State Democrats could defeat themselves in next elections

Divisions dominating the California Democratic Convention last weekend raise questions about whether the party can get its act together for this year’s congressional races and rally behind a single candidate in the 2020 presidential election.

No state is bigger or bluer than California. But Democrats have made zero progress uniting progressives and moderates, and risk splintering as they did between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in the 2016 presidential campaign.

The inability to unite, and the move to pull the party left, could alienate critical centrist voters. And the burgeoning number of Democratic candidates in key congressional districts could split the party’s primary vote and let Republicans grab the two spots on the November ballot.

It’s especially problematic after Gov. Jerry Brown’s masterful bridging of the intraparty divide for the past eight years. Yet, after 26 years in the U.S. Senate, Dianne Feinstein, facing a left-wing challenge from state Sen. Kevin de León, couldn’t win the party’s endorsement at the convention because of her expressed willingness to try to work with President Trump and Republicans.

Democrats need to win 24 seats nationally to reclaim a majority in the House. In California, Republicans are vulnerable in as many as 10 House seats.

Democrats are salivating at the possibility of capturing them. “The level of enthusiasm at the convention was over the top. I’ve never seen this level of engagement and activism,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose. “But these aren’t going to be easy seats to flip. These are Republican seats. They’re going to be tough fights.”

In one sense, the intensity of Democratic infighting reveals a level of passion that could result in the high voter turnout needed to flip some of those GOP seats. But it could instead undermine the needed rallying behind the candidate with the best chance of turning red seats blue.

Republicans, for example, are gleeful that eight Democrats are running for the 39th District seat left vacant by the retirement of Orange County Republican Ed Royce, and, before the March 9 deadline, six Democrats may enter the race for the 49th District seat held by GOP Rep. Darrell Issa of Vista.

“The biggest threat in the 39th and 49th District is that two Republicans will emerge from the primary with no Democrat in the November race,” said veteran Democratic campaign strategist Katie Merrill. “Democrats in those races need to take a long, hard look at why they got into the race in the first place. Some are polling in single digits and haven’t raised the real money needed to get elected.”

Those candidates need to pull out for the good of the party. But they aren’t yielding, at least not yet.

California Democrats have a blueprint for turning a traditionally red House seat blue. All they need to do is look to former East Bay Rep. Ellen Tauscher’s 1996 win over twoterm Republican incumbent Bill Baker. Tauscher ran as a centrist, focusing on the economy and reinstating the federal ban on assault weapons. The message resonated with swing voters who ultimately decided the race.

Tauscher, who went on to serve as undersecretary of state for arms control in the Obama administration, and her former campaign manager, Merrill, are now concentrating on what they call the “California 7 Project,” aimed at unseating the seven Republicans in congressional districts that Clinton won in 2016.

Another problem for Democrats running in traditional Republican seats is message.

The temptation to focus on resisting Trump is satisfying but often not productive. The reason? The growing number of independent voters with no party preference, or NPP.

“In California, the NPPs are almost as large in numbers as the number of registered Republicans,” Merrill said. “To win contested House districts you have to win those voters, because there aren’t enough Democrats to win an election in those districts.”

The NPP voters don’t care whether candidates attack Trump at every chance they get. They don’t care about party politics. Most are so disgusted with both parties that candidates toeing the party line are a turnoff. Candidates need to show them they are independent enough to focus more on solutions than fighting the opposition.

Instead, Democratic leaders spent too much of the convention last weekend racing further to the left and inciting intraparty warfare that featured warring factions putting their own self-interests over the good of the party.

Keep it up and Democrats will hand Republicans a blueprint for maintaining the House and giving Trump another four years in the White House.