Defying the Odds

by James W. Ceaser

  12. Paul Steinhauser, “CNN Poll: 75% Say Most Republicans in Congress Don’t Deserve Re-Election,” CNN, October 22, 2013, http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/21/politics/cnn-poll-shutdown-re-election.

  13. John B. Judis, “The Last Days of the GOP,” The New Republic, October 10, 2013, https://newrepublic.com/article/115134/gop-death-watch-final-days-republican-party.

  14. The previous post-Reconstruction low for Democrats was twelve legislatures, which they reached after the elections of 1894, 1896, and 1920. Michael J. Dubin, Party Affiliations in the State Legislatures: A Year by Year Summary, 1796–2006 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2007), 9–11.

  15. Harry Enten, “It’s Much Harder to Protect Southern Black Voters’ Influence Than It Was 10 Years Ago,” FiveThirtyEight, December 5, 2016, http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/its-much-harder-to-protect-southern-black-voters-influence-than-it-was-10-years-ago.

  16. Kathryn Chakmak, “How the Natural State Turned Red: Political Realignment in Arkansas,” undergraduate thesis, Claremont McKenna College, 2015.

  17. David Hawkings, “The House’s Ideology, in Seven Circles,” Roll Call, January 19, 2016, http://www.rollcall.com/news/home/houses-ideology-seven-circles.

  18. Peter Urban, “Harry Reid Grows More Democratic,” Las Vegas Review-Journal, October 24, 2010, http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/elections/harry-reid-grows-more-democratic.

  19. Justin McCarthy, “Quarter of U.S. Voters Say Candidate Must Share View on Guns,” Gallup, October 19, 2015, http://www.gallup.com/poll/186248/quarter-voters-say-candidate-share-view-guns.aspx.

  20. Rich Morin, “The Demographics and Politics of Gun-Owning Households,” Pew Research Center, July 15, 2014, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/07/15/the-demographics-and-politics-of-gun-owning-households.

  21. Michael Dimock, “Widening Regional Divide over Abortion Laws,” Pew Research Center, July 29, 2013, http://www.people-press.org/2013/07/29/widening-regional-divide-over-abortion-laws.

  22. Emma Green, “Democrats Have a Religion Problem,” The Atlantic, December 29, 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/democrats-have-a-religion-problem/510761.

  23. Jowei Chen and Jonathan Rodden, “Unintentional Gerrymandering: Political Geography and Electoral Bias in Legislatures,” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 8 (2013): 239–69, http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jowei/florida.pdf.

  24. Alec MacGillis, “Go Midwest, Young Hipster,” New York Times Magazine, October 22, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/opinion/campaign-stops/go-midwest-young-hipster.html.

  25. Lisa Lerer, “As Obama Accomplished Policy Goals, His Party Floundered,” Associated Press, December 24, 2016, http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/obama-accomplished-policy-goals-party-floundered-44383430.

  26. Edward-Isaac Dovere, “DNC Insiders Detail Months of Escalating Dysfunction,” Politico, July 28, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/dnc-debbie-wasserman-schultz-226352.

  27. Lerer, “As Obama Accomplished.”

  28. Barack Obama, “The President’s News Conference,” December 16, 2016, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid119865.

  29. Emily Badger and Quoctrung Bui, “Why Republicans Don’t Even Try to Win Cities Anymore,” New York Times, November 2, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/03/upshot/why-republicans-dont-even-try-to-win-cities-anymore.html.

  30. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Union Affiliation Data from the Current Population Survey,” January 28, 2016, https://www.bls.gov/webapps/legacy/cpslutab1.htm.

  31. Kyle Peterson, “The Spoils of the Republican State Conquest,” Wall Street Journal, December 9, 2016, http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-spoils-of-the-republican-state-conquest-1481326770.

  32. Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake, “Democrats See Map and Math Working to Their Advantage in 2016 Senate Races,” Washington Post, January 18, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-see-map-and-math-working-to-their-advantage-in-2016-senate-races/2015/01/18/b85657d6-9eb6-11e4-bcfb-059ec7a93ddc_story.html.

  33. Jeremy W. Peters and Jonathan Martin, “G.O.P. Weighs Limiting Clout of Right Wing,” New York Times, November 6, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/07/us/politics/gop-weighs-limiting-clout-of-right-wing.html.

  34. Carl Hulse, “Leading Republicans Move to Stamp Out Challenges from Right,” New York Times, March 8, 2014, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/us/politics/leading-republicans-move-to-stamp-out-challenges-from-right.html.

  35. James Hohmann, “ ‘The Guerrilla’: Mitch McConnell’s Long-Shot Challenger,” Politico, January 22, 2014, http://www.politico.com/story/2014/01/matt-bevin-kentucky-senate-2014-on-the-ground-mitch-mcconnell-102498.html.

  36. Donna Cassata, “Tea Party Ready for Fight with GOP Establishment,” RealClear-Politics, March 1, 2014, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/03/01/tea_party_ready_for_fight_with_gop_establishment_121771.html.

  37. Reid Wilson, “The Untold Stories of the 2016 Battle for the Senate,” The Hill, November 15, 2016, http://origin-nyi.thehill.com/homenews/senate/306002-2016s-battle-for-senate-crushing-the-tea-party.

  38. Alex Roarty, “In Kansas, Pompeo Won’t Challenge Sen. Moran,” Roll Call, April 25, 2016, http://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/kansas-pompeo.

  39. Alexis Levinson, “How McCain Survived,” National Review, August 31, 2016, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/439543/john-mccain-primary-victory-was-won-old-fashioned-way.

  40. Ibid.

  41. Arizona Grassroots Action, “Skywriting—Kelli Ward for U.S. Senate,” YouTube, July 14, 2015, https://youtu.be/mpTfbwIpkbk.

  42. Paul Kane, “Why Mitch McConnell’s Strategy to Quash the Tea Party Is Working,” Washington Post, September 1, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/09/01/why-mitch-mcconnells-strategy-to-quash-the-tea-party-is-working.

  43. Will Tucker, “Scam PACs Keep Money Churning, But Not to Candidates,” OpenSecrets, July 29, 2015, http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2015/07/scam-pacs-keep-money-churning-but-not-to-candidates.

  44. Paul H. Jossey, “How We Killed the Tea Party,” Politico, August 14, 2016, http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/08/tea-party-pacs-ideas-death-214164.

  45. Jennifer E. Manning, “Membership of the 114th Congress: A Profile,” Congressional Research Service, September 7, 2016, http://www.senate.gov/CRSpubs/c527ba93-dd4a-4ad6-b79d-b1c9865ca076.pdf.

  46. Reid Wilson, “2016’s Battle for the Senate: A Shifting Map,” The Hill, November 16, 2016, http://origin-nyi.thehill.com/homenews/senate/306220-2016s-battle-for-the-senate-a-shifting-map.

  47. Theodoric Meyer, “Johnson Upsets Feingold to Keep Wisconsin Senate Seat,” Politico, November 9, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/johnson-feingold-wisconsin-senate-race-2016-election-results-231027.

  48. Rich Kremer, “Wisconsin Leads Nation in Declining Union Membership,” Wisconsin Public Radio, January 28, 2016, http://www.wpr.org/wisconsin-leads-nation-declining-union-membership.

  49. Todd Young for Indiana, “Evan Bayh: Bayh Left Us,” YouTube, September 12, 2016, https://youtu.be/1mQ1RLaWdtI.

  50. Missourians for Kander, “Background Checks,” YouTube, September 15, 2016, https://youtu.be/-wqOApBLPio.

  51. Jason Zengerle, “The Second-Strangest Campaign of the Season,” New York Magazine, July 26, 2016, http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/07/alan-grayson-florida-senate-race.html.

  52. Rebecca Sinderbrand, “This Mark Kirk Debate Gaffe Is Stunningly Bad,” Washington Post, October 27, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/27/yes-it-was-the-most-cringe-worthy-debate-moment-of-the-week.

  53. Rorye O’Connor, “DAR Dedicates Women Veterans Memorial,” The Register-News, Mount Vernon, Illinois, June 20, 2011, http://www.register-news.com/news/dar-dedicates-women-veterans-memorial/article_77ce87be-3ab6-59b7-9896-c487b8f4204e.html.

  54. Alex Roarty, “Kirk’s Latest Controversy Follows Other Questionable Comments,” Roll Call, October 28, 2016, http://www.rollcall.com/news/politics/kirks-latest-
controversy-begs-question-stroke-blame.

  55. Burgess Everett, “Democrats’ Surprising Strategy to Win the Senate: Be Boring,” Politico, June 13, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/democrats-senate-boring-trump-224194.

  56. Ward Baker, “Senate Republicans Are Going to Win in November,” Medium, May 23, 2016, https://medium.com/@nrsc/republicans-are-going-to-win-in-november-heres-why-62f17fc8cd59.

  57. Robert Draper, “Can the G.O.P. Senate Majority Survive Donald Trump?” New York Times Magazine, July 12, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/17/magazine/can-the-gop-senate-majority-survive-donald-trump.html.

  58. Phil Mattingly, “The Super PAC Workaround: How Candidates Quietly, Legally Communicate,” Bloomberg Business Week, August 28, 2014, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-08-28/how-candidates-communicate-legally-with-super-pacs.

  59. Reid Wilson, “Battle for the Senate: Top of Ticket Dominates,” The Hill, November 17, 2016, http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/306487-battle-for-the-senate-top-of-ticket-dominates.

  60. Art Swift, “U.S. Congressional Approval Averages Weak 17% for 2016,” Gallup, December 15, 2016, http://www.gallup.com/poll/199445/congressional-approval-averages-weak-2016.aspx.

  61. “Reelection Rates Over the Years,” Center for Responsive Politics, https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/reelect.php.

  62. CNN, “Exit Polls: National House,” November 23, 2016, http://www.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls/national/house.

  63. Gabby Morrongiello, “Trump Hammers Ryan: ‘There’s a Whole Sinister Deal Going On,’ ” Washington Examiner, October 12, 2016, http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-hammers-ryan-theres-a-whole-sinister-deal-going-on/article/2604375.

  64. Reid Epstein, “Donald Trump Hints If He’s Elected, Paul Ryan Will Be Out of a Job,” Wall Street Journal, October 11, 2016, http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2016/10/11/donald-trump-hints-if-hes-elected-paul-ryan-will-be-out-of-a-job.

  65. Jennifer Steinhauer, “Democrats’ Weak Bench Undermines Hope of Taking Back Senate,” New York Times, August 25, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/26/us/politics/democrats-weak-bench-undermines-hope-of-taking-back-senate.html.

  66. Billy House, “For Ambitious House Democrats There’s Nowhere to Go but Out,” Bloomberg, January 7, 2016, https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-01-07/for-ambitious-u-s-house-democrats-there-s-nowhere-to-go-but-out.

  67. Thomas Mills, “How the Democratic Party Lost Its Way,” Politico, December 10, 2016, http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/12/how-the-democratic-party-lost-its-way-214514.

  68. Katie Leslie, “Is Dallas Rep. Pete Sessions Vulnerable After Clinton Won His District?” Dallas Morning News, December 12, 2016, http://www.dallasnews.com/news/local-politics/2016/12/12/sessions-culberson-see-districts-turn-blue-presidential-race-age-trump-signal-long-term-trouble/.

  69. Elena Schneider, “The GOP Establishment Strikes Back,” Politico, August 15, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/gop-establishment-strikes-back-house-freedom-caucus-226997.

  70. “2016 National House Popular Vote Tracker,” https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1oArjXSYeg40u4qQRR93qveN2N1UELQ6v04_mamrKg9g/editgid0.

  71. Aaron Blake, “3 Election Stats Liberals Love That Don’t Mean As Much as They Seem,” Washington Post, December 13, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/12/13/3-election-stats-liberals-love-that-dont-mean-as-much-as-they-seem/.

  72. “America’s Most (and Least) Popular Governors,” Morning Consult, September 20, 2016, https://morningconsult.com/state-governor-rankings.

  73. Summer Ballentine, “Missouri GOP Governor Candidate Greitens Touts Outsider Role,” Associated Press, July 27, 2016, http://www.columbiamissourian.com/news/elections/missouri-gop-governor-candidate-greitens-touts-outsider-role/article_22d57f6e-1819-5071-879c-e3597dc522c0.html.

  74. Emma Grey Ellis, “Guess How Much That Anti-LGBTQ Law Is Costing North Carolina,” Wired, September 18, 2016, https://www.wired.com/2016/09/guess-much-anti-lgbtq-law-costing-north-carolina.

  75. California Secretary of State, “60-Day Report of Registration,” September 8, 2000, http://elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/ror/ror-pages/60day-presgen-00/historical-registration-stats-60-day-close.pdf.

  76. California Secretary of State, “60-Day Report of Registration,” September 9, 2016, http://elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/ror/ror-pages/60day-gen-16/hist-reg-stats.pdf.

  77. Fred Bauer, “Pete Wilson Did Not Make California Turn Blue: Unraveling a Myth,” National Review, January 21, 2016, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/430032/immigration-republicans-hispanic-vote-california-pete-wilson.

  78. U.S. Bureau of the Census, “Demographic Trends in the 20th Century,” November 2002, https://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/censr-4.pdf.

  79. U.S. Bureau of the Census, “Quick Facts: California,” 2016, http://www.census.gov/quickfacts/table/PST045215/06.

  80. Mark Baldassare et al., “Race and Voting in California,” Public Policy Institute of California, September 2016, http://www.ppic.org/main/publication_show.asp?i264.

  81. See exit poll data for 1992 at http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/1998/states/CA/polls/CA92PH.html and for 2016 at http://www.cnn.com/election/results/exit-polls/california/president.

  82. Matt Levin, “From Loyal to Lost? Vietnamese Voters and the GOP,” CalMatters, November 2, 2016, https://calmatters.org/articles/from-loyal-to-lost-vietnamese-voters-and-the-california-gop.

  83. Michael Oden, “When the Movie’s Over: The Post–Cold War Restructuring of Los Angeles,” in Local Consequences of the Global Cold War, ed. Jeffrey A. Engel (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), 135.

  84. Robert A. Kleinhenz et al., “The Aerospace Industry in Southern California,” Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation, August 2012, http://www.laedc.org/reports/AerospaceinSoCal_0812.pdf.

  85. Betsy Sinclair summarizes the evidence in “Introduction: The California Top Two Primary,” California Journal of Politics and Policy 7 (2015), http://escholarship.org/uc/item/4qk24589.

  86. Javier Panzar, “GOP Dead Zones: You Won’t Find Any Republicans to Vote for in Big Areas of L.A. County,” Los Angeles Times, October 26, 2016, http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-gop-dead-zone-20161026-snap-story.html.

  87. Mark Baldassare et al., “Californians and Their Government,” Public Policy Institute of California, October 2016, http://ppic.org/content/pubs/survey/S_1016MBS.pdf.

  88. House, “For Ambitious House Democrats.”

  89. Jens Manuel Krogstad, “With Fewer New Arrivals, Census Lowers Hispanic Population Projections,” Pew Research Center, December 16, 2014, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/12/16/with-fewer-new-arrivals-census-lowers-hispanic-population-projections-2.

  90. “56 Interesting Facts About the 2016 Election,” Cook Political Report, December 16, 2016, http://cookpolitical.com/story/10201.

  91. “Excerpts from House Speech by Gephardt on Ceding Control to G.O.P.,” New York Times, January 5, 1995, http://www.nytimes.com/1995/01/05/us/104th-congress-democratic-leader-excerpts-house-speech-gephardt-ceding-control.html.

  Chapter Six

  Aftermath and Future

  Not since the election of 2000 had the maneuvering and emotion of a presidential contest continued so long after Election Day. In 2000, multiple recounts left the result in Florida—and hence in the nation—in doubt. Legal disputes, including cases before the Supreme Courts of Florida and the United States, angry demonstrations on both sides, and organized efforts to sway electors finally did not end until after December 12, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bush v. Gore that the latest Florida recount had to stop.

  In 2016, no sooner had Donald Trump’s victory become clear than protestors filled the streets in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Oakland, Portland, Indianapolis, and elsewhere, venting their rage at the triumph of the Orange. (Upon investigation, it turned out that many of the young protestors had not voted for Hillary Clinton but for Jill Stein, Bernie Sanders as a write-in, or not at all.
Some said that they would have been in the streets protesting if Clinton had won, too.1) College administrators around the country felt compelled to issue statements soothing their inconsolable students, sometimes offering snacks and therapy.2 As in 2000, the leader in the nationally aggregated popular vote lost in the Electoral College, leading to a renewed debate over that institution. A losing candidate—this time Green Party nominee Jill Stein—requested recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Nearly five million people signed an online petition calling on electors from Trump states to vote for Hillary Clinton instead, in order to “to protect the Constitution from Donald Trump, and to support the national popular vote winner.” Trump, the petition asserted, was not fit to serve: “His scapegoating of so many Americans, and his impulsivity, bullying, lying, admitted history of sexual assault, and utter lack of experience make him a danger to the Republic.”3 When it became apparent that this appeal would fall on deaf ears, a new effort was launched. Democratic electors in Colorado and Washington mounted legal challenges to their states’ laws requiring electors to vote for the candidate for whom they were pledged.4 Pointing to Alexander Hamilton’s vision for the electors found in Federalist no. 68, the so-called Hamilton electors sought to free electors everywhere from their pledges in order to form a bipartisan anti-Trump coalition. Ideally, they would come together behind an alternative Republican candidate; failing that, they would at least try to deprive Trump of thirty-seven of his electors, thus throwing the election into the House of Representatives, where they hoped a more broadly acceptable candidate might emerge. Far from developing suddenly, in the immediate wake of Trump’s win, the idea of the electors acting on their own judgment to find a winner other than Trump or Clinton had been floated in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal as early as September 8.5 From Election Day until they voted at their state capitols on December 19, Republican electors around the country reported lobbying and downright harassment on a level not seen since 2000, and possibly surpassing even that year. The political website Politico reported two days before the electors voted: