April 25, there’s a special election for the Connecticut House of Representatives. You should consider phone-banking or, if you live in Western Connecticut, volunteering.
Why? I mean, okay sure, every race counts, fifty-state strategy, yadda yadda. But this is just one seat for a state House. why should you spend some of your precious time on this race?
Several reasons.
1) This one is winnable. The 68th is a purple district. It’s an old post industrial area near Waterbury, CT. The demographics skew Republican -- mostly white, skewing old, lots of third and fourth generation “white ethnics” (especially Italian-Americans — both candidates are IAs this time.) On the other hand, there’s a deep Democratic tradition. The district went for Trump in November, but not by much. The last race for this seat was in 2014, and that was a heartbreaker — the Democrat lost by less than 400 votes. So this is a winnable race.
2) This one matters. We’re used to thinking of Connecticut as a blue state. At the level of Presidential elections, that’s true — for now. But at the local level, it’s a blue and red patchwork, and highly competitive. The CT state Senate is split right down the middle, 18-18 Republican / Democrat. (The Democratic Lieutenant Governor casts the deciding vote — for now.) The state House of Representatives is almost as bad: it’s currently 78-71 Democrats, which is not exactly an overwhelming margin. Right now we’re one bad election away from losing control. Every seat counts.
3) This one is personal. Question: how do you feel about Democrats who switch parties and become Republicans?
Okay, well: the Republican candidate in this race did just that. He’s a former Democrat who ran for office a few years ago and lost. After that loss, he suddenly discovered that, hey, he’d really been a conservative all along! And now he’s running as a Republican — with the energetic support of the state and local GOP parties.
It doesn’t get discussed much, but historically this is one way the GOP has turned purple districts red: find Democrats whose loyalty is weak, and flip them. And in Connecticut in particular, they’ve gotten really good at this.
Want to help give a turncoat what he deserves? Come; join us.
4) You can make a difference. The last general election involved less than 9,000 votes. This special election might involve half that many. The election will probably be decided by a handful of votes.
Okay, so then what should you do?
1) Don’t send money. Yes, that’s right. The way CT state financing works is that you get co-financing from the state. Donations from outside of the district get deducted from that co-financing, so that it’s hard for outsiders to flood a local race with cash. So, unless you live in CT-68, don’t send money. (If you do live in CT-68, heck yeah, drop a sawbuck or two.)
2) Do come phonebank. They need phonebankers, always. [url=causes.anedot.com/...]Here’s the link[url].
3) If you live in or near Western Connecticut, come volunteer. The 68th is within an hour of most of Western Connecticut plus bits of Massachussetts and New York. Come stuff envelopes and knock on doors! You’ll want to contact Ed Corey; his e-mail is “ed (at) thevincigroup (dot) com”.
4) Follow along on Facebook: www.facebook.com/...
We have a great candidate in Lou Esposito. This is a chance to make a difference. It’s exactly the kind of tough-but-competitive local race that we need to win to start our comeback. This is the long game, people. Come play with us.