Can we anticipate a “Sarah McBride Effect” in 2020?
BlueDelaware’s FB page linked to this Slate Interview with Sarah McBride.
It is worth a listen, and it has solidified something that I’ve been thinking. McBride is a national figure. She is going to raise decent money. More money, certainly, than it will make sense to spend on her race alone.
Whereas in the past only Tom Carper had enough money to help out other Democrats, now there will be someone else with a campaign account that could potentially help out other Democrats.
Moreover, Sarah is a bit of a unicorn candidate that appeals to a wide spectrum of Democratic voters. So in addition to money she also has the potential to leverage her other campaign strengths to help like-minded campaigns.
Spreading the money around is a great way to develop influence in Dover. I fervently hope that she and Kyle Evans Gay will influence the votes for leadership of the Senate D Caucus.
I think the McBride thing is overplayed. The reality is she has been a career politician her whole life. Once she gets to Dover and runs into some of the Carney allies she helped beat in 2008 I don’t think there is Gona be a rush to make her the next thing.
Slow down everyone
There’s a difference between ‘career politician’ and ‘career activist’.
This is her first run for political office–hardly the hallmark of a career politician.
Does she have skills that could make her successful as a politician AND have made her an incredibly effective activist? Yes. Which is why I’m thrilled she’s decided to run for office as she supports a lot of the positions that I hold.
As to her not supporting Carney against Markell, every day that Carney’s in office shows that he is incapable of being a good governor. He hardly possesses the muscle to hurt her career.
OK, so we’ve got the Sarah McBride coronation 14 1/2 months before the election. I get that.
May be some validity to Lurker’s point, but there’s little difference between a Carney D and a Markell D except that they don’t like each other. McBride grew up in the Markell camp; to me, that means she’s another corporate D who just happens to be of the LGBTQ genus.
I grant that she will be an improvement over McDowell, who stayed (at least) four years too long, but it will take action in the trenches of Legislative Hall, not books, speeches and a high-visibility campaign to confirm her true progressive standing.
Mediawatch, you know and I know that Markell RAN as the more progressive candidate in 2008. Maybe you saw through it, but I didn’t, and I wasn’t alone. Even on education, Markell ran as pro-public education, an agnostic on charter schools. Changed his tune as soon as he was elected. I remember Pandora putting up clips here of Markell on the stump on that issue during 2008.
Markell the 2008 candidate, and Markell the pro-business, pro-Charter School governor, were two different people. He lied to us. Not that, in retrospect, Carney would have been any better.
BTW, you’re correct about the coronation, and it’s way premature. My hope is that, should she and Cloutier’s opponent get elected, the D leadership will change. That opens up an array of possibilities for progressive legislation. Especially since I think Tizzie Lockman is likely to have a higher profile after the next election.
One way that Sarah is an upgrade over McDowell, who I truly admire, is that, if Harris wanted to retain his chair of JFC, he had to support the odious leadership of McBride and Poore. Different leadership means different dynamics.
You’ve skipped to McBride in Leg Hall and missed my point about the McBride Effect in this upcoming election.
As to her being another corporate D, listen to the interview. Her politics seem more progressive to me in view of her camopaign priorities.
Jason,
See ElSom’s comments re my observations on Carney and Markell.
Markell talked a progressive game in 2008, and turned out to be anything but.
McBride is talking a progressive game this year, but it’s going to take more than words to show that she’s something other than an LBTQ corporate D.
Point taken.
She’s like 28. My point is what has she done besides be in politics? Exactly. Not the best candidate in my opinion
More than you. When the equal marriage bill passed, I was out in Richmond Indiana for my daughter’s college graduation. Like so many others, including my daughter, I was listening to the Senate debate on the bill. When the bill passed, my daughter, who headed the Gay-Straight Alliance at her high school, burst into tears, and I had tears as well.
Here’s a brief bio from Wikipedia:
“Sarah McBride (born August 9, 1990) is an American transgender rights activist. She is currently the National Press Secretary of the Human Rights Campaign.[1][2] McBride made national headlines when she came out as transgender to her college while serving as student body president at American University.[3]
McBride is largely credited with the passage of legislation in Delaware banning discrimination on the basis of gender identity in employment, housing, insurance, and public accommodations.[4] In July 2016, she was a speaker at the Democratic National Convention, becoming the first openly transgender person to address a major party convention in American history.[5][6][7][8]
In 2018, she released the book Tomorrow Will Be Different: Love, Loss, and the Fight for Trans Equality. ”
That’s more than most of us have done in our entire lives. Or will do.
She helped pass equality in Delaware? So did like a few hundred other people I remember. I’m not saying she’s bad but damn she’s got a lot to Prove before this coronation:l.
By the way you have candidate and legislators who have been teachers, union workers, cops, fought in wars, been activists since the 60s, done pro bono work for the poor etc so slow down with what others have done. Sarah can’t touch a candle to some other scarifies around this state
Really? Come up with another prospective candidate from the 1st Senatorial District. Then we can talk. Oh, and in the event that nobody else enters the race, it WILL be a coronation. By definition.
Cops? Union workers? Some of the worst legislators in the history of Delaware have been cops and union workers, etc. Too many cops in the General Assembly have led to disastrous consequences. I’ll start with DeLuca and Schwartzkopf, just to illustrate my point. What’s your real issue here?
If you ask any LGBTQ activist in Delaware, they will say that Sarah is in the top three or four people who helped usher in LGBTQ equality in this state. She’s helped pass legislation through the U.S. House of Representatives. She’s been under the national spotlight for the last five years and did it through losing her husband to cancer. That’s not anything to scoff at.
lol why is this blog so obsessed with my bf
Dashing good looks, probably
…Is there any reason there’s a picture of Mat Marshall up there?
That’s Mat Marshall? That unravels a mystery we’ve been grappling with this morning…
No reason beyond the fact that I got tired of using the other picture i have of Sarah and this one has Marshall connected to it for some reason. That reminds me, I should ask her campaign to send me some updated pics.
You can’t just google them?
I’m sure I could. Maybe I’ll do that now, in fact.