats still have a turnout problem among minority voters. (Note: the best basis for comparison here is not the district's presidential lean, for reasons explained above; instead, keep an eye on how Taddeo and Díaz perform relative to Bullard and Artiles in the last open State Senate race in this district just ten and a half months ago.)
Most special elections this year have taken place in districts that shifted toward Republicans in 2016 with Trump on the ticket—enough that we can be pretty sure that "Trump Democrats" aren't lost to Democrats forever. But we know a lot less about the opposite case: historically Republican Clinton voters. Will Democrats be able to hold onto them in future elections? Many of their best paths to a U.S. House majority go through districts, including several in heavily Hispanic California and Florida, that shifted toward Democrats in 2016.
Florida SD-40 is one of those districts. According to Isbell, voters within its lines went for Barack Obama over Mitt Romney 54.5% to 44.9% in 2012. In a scenario where Democrats succeed in nationalizing this special election, a smaller Taddeo win might suggest that voters are sticking with their 2012 preferences; a Taddeo blowout might suggest that the 2016 baseline is more accurate. However, because of this district's unusual ticket-splitting tendencies, it may not be easy (or appropriate) to directly compare the 2017 State Senate results with the 2016 and 2012 presidential results, as explained above. So while the district's (new or old, 2016 or 2012) partisan baseline will certainly factor into tonight's results, it will probably be the trickiest thing to tease out. Simply put, the race is expected to be far closer than either Obama's 9.6-point win or Clinton's 17.6-point win, so a nail-biter wouldn't necessarily mean that the more Republican-favorable (i.e., 2012) baseline is the correct one.
Indeed, all three of these factors are going to affect the final verdict in Florida SD-40 tonight—and yet we're only going to see one set of topline results. Admittedly, that may make it difficult to tease apart exactly what to take away from the election; for instance, the variables listed above could pull in multiple directions, muddling the analysis and leaving the door open to more than one explanation. There's another major confounder: the cleanup after Hurricane Irma. Many areas of the district, which was hit hard earlier this month, are still without power, and voting may simply not be many people's top priority. (Governor Rick Scott rejected the Democratic Party's request to postpone the election until life in South Florida returned to normal.)
So even though the answers to all three questions will lie hidden in tonight's two simple results—Taddeo X, Díaz Y—they may not be obvious. But the election will still be able to tell us something. Certain results could eliminate certain 2018 theories, and a select few results would offer unambiguous lessons. If Taddeo wins by 17 points or better (i.e., she does better than Clinton), all three questions will have been answered in Democrats' favor. If Díaz outperforms Artiles's 10-point win from 2016, Republicans will be dancing a jig of glee.
If you're looking for a more definitive lesson to take away from tonight's results, though, you're in luck. If nothing else, this election is likely to foreshadow the open race for Florida's 27th Congressional District, which is being vacated by Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in 2018. Both FL-27 and SD-40 voted similarly in the 2016 and 2012 presidential races (both moving toward Democrats), both are three-quarters Hispanic, and both are open seats. In fact, they share many of the exact same voters: 24.1% of voters in FL-27 live in SD-40, and 34.7% of voters in SD-40 live in FL-27. Whichever party prevails tonight has to be considered the favorite in FL-27 next November—and that's one-twenty-fourth of Democrats' way to a majority.
Florida Senate District 40 covers Kendall and other dense suburbs southwest of Miami, stretching from South Dixie Highway (U.S. 1) near Dadeland Mall in the east to Krome Avenue in the west. According to Florida data consultant Matthew Isbell, it voted 57.1% for Hillary Clinton and 39.5% for Donald Trump in 2016 yet preferred Republican Marco Rubio to Democrat Patrick Murphy in that year's U.S. Senate race, 50% to 47%. At the same time, Artiles, a Republican, defeated Democrat Dwight Bullard 50.6% to 40.7% for what was (like it is today) an open State Senate seat.
Why the wide variation in results? A plurality of Florida SD-40's voters belong to the difficult-to-pin-down community of Cuban Americans. This historically Republican bloc has edged into competitiveness as young Cuban Americans (who are more liberal) come of age, the national parties have become more racially polarized, and/or President Trump has alienated the Hispanic community writ large. That explains why SD-40 largely rejected Trump in the 2016 presidential election while still supporting Rubio and Artiles (who are both Cuban American themselves). According to Isbell, an estimated 38% of the district's population is Cuban American. Overall, as of the 2010 Census (and, fair warning, South Florida is a rapidly changing area), the district was 74.6% Hispanic, 14.5% non-Hispanic white, and 8.0% non-Hispanic black.
Today, Democrat Annette Taddeo (who is half Italian American, half Colombian American) faces off against Republican José Felix Díaz (who is Cuban American). It's been an expensive campaign (political committees have spent $4.1 million on the race on top of the $1.8 million spent by the campaigns), and the outcome is legitimately in question (the only poll of the race, a three-month-old Democratic internal, gave Taddeo a 42–38% lead). The final results, which will trickle in starting at 7pm ET tonight, will be a particularly useful data point in our never-ending quest to figure out what's going to happen in 2018. There are three crucial questions that we need answered in order to understand how and whether Democrats can take back a U.S. House majority in next year's midterms, and, more than most special elections this year, Florida SD-40 will hold a clue to each of them.
1. Will the election be nationalized, or will voters consider it locally?
This is pretty simple. Unlike more uniform legislative and congressional districts, Republicans have recently done much better here downballot than at the top of the ticket. If voters cast their ballots based on their feelings toward Donald Trump and what is happening in Washington, it's good for Democrats. If they consider the two candidates in a vacuum, it's good for Republicans. Knowing this, Taddeo has tried to tie Díaz (who is a former contestant on The Apprentice!) to Trump with a contrastive TV ad, while Díaz has attempted to play up Taddeo's weaknesses, such as her support for the Colombian peace accord with the FARC and her alleged tolerance of the communist regimes in Cuba and China.
The final result will tell us which candidate was successful. If Taddeo approaches or even exceeds Clinton's 57% here, it could be a sign that this election was decided along national battle lines. That could bode well for Democrats in 2018 if everyone goes to the polls with the unpopular Trump in mind, not their local congressman. If Díaz wins, it's pretty solid evidence that local considerations can still win out in the age of Trump.
2. Will the electorate be more Democratic than usual?
The conventional wisdom about midterm elections is that the electorate is older, whiter, and more Republican than in presidential elections. But most of that conventional wisdom is rooted in the Obama midterms of 2010 and 2014, and the longer-term trend is that the president's party tends to suffer in midterm elections. Indeed, an enthusiasm gap in favor of the Democrats has been apparent lately in measures from the generic ballot to demonstrations. Democratic overperformance has also been a crystal-clear pattern in special-election results so far in 2017, but it'll be important to see whether it holds in SD-40 in particular. Because SD-40 is so heavily Hispanic, there is greater danger than usual of midterm dropoff voting harming Democratic chances. If Taddeo tonight follows in the footsteps of other Democratic special-election candidates across the nation and exceeds the typical Democratic performance in her district, it's a good sign for the party that the typical demographic forces of midterm elections can be overcome. If Díaz does better than expected, it'll suggest that Democrats still have a turnout problem among minority voters. (Note: the best basis for comparison here is not the district's presidential lean, for reasons explained above; instead, keep an eye on how Taddeo and Díaz perform relative to Bullard and Artiles in the last open State Senate race in this district just ten and a half months ago.)
3. Was 2016 a political realignment, or will election results revert to their pre-2016 norms?
Most special elections this year have taken place in districts that shifted toward Republicans in 2016 with Trump on the ticket—enough that we can be pretty sure that "Trump Democrats" aren't lost to Democrats forever. But we know a lot less about the opposite case: historically Republican Clinton voters. Will Democrats be able to hold onto them in future elections? Many of their best paths to a U.S. House majority go through districts, including several in heavily Hispanic California and Florida, that shifted toward Democrats in 2016.
Florida SD-40 is one of those districts. According to Isbell, voters within its lines went for Barack Obama over Mitt Romney 54.5% to 44.9% in 2012. In a scenario where Democrats succeed in nationalizing this special election, a smaller Taddeo win might suggest that voters are sticking with their 2012 preferences; a Taddeo blowout might suggest that the 2016 baseline is more accurate. However, because of this district's unusual ticket-splitting tendencies, it may not be easy (or appropriate) to directly compare the 2017 State Senate results with the 2016 and 2012 presidential results, as explained above. So while the district's (new or old, 2016 or 2012) partisan baseline will certainly factor into tonight's results, it will probably be the trickiest thing to tease out. Simply put, the race is expected to be far closer than either Obama's 9.6-point win or Clinton's 17.6-point win, so a nail-biter wouldn't necessarily mean that the more Republican-favorable (i.e., 2012) baseline is the correct one.
* * *
Indeed, all three of these factors are going to affect the final verdict in Florida SD-40 tonight—and yet we're only going to see one set of topline results. Admittedly, that may make it difficult to tease apart exactly what to take away from the election; for instance, the variables listed above could pull in multiple directions, muddling the analysis and leaving the door open to more than one explanation. There's another major confounder: the cleanup after Hurricane Irma. Many areas of the district, which was hit hard earlier this month, are still without power, and voting may simply not be many people's top priority. (Governor Rick Scott rejected the Democratic Party's request to postpone the election until life in South Florida returned to normal.)
So even though the answers to all three questions will lie hidden in tonight's two simple results—Taddeo X, Díaz Y—they may not be obvious. But the election will still be able to tell us something. Certain results could eliminate certain 2018 theories, and a select few results would offer unambiguous lessons. If Taddeo wins by 17 points or better (i.e., she does better than Clinton), all three questions will have been answered in Democrats' favor. If Díaz outperforms Artiles's 10-point win from 2016, Republicans will be dancing a jig of glee.
If you're looking for a more definitive lesson to take away from tonight's results, though, you're in luck. If nothing else, this election is likely to foreshadow the open race for Florida's 27th Congressional District, which is being vacated by Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in 2018. Both FL-27 and SD-40 voted similarly in the 2016 and 2012 presidential races (both moving toward Democrats), both are three-quarters Hispanic, and both are open seats. In fact, they share many of the exact same voters: 24.1% of voters in FL-27 live in SD-40, and 34.7% of voters in SD-40 live in FL-27. Whichever party prevails tonight has to be considered the favorite in FL-27 next November—and that's one-twenty-fourth of Democrats' way to a majority.
Thursday, August 24, 2017
Thanks to a Constitutional Quirk, Nothing to See in New Hampshire or Vermont in 2018
New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu and Vermont Governor Phil Scott just took office seven months ago, and yet they are already having to run for reelection. New Hampshire and Vermont are unique among the states in that they elect their governors to two-year, rather than four-year, terms—resulting in nearly never-ending gubernatorial campaigns.
Democrats eager to start rebuilding their gubernatorial bench in 2018 are practically salivating over these two northern New England states. They doubtlessly look out on the Granite State’s political landscape and see a state that’s among the swingiest in the nation—one Donald Trump lost by just 2,736 votes in 2016—entering what could be a dramatic Democratic wave election. Meanwhile, in the Green Mountain State, a Republican sits on the throne of one of the most liberal states in the union—the home state of Bernie Sanders that went for Hillary Clinton by 26 points. You can understand why Democrats think they have an opening.
Unfortunately for them, their thinking is flawed; both Sununu and Scott are heavy favorites in 2018 due to the same underlying campaign context that Democrats think will help them. While New Hampshire and Vermont voters can be quite independent, that doesn’t mean they’re impatient enough to give up on their governors after just two short years. Indeed, these states’ unusual election calendars raise a very simple question: how often do governors lose reelection after only two years in office?
In addition to New Hampshire and Vermont, Rhode Island also elected governors to two-year terms until it amended its constitution effective 1994. Out of the collective past 85 biennial gubernatorial elections in those three states, an incumbent governor running for reelection after his or her first term has lost just one. It hasn’t happened in Vermont since 1962; it didn’t happen in Rhode Island after 1962; and it has happened just once (2004) in New Hampshire in the past 90 years. Indeed, running for governor against a two-year incumbent could be considered insane by one famous definition—doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
This is a significant difference in job security from governors elected quadrennially. As we’ve all observed, one-term governors are hardly unusual in the other 47 and a half states. It also becomes a lot more likely that Vermont, sometime Rhode Island, and especially New Hampshire governors lose reelection or retire once they serve four years:
What accounts for this near-invincibility? Most likely, it’s an extended honeymoon period. When any politician enters office, he or she generally enjoys increased popularity and political capital. Most of them are able to convert this political capital into action and results, which in turn lifts their popularity even higher. It’s not until a few years down the line that voters begin to get sick of their governor and/or the candidate falters.
This theory arises from the fact that, not only do two-year governors almost always win their first reelection battles, but they almost always do so even more convincingly than they won the corner office in the first place. Historical results for New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island gubernatorial elections going back to 1972 point to the electoral potency of a two-year incumbency:
That’s an average boost of 7.0 percentage points to the incumbent’s vote share and an average 13.4-point widening of his or her margin of victory. That’s conservative, too; Bruce Sundlun drags down the data because he did so well in his first election that his reelection (which he won comfortably) couldn’t possibly match it. In addition, Madeleine Kunin’s vote share fell in her reelection bid even though her margin of victory increased; that was because she faced a credible third-party challenger (Sanders, of all people) in 1986 as well.
Craig Benson in 2004—the one two-year governor during this period to lose reelection—remains the only truly concerning precedent for Sununu and Scott. Indeed, he is a poster child for what not to do in your first two-year term as governor: flout ethics rules, overreach legislatively, and make enemies. However, Sununu and Scott have avoided any such missteps, and their net approval ratings are sky high. They look well ensconced in their aforementioned honeymoon periods, and they are well on the path of every non-Benson two-year governor since 1972 to comfortable reelections. If historical averages hold, Sununu can expect to receive about 56% of the vote in 2018 to his opponent’s 40%; Scott can expect to prevail 60% to 38%.
But there’s also a warning hidden in the data. Two of the three governors whose margins of victory shrank in their reelection campaigns have served within the last 15 years; the recentness of Benson’s example is certainly a red flag. Could we be entering a period of more impatience in the electorate? Are the 21st century’s heightened partisanship and increased correlation between national and state election results finally overpowering these states’ longstanding traditions of voting for the person over the party? It’s impossible to tell as of yet, but it’s something for Sununu and Scott to be mindful of. By no means can they afford to sit back and take reelection for granted. But with prepared and competent incumbents, Republicans at least have history on their side.
Democrats eager to start rebuilding their gubernatorial bench in 2018 are practically salivating over these two northern New England states. They doubtlessly look out on the Granite State’s political landscape and see a state that’s among the swingiest in the nation—one Donald Trump lost by just 2,736 votes in 2016—entering what could be a dramatic Democratic wave election. Meanwhile, in the Green Mountain State, a Republican sits on the throne of one of the most liberal states in the union—the home state of Bernie Sanders that went for Hillary Clinton by 26 points. You can understand why Democrats think they have an opening.
Unfortunately for them, their thinking is flawed; both Sununu and Scott are heavy favorites in 2018 due to the same underlying campaign context that Democrats think will help them. While New Hampshire and Vermont voters can be quite independent, that doesn’t mean they’re impatient enough to give up on their governors after just two short years. Indeed, these states’ unusual election calendars raise a very simple question: how often do governors lose reelection after only two years in office?
In addition to New Hampshire and Vermont, Rhode Island also elected governors to two-year terms until it amended its constitution effective 1994. Out of the collective past 85 biennial gubernatorial elections in those three states, an incumbent governor running for reelection after his or her first term has lost just one. It hasn’t happened in Vermont since 1962; it didn’t happen in Rhode Island after 1962; and it has happened just once (2004) in New Hampshire in the past 90 years. Indeed, running for governor against a two-year incumbent could be considered insane by one famous definition—doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
This is a significant difference in job security from governors elected quadrennially. As we’ve all observed, one-term governors are hardly unusual in the other 47 and a half states. It also becomes a lot more likely that Vermont, sometime Rhode Island, and especially New Hampshire governors lose reelection or retire once they serve four years:
What accounts for this near-invincibility? Most likely, it’s an extended honeymoon period. When any politician enters office, he or she generally enjoys increased popularity and political capital. Most of them are able to convert this political capital into action and results, which in turn lifts their popularity even higher. It’s not until a few years down the line that voters begin to get sick of their governor and/or the candidate falters.
This theory arises from the fact that, not only do two-year governors almost always win their first reelection battles, but they almost always do so even more convincingly than they won the corner office in the first place. Historical results for New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island gubernatorial elections going back to 1972 point to the electoral potency of a two-year incumbency:
That’s an average boost of 7.0 percentage points to the incumbent’s vote share and an average 13.4-point widening of his or her margin of victory. That’s conservative, too; Bruce Sundlun drags down the data because he did so well in his first election that his reelection (which he won comfortably) couldn’t possibly match it. In addition, Madeleine Kunin’s vote share fell in her reelection bid even though her margin of victory increased; that was because she faced a credible third-party challenger (Sanders, of all people) in 1986 as well.
Craig Benson in 2004—the one two-year governor during this period to lose reelection—remains the only truly concerning precedent for Sununu and Scott. Indeed, he is a poster child for what not to do in your first two-year term as governor: flout ethics rules, overreach legislatively, and make enemies. However, Sununu and Scott have avoided any such missteps, and their net approval ratings are sky high. They look well ensconced in their aforementioned honeymoon periods, and they are well on the path of every non-Benson two-year governor since 1972 to comfortable reelections. If historical averages hold, Sununu can expect to receive about 56% of the vote in 2018 to his opponent’s 40%; Scott can expect to prevail 60% to 38%.
But there’s also a warning hidden in the data. Two of the three governors whose margins of victory shrank in their reelection campaigns have served within the last 15 years; the recentness of Benson’s example is certainly a red flag. Could we be entering a period of more impatience in the electorate? Are the 21st century’s heightened partisanship and increased correlation between national and state election results finally overpowering these states’ longstanding traditions of voting for the person over the party? It’s impossible to tell as of yet, but it’s something for Sununu and Scott to be mindful of. By no means can they afford to sit back and take reelection for granted. But with prepared and competent incumbents, Republicans at least have history on their side.
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Why Ditching Pelosi Would Be Pointless
I don't have strong feelings one way or the other about whether Democrats should fire Nancy Pelosi. But I do have strong feelings about people who howl incessantly that Democrats should fire Nancy Pelosi. There would be no point to forcing her out—and Democrats certainly wouldn't be solving all their apparent electoral problems* by doing so.
There's no question that Republicans have had success using Pelosi as a bogeyman in campaign ads—"vote for the Democrat," they threaten, "and Pelosi's liberal agenda will take over the country!" But do any Democrats really think that these ads will stop without Pelosi in power? That Republicans will just throw up their arms and say, "Oh well, I guess we can't attack Democrats anymore"? No; the GOP will simply move on to the next-best bogeyman—probably Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
Furthermore, whoever Democrats pick to succeed Pelosi—even if it's someone eminently likable—will immediately become the target of Republican attacks and will suffer a popularity hit as a result. It is the other party's job to try to define its opponents in a negative way. It is one of the great paradoxes of politics that party leaders (at least in Congress) are always among the least popular members of that party—but that's a feature, not a bug. The very act of being in leadership makes you less popular. That's why it's tempting to always think that a party's congressional leader is the absolute worst choice for the job, but really no one else would do much better.
Others might argue that Pelosi's age (she just turned 77 in March) is holding Democrats back. But I fail to see why Pelosi's age matters to the average voter other than just being one of the ingredients in the Republican cocktail of discrediting her. This is not the United Kingdom; voters don't go to the polls to choose between Nancy Pelosi and Paul Ryan. They vote for the local candidates in their districts, and as long as Democrats nominate appealing individual candidates (and yes, youth/vigor can be an element of that), the age of the potential speaker of the House doesn't matter.
Nor do I really see anything for Democrats to gain by picking a dynamic new leader. Republicans basically tried this, switching from John Boehner to the young and likable Paul Ryan in 2015. As a result, Ryan's unpopularity shot up, and although his GOP did well in the 2016 congressional elections, I don't know anyone who says it was because of Ryan. The reality is that, in our president-centric system of government, it's just not clear that congressional leadership makes much of a difference in elections (again, apart from being convenient fodder for attack ads). Tim Ryan or Katherine Clark or whoever Democrats pick isn't going to zigzag the nation kissing babies and winning over voters. That's just not the role our legislative leaders play.
There's already a debate in political science over whether presidential elections are a referendum or a choice. Basically, even when the opposition formally agrees that Polly Tishan is going to be the face of their party, and even when Polly embarks on an exhaustive campaign schedule, half of political scientists still think voters are essentially just voting based on what they think of the incumbent president. So in a midterm election like 2018, what chance does the face of the Democratic Party have of convincing voters to cast their ballots primarily as a statement of support for him or her? Fundamentally, our system of government and our electoral culture does not lend itself to Theresa May-vs.-Jeremy Corbyn-style ideological and personal movements. The question of the 2018 election is likely to be simple and blunt: "Donald Trump—yes or no?"
Democrats can decide for themselves what to do about Pelosi. But they would be foolish to think that getting rid of her is a panacea. There is no Democratic House member ready to step in who already has a bulletproof national brand and won't be able to be defined negatively by Republicans. The other party is always going to find a way to demonize your congressional leadership. Electorally, they can never help you, and you should probably just accept that they are inevitably going to harm you. So both parties: stop picking (and picking on) your legislative leaders based on political considerations or popularity. Choose them for their actual job: their ability to cut legislative deals and govern effectively. At the ballot box, it absolutely will not matter one bit.
*I'm not even convinced that they have electoral problems, to be honest. Yes, eventually they will need to sort through their internal divisions to pick a 2020 presidential nominee and settle on a grand message to compete with Donald Trump's, but for midterm elections, just being the opposition party is often more than sufficient.
There's no question that Republicans have had success using Pelosi as a bogeyman in campaign ads—"vote for the Democrat," they threaten, "and Pelosi's liberal agenda will take over the country!" But do any Democrats really think that these ads will stop without Pelosi in power? That Republicans will just throw up their arms and say, "Oh well, I guess we can't attack Democrats anymore"? No; the GOP will simply move on to the next-best bogeyman—probably Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
Furthermore, whoever Democrats pick to succeed Pelosi—even if it's someone eminently likable—will immediately become the target of Republican attacks and will suffer a popularity hit as a result. It is the other party's job to try to define its opponents in a negative way. It is one of the great paradoxes of politics that party leaders (at least in Congress) are always among the least popular members of that party—but that's a feature, not a bug. The very act of being in leadership makes you less popular. That's why it's tempting to always think that a party's congressional leader is the absolute worst choice for the job, but really no one else would do much better.
Others might argue that Pelosi's age (she just turned 77 in March) is holding Democrats back. But I fail to see why Pelosi's age matters to the average voter other than just being one of the ingredients in the Republican cocktail of discrediting her. This is not the United Kingdom; voters don't go to the polls to choose between Nancy Pelosi and Paul Ryan. They vote for the local candidates in their districts, and as long as Democrats nominate appealing individual candidates (and yes, youth/vigor can be an element of that), the age of the potential speaker of the House doesn't matter.
Nor do I really see anything for Democrats to gain by picking a dynamic new leader. Republicans basically tried this, switching from John Boehner to the young and likable Paul Ryan in 2015. As a result, Ryan's unpopularity shot up, and although his GOP did well in the 2016 congressional elections, I don't know anyone who says it was because of Ryan. The reality is that, in our president-centric system of government, it's just not clear that congressional leadership makes much of a difference in elections (again, apart from being convenient fodder for attack ads). Tim Ryan or Katherine Clark or whoever Democrats pick isn't going to zigzag the nation kissing babies and winning over voters. That's just not the role our legislative leaders play.
There's already a debate in political science over whether presidential elections are a referendum or a choice. Basically, even when the opposition formally agrees that Polly Tishan is going to be the face of their party, and even when Polly embarks on an exhaustive campaign schedule, half of political scientists still think voters are essentially just voting based on what they think of the incumbent president. So in a midterm election like 2018, what chance does the face of the Democratic Party have of convincing voters to cast their ballots primarily as a statement of support for him or her? Fundamentally, our system of government and our electoral culture does not lend itself to Theresa May-vs.-Jeremy Corbyn-style ideological and personal movements. The question of the 2018 election is likely to be simple and blunt: "Donald Trump—yes or no?"
Democrats can decide for themselves what to do about Pelosi. But they would be foolish to think that getting rid of her is a panacea. There is no Democratic House member ready to step in who already has a bulletproof national brand and won't be able to be defined negatively by Republicans. The other party is always going to find a way to demonize your congressional leadership. Electorally, they can never help you, and you should probably just accept that they are inevitably going to harm you. So both parties: stop picking (and picking on) your legislative leaders based on political considerations or popularity. Choose them for their actual job: their ability to cut legislative deals and govern effectively. At the ballot box, it absolutely will not matter one bit.
*I'm not even convinced that they have electoral problems, to be honest. Yes, eventually they will need to sort through their internal divisions to pick a 2020 presidential nominee and settle on a grand message to compete with Donald Trump's, but for midterm elections, just being the opposition party is often more than sufficient.
Monday, June 19, 2017
Reflections on the 2017 Congressional Baseball Game
I always look forward to the Congressional Baseball Game; it's the platonic ideal of my two main interests combined. Usually, it's a fun and intimate affair—me and 10,000 of my closest friends watching the sloppiest All-Star Game of all time—but that all changed this year when a gunman opened fire on a Republican baseball practice the day before the game.
Although, thankfully, no one was killed, the tragedy completely reshaped our fun little tradition. Heavy security and solemn pregame ceremonies changed how I covered the game this year. A flood of interest in the Congressional Baseball Game suddenly meant lots of people were asking me about my experience covering the game and my research into its history. It was, frankly, a blur of activity that I even had trouble sorting through as I was living it. However, for you, my dear reader, I will attempt to make sense of it all. Here are all the articles and quotes I contributed to coverage of this year's Congressional Baseball Game.
Although, thankfully, no one was killed, the tragedy completely reshaped our fun little tradition. Heavy security and solemn pregame ceremonies changed how I covered the game this year. A flood of interest in the Congressional Baseball Game suddenly meant lots of people were asking me about my experience covering the game and my research into its history. It was, frankly, a blur of activity that I even had trouble sorting through as I was living it. However, for you, my dear reader, I will attempt to make sense of it all. Here are all the articles and quotes I contributed to coverage of this year's Congressional Baseball Game.
- My statistical preview of the game. As you may know, I keep a totally unnecessary Google spreadsheet of representatives' batting and pitching statistics in the Congressional Baseball Game since 2009. This year, for the first time, I used the stats to preview the game in Roll Call's official game program. The article isn't online yet, but I'll link to it here when it's up.
- My dispatch from covering the game in person. I was originally expecting my recap for The Hardball Times to focus on the baseball game, but it ended up mostly a play-by-play of the pregame ceremonies and the bipartisanship that pervaded Nationals Park.
- My statistical recap of the game. This follow-up to my first Roll Call article looks at who actually racked up the numbers in this year's game.
- The Washington Post walked through the history of the Congressional Baseball Game, from 1909 to today. I'm quoted about the purpose of the game and why it was organized in the first place. The article also comes with some snazzy maps and a timeline of the game's historical results.
- CBS This Morning interviewed me about the history of the game. My national TV debut! A brief overview of how the game was founded, Steve Scalise's gritty play, and why the game is so valuable to members like Linda Sánchez.
- Dave Montero of the Los Angeles Times wrote about baseball's power to unite. I contributed a few quotes, but Dave's writing really drives this beautiful piece. Former Congressional Baseball Game player Marty Russo talks about the thrill of playing on a major-league field, Dave walks through the most important moments when baseball and politics have intersected (such as President Bush's first pitch after 9/11), and baseball is treated as a metaphor for our political system.
- The Los Angeles Times also wrote about how California's eight congressional ballplayers did. Reporter Sarah D. Wire contacted me for the box score from the game; while the official box score isn't released by the game's scorekeepers until weeks later, I shared the play-by-play that I scrawled down on my own personal scorecard.
Last Wednesday's shooting was, without question, the biggest story in the 108-year history of the Congressional Baseball Game. Without the heroism of the three Capitol Police officers stationed at the practice, it could have been the bloodiest assassination incident in American history. Extremely fortunately, it was not that, but instead evolved into a moment of national unity, bringing awareness to a truly good-hearted charity tradition that did not deserve to be sullied in such a way but absolutely deserves the warm embrace it received from the nation on Thursday night. A full 24,959 spectators attended the game, more than double its previous record attendance; over $1.5 million were raised for charity, another record; and six million people (!) watched the game as it was livestreamed on Facebook. Out of a horrible attack, I was thrilled to see some true goodness emerge.
Friday, May 12, 2017
How to Solve Gerrymandering
Even in today's era of political polarization, there should be a few things we can all agree on. Puppies are cute. Arsenic is bad. Broccoli is the devil's food. And letting politicians draw uncompetitive districts for their own benefit is bad for democracy.
Members of both parties have voiced support for taking partisanship out of the process of drawing congressional and legislative districts. And yet, instead of being the rare issue where both parties are eager to get something done, redistricting reform has proven nearly impossible to implement. The latest example of why comes from the great state of Maryland. Republican Governor Larry Hogan has made an independent redistricting commission one of his top priorities. The Democratic legislature passed a redistricting reform bill with strong majorities. But, this week, Hogan vetoed the measure.
The reason is pure self-interest. The Democratic bill would have only switched Maryland's redistricting process to an independent commission if five nearby states did so first; Hogan, contending that this will never happen, is holding out for a bill that would have Maryland unilaterally disarm. That too will never happen. While Democrats may support nonpartisan redistricting in the abstract, Maryland Democrats correctly see it as a threat to their power. Partisan redistricting always favors the dominant party, and a state as blue as Maryland gives Democrats the opportunity to creatively mold several more Democratic seats in Congress than they are entitled to. They’ve done just that, as 87.5% of Maryland’s congressional delegation (seven of eight) are Democrats despite the party receiving just 60.4% of the combined statewide vote in the last round of congressional elections.
Maryland Democrats aren’t alone in this cartographical trickery. Most states gerrymander their districts, to varying degrees of blatancy, including several Republican-controlled states, including Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Texas. Like an arms race in an electoral cold war, neither side is going to give up its advantage until the other one does. And so reform languishes.
The Democratic bill hints at a solution but doesn't go far enough. Would-be redistricting reformers can't just sit back waiting for other states to take action on their own; they have to make a deal. Maryland’s gerrymandering problem won’t be solved in Annapolis. In fact, the key to getting fair districts in the Old Line State actually lies in Indiana.
If the Maryland Legislature is ever going to agree to an independent redistricting commission, Hogan needs to strike a deal with another state legislature—a Republican one—first. If Maryland and a red state both agree to stop gerrymandering, the Republican gain in Maryland and the Democratic gain in the other state would cancel each other out—but elections in both states would be more fair. And as it turns out, Indiana is the perfect partner in such a compact.
Like Maryland Democrats, Indiana Republicans have succeeded at gerrymandering their home state. Although the GOP won only 54% of the congressional popular vote in Indiana in 2016, the party controls 78% of the congressional delegation—seven out of nine seats. Reformers in Indiana have likewise tried to implement an independent redistricting commission, getting a bill through the Indiana State House in 2014. But while the appetite was there, the effort was also eventually killed by entrenched interests. Indiana is also comparable in size to Maryland, making the two states a fair trade. If Indiana switched to an independent redistricting commission, it would likely elect five Republicans and four Democrats. That net loss of two Republicans would balance out the two-seat gain that the GOP would probably see under a fair congressional map in Maryland.
Indiana is the best option on a short list of possible partners for Maryland. Wisconsin and Missouri each seats eight representatives—an even more precise match for Maryland—but Missouri already uses a hybrid redistricting system of legislators plus a commission. Wisconsin Republicans, meanwhile, are unlikely to go along since they risk losing control of this blue-tinged state altogether. Tennessee is another possible choice, with its Hoosier-esque 7–2 Republican congressional delegation, but it is more Republican than Maryland is Democratic.
There are still some obstacles faced by such a “grand bargain” between states. First, congressional incumbents in danger of losing their safe seats would certainly pressure their legislators to vote against the plan. In addition, redistricting affects not only the composition of Congress, but also state legislatures themselves; Maryland Democrats and Indiana Republicans would not be enthusiastic about the prospect of reducing their majorities. Although she might regard the swap of congressional seats as equitable, the average Maryland Democrat probably doesn’t care enough about Indiana that she values a State Senate seat there as highly as one back home. And because the plan would redraw existing legislative districts, there is the reality that some of the people asked to vote for this arrangement would lose their seats as a direct result.
Reformers would still have to lobby lawmakers hard to look past these issues, but they are not the main reason redistricting reform has stalled in Maryland and in state houses across the nation. Reformers cannot expect to make progress asking the majority party to give up leverage without getting anything in return. Perhaps soon the many states failing to end gerrymandering on their own will discover the elegant solution of looking to each other for help.
Members of both parties have voiced support for taking partisanship out of the process of drawing congressional and legislative districts. And yet, instead of being the rare issue where both parties are eager to get something done, redistricting reform has proven nearly impossible to implement. The latest example of why comes from the great state of Maryland. Republican Governor Larry Hogan has made an independent redistricting commission one of his top priorities. The Democratic legislature passed a redistricting reform bill with strong majorities. But, this week, Hogan vetoed the measure.
The reason is pure self-interest. The Democratic bill would have only switched Maryland's redistricting process to an independent commission if five nearby states did so first; Hogan, contending that this will never happen, is holding out for a bill that would have Maryland unilaterally disarm. That too will never happen. While Democrats may support nonpartisan redistricting in the abstract, Maryland Democrats correctly see it as a threat to their power. Partisan redistricting always favors the dominant party, and a state as blue as Maryland gives Democrats the opportunity to creatively mold several more Democratic seats in Congress than they are entitled to. They’ve done just that, as 87.5% of Maryland’s congressional delegation (seven of eight) are Democrats despite the party receiving just 60.4% of the combined statewide vote in the last round of congressional elections.
Maryland Democrats aren’t alone in this cartographical trickery. Most states gerrymander their districts, to varying degrees of blatancy, including several Republican-controlled states, including Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Texas. Like an arms race in an electoral cold war, neither side is going to give up its advantage until the other one does. And so reform languishes.
The Democratic bill hints at a solution but doesn't go far enough. Would-be redistricting reformers can't just sit back waiting for other states to take action on their own; they have to make a deal. Maryland’s gerrymandering problem won’t be solved in Annapolis. In fact, the key to getting fair districts in the Old Line State actually lies in Indiana.
If the Maryland Legislature is ever going to agree to an independent redistricting commission, Hogan needs to strike a deal with another state legislature—a Republican one—first. If Maryland and a red state both agree to stop gerrymandering, the Republican gain in Maryland and the Democratic gain in the other state would cancel each other out—but elections in both states would be more fair. And as it turns out, Indiana is the perfect partner in such a compact.
Like Maryland Democrats, Indiana Republicans have succeeded at gerrymandering their home state. Although the GOP won only 54% of the congressional popular vote in Indiana in 2016, the party controls 78% of the congressional delegation—seven out of nine seats. Reformers in Indiana have likewise tried to implement an independent redistricting commission, getting a bill through the Indiana State House in 2014. But while the appetite was there, the effort was also eventually killed by entrenched interests. Indiana is also comparable in size to Maryland, making the two states a fair trade. If Indiana switched to an independent redistricting commission, it would likely elect five Republicans and four Democrats. That net loss of two Republicans would balance out the two-seat gain that the GOP would probably see under a fair congressional map in Maryland.
Indiana is the best option on a short list of possible partners for Maryland. Wisconsin and Missouri each seats eight representatives—an even more precise match for Maryland—but Missouri already uses a hybrid redistricting system of legislators plus a commission. Wisconsin Republicans, meanwhile, are unlikely to go along since they risk losing control of this blue-tinged state altogether. Tennessee is another possible choice, with its Hoosier-esque 7–2 Republican congressional delegation, but it is more Republican than Maryland is Democratic.
There are still some obstacles faced by such a “grand bargain” between states. First, congressional incumbents in danger of losing their safe seats would certainly pressure their legislators to vote against the plan. In addition, redistricting affects not only the composition of Congress, but also state legislatures themselves; Maryland Democrats and Indiana Republicans would not be enthusiastic about the prospect of reducing their majorities. Although she might regard the swap of congressional seats as equitable, the average Maryland Democrat probably doesn’t care enough about Indiana that she values a State Senate seat there as highly as one back home. And because the plan would redraw existing legislative districts, there is the reality that some of the people asked to vote for this arrangement would lose their seats as a direct result.
Reformers would still have to lobby lawmakers hard to look past these issues, but they are not the main reason redistricting reform has stalled in Maryland and in state houses across the nation. Reformers cannot expect to make progress asking the majority party to give up leverage without getting anything in return. Perhaps soon the many states failing to end gerrymandering on their own will discover the elegant solution of looking to each other for help.
Wednesday, May 3, 2017
Is Boston Racist?
By now you've heard about the Adam Jones incident. Twenty-four hours later, the topic was still the news story in baseball, unspooling new sub-threads and inspiring much larger debates (anyone still think sports isn't political?). They'll move on, eventually. But in my hometown of Boston, the incident has exposed an ugly truth and forced a great deal of introspection that will—or at least should—linger.
We Bostonians have an inferiority complex, and one of our most tender spots is when the rest of the country plays the "Boston is racist" card. A cosmopolitan, liberal city, Boston certainly doesn't see itself that way—yet at the same time anyone with a more than passing connection to the city carries around the hidden shame of the city's violent resistance to busing in the 1970s. Within my lifetime, the Boston media, city leaders, and the collective masses were all guilty of a rush to judgment about the murder of Carol Stuart, a young suburban mother-to-be killed not by a black carjacker, but by her white husband. When an African American baseball player is called the N-word at Fenway Park, it's impossible not to draw the connection.
My first impression was optimism that our city was at least viewing Jones's assault with open eyes. Instead of attacking Jones or ignoring the story entirely, the Boston elite faced up to it. The Boston Globe led with the story all day on its website, and Mayor Marty Walsh and Governor Charlie Baker both issued swift statements of condemnation early this morning. Walsh, an Irish Catholic from Dorchester (still a demographic profile that's more associated with Trumpian intolerance than the bleeding-heart inclusiveness of the Cantabrigian university student), had particularly strong words: "If they claim to be a sports fan, they’re not a sports fan—nothing but a racist." Boston finally seemed to be acknowledging that, yes, it had a problem with racism it desperately needed to fix.
There was also a common thread in Walsh's and Baker's words, as Globe columnist Renée Graham pointed out: "This is not what Massachusetts and Boston are about." So maybe the sensitivity remained. Walsh and Baker were acknowledging that Boston has racist elements, but also insisting that, at its core, Boston was a welcoming and tolerant place. Well, OK. They're politicians—they are going to believe (or at least say they believe) the best about their constituents. But it's worth noting that Walsh's administration last year kicked off a series of town halls "aimed at bringing conversations about racism, healing, and policy work into all Boston neighborhoods." At one of the meetings, Walsh said, point-blank, "Boston has an issue with racism." Whether he thinks "racist" or "tolerant" is a more fitting adjective for Boston in 2017, Walsh clearly understands that there is still racism left to overcome in the city.
That was the city's elite, however. How did the hoi polloi react? Twitter unfortunately became the instrument by which this was measured, and the results were mixed at best. Liberal baseball Twitter pounced upon this tweet by NFL writer Albert Breer that summed up the denial of many Bostonians: "Is it horrible to want some proof? I dunno. I've probably been to 200 games at Fenway in my life. Never heard a slur yelled at a player." (Never mind that Jones had no reason to lie, and Boston fans have a reputation for racial taunting among African American athletes.) However, I saw just as many tweets from Bostonians (not to mention my own reaction) expressing their unqualified disgust for their fellow Red Sox fans in the bleachers Monday night, so I hardly think Breer's viewpoint is universally held here. Twitter attracts a broad element of society, including its dregs. You can find pretty much any opinion on there if you're looking for it. Overall, I think Boston took responsibility for the incident, as it should have—as it must have if we're going to make sure it isn't repeated.
It would be nice if that were the final word. But that inferiority complex is acting up again, because even those of us who own up to the racism of drunk Red Sox fans can't help but get defensive about the resurgent blanket narrative that "Boston is racist." We object to the very logic that people accuse us of: that our entire community should be stereotyped by the actions of a foolish few. This is unfair, of course; most people in Boston are not racist, as illustrated most recently by the classy standing ovation Red Sox fans gave Jones at Tuesday's game. The ovation did not undo what happened to Jones, but neither does what happened to Jones negate the ovation. Clearly, Boston has a racist underbelly, but what percentage of a city's residents have to belong to that fringe in order to say the city as a whole is racist? One bigot does not a racist city make, but a place doesn't need to be 100% pure-grade racist either.
This is something outsiders fail to realize when they smugly ask how Boston can be considered one of the most liberal cities in America while still struggling with racism. The two facts have little to do with each other. Massachusetts isn't a monolith where 100% of its citizens are latte-sipping progressives who nonetheless harbor secret racial animosities. Yes, it's true, 60% of Bay Staters voted for Hillary Clinton in November, more than 45 other states. But that means 33% voted for Donald Trump—at least some of whom were motivated by prejudice. (Trump also won the state handily during the primary.) And yes, some Democrats are racist as well, even if only in subtler ways. It was in dark blue Cambridge that someone called 911 to report that famed African American Studies scholar Henry Louis Gates looked suspicious as he attempted to open the jammed front door of his Harvard Square townhouse. These uncomfortable truths do nothing to change the fact that Massachusetts has been at the forefront of the progressive movement (inaugurating, among other things, same-sex marriage and Obamacare), including on issues of racial justice, which aren't abstract to them either: Massachusetts was home to the first black U.S. senator and the second black governor ever to be elected.
The question is whether Boston is racist with tolerant elements or tolerant with racist elements. And I honestly don't know which is correct. Boston hasn't earned the benefit of the doubt with its history; in addition to the nationally publicized busing crisis, Celtics players including the great Bill Russell confronted blatant racism here during the 1970s and '80s. But Boston is also a very different city than it was back then, and the racist reputation it earned 40 years ago gives us only an incomplete picture of the present day. The Jones incident did elicit a disturbing comment out of fellow African American ballplayer C.C. Sabathia, who said he has "never been called the N-word" anywhere but Boston (albeit not since before 2009); "when you go to Boston, expect it." Former MLB outfielder Vernon Wells chimed in that he "was only warned about two stadiums where racially motivated comments could occur...Fenway was one." In 2007, Gary Matthews Jr., then of the Angels, called Boston "one of the few places where you hear racial comments." But then that reminds you that other fan bases have brazenly engaged in bigotry as well. Athletics outfielder Rajai Davis—who has never played for the Red Sox and has no apparent reason to hold back about the city—said Tuesday, "It's not a Boston problem. It's a national problem."
And there's another confounder. As we learned seemingly nonstop for eight years after we supposedly overcame it by electing Barack Obama, the United States is still infested with latent racism. Other cities—Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, DC—have racial records as troubled as Boston's. Heck, it's not even limited to this country—the last time Adam Jones was subjected to racial slurs, it was in Toronto during last year's Wild Card game. All this makes it even harder to determine whether Boston is a particular hotbed for bigotry or merely part of a wider problem, from which even coastal liberal bastions are not safe. Of course, the fact that other cities are racist too doesn't make Boston not racist.
So is Boston racist? Ultimately, it's semantic. I have a hard time disagreeing with someone who says Boston is racist according to a certain definition of the term. Personally, though, I would say instead that it has a race problem. So does the entire country—that shouldn't be controversial. Is Boston's worse? I don't know. It certainly was historically; it might still be. We've made enough progress since the 1970s that we're now in a gray zone where the slurs directed at Adam Jones could plausibly be either the residue of Boston's prejudicial past or a symptom of a national trend. But it also doesn't really matter, because neither is good enough. Even after Monday night's vulgarity, I love my hometown. I love it because of all the things it does right—ranked at or near the top in education, medical care, economic vitality. With that pedigree, there's no excuse for having even nationally average levels of racism. We are the City on a Hill, meant from our founding to be an example for the rest of the world to strive toward. The same self-righteousness that makes Bostonians so protective and such easy targets for the rest of the country should be a unique motivator to clean up our act. If you think, in the face of so much evidence, that Boston is already perfect, you're interpreting this Hub of the Universe thing wrong. Instead, it's the nagging conviction that we should be better that propels us there.
We Bostonians have an inferiority complex, and one of our most tender spots is when the rest of the country plays the "Boston is racist" card. A cosmopolitan, liberal city, Boston certainly doesn't see itself that way—yet at the same time anyone with a more than passing connection to the city carries around the hidden shame of the city's violent resistance to busing in the 1970s. Within my lifetime, the Boston media, city leaders, and the collective masses were all guilty of a rush to judgment about the murder of Carol Stuart, a young suburban mother-to-be killed not by a black carjacker, but by her white husband. When an African American baseball player is called the N-word at Fenway Park, it's impossible not to draw the connection.
My first impression was optimism that our city was at least viewing Jones's assault with open eyes. Instead of attacking Jones or ignoring the story entirely, the Boston elite faced up to it. The Boston Globe led with the story all day on its website, and Mayor Marty Walsh and Governor Charlie Baker both issued swift statements of condemnation early this morning. Walsh, an Irish Catholic from Dorchester (still a demographic profile that's more associated with Trumpian intolerance than the bleeding-heart inclusiveness of the Cantabrigian university student), had particularly strong words: "If they claim to be a sports fan, they’re not a sports fan—nothing but a racist." Boston finally seemed to be acknowledging that, yes, it had a problem with racism it desperately needed to fix.
There was also a common thread in Walsh's and Baker's words, as Globe columnist Renée Graham pointed out: "This is not what Massachusetts and Boston are about." So maybe the sensitivity remained. Walsh and Baker were acknowledging that Boston has racist elements, but also insisting that, at its core, Boston was a welcoming and tolerant place. Well, OK. They're politicians—they are going to believe (or at least say they believe) the best about their constituents. But it's worth noting that Walsh's administration last year kicked off a series of town halls "aimed at bringing conversations about racism, healing, and policy work into all Boston neighborhoods." At one of the meetings, Walsh said, point-blank, "Boston has an issue with racism." Whether he thinks "racist" or "tolerant" is a more fitting adjective for Boston in 2017, Walsh clearly understands that there is still racism left to overcome in the city.
It would be nice if that were the final word. But that inferiority complex is acting up again, because even those of us who own up to the racism of drunk Red Sox fans can't help but get defensive about the resurgent blanket narrative that "Boston is racist." We object to the very logic that people accuse us of: that our entire community should be stereotyped by the actions of a foolish few. This is unfair, of course; most people in Boston are not racist, as illustrated most recently by the classy standing ovation Red Sox fans gave Jones at Tuesday's game. The ovation did not undo what happened to Jones, but neither does what happened to Jones negate the ovation. Clearly, Boston has a racist underbelly, but what percentage of a city's residents have to belong to that fringe in order to say the city as a whole is racist? One bigot does not a racist city make, but a place doesn't need to be 100% pure-grade racist either.
This is something outsiders fail to realize when they smugly ask how Boston can be considered one of the most liberal cities in America while still struggling with racism. The two facts have little to do with each other. Massachusetts isn't a monolith where 100% of its citizens are latte-sipping progressives who nonetheless harbor secret racial animosities. Yes, it's true, 60% of Bay Staters voted for Hillary Clinton in November, more than 45 other states. But that means 33% voted for Donald Trump—at least some of whom were motivated by prejudice. (Trump also won the state handily during the primary.) And yes, some Democrats are racist as well, even if only in subtler ways. It was in dark blue Cambridge that someone called 911 to report that famed African American Studies scholar Henry Louis Gates looked suspicious as he attempted to open the jammed front door of his Harvard Square townhouse. These uncomfortable truths do nothing to change the fact that Massachusetts has been at the forefront of the progressive movement (inaugurating, among other things, same-sex marriage and Obamacare), including on issues of racial justice, which aren't abstract to them either: Massachusetts was home to the first black U.S. senator and the second black governor ever to be elected.
The question is whether Boston is racist with tolerant elements or tolerant with racist elements. And I honestly don't know which is correct. Boston hasn't earned the benefit of the doubt with its history; in addition to the nationally publicized busing crisis, Celtics players including the great Bill Russell confronted blatant racism here during the 1970s and '80s. But Boston is also a very different city than it was back then, and the racist reputation it earned 40 years ago gives us only an incomplete picture of the present day. The Jones incident did elicit a disturbing comment out of fellow African American ballplayer C.C. Sabathia, who said he has "never been called the N-word" anywhere but Boston (albeit not since before 2009); "when you go to Boston, expect it." Former MLB outfielder Vernon Wells chimed in that he "was only warned about two stadiums where racially motivated comments could occur...Fenway was one." In 2007, Gary Matthews Jr., then of the Angels, called Boston "one of the few places where you hear racial comments." But then that reminds you that other fan bases have brazenly engaged in bigotry as well. Athletics outfielder Rajai Davis—who has never played for the Red Sox and has no apparent reason to hold back about the city—said Tuesday, "It's not a Boston problem. It's a national problem."
And there's another confounder. As we learned seemingly nonstop for eight years after we supposedly overcame it by electing Barack Obama, the United States is still infested with latent racism. Other cities—Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, DC—have racial records as troubled as Boston's. Heck, it's not even limited to this country—the last time Adam Jones was subjected to racial slurs, it was in Toronto during last year's Wild Card game. All this makes it even harder to determine whether Boston is a particular hotbed for bigotry or merely part of a wider problem, from which even coastal liberal bastions are not safe. Of course, the fact that other cities are racist too doesn't make Boston not racist.
So is Boston racist? Ultimately, it's semantic. I have a hard time disagreeing with someone who says Boston is racist according to a certain definition of the term. Personally, though, I would say instead that it has a race problem. So does the entire country—that shouldn't be controversial. Is Boston's worse? I don't know. It certainly was historically; it might still be. We've made enough progress since the 1970s that we're now in a gray zone where the slurs directed at Adam Jones could plausibly be either the residue of Boston's prejudicial past or a symptom of a national trend. But it also doesn't really matter, because neither is good enough. Even after Monday night's vulgarity, I love my hometown. I love it because of all the things it does right—ranked at or near the top in education, medical care, economic vitality. With that pedigree, there's no excuse for having even nationally average levels of racism. We are the City on a Hill, meant from our founding to be an example for the rest of the world to strive toward. The same self-righteousness that makes Bostonians so protective and such easy targets for the rest of the country should be a unique motivator to clean up our act. If you think, in the face of so much evidence, that Boston is already perfect, you're interpreting this Hub of the Universe thing wrong. Instead, it's the nagging conviction that we should be better that propels us there.
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