Montana Sen. Jon Tester told David Axelrod (the Axe Files podcast) that Democrats cannot be a majority party unless they begin showing up more in “the area between the two mountain ranges, the Appalachians and the Rocky Mountains.” By majority party, Tester is viewing from his perch in the U.S. Senate, a body that by design is tilted toward smaller, less populated states where Republicans dominate.
CNN:
Tester, who was critical of Democrats’ messaging and appeal to rural Americans following the 2020 presidential election, also told Axelrod rural Americans view the Democratic Party as “toxic.”
“It’s toxic. The national Democratic brand in, I think in rural America generally, is toxic, and it’s because, quite frankly, we don’t show up,” he said when asked how his Montana neighbors view the Democratic Party. “I’m talking about national Democrats. We’re not willing to go places we’re not wanted and answer questions.”
He continued, “I think it’s critically important if you’re going to win, you’ve got to go to those places, as miserable as it might be, you still go. You still contact the people, and you still let people know that you’re a human being and you have a view for this, a vision for this country.”
Through the mechanism of the Electoral College, the same structure that over-represents Republican voters in the Senate disincentivizes Democratic national campaigns from campaigning “between the two mountain ranges” when voters are paying the most attention. After the primaries, the most heavily populated, more-urbanized states get the most attention. They are where the electoral votes are.
But winning the White House that way is not enough to retake control in the Senate. Policies that benefit rural America are not enough. Like it or not, Democrats are faced with convincing rural voters, as Tester has in Montana, that they don’t have horns and tails.
You must be present to win. That is why this Howard Dean quote from his days as DNC chair appears on the inside cover of my get-out-the-vote planner:
“We’re going to be in places where the Democratic Party hasn’t been in 25 years. If you don’t show up in 60 percent of the country, you don’t win, and that’s not going to happen anymore.” – Gov. Howard Dean
Matt Bai, “The Inside Agitator,” New York Times Magazine, Oct. 1, 2006
Even though Dean’s 50-state plan was bearing fruit in rural America, once Barack Obama took the White House, he cancelled the project.
While acknowledging that the victories cannot be exclusively tied to Dean’s gambit, Governing noted in 2013:
… the patterns are suggestive. In the 20 states we looked at — those that have voted solidly Republican in recent presidential races — Democratic candidates chalked up modest successes, despite the difficult political terrain. Then, after the project stopped, Democratic success rates cratered.
[…]
In these 20 solidly red states, the Democrats controlled 13 legislative chambers in 2005, a number that fell to just three in 2013. Of the 40 chambers in these states, only two experienced a net gain of Democratic seats between 2005 and 2013; in the other 38, the Democrats lost ground.
And because state legislative seats and lower statewide offices provide the “bench” for future runs for governor and Congress, these developments could prompt a self-perpetuating death spiral for the party in these states.
Libertarian leanings in the Great Plains and West made Democrats’ chances better there than among Christian conservatives in the South.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a single op-ed admonishing Republicans for not appealing more to urban Americans,” responds journalist Simon Owens. But that’s the GOP’s problem and why the Republican Party nationwide is shrinking.
National Democrats’ absence in much of rural America is why the map above is so red between the two mountain ranges.
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For The Win, 4th Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide GOTV planning guide at ForTheWin.us. This is what winning looks like.