Mo’ Better Democrats: Melanie George Smith, RD 5
OK, I’m cheating here a little. Melanie Smith and her husband have purchased a house outside of her RD. It is an open secret that she plans to leave the General Assembly at the end of her term. She sought a judgeship, but was rebuffed by the Nominating Committee. However, even had she chosen to stay in Dover, a progressive challenger would have been welcome. Yes, she was highly competent. Yes, she accomplished quite a bit when it came to criminal justice reform, to name but one issue. Yes, she was great on equality issues. But she also benefited greatly from her insider status, especially with her deals with Pete Schwartzkopf. And, especially in the last couple of years, Democratic constituencies suffered as she voted the Chamber line and backed Pete Schwartzkopf’s leadership. As Chair of the Joint Finance Committee, Smith did not hesitate to bring the hammer down on education, seniors, and health care during this year’s budget deliberations. She backed elimination of the Estate Tax and flipped from sponsoring death penalty abolition to supporting the death penalty.
The District: RD 5 was created specifically for Melanie, thanks to Bob Gilligan (Lonnie George’s co-henchperson at Del Tech). During the aughts, the district was shaped like a barbell, in blatant violation of redistricting standards. But the R’s didn’t object b/c putting all those D’s in George’s district helped protect R seats in NCC (yes, they held several seats in that general area at the time, including those of Terry Spence, Bruce Reynolds and Rich Davis and even Jeff Mack). Post-2012, the district is only slightly less barbellian than before:
CLICK MAP TO ENLARGE
The district is overwhelmingly Democratic, with registration figures of 10,706 D; 2,076 R; and 3,113 I. Did I say ‘overwhelmingly’? The proper word is ‘obscenely’. The very idea that a blatantly gerrymandered district like this was crafted for Lonnie George’s daughter to the detriment of other D legislators (and prospective D legislators) is political malpractice. This is not a City of Wilmington district. This is a district that was cut-and-pasted together to benefit just one person. In fact, if you look back to the 2002 through 2011 period, every single adjacent RD was held by a Republican. So, Melanie got her seat and the D’s had to wait to finally get their majority in 2008.
Prospects: No Republican can win in this district, it’s as simple as that. It’s a vacant seat come 2018, and it is imperative that someone who does not march to the tune of the Chamber of Commerce, Pete Schwartzkopf and Richards, Layton & Finger (Melanie’s entrenched law firm, it’s where Pete DuPont hung his shingle) occupies this seat. Someone who supports a minimum wage, someone who believes that Delaware’s wealthiest must pay their fair share, someone who believes that health care is a right, not a privilege, someone who believes that public education is essential in a democracy. You know, traditional Democratic priorities. Whoever wins this seat can likely occupy it for a long time. Progressives: Do not let this opportunity pass!
Tags: Featured
This is idle speculation, but say I was a progressive activist who was interested in getting better, more progressive Democrats into office, but I didn’t know anyone in the area who would be willing to step up and take the mantle of said progressive Democrat. I wonder if anyone more familiar with the area would know of such a person, and if so, would be willing to share their names, perhaps here on the blog or through an email.
Brainstorming among progressive groups like Delaware United and Network Delaware is, IMHO, the way to go.
We used to have a group within the Party that did this. We sat around with lists of names and came up with names to contact. Problem is, when people like Ed Freel and Vince Meconi were at the table, no progressive names were allowed to be considered.
BTW, you can BET that the Third Way insiders are still plotting. I can visualize Freel with his glasses at half-mast as I write this.
Start with your membership databases and go from there. Also, talk to progressive officeholders you can trust.
To be completely accurate, Republicans controlled the House in 2002 and therefore were in charge of redistricting the House, so the “political malpractice” that created the district was done by the Rs to protect the Republican legislators in adjacent districts.
No. To be completely accurate (I was there and worked on the Senate redistricting), the deal that was cut was that Dave Brady and Rick DiLiberto were to lose their districts in exchange for Melanie getting a district that was safely D. Which also benefited the R’s in the districts surrounding hers.
The redistricting plan was so blatant, and the districts so weirdly configured, especially Melanie’s, that I urged both Brady and DiLiberto to challenge it in court. But, since D ‘leadership’ was in on the deal, they chose not to.
The city districts were gerrymandered as well. Unfortunately, the blowhard who threatened to challenge them in court was Sam Guy. True to form, he never did.
While the R’s ‘controlled’ the process, it was this deal-cutting to jumpstart the career of the daughter of Gilligan’s boss at Del-Tech that led to what I believe was an unconstitutional redistricting. Rather than watch out for caucus members, D leadership watched out for Melanie George.
There were definitely deals cut. DiLiberto got on the wrong said of Tom Sharp for some reason I can’t recall, but the purpose of my post was to simply point out that the Dems were in the minority (and pretty deep one at that) when this redistricting was done.
The last redistricting was in 2012, not 2002. It doesn’t matter who drew the lines in 2002, they were up for review and change in 2012.
The D’s had the courts, but chose not to pursue that remedy. Instead, they took the Melanie deal and ran with it. The numbers and demographics were changing, especially in NCC, and especially in northern NCC. The R’s would have likely lost their majority earlier had their plan been successfully challenged in court. But jumpstarting Melanie’s career was more important than retaking the House back then.
I’ve written about that 2002 redistricting a lot. For those of you unfamiliar with the most blatantly gerrymandered districts from 2002, I present to you:
The Barbell (Melanie George):
http://electionsncc.delaware.gov/house/2002/hse05.pdf
The Sickle (Bob Valihura):
http://electionsncc.delaware.gov/house/2002/hse10.pdf
Jack O’Lantern Teeth (Greg Lavelle, actually, it’s even worse than that):
http://electionsncc.delaware.gov/house/2002/hse11.pdf
None of those districts come CLOSE to the required standards of compactness and contiguity, and everybody back then KNEW it.
Alby, it matters for historical context. How D leadership prioritized the career of a well-connected insider over the future of its own caucus.
I’ve never seen it studied, but I have to think that part of the anti-democratic impact of these wack-ass districts is that people don’t know who there Rep is. It is a nice perk for the incumbent Reps who want low turn out elections.
@El Som: I understand, but you’ll notice the lines were redrawn in 2012 to their current configuration. I don’t want anyone to think this was done by Democrats in ancient times. I suppose the current crop could plead tradition.