How the press is getting it wrong about the Democratic primaries
At first glance these two headlines would seem to contradict each other. By definition, “outsiders” are not members of “the establishment,” so when one group performs well, you would assume the other performed poorly.
The press isn’t really to blame for these simplistic, zero-sum story lines, even though it’s perpetuating them. Our relentless media machine runs on so-called takes: the quicker and clearer the better.
But the reality about what’s happening in these Democratic primaries is more complicated, as reality often is. Turns out it’s neatly reflected in Tuesday’s results — and the dueling headlines that allegedly captured them.
That’s because the most interesting thing about the latest Democratic developments is that outsider and establishment forces are both notching victories. In fact, it isn’t always clear who’s who. And this says a lot about the future of the party.
Take Tuesday’s marquee primary: the battle of the “Two Staceys,” Abrams and Evans, for Georgia’s Democratic gubernatorial nomination.
National reporters had largely framed the race as competition between a black candidate (Abrams) and a white candidate (Evans) with differing views of how to win statewide in November.
Abrams, the thinking went, would boost turnout among minority voters who comprise a growing share of the Georgia electorate but who tend not to show up in midterms. Evans would pursue the more traditional path for Southern Democrats, appealing to white workers and suburbanites souring on the controversial Republican president. Thus, when Abrams trounced Evans Tuesday night, the press tended to portray her as an outsider who had overcome the establishment.
It’s true that Abrams’s achievement could portend a historic result this fall: If she defeats Republican Casey Cagle, she will become the first female African-American governor in U.S. history. Winning as a black woman is harder than winning as a white woman (or man). But look a little closer and the whole outsider vs. establishment narrative begins to blur, as does the near synonymous “liberal vs. moderate” dichotomy.
For instance, Evans and Abrams were virtually indistinguishable on the issues, and while Evans boasted endorsements from former Democratic Gov. Barnes and former Democratic Sen. Max Cleland, Abrams had establishment supporters as well: three of Georgia’s four Democratic members of Congress, a bevy of state legislators, U.S. Sens. Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Kirsten Gillibrand and Chris Coons — and Hillary Clinton. (No current U.S. senators and only one congressman chose to back Evans.) Abrams was also the former minority leader of the Georgia House of Representatives — and the frontrunner for pretty much the entire race. To claim her as an outsider would be an exaggeration, to say the least.
Tuesday’s other most-watched primary was a similar story. Located in the Houston suburbs, the Seventh Congressional District made waves earlier this year when the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee intervened on behalf of primary candidate Lizzie Fletcher, releasing an opposition-research memo attacking her main opponent, the progressive activist and writer Laura Moser. The backlash among grassroots liberals was enough to propel Moser into Tuesday’s runoff — but it wasn’t enough to power the self-branded insurgent to victory. According to the final tally, Fletcher wound up with twice as many votes as her rival.
Elsewhere in Texas on Tuesday, the distinctions between outsider and establishment were just as hazy. Congressional primary winners included an openly lesbian Filipina Air Force intelligence officer (Gina Ortiz Jones) and a black civil rights attorney who once played in the NFL (Colin Allred). Both seem on the face of it like outsiders, but both were backed by the DCCC. In Kentucky, the former fighter pilot and rookie political candidate Amy McGrath defied conventional wisdom by upsetting Lexington Mayor Jim Gray, who was recruited by national Democrats, while state Rep. Clarke Tucker — another DCCC Red to Blue congressional pick — clobbered several candidates to his left in Arkansas’s only contested Democratic primary.
So what conclusions should political junkies draw from Tuesday’s results, if not the reductive ones preferred by the press? Perhaps something a little less polarized and a little more accepting of outcomes that don’t fit into one box or the other. Yes, there are more outsiders running, and winning, this year; the rise of rookie resistance candidates is one of the biggest stories of the cycle. And yes, Democrats as a whole are moving to the left; that much was clear as soon as Hillary Clinton started co-opting Bernie Sanders’s positions in 2016.
The thing is that the establishment recognizes these realities, and it is responding in kind. That’s why it didn’t go to the mat against Moser, or for Gray; that’s why the white gubernatorial candidate in Georgia got less support from national Dems than her black rival, and why the DCCC immediately released a memo showing that McGrath would be a strong general-election contender.
Politics is always going to be local, to some extent. And good candidates who understand their constituents are always going to outperform their less talented, less tuned-in rivals. What those constituents want might be shifting. What those good candidates look and sound like might be evolving too. But the establishment is adjusting in response. For Democrats, the story of Tuesday’s primaries — and this year’s primaries as whole — isn’t that outsiders and insiders are pulling the party apart. The story is that, slowly but surely, they’re starting to move in the same direction.
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