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WASHINGTON Members of Congress grappling with how to respond to the coronavirus pandemic have few reasons to smile these days. But House Democrats have found one, and her name is Earnestine.

Earnestine Dawson is kind of a mystery woman, Democrats agree. Most have never seen her, though they all know the sound of her voice. Their spouses and kids adore her. There is talk of sending her flowers (that would be difficult they have no idea where she is), and some have invited her to join them for dinner at the Democratic Club once Covid-19 subsides and such things are possible again.

I dont know where we got Earnestine, confessed Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the majority leader. Does she work for us?

Yes, Earnestine does work for the party leadership. She is the digital director for the House Democratic Caucus, but better known by lawmakers for her pandemic side-gig as moderator of a seemingly endless series of conference calls that have become the Democrats only means of communication and deliberation during the pandemic.

A Mississippi native who grew up dreaming of a job in Washington, Ms. Dawson, 37, is in charge of shaping social media strategy for House Democrats messaging arm, a relatively obscure position that normally entails little interaction with members of Congress. But in recent weeks, House Democrats have gotten to know her as the cheery master of ceremonies for their private calls, calling on each lawmaker in turn with her signature tag line: Congresswoman So-and-So, you are NOW LIVE!

As people all over the world adjust to living and working in the age of the coronavirus, with its lack of human contact and seemingly endless stream of fear and bad news, rare silver linings appear in surprising ways. For House Democrats, struggling to adapt to life as remote legislators and representatives, one bright spot has been Earnestine.

She has brought them together through tense and serious business: the drafting of three coronavirus relief packages, including the most recent $2 trillion economic stimulus bill, hashed out during a series of calls that typically lasted two hours. With more than 200 members, the caucus is too large to convene by video.

Ms. Dawson has moderated more than a dozen two-hour caucus calls since March 16, facilitating nearly 300 questions from 235 individual lawmakers. Often the calls feature special guests. Janet Yellen, the former chair of the Federal Reserve, briefed Democrats on Monday, and Vice President Mike Pence, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci and other members of the presidents coronavirus task force fielded questions from them on Wednesday.

Ms. Dawson is a constant, telling lawmakers to press star three to ask questions, gently teaching members twice her age how to unmute their phones, and letting them know sounding more like a party D.J. than a telephone operator when they have the floor to speak. She does it all from her desk in the basement of the House Longworth Building across from the Capitol, where she prefers to work rather than being at home.

I dont hear strain, I hear strength, Ms. Dawson said in an interview, her first. I think when they are on these calls together, they pull strength from one another.

But to hear Democrats tell it, the person from whom they are pulling strength is Ms. Dawson.

To Representative Richard Neal, 71, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Ms. Dawson is a reminder of what radio meant to us in the simpler days of his childhood. To Representative Debbie Dingell of Michigan, 66, Ms. Dawson is a touchstone and a rock the glue that keeps you together in a troubled, uncertain time.

Mr. Hoyer says Ms. Dawson deserves a title: We need to get a name for her, like Conference Queen or something like that. Very few of us know her personally, but we all know her through this phone connection, and shes the connector.

Americans of a certain age (including Mr. Neal, Ms. Dingell and Mr. Hoyer, 80) may remember another telephone operator named Ernestine a character played by the actress Lily Tomlin on Rowan & Martins Laugh-In, a 1960s- and 1970s-era television variety show. Ms. Tomlins Ernestine was nasal-voiced and slightly sarcastic. Ms. Dawson is nothing like her.

She is so sweet and she is so darling, said Representative Kim Schrier, Democrat of Washington, whose district was an early epicenter of the American pandemic. My husband and son love to listen to her say, Congressman Blah Blah Blah, you are now live! I purposely put her on speakerphone, just so they can hear her do the introduction.

A daughter of a bank manager and a corrections officer who worked in a maximum-security prison on death row, Ms. Dawson grew up in Cleveland, Miss., a city of roughly 11,000 people once divided by railroad tracks. Blacks, including Ms. Dawsons family, lived in the lowlands east of the tracks. Whites lived on the west side on higher ground. Each side had its own high school, though Ms. Dawson said they have since combined.

I had friends all over the city, she said, but we always knew what that railroad track meant when we crossed it.

Ms. Dawson said she knew early on that she wanted to get away from my small little town, and to serve the people, but her path to Capitol Hill was circuitous. She graduated from Tennessee State University in 2005 with a dream, she said, of becoming the first African-American female senator from Mississippi.

After a stint at a human rights group in her home state, Ms. Dawson grabbed a chance to get to Washington as an intern for a lobbying firm whose Republican politics were antithetical to her own. After a year in law school (I figured out real quickly it was not for me) and a string of jobs, including courtroom clerk and field organizer for President Barack Obamas 2012 re-election campaign, she made her way to Capitol Hill as digital director for Representative Yvette Clarke, Democrat of New York.

Ms. Clarke said Ms. Dawson had a way of making lemonade out of lemons, a trait the congresswoman attributed to her upbringing in a place with the legacy of segregation. Judge Hiram Puig-Lugo, for whom Ms. Dawson clerked when he was the deputy presiding judge of the Family Court division of the superior court in Washington, said the two often spoke about that aspect of her experience and how it shaped her.

When Democrats won control of the House in 2018, Ms. Dawson was hired by another New York Democrat, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the caucus chairman. In her current post, she has established an informal program to mentor young people of color who want to work in the digital space, in fields where minorities are often underrepresented.

With lawmakers scattered around the country, including some in quarantine, the caucus needed to create a system for communicating that would mimic its in-person meetings, which occur weekly or more often. After a few practice runs, it seemed obvious that Ms. Dawson should manage the calls, said Michael Hardaway, the caucus communications director and Ms. Dawsons boss.

We literally have had to build a virtual Congress for our members, Mr. Hardaway said.

The lawmakers calls have not been without incident. There have been interruptions from doorbells, barking dogs and crying children, as well as the occasional overheard private spousal communications. Members are supposed to keep their comments to a minute, and if someone needs to be cut off, that task falls to Mr. Jeffries.

Last week, after teasing Ms. Dawson about whether she had gotten flowers that were never sent, Representative John Larson, Democrat of Connecticut, invited her to dinner on behalf of himself and a handful of other lawmakers.

She is such an absolute delight and such a break from everything that were going through, Mr. Larson said. We cant wait to take her out if shes willing to go with us.

Ms. Dawson, for the record, did not respond. She does not engage with members on the calls, even when they praise her, but said she tries to remain as invisible as possible out of a sense of respect and a desire to be discreet.

She sees her job, she said, as making sure that all the members have a happy voice on the other end, especially during these hard times.

They are making some very hard decisions for the American people, Ms. Dawson said. Im just someone on the other line, letting them know that its time for them to ask their question or make their comment in a very upbeat way on a topic thats not very upbeat.

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Democrats Have Found a Coronavirus Bright Spot. Her Name Is Earnestine. - The New York Times

John Steinbecks 1939 novel The Grapes of Wrath describes a similar moment during the Great Depression, when people starved even as orchards of fruit were burned to make the food that remained more profitable: Men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

Were about to live this again, in more sophisticated ways. Then it was fruit being incinerated so no one could eat it. Now its cheap ventilators that werenever builtbecause a company called Covidien worried they would compete with their more expensive models. Its N95 masks that were not available because President Donald Trumpdelayed invokingthe Defense Production Act in order to protect corporate power. Its tens of thousands of hospital beds being eliminated in New York and New Jersey because the surplus capacity cost money; some of those hospitals were turned into luxury condos. Now, as it was 85 years ago, human beings are being offered as a blood sacrifice to profit. Now as then, the resulting wrath will be towering.

What we know from history is that someone always shows up to harvest this level of ambient rage but it can go in two directions. If people can be made angry at the crime, as Steinbeck wrote, there can be huge positive political changes. During the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt and unions organized the anger and used it to create the New Deal and the largest middle class in history. In unluckier countries, like Germany, Italy and Japan, the political left failed. The fury was organized by fascists, and directed at innocents.

Its tough to be optimistic that todays liberals can replicate Roosevelts success. The corporate-managerial-legal class that operates the Democratic Party fears anger and sees it as illegitimate as the basis for action. Having beaten back the threat of the Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren presidential candidacies, both fueled by strong populist emotion, they dream of a technocratic politics purified of messy, fickle human feelings.

But the American right specializes in the politics of anger. If the Democrats refuse to harness the legitimate rage of Americans and direct it at those responsible for our predicament, the right will make this anger its own and will win.

To understand the stakes, briefly imagine two possible versions of America one year from today, with two different uses of anger. Lets start with the anger we need, the kind that clarifies and motivates, and underlies all effective politics.

The Democratic candidate likely Joe Biden, but we know anything can happen in U.S. politics beat Donald Trump going away.

The winning Democrats slogan was Fighting Mad. And that was the core of his or her campaign both the unabashedly mad part and the demonstrated willingness to fight based on that anger.

The Democrat began the convention address either in Milwaukee or from his or her basement with no one within6 feet by saying: Im running for president because Im angry. And if youre angry too, theres nothing wrong with that. Anger comes from an Old Norse word that means sorrow. Every single one of us has known sorrow because of the thieves and incompetents whove been running this country. If youre angry, then join me and together well take that trash out to the curb.

The Democrat told the truth without truckling about who exactly was to blame for what had befallen them. The overall Democratic story could be understood by regular people because it included what every story needs: villains to be angry at, and heroes to root for. And unlike the rights stories, this story was true.

Were all in this together, the Democrat declared. And what that means is that the people whore out for themselves are going to pay the price. When Im president, were going to put all the presidents daily briefs online so everybody can see exactly how Trump screwed us. Politicians who made money off inside information on the coronavirus and profiteers who hoarded medical supplies are going to spend the rest of their lives in jail.

Mobilized anger at the healthcare industry terrified Congress into passing Medicare for All.

Mobilized anger at the countrys poisoning by Fox News led to a congressional investigation of whether the network had knowingly misled Americans about the dangers of Covid-19. The documentation uncovered became the basis for lawsuits that bankrupted and neutered Fox.

Mobilized anger created a sea change in U.S. culture. The taboo against being honest about the anguish and failure all humans experience was shattered. Suddenly Americans realized they were surrounded by suffering just like their own, and much of it was the fault of political choices, rather than them individually being losers.

The example from the top made an entire young, tragedy-stricken generation see that being a liberal politician can mean being a normal, angry human being instead of a technocrat built in a Stanford lab. Suddenly new potential candidates were showing up from unions and grassroots activists rather than elite law schools.

More than anything else, the liberal embrace of anger in 2021 transformed progressive politics into a movement that was serious about power. If there were no people who were truly dangerous, who were hurting us and rightfully deserved our fury, why bother getting out of bed to get power in the first place? And why wield it to vanquish your foes if were all on the same team in the end? Anger finally unlocked a liberal capacity to tell the truth.

Donald Trump was reelected. What stunned the Democrats, CNN, and the New York Times even more than Trumps victory is that he ran on the slogan Healing America even as voluminous, exquisitely researched media output demonstrated that his catastrophic mismanagement helped the coronavirus kill a million surplus Americans.

Yet it somehow didnt matter. Trump and the GOPs mighty Wurlitzer settled on a suite of hazy stories, all of which the partys base fervently believed even though they were mutually contradictory.

Such as, there had been mass deaths but they were the fault of Hunter Bidens friends in China. Simultaneously, they argued that barely anyone had died and the numbers had been wildly exaggerated by the media to hurt Trump. The suffocation of the countrys small businesses could be blamed on Nancy Pelosis bailout of big business and Wall Street. Big business and Wall Street had valiantly kept us alive despite the Democratic hate for free enterprise. At the bottom of the rights food chain, there were constant whispers thatbrown peoplefrom New York had streamed out of their warrens to purposefully infect the heartland.

What the stories had in common was that they featuredsomeone to blame, someone who could be the target of valid but misplaced rage. By contrast, the stories told by the Democratic candidate and the corporate press were accurate but had no villains and no heroes, and hence were not stories in the normal sense at all, just a complicated conglomeration of facts that looked good on a blackboard but had no heart.

The Democratic candidates quiet campaign refused to get exercised about much of anything. When the candidate was asked whether he or she would investigate Trumps dilatory response to the coronavirus at the beginning of 2020, the Democrat said no, because I know Donald loves this country and even out of office well need his shoulder at the wheel to beat this thing. What about prosecuting senators for insider trading? No, the candidate explained, because when Im president the country will all pull together.

With a terrifying resurgence of Covid-19 in the fall, and the Democrats failing to secure universal vote by mail, that November saw the lowest turnout ever in a presidential election. The Democratic base confused, demoralized, and frightened didnt show up. Trump declared his modest win to be the greatest landslide in history.

The Republican base became even more rage-filled and vindictive in victory. The Washington Post is trying to destroy America, Sean Hannity began to declare each week. Someones got to shut it down. Two days later, a gunman infiltrated Post headquarters and was stopped just before he could open fire.

Trump was now free of all restraints, and he commenced an enormous bombing campaign against Iran. Protests were outlawed for public safety. Large numbers of Americans continued to die from the coronavirus, although no one was sure exactly how many because the government no longer released statistics on it. Fox began quietly, and then more and more loudly, claiming that opponents of the war were importing biological bombers from Iran to spread the disease. The stage was set for the classic collapse into authoritarianism, with the official outside enemies purportedly collaborating with the enemies on the inside.

No one knows today which path the U.S. will take. But its going to be one or the other: The right or the left will emerge as the champion of the coming American rage. All we can do now is try to make the anger and its consequences rational, based on an accurate understanding of the world and the unnecessary sorrow we experience.We need to make people angry at the crime.

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The Left Must Organize the Coming American Fury - The Intercept

Republican governors have been widely criticized for being slower than their Democratic counterparts in imposing social distancing requirements to halt the spread of the new coronavirus. Some Democratic governors Govs. Gavin Newsom (California), Andrew Cuomo (New York), J.B. Pritzker (Illinois) and Jay Inslee (Washington) in particular moved to enact social distancing measures relatively early, in some cases weeks ahead of other states. But this hasnt been an entirely partisan push Republican Gov. Mike DeWine (Ohio) also enacted social distancing measures early, declaring we must be at war with the virus.

In fact, many of the governors who have responded the fastest, lead states that faced intense outbreaks of the virus much earlier than other states. New York, for instance, is at the epicenter of the pandemic in the U.S. and accounts for nearly half of the countrys reported coronavirus-related deaths with thousands of new cases reported daily.

It makes sense, then, that we see some variation in when states first issued a statewide order to stay at home, but is there an actual partisan split in how Democratic and Republican governors have responded? In looking at the first recorded COVID-19 case in a given state and how many days passed before the governor imposed a statewide stay at home or shelter in place order, I found a governors party affiliation didnt make a huge difference in when the order was issued.

The median Democratic governor imposed such an order 21 days after the first case appeared and the median Republican governor took 25 days.

The key difference here, of course, is that the eight governors who have yet to impose a statewide order are all Republican. Yes, some of those states have partial stay-at-home orders enacted in some cities and counties, but nothing statewide. And each of those states is now well beyond the 25-day time frame of the median Republican-led state. Nebraska, for instance, saw its first case on Feb. 17 52 days ago and still hasnt imposed a statewide order.

However, these are also some of the states with the lowest number of detected cases. Obviously, detected cases arent a perfect metric, given the wide variation in testing strategies, but it does seem that there is less political demand on these governors to impose a stay-at-home order because the perception of an urgent public health crisis is less prevalent within those states. Their party affiliation probably plays a role in that perception.

Republican Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, for instance, made a point in mid-March of taking his family out to dinner, encouraging other asymptomatic people to do the same to help the local business community. And although Stitt later sounded a more cautious tone, this is a line that has been echoed by a number of other Republican leaders, perhaps because the spread of the disease hasnt been as prevalent in their state. The virus largely appeared (or was detected) in Democratic-controlled states earlier, so theres been more pressure for Democratic governors to respond. But well see just how much longer before the remaining governors impose such an order in their state, as there are signs that the coronavirus could grow just as fast in red states.

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Democratic And GOP Governors Enacted Stay-At-Home Orders On The Same Timeline. But All Holdouts Are Republicans. - FiveThirtyEight

The coronavirus pandemic has canceled thousands of business, sporting and cultural events into the summer, with some rescheduled for the fall or even next year. But the Republican and Democratic presidential nominating conventions are likely to take place in August, as scheduled, according to one shrewd political analyst.

On the Yahoo Finance Electionomics podcast, Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg explained why its crucial for President Trump to accept his partys presidential nomination in person at the convention in late August. Having a real convention will be important for him, Greenberg says. Trump will push very hard to have a real convention because it would be a real judgment about his presidency if he couldnt have a convention.

Trump has been itching to reopen the economy, pushing first for businesses to reopen on Easter Sunday, April 12. Thats obviously impossible, with coronavirus infections and deaths still cresting across the country. Trump later extended federal distancing guidance to April 30, and now he talks more broadly about light at the end of the tunnel.

If the outbreak remains so severe by August that neither party can hold a physical convention, that would amount to five months of business shutdowns. The toll on the economy would be so severe that Trumps reelection would probably be doomed by then. Economists have a hard time predicting when the U.S. economy will start to recover, because it depends on aggressive public health measures including widespread testing for the virus, antibody tests to determine who might be immune and careful plans for limited and safe business re-openings.

[Check out all of our Electionomics podcasts.]

Many forecasts call for a severe slowdown in the second quarter of the year, with a gradual recovery starting in the third quarter. If that pans out, the Republican convention might begin as scheduled on August 24, in Charlotte. Planners may still have to thin attendance, force distancing and abide by the Centers for Disease Control guidelines for reopening.

The Democratic Party has already postponed its convention, which was supposed to start in Milwaukee in mid July. Thats now scheduled to begin August 17, a week before Republicans gather. And if the Republicans hold theirs, the Democrats will essentially have to as well. Well have a lot of pressure on the Democrats to hold their convention, Greenberg says.

Conventions entail a lot of political theater that isnt essential to nominating a candidate. Each party could amend its rules to nominate a candidate and conduct other party business without gathering in person. But conventions generate party unity and garner a lot of free publicity, with the nominee typically enjoying a convention bump that pushes his or her poll numbers up a couple of points. Trump in particular is a devotee of orchestrated televised events, one reason hes likely to insist on a convention. And dont expect to see him wearing a mask.

If the conventions do happen, theyll probably be dominated by coronavirus anyway. Trump will try to convince voters hes a strong leader during tough times. Biden will make the case that hed do better. And voters, by then, will have strong views on whether theyre doing okay under Trump or want somebody else to take charge.

Rick Newman is the author of four books, including Rebounders: How Winners Pivot from Setback to Success. Follow him on Twitter:@rickjnewman. Confidential tip line:rickjnewman@yahoo.com.Encrypted communication available. Click here toget Ricks stories by email.

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Coronavirus won't stop the Republican and Democratic conventions - Yahoo Finance

More thana dozen House Democrats led by California Reps. Norma TorresNorma Judith TorresOvernight Health Care Presented by PCMA US now leads world in known coronavirus cases | Unemployment claims soar by over 3 million | House to vote on stimulus Friday | Ventilator shortage sets off scramble Democrats ask Trump for evidence that medical supplies are available Hispanic Democrats demand funding for multilingual coronavirus messaging MORE and TJ Cox are calling on the Trump administration to haltits efforts to produce county-specific social distancing guidelines, citing concerns over the potential misclassification of low-income and rural communities that lack access to coronavirus tests.

Nearly two weeks ago, Trump sent a letter to U.S. governors outlining a plan to classify counties in the U.S. based on their risk factors and rescind social distancing guidelines accordingly. The presidentprioritized reopening the economy, which has ground to a halt as a result of social distancingmeasures, leaving millions unemployed.

Our country does not presently have the testing infrastructure to accurately gauge the prevalence of COVID-19. Determining a risk classification based on insufficient testing could have a devastating impact on our national efforts to combat this disease, and in particular, on low-income and rural communities, the lawmakers wrote in a letter addressed to the president and the public health officials in his Cabinet.

In Trump's letter sent March 27,the president said counties will be ranked based on robust surveillance testing. Such a plan could scale back social distancing measures in communities that unknowingly have an outbreak because of a lack of testing, posing the risk of the virus further spreading.

Cox said the administration cannot use incomplete and inaccurate data in matters of life or death and challenged the administration to commit to, at the very least, widespread testing access, before implementing a system.

We need tests, not county classifications, and the fact that this president is trying to ease social distancing guidance without the data to support his claims should alarm every single American, Torres said, adding that testing facilities that serve low-income and rural communities are already stretched thin.

The lawmakers many of whom represent districts withlarge low-income and minority populations noted pre-existing health care inequities pose a barrier between their constituents coronavirus cases being accurately counted.

Further, low-income individuals may not seek testing out of fear of other associated medical costs, especially if they are uninsured, and individuals in rural areas may be unable to reach testing sites given an already low number of health care facilities in their areas, the lawmakers added.

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Democratic reps ask Trump not to issue region-specific social distancing guidelines | TheHill - The Hill

Former Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein responded to the end of the presidential campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) by telling her followers to exit the Democratic Party, and many Democrats were incensed at the suggestion.

"Bernie Sanders ran a good race. Now it's clearer than ever: establishment Dems' top priority is sabotaging progressives to maintain their own power," Stein tweeted on Wednesday.

"@GreenPartyUS welcomes all who understand that the fight for people, planet & peace must continue," she added, with the hashtag "DemExit."

Stein supported the Sanders campaign, but many Democrats blame her and her supporters for the stunning loss of Hillary Clinton to then-candidate Donald Trump in the 2016 election.

Many on the left took to Twitter to excoriate her for throwing her support away from the establishment candidate, Joe Biden, after Sanders exited the race.

"You need to be airdropped straight into Moscow. And stay the hell there. Freaking traitor," tweeted feminist Ellen Hopkins.

"Didn't you sabotage the last election allowing Trump to win? Hard to take this comment seriously," responded blogger Tom Coates.

"When the @DrJillStein idiots were willing to lose two Supreme Court seats to Mitch McConnell that's when I knew they were full of s**t and had no intention of overturning Citizens United or anything else. They just wanted to blow things up," replied film blogger Sasha Stone.

"INTO THE SUN may she f**k right off," tweeted author Cherie Priest.

"Jill Stein felt all kinds of wrong, like she was a pawn or something even more nefarious," responded author Raquel Cepeda.

"Jill Stein threatening DemExit is like Tanya Harding threatening to quit figure skating," said one user.

Stein says Clinton promoting 'unhinged conspiracy theory'www.youtube.com

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Jill Stein encourages followers to leave the Democratic Party after Bernie drops out, and Democrats are melting down - TheBlaze

Sherrod Brown has always defied easy categorization. A Yale graduate from a well-off family, he became a state representative in Ohio at the age of 21 and spent his free time in local union halls, absorbing the stories of auto and steelworkers. In the 1990s and 2000s, when Bill Clinton and the New Democrats preached the gospel of globalization, Brown, then a congressman, warned about the ugly consequences of free-trade deals like NAFTA jobs shipped overseas, factories abandoned, towns and cities hollowed out. During the Obama years, Brown, now in the U.S. Senate, pleaded with his party brethren not to abandon their working-class roots, only to watch Donald Trump win in 2016 with the help of the white working class on Browns home turf.

Brown, 67, is one of the last true progressive populists. He insists that Democrats should campaign through the eyes of workers and honor the dignity of work a message he used to win a decisive re-election victory in Ohio two years after Trump won the state. The pleas for him to run for president flooded in. It came on me so sudden, he recalls. I looked at who the cast of characters were, and I came from the right place with the right message and the right politics and the right history, perhaps.

But his heart wasnt in it.

I didnt have the ambition, he tells Rolling Stone during one of several long conversations this past winter and spring. One of the things about Ted Kennedy was his joy of life, his joy of service. I bring that to my campaigns; I bring that to this job. I dont think I couldve brought it to a presidential race, and fundamentally, that more than anything kept me out.

You could argue that Browns candor and modesty two qualities you dont often find in United States senators might be precisely what the country needs in a president right now. But Brown has found other ways to make himself heard. Last November, he published his third book, Desk 88, a hybrid of memoir and history that traces the lineage of progressive senators (Hugo Black, Bill Proxmire, Bobby Kennedy, and others) who sat at the same desk on the Senate floor now used by Brown. In February, he wrote a scathing op-ed for The New York Times about the power of fear and how it stopped Republicans from holding Trump accountable during his impeachment trial. (The piece also featured a sly reference to Lizzo. More on that later.)

And as the novel coronavirus pandemic swept the country, Brown blasted Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for the Senates sluggish response and foot-dragging in taking up the first of several major relief bills. A video of Brown tearing into McConnell received more than 1.5 million views and earned him comparisons to Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Who can say anything but this is a national crisis? Brown bellowed on the Senate floor. Were going to make our unwillingness to do anything contingent on some parliamentary trick? No.

Brown has a message for his fellow Democrats, too. If they want to win back not only the working-class voters they lost in 2016 but also mobilize the multiracial coalition they need to beat Trump, theyll need to rethink the American electorate altogether. Its a message that Brown will soon be sharing on behalf of former Vice President Joe Biden; this week, Brown voted (early) for Biden in Ohios primary and plans to help Bidens campaign later this year. Voters dont see politics as left or right, he says. This whole idea that independent voters are in the middle that theyre less liberal than Democrats and less conservative than Republicans is crap. People dont see themselves as conservative/liberal; people see themselves. And people see politicians as Whose side are you on?

What happened in that moment on the Senate floor during the coronavirus debate?[Democratic Sen. Dick] Durbin was impatiently, for all the right reasons, saying we needed to do this tonight. A Republican stood up and gave some parliamentary sleight-of-hand reason for the delay. And so I just took off on that. Why arent we doing this? Three, four, five days of delay when people are scared, when people are angry, when people are anxious about their future? They know theyre about to lose their job or theyve already lost it. They dont know if theyre going to be able to pay their rent. They dont know whats going to happen to their sister whos not feeling well but has to choose between going to work or taking a day without pay, or even worse, cant get a test for what she thinks might be the coronavirus.

More than 600 days ago, you raised the issue of Trump and John Bolton disbanding the pandemic team inside the National Security Council.I wrote the letter, I think, about a week after he disbanded it. The admiral in charge of this office had worked for [George W.] Bush, managing the international combating of malaria. Then he worked for Obama on a global-health-security office, where the function of the office was to surveil countries around the world for epidemics that might evolve into a pandemic.

One of the greatest things we do in our country, we send health care people around the world to help them with problems. We partly do it for our own interest, to keep it out of the country, but we do it for humanitarian reasons. The White House had nobody doing that. This guys job was to do that. If he had been there in November, he maybe sees this before the Chinese acknowledge it. Maybe it wouldve been the 10th of December, he wouldve had the wherewithal and gravitas and position to go to the president and say, Weve got to start preparing for this.

But for the rest of December, all of January, all of February, [Trump] didnt declare a health care emergency. Until March. All that time lost, more people get sick and more people die.

Should we listen to what the president says in the middle of this pandemic if hes going to say things that are wrong?We should listen to the public-health professionals. What Pence and Trump say moves some people, but theyre not reliable spokespeople to combat this pandemic, so I listen to the public-health professionals who have done this before. Theyve never seen something quite like this, but they are the best equipped to do it. What the president says is either misleading or wrong or outright lies or always for his political benefit. I just dont think any of us have time for that.

Tell me about the New York Times op-ed you published right after impeachment, where you said Republicans acquitted Trump out of fear. Theres a line in it I want to ask you about.If its the Lizzo line, it wasnt mine. The article was absolutely mine. Lizzo displaced the line Thou doth protest too much. When my wife [journalist Connie Schultz] read it, she thought that was too clich. Katie Mulhall Quintela in our office came up with Lizzo. [Ed. note: The line in question is, In the words of Lizzo: Truth hurts.]

Several people, unprompted, noted it in my circles: Sherrod Brown listens to Lizzo?Well, I do now. The article really started when I was just watching Republicans and listening to their fear. I remember going up to [Sen.] Patty Murray and saying, Im really struck by the fear on the other side. I just thought it was a story that needed to be told, because people ask all the time, How could Republicans not vote, for Gods sakes, for witnesses [to be called in the impeachment trial]? What are they thinking? And I said its really two things. They like what Trump gives them, and theyre scared to death. And fear does the business. And when fear does the business in a legislative body, the decision is almost always wrong for the country long term.

There was a line in the op-ed: For the stay-in-office-at-all-costs representatives and senators, fear is the motivator. When did staying in office at all costs become the be-all and end-all of ones existence here?Im not sure the assumption is right, When did it become? I mean, look I dont have much empathy for that attitude, but we all have it to a point. Everyone has some fear of losing their job. Its just much more unseemly if its a U.S. senator, because we can find something. The SEIU member in Cincinnati, if she gets some supervisor harassing her? She doesnt have a lot of options. I think politicians have always had that illness. Weve always voted in ways to keep our jobs that we probably shouldnt have. Ive never wanted to let fear do the business. I think I am even stronger in that view today than I was my first term. Partly that its OK if I lose, partly its the voters want authenticity, and partly because Ill sleep better.

There is now a trendy observation among the politically savvy that Ohio is a red state. It cannot be won by a Democrat apart from you, apparently. How do you respond to those who say Democrats should write off Ohio and campaign elsewhere?You dont write off a state thats voted for the winning candidate for president more times in the last 100 years than any state except maybe New Mexico. The state hasnt dramatically changed in the last 10 years; its just the politics of the country has changed.

We knew in my [2018] race we had to get one out of seven Trump voters. We knew it was mostly female Trump voters, and we did. And we did it with progressive populism, not the phony divide populism of Trump. Real populism is never anti-Semitic and never racist and never divisive. It brings people together. You campaign through the eyes of workers, and you govern through the eyes of workers. You do it in an inclusive way.

Ive had an F from the NRA my whole career. I was for marriage equality for 20, 25 years. I dont compromise on economic justice or civil-rights issues or womens issues ever.

Theres a multiracial coalition that your campaigns put together that I feel like is a model for someone running for president. A Democrat probably isnt going to beat Trump without building that kind of coalition. What are the lessons from your elections that you think have some broader applicability?I think you can do it and this isnt meant at any candidate you can do it by vilifying, demonizing, and attacking less. And I do plenty of that. I understand that, because you need to make contrasts. But [it should be] more about talking about workers and talking about peoples lives.

Whether you punch a clock or swipe a badge or work for tips or are raising kids or taking care of sick parents [Martin Luther] King said that no job is menial if it pays an adequate wage. And you illustrate that in part by stories.

I was at an AFL-CIO dinner in Cincinnati some years ago, and there was a table of middle-aged women, probably half white, the other half Latino and black. They were janitors. They had just signed their first union contract, SEIU, with downtown Cincinnati business owners. I sat down at that table next to a woman and said, Whats it like to have a union? She said, For the first time in 51 years, Ill have a paid, one-week vacation. You tell stories like that and you show what a union can mean and what issues of justice are all about. People respond to that. Thats a story Donald Trump could never match. For one thing, hes probably got all kinds of workers that hes contracted with that hes stiffed. I guess you do have to make the contrast and demonize from time to time.

Is there a misconception of what the working and middle classes look like? After the 2016 election there was a lot of hand-wringing about how Democrats failed to appeal to the white working class in the Midwest.Generally, when people say workers, maybe theyre thinking construction; theyre thinking maybe more of men than women. Theyre thinking not necessarily more white than people of color; I dont know if thats the case or not. But weve got to always speak expansively.

My wifes mother was a home-care worker. She died at 62. Her dad died at 69. Connie has said that they wore out their bodies so we didnt have to wear out ours.

I was at my high school reunion, I think my 40th. They had an easel with the pictures of kids who we know have died of the 400 in the class. And it was a pretty consequential number, and they were mostly low-income white and black kids. The other thing I remember: I sat across from a woman in my class. She worked at JP Morgan Chase as a bank teller for 30 years. She was making $30,000 a year. We ought to be thinking about them as workers.

Its a broad group of people that do most of the work in the day. Its the people that youre allowed to ignore. Its the food-service -worker; its the custodian in this building [the Hart Senate Office Building]. This building is way too white during the day, and its a whole lot of Latina and mostly women, not entirely, and black people that come in and clean up. Theres too much of that in society.

Your mom grew up in the segregated South, but ended up being a civil-rights activist, a progressive.In every way.

Your dad was from Ohio, a doctor, but a conservative, at least for a time.Till his kids changed him.

You and your two brothers all went to Ivy League schools. You went to Yale. But you go back to Ohio and become the defender of the worker and the dignity of the working class in Congress. How do I connect all those dots in your life?My dad always took care of people whether they could pay or not. I remember he had a thing of arrowheads in his office, a display of them. A patient had given them to him because they couldnt pay.

People would say to me in high school, Your dad spends time with us, he talks to us, he always finds a way to give us a bunch of pills that we dont have to pay for. He takes care of us. He had the reputation, and I didnt really know this growing up, as being the best diagnostician in town. I dont think it was science-based as much as it was listening-based. If you listen to somebody you can often tell whats wrong with them if youre a good doctor, without blood tests. Not that he didnt do those too.

My dad was a conservative, but only because he really didnt think about it. His dad was a conservative. Thats probably why. But then he changed. Nixon changed him, Agnew changed him. He changed in the Sixties, because he voted for Goldwater. How many people voted for Goldwater, then McGovern, right? Not very many. It was a small group.

You first got elected to the Ohio Legislature when you were 22?I was 21 when I got elected, turned 22 right after the election. Because I was young, I didnt need a lot of money to live on. The Legislature paid $17,500 in 1975; that was a living wage for sure. That was plenty of money to live on in Mansfield, and I didnt have another job; so when the Legislature wasnt in session, I would go and just hang out at the steelworkers hall and the UAW hall, and Id listen to workers talk.

That really did have a socializing effect on me. I heard what theyd say about scabs. I walked picket lines. It was a Republican county overall, but with a strong union presence. I guess thats where I learned politics more than anything.

How have the conversations in that steelworkers hall or that UAW hall changed in the years that youve been going there?I think there was a certainty in 1978 that My kidll have it better than I will. There was a certainty among the parents that their kids would have it better off, partly because they carried a union card, partly because there were economic opportunities abounding. They just all thought there was more opportunity than they think now. And thats because of bad trade agreements. Its because of terrible tax policy. Its because of elected officials that have not looked out for them, frankly.

Whose fault is that? Is it Democrats as much as Republicans?Of course not. But Democrats arent blameless. Democrats passing bad trade agreements, Democrats giving in to Republicans on tax issues. Most of us dont most of the time, but enough of us do enough of the time to get to a bad place.

One of my favorite Lincoln lines is when he was in the White House, his staff said, Stay in the White House and win the war and free the slaves and preserve the Union. Lincoln said, No, Ive got to go out and get my public-opinion bath.

Pope Francis said and my wife hates it when I use this one, but shes not here, so what the heck? but Pope Francis exhorted his parish priests to go out and smell like the flock, which has a different connotation, but it really is go out and be among the flock. I think that none of us does that enough. I think I do it more than most, but I dont do it nearly enough.

Speaking of history, where do you look in history to make sense of the moment were in now? [Note: This question was asked in mid-February, before the full-blown coronavirus crisis emerged.]Well, I start with this isnt the worst time in our countrys history, not even close. This is not the divisions of 1968, when a large swath of people couldnt vote because of their skin color. This isnt McCarthy, where people couldnt stand on street corners and criticize the government, or at least that part of the government. This isnt the Depression. Its not the Civil War. Its not Jim Crow. Its not those days, so thats good.

But Trump is the worst president in our history, and I also think if he has a second term, it could become one of the worst times it could reach the level of those periods or worse. That to me is whats at stake in 2020.

Did it surprise you to see Biden have such a good night [on Super Tuesday]? Or were those Biden is done narratives wrong?A little of both. Hes so well known. Hes very well-liked among voters and among party activists. Not necessarily their first choice, maybe. But personally, hes very well-liked. People all have seen his empathy, borne in part Im making too much of this, perhaps the same way Franklin Roosevelt had such empathy, because of his personal life. Few people have suffered as much as Joe Biden. People know that about him: that you either turn bitter from that tragedy or you grow and have great empathy. Thats the Joe Biden that people like. They know what theyre getting.

Was this the quote-unquote Democratic establishment lining up behind Joe Biden? Or is it Democratic voters finally saying, OK, we think Joe Biden is going to be our guy?I dont know what the Democratic establishment is. Its not a bunch of people in a back room that made all those people in South Carolina and made all those people in Texas and Minnesota and Massachusetts and Tennessee and North Carolina and Arkansas and Oklahoma vote for Biden. I know that some are going to characterize the Democratic establishment as pushing him over, but this was huge numbers of voters that made their decision.

What did you think seeing these stories that said you were going to be a white-knight savior of a divided Democratic Party?Im flattered, I guess, but the voters will work their will, and well have a nominee, and our nominee is going to beat Trump. Im confident of that, increasingly confident of that.

What is your theory for how this president won in 2016? And how does that inform the Democratic Party nominee defeating the president in 2020?First of all, he lied to people about protecting Social Security and Medicare. He sold people a phony populism to make them feel like he was on their side, and then he betrayed them. He uses racism and bigotry to divide people to distract from the fact that hes used the White House to enrich himself and his family. Populisms never racist. It doesnt push some people down to lift others up. We fight his phony populism with real populism that fights for all people. Thats what the whole dignity-of-work message is about. Thats where Trump has just missed it. It may have paid off for him in 16, but its not going to pay off for him again.

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Senator Sherrod Brown Knows How to Save the Soul of the Democratic Party - Yahoo Entertainment

Donald Trumps response to the global pandemic will cost an untold amount of lives. His denial of the viruss seriousness, failure to stockpile and manufacture the necessary protective gear, dismissal of the pandemic team, and spread of misinformation and pseudoscience means, quite literally, that hundreds of thousands of people could die who otherwise may not have. The rot goes all the way down: The Republican Party is using this crisis to jam through the largest corporate bailout in history, while doing almost nothing in comparison for the millions of Americans who are now without jobs or had little income to begin with.

None of this is unexpected. Yet as Republicans militantly push through their policy prioritiesone might say they are politicizing the pandemicDemocratic leadership has been largely absent. In what is not simply a political opportunity, but a historic moment of unprecedented need, the party that supposedly represents the working people is barely putting up a fight.

Joe Biden, the presumed Democratic nominee, is nowhere to be found. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer are operating as if its business as usual, ceding whatever power they have to Republicans. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren quickly folded and voted for the stimulus bill, perhaps in part because of the bruising primary process. And, while Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez railed against the bill, shes only a single freshman representative. The working class is still vastly underrepresented in the House and the small but newly emboldened progressive wing has not yet come together as a consistent, effective bloc to put pressure on leadership.

Biden, who is still rejecting the idea of single-payer health care during a global pandemic, is a frontrunner leading from behind. After the Democratic establishment spent the last month of the primary coalescing around their candidate, that same candidate has suddenly disappeared during a moment of national crisis. As Biden fell off the face of the earth for nearly a week in March, he told reporters that his team was still working on figuring out the infrastructure at home to be in significant contact with the American people.

When Biden does emerge, hes reticent to go hard on Trump. As an outside advisor to Biden told Politico on Monday, As much as I dislike Trump and think what a bad job hes doing, theres a danger now that attacking him can backfire on you if you get too far out there. I dont think the public wants to hear criticism of Trump right now. In the meantime, Donald Trumps polling has managed to creep up in the initial weeks of the epidemic (though it has begun to fizzle in recent days).

Bidens strategy, it seems, is to stay on the sidelines, much to the frustration of some within the party.

They need to be drawing a sharper contrast with Trump at this point in time given his obvious failings while standing at that podium every afternoon, Jim Manley, former aide to Senators Harry Reid and Ted Kennedy, said of Biden.

Instead of more livestreams and televised spots, Biden has decided to release a podcast, Heres the Deal, in which he tells the American people what, exactly, the deal is. Going the podcast route is not just a missed political opportunity, but a missed public health opportunity. Older, at-risk people are more likely to get their news from television. And while someone like Biden may not be able to easily break through the coronavirus disinformation Fox News viewers receive, a not-insignificant number of moderate viewers who watch CNN are also confused about whats happening. According to the Pew Research Center, a quarter of CNN viewers think that the media has greatly exaggerated the risks of the pandemic and nearly one fifth think COVID-19 was developed intentionally in a lab.

The other obvious rallying point for Democrats would be in the House, which is the one chamber that they currently control. Yet even as the coronavirus stimulus bill was making its way through the Senate, Republicans were down by five votes because of members who were quarantined, meaning that Democrats in that chamber had more leverage than usual to push for priorities.

But neither Speaker Nancy Pelosi nor Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer offered any sort of robust defense or rebuke to the Republican Partys corporate robbery in the Senates most recent stimulus bill. The bill includes $500 billion in corporate bailouts, which essentially translates into a $4.5 trillion bailout in leveraged lending from the Federal Reserve. In turn, Democrats secured weak oversight of the bailout money, one-time $1200 checks for individuals, and more generous unemployment benefitswins that are far from commensurate with the much more permanent losses.

The bill was a monstrous, indefensible giveaway to greedy financiers and monopolists and arsonists, justified by the scraps it gave people out of work and the scraps it gave small businesses, Zephyr Teachout, a corruption expert and Sanders ally, told VICE. I understand that Democrats don't control the Senate, but I don't understand why they didn't stand on the rooftops and demand two separate bills, one for immediate needs and the other for bailouts, and yell at Republicans at every possible opportunity for their effort to put them together.

Pelosi is now gearing up for a fourth bill, in which she is pushing for more of the Democrats priorities. This isnt about how fast we can do it. Its how fast we must do it, she told reporters on a call earlier this week. Yet with the corporate bailouts already secured, Democrats have less leverage than they did before. Republicans have little incentive now to bend on any of their opponents policy prioritiesNo more spending. We did all the spending, one White House economic adviser told a Washington Post reporter.

Again, none of this is unexpectedRepublicans have always had a Machiavellian focus on corporate giveaways. Yet during the crisis, many of Pelosis decisions have been to seemingly stymie the priorities of her own party. Not only did she fail to pass a more progressive House relief bill, Pelosi stubbornly refused to push for remote voting before sending members home. Without remote voting, members have to either accept the stimulus bill wholesalecorporate bailouts includedvia unanimous consent, or individually object and force all their colleagues to return to Congress during a pandemic. Some progressive members saw this as a power play by Pelosi.

If you have remote voting and you actually have to whip your members rather than just being able to count on unanimous consent, it would definitely give more leverage to members, one senior aide to a progressive House member told HuffPost.

The lack of remote voting also means that House leadership can use the excuse that pushing too hard for progressive priorities would mean a Republican member would block unanimous consent and force everyone to come in and risk getting sick. David Segal, the executive director of Demand Progress, a progressive group that is pushing for emergency remote voting, told VICE that because of this, the outcomes of House negotiations have been, and will continue to be, more moderate than they otherwise could be, and it means the House can't pass strong, progressive stimulus measures and try to force the Senate's hand.

If the Democratic establishment hasnt broken out in this moment, those on the partys left wing arent doing much better. Both Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren voted for the Senate stimulus bill, which passed unanimously 96-0, despite the fact that it included a historic bailout for the shareholder class. Warren even went to the lengths of laying out a progressive litmus test for any corporate bailouts, a test that the bill did not pass. Sanders made a speech criticizing Republicans who were fighting the unemployment provisions, killing an amendment that would have made the deal even worse. But in the end, this just essentially served to move forward Schumer and Mitch McConnells package, corporate bailouts included.

To be fair, only the left-wing of the party has offered a robust policy vision proportional to the scale of coronavirus. And as a fraction of the Senate body, both Sanders and Warren had much less power over the deal than those in actual leadershipit was clear that the bill was going to pass regardless. But it was a moment when either senator could have registered dissent, in the likes of Barbara Lee and her lone vote against the war in Afghanistan. Yet neither did.

The pandemic has revealed fractures in how our country operates as a whole. As a result, the nation is opening up to the idea that broad social programs are not only viable, but necessary solutions. Support for Medicare for All is at a nine-month high, the Republican administration itself instated a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions for homeowners, and lawmakers are seriously discussing a universal basic income. Much of this is temporary, of course, until its not. Its up to Democrats seize upon this energy and change thatas Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor wrote in The New Yorker, Now is a moment to remake our society anew.

If there is one national Democratic leader who has emerged over the past month, its New Yorks Governor Andrew Cuomo. Giving measured, daily press conferences from the epicenter of the pandemic, Cuomo has won over the media class and given the public a sense of authoritative control over the situation. But this is also the bare minimum that a public official should do in the time of crisis. In reality, Cuomo is also bungling the situationhe didnt shut down the city until nearly two weeks after the states first confirmed case, is refusing to give relief to renters, and has left people to die in jails. Perhaps most egregiously, as millions of people lose their jobs and face a public health crisis, the governor is focused on cutting Medicaid. Cuomos rise says more about the vacuum in leadership from the rest of the Democratic Party than anything else.

This is an unprecedented moment. Republicans, some of whom are selling off stock to enrich themselves, understand that. But the energy on the ground for a new, better world is here. There are people organizing mutual aid groups, those calling for a massive, nation-wide rent strike, and Whole Foods and Instacart workers who are striking over their health and safety. Democrats could seize on this energy to push for massive New Deal-era public policies that would help the working-class. At the very least, they could offer a unified steady, moral vision for such policies. Yet in the moment when the working class needs them the most, the party is leaving them behind.

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This Is a Historic Crisis. Where Is Democratic Leadership? - VICE

Elections in New Jersey are authorized under Article II of the New Jersey State Constitution, which establishes elections for the governor, the lieutenant governor, and members of the New Jersey Legislature. Elections are regulated under state law, Title 19. The office of the New Jersey Secretary of State has a Division of Elections that oversees the execution of elections under state law (This used to be the New Jersey Attorney General). In addition, the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC) is responsible for administering campaign financing and lobbying disclosure.

Historically, it has voted about half the time, nationally, for each of the two major parties since 1860.[1] Traditionally a swing state, It has voted Democratic in recent decades. The governorship has alternated between the two major parties since the election of Democrat Richard J. Hughes in 1961, with a succession of Republicans and Democrats serving as governor. The New Jersey Legislature has also switched hands over the years, and one house was evenly divided from 19992001, when the Democrats took control. Three of the last four gubernatorial elections have been close. New Jersey leans Democratic in national elections. The Congressional seats have been as evenly divided over the decades, with little change due to political trends in the state. New Jersey currently has a Democratic governor, Phil Murphy and recently elected their second lieutenant governor, Democrat Sheila Oliver.[2]

At the national level, the state favors the Democratic Party: Both of its Senators have been Democrats since 1982, and George H. W. Bush was the last Republican candidate for President to carry the state, in 1988. However, previous governor Chris Christie was a Republican serving from 2010 to 2018, as was Christine Todd Whitman, who served from 1994 to 2001.

New Jersey is split almost down the middle between the New York City and Philadelphia television markets, respectively the largest and fourth-largest markets in the nation. As a result, campaign budgets are among the largest in the country.

In 1776, the first Constitution of New Jersey was drafted. It was written during the Revolutionary War, and was created a basic framework for the state government. The constitution granted the right of suffrage to women and black men who met certain property requirements. The New Jersey Constitution of 1776[3] allowed "all inhabitants of this Colony, of full age, who are worth fifty pounds proclamation money" to vote. This included blacks, spinsters, and widows; married women could not own property under the common law. The Constitution declared itself temporary, and it was to be void if there was reconciliation with Great Britain.[4][5] Both parties in elections mocked the other party for relying on "petticoat electors" and accused the other of allowing unqualified women to vote.

The second version of the New Jersey State Constitution was written in 1844. The constitution provided the right of suffrage only to white males, removing it from women and black men. Some of the important components of the second State Constitution include the separation of the powers of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. The new constitution also provided a bill of rights. The people had the right to directly elect the governor.

In national elections, the New Jersey has recently leaned towards the national Democratic Party.

For much of the second half of the 20th century, New Jersey was one of the most Republican states in the Northeast. It supported Republican presidential candidates in all but two elections from 1952 to 1988. It gave comfortable margins of victory to the Republican candidate in the close elections of 1948, 1968, and 1976. New Jersey was a crucial swing state in the elections of 1960, 1968, and 1992.

However, the brand of Republicanism in New Jersey has historically been a moderate one. As the national party tilted more to the right, the state's voters became more willing to support Democrats at the national level. This culminated in 1992, when Bill Clinton narrowly carried the state, becoming the first Democrat to win it since 1964. Since then, the only relatively close presidential race in New Jersey was in 2004, when Democrat John Kerry defeated George W. Bush in New Jersey by a margin of about seven percentage points. Clinton won it handily in 1996, and Al Gore won it almost as easily in 2000. In the 2008 and the 2012 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama carried the state by more than 15 percentage points. Hillary Clinton won it by over 14 points in 2016. Indeed, the 2004 election is the only election in recent years where the race hasn't been called for the Democrat soon after the polls closed. As a result, at the presidential level New Jersey is now considered part of the solid bloc of blue states in the Northeast.

The most recent victory by a Republican in a U.S. Senate race in the state was Clifford P. Case's reelection in 1972. Only Hawaii has had longer periods of exclusive Democratic victories in U.S. Senate races. The last Republican to hold a Senate seat from New Jersey was Jeffrey Chiesa, who was appointed a U.S. Senator by Governor Chris Christie in 2013 after Democrat Frank Lautenberg died in office. Chiesa served four months in office and did not seek election in his own right.

After Kean won the biggest victory for a gubernatorial race in New Jersey in 1985, no Republican ever won 50 percent of the vote in a New Jersey election for three decades until Chris Christie was re-elected in 2013 with 60% of the vote. Christine Todd Whitman was elected governor with 49 percent of the vote in 1993 and with 47 percent in 1997.

On November 3, 2009, incumbent Democratic Governor Jon Corzine was unseated by Republican challenger Chris Christie. Christie's margin of victory was 49%-45%.[7] Four years later, Christie was reelected with 60 percent of the vote, becoming the first Republican to clear the 50 percent mark since 1985.

As New Jersey is split almost down the middle between the New York City and Philadelphia television markets, advertising budgets for statewide elections are among the most expensive in the country.

The state's Democratic strongholds include Mercer County around the cities of Trenton and Princeton; Essex and Hudson counties the state's two most urban counties, around the state's two largest cities, Newark and Jersey City; as well as Camden County and New Brunswick/Middlesex County and most of the other urban communities just outside Philadelphia and New York City. The northeastern and southwestern counties, with over two million voters between them, have made it extremely difficult in recent years for a Republican presidential candidate to carry New Jersey. In 2004, for instance, Bush lost the state largely due to being completely shut out in those areas.

The state's more rural to suburban northwestern counties are Republican strongholds, especially mountainous Sussex County, Morris County, Hunterdon County and Warren County. Somerset, a more rural northwestern county, also leans Republican but can be competitive in national races. In the 2004 presidential election, Bush received about 52% in Somerset and 60% in Hunterdon, while in rural Republican Sussex County, Bush garnered 64% of the vote. Parts of rural to suburban northwestern Bergen and Passaic counties which are also mountainous, are also usually Republican.

The southeastern counties along the coast also favor Republicans, notably Ocean County, Monmouth County, and Cape May County. However, Atlantic County, which includes urban Atlantic City, has recently swung Democratic in national elections.

About half of the counties in New Jersey, are considered swing counties, though most lean toward one party, usually the Democrats. For example, Bergen County is solidly Republican in the wealthier and in some places rural and mountainous north and solidly Democratic in the more urbanized south. Due to the influence of the south, Bergen County has not gone Republican in a presidential election since 1992. The same is true of Passaic County which has a densely populated, heavily Hispanic Democratic south and a rural Republican north. Some other counties such as Salem County lean Republican because the urbanized areas in those counties are relatively small compared to those of the more heavily Democratic counties. Statistically, Atlantic County is the most representative county.

Unaffiliated is a status for registered voters in New Jersey. Those voters who do not specify a political party affiliation when they register to vote are listed as unaffiliated.[8] Affiliated voters may change their status to unaffiliated or to another political party if they wish, although any such change must be filed with the state 55 days before the primary election.[8] As of 2017, there were 2.4 million unaffiliated voters in New Jersey, more than members of any party in the state.[9]

New Jersey is a closed primary state.[10] This means that only voters who affiliate with a political party may vote in that party's candidate selection process (i.e., the primary election). However, unaffiliated voters may declare their party affiliation up to and including the day of the primary election.[8] Unaffiliated status does not affect participation in general elections.

Following each decennial census, the New Jersey Redistricting Commission forms to realign the districts. New Jersey currently has 12 House districts In the 116th Congress, eleven of New Jersey's seats are held by Democrats and one is held by a Republican.

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Elections in New Jersey - Wikipedia

That the parties are coming together at all on major legislation is, of itself, a remarkable turn from the intransigence that has defined Washington since Trump won election in 2016 and Democrats regained control of the House two years later. Joe Lieberman, the former Connecticut senator, described the current landscape in Washington as an extremely partisan time, ideologically divided time in our government worse than 2008 and 2009 by far, Im afraid.

Still, Republicans and Democrats are coming together to get things done, he said, adding that if it works which I hope and believe it will, if they do enough quickly enough maybe there wont be a dominant counter-reaction among Democrats or Republicans left or right.

Yet already, the pandemic has emboldened Democrats calls for more comprehensive health care and employee benefits, with the crisis laying bare not only shortcomings within the nations health care system, but the precariousness of Americans financial condition. Retirement accounts have been ravaged and unemployment claims are soaring.

David Pepper, chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party, said the pandemic has exposed just that the current state of affairs just leaves so many Americans living right on the edge of disaster, and wed heard these studies for years.

This just bears this out, he said. It tells you what an unstable status quo were living in to start That is something that might reframe politics for a long time.

Progressive Democrats, anticipating a recession and high rates of unemployment, are preparing to use the coronavirus pandemic to draw their party to the left on economic policy, attempting to broaden support for a Green New Deal as a way to spur employment while decarbonizing the economy. And they are watching party leaders closely in negotiations for the rescue package and demanding constraints on corporations that receive federal aid, as well as guarantees for the working class.

Charles Chamberlain, chairman of the liberal political action committee Democracy for America, said Were in a moment right now where obviously one of the long-term impacts of the coronavirus is likely to be a complete restructure of our economy.

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'Extraordinary change': How coronavirus is rewiring the Republican and Democratic parties - POLITICO