Lara Putnam, professor and chair of the department of History at the University of Pittsburgh, has written a short and very informative article for Democracy Journal arguing that:
Grassroots women and organized labor pulled voters together in support of Conor Lamb. Conversations made it work.
If you’ve been following the punditry, you already know that some have chalked up Lamb’s surprise victory to “enthusiasm,” while others have claimed — after the fact — that he won because he ran as a “Republican lite” and not as a “real Democrat.” (There has also been some good political analysis of the results, but I haven’t seen it getting much traction in the national press.)
Both takes, Putnam shows, are wrong. The “Republican lite” narrative, most recently tweeted out by Cheetolini himself, is patently ridiculous: Lamb campaigned on his opposition to the core GOP goals of slashing taxes on the filthy rich, gutting the regulations that protect the public, and eliminating the promise of health care for all.
The “enthusiasm” narrative isn’t wrong in the same way. The enthusiasm was real, but as Putnam shows, it wasn’t enthusiasm alone that lifted the Democrat to victory. It was the organizing carried out by a reinvigorated opposition to Trump, beginning before Lamb even entered the picture.
Grassroots democracy groups of the kind that popped up across America’s red and purple suburbs in the wake of Donald Trump’s election had been mobilizing in the Pittsburgh suburbs since the start of 2017, seeking a challenger to Republican incumbent Tim Murphy, who had run unopposed in 2014 and 2016. These groups, often growing out of friendships forged in the Women’s March and honed over the subsequent long summer of protests in support of the ACA, were thickest on the ground in PA 18’s affluent Allegheny County suburbs, which had been trending more liberal for years. Yet even deep red Westmoreland County saw the flourishing of “Voice of Westmoreland,” a grassroots group founded by three angry and inspired women in response to the same national events. And in PA 18’s center-west, the new independent Washington County Democrats club powered up along that same timeline. Grassroots women were organizing for action.
(If this argument sounds familiar, it is the same one that Lara Putnam and political scientist Theda Skocpol made in their article “Middle America Reboots Democracy,” published in Democracy Journal days before the PA-18 election.)
But it wasn’t the Women’s March organizers alone who pulled off the election! The other key to victory was union organizing — and the eagerness of suburban women and union workers to join forces for a common purpose.
Meanwhile, those of us canvassing in Washington County and Greene County heard echoes of a separate set of conversations—likewise carried along pre-existing personal ties—among union members, as they reassured each other that this time, this Democrat shared the values that mattered most. “Me and the guys down at the shop were just talking about him!” “I walk with the Silver Sneakers every week, there are other veterans there too. We’re pretty impressed with that young Marine.” “A group of us retirees from the plant get together every week: One in leadership was talking about Lamb and pensions.” “We’ll spread the news down at the Fish Fry.”
Putnam’s conclusion?
“Enthusiasm” doesn’t get absentee ballot request forms into the hands of potential voters three weeks before an off-season election. Organization does. “Moderation” doesn’t ensure suburban moms and retired mineworkers will discover the common ground they share. Conversations do.
And that’s the path to winning in November.