Check out the website: https://lenspoliticalnotes.com Look at the recent Political Notes and Len’s Letters on the website.
NORTHEAST: Political Note #363 Tom Malinowski NJ 07
MIDWEST: Political Note #376 Lauren Underwood IL 14, Political Note #378 Elissa Slotkin MI 08, Political Note #357 Haley Stevens MI 11, Political Note #355 Angie Craig MN 02
SOUTHWEST: Political Note #375 Steven Horsford NV 04, Political Note #356 Susie Lee NV 03, Political Note #377 Lizzie Fletcher TX 07, Political Note #362 Vicente Gonzalez TX 15
WEST: Political Note #383 Harley Rouda CA 48, Political Note #384 Peter DeFazio OR 04.
SPECIAL ELECTION: Political Note #382 Melanie Stansbury NM 01 June 1, 2021
May 17, 2021 Political Note #385 Carolyn Bordeaux
2022 General Election
At the beginning of March, Carolyn Bordeaux and four other Democratic Members of Congress, three of them, like her, members of the Problem Solvers Caucus, wrote the following to Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer: They intended the letter be taken into account before the Senate considered the version of Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan that had passed the House:
“We support doing everything that is necessary to defeat the pandemic and provide economic support during this crisis. As such we have voted to send the American Recovery Plan to the US Senate. We agree with President Biden, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell among others who have said it is better to go too big than too small….
“That said, we also agree with many experts who have said this bill would be better targeted to make sure that taxpayer dollars go where they are truly needed…. The Washington Post said “There’s room to scale this back….”
Even though she ran for this seat and lost in 2018, Carolyn Bordeaux https://www.carolyn4congress.comis not one of the those whose involvement in politics was jump started by Donald Trump’s victory. She’s the daughter of school teachers in Roanoke, Virginia – a very old city with a population that has hovered around 100,000. She escaped to Yale. Because her interest and commitment was to public service, after she completed her BA, she went to Washington where she worked for five years in Senator Wyden’s office.
Next, Carolyn Bordeaux went west to the University of Southern California for an MPA. She returned east to Syracuse for a PhD in Public Administration. Ready for life as an academic, she got a job, in 2003, at the Andrew Young School of Public Policy at Georgia State University in Atlanta.
It turns out that Carolyn Bordeaux was not just an academic. She took a leave of absence to do practical work, to be Director of the Georgia Senate Budget and Evaluation Office. This was a non-partisan job in a body with a Republican majority. She earned praise from Democrats and Republicans alike because she was practical and focused. The Georgia Senate, a majority Republican body, voted to honor her for helping them deal with and recover from the 2007 — 2008 Great Recession.
Carolyn Bordeaux returned to academia for a few years. She and her husband became parents. Her work continued at the intersection of the political and academic worlds. She became the Director of a kind of university think tank — the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State.
Thinking was not enough. Carolyn Bordeaux stepped down from being Director and started her run for Congress. In 2018, she won the Democratic primary run off by 569 votes and lost the election by 33. Rob Woodall, the Incumbent she lost so narrowly to, retired in 2020. Carolyn Bordeaux won the Democratic primary in 2020 easily. She won the general election by more than 10,000 votes.
When Democrats argue for the importance of running moderate candidates in order to win in the south, in order to win in Republican (or formerly Republican) districts, a cerebral and moderate problem-solver like Carolyn Bordeaux is the kind of candidate they have in mind. GA 07 is a suburban Congressional District northeast of Atlanta. It is no longer majority white. What it will be after redistricting is a different story, but according to a 2013 calculation it was 46% white, 21% Black, 19% Hispanic, and 14% Asian.
In order to represent GA 07, Carolyn Bordeaux joined the Bi-Partisan Problem Solvers Caucus, the relatively small and conservative Blue Dog Coalition, and the centrist new Democrat Coalition. In keeping with her economic interests, she is on the Small Business Committee and the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. She is in a position to deal with federal legislation to help create an economic recovery.
What she had to say on her 2020 campaign website was not exactly a slogan: “I will work tirelessly to pass creative, bold, and fiscally responsible policy that addresses the very real priorities of Georgians, “ “Public Service and Solving Problems for People has been my Life’s Work.”
In her letter to Speaker Pelosi and Leader Schumer, Carolyn Bordeaux was fulfilling those slogans. While she was at it, she was being the Member of Congress that her district wanted and expected.
Let’s keep her in Congress. Carolyn Bordeaux https://www.carolyn4congress.com will need help. If nothing else, she’ll need help because redistricting will make the district different. Her 10,000 vote win was narrower than you might think. She got 51.39% of the vote. Every dollar will count. We don’t want he to lose in a revised district by 33 votes.
Candidates to flip Republican Seats
California 48 Harley Rouda https://harleyforcongress.com
Members of Congress who won with less than 52% of the vote
Georgia 07 Carolyn Bordeaux https://www.carolyn4congress.com Received 51.39% of the vote in 2020
Iowa 03 Cynthia Axne https://cindyaxneforcongress.com Received 48.9% of the vote in 2020
Illinois 14 Lauren Underwood https://underwoodforcongress.com Received 50.67% of the vote in 2020
Michigan 08 Elissa Slotkin https://elissaforcongress.com Received 50.88% of the vote in 2020
Michigan 11 Haley Stevens https://haleystevensforcongress.com Received 50.2% of the vote in 2020
Minnesota 02 Angie Craig https://angiecraig.com Received 48.21% of the vote in 2020
Nevada 03 Susie Lee https://www.susieleeforcongress.com Received 48.75% of the vote in 2020
Nevada 04 Steve Horsford https://www.stevenhorsford.com Received 50.67% of the vote in 2020
New Jersey 07 Tom Malinowski https://malinowskifornj.com Received 50.61% of the vote in 2020
Oregon 04 Peter DeFazio https://www.defazioforcongress.org Received 51.26% of the vote in 2020
Texas 07 Lizzie Fletcher https://www.lizziefletcher.com Received 50.79% of the vote in 2020
Texas 15 Vicente Gonzalez http://www.vicentegonzalez.com Received 50.5% of the vote in 2020
Organizations to support
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) https://dccc.org
The Democratic National Committee (DNC). https://democrats.org The official organization of the Democratic Party.
Fair Fight https://fairfight.com Promotes fair elections around the country
A Special Election Coming Up
On June 1, Melanie Stansbury https://melaniefornm.com will be running to replace Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland in Congress, in NM 01. Melanie Stansbury has moved from sociology doctorate program to advocating for expanding access to medical care and ending access to assault weapons. A New Mexico State Rep, she had to work hard to obtain the Democratic nomination. Do some work for her or give some money to her to ensure her election. The special election is on June 1.
A Special Interest of Mine
New York City has its own small-town politics. Many of the readers of Lenspoliticalnotes are New Yorkers. Some may live in or know people in Part A of Assembly District 76 (roughly east of 3rd Avenue and south of 79th Street to and including Roosevelt Island).
If you live in Part A of State Assembly District 76 in New York, please support and vote for Rebecca Weintraub in the June 22 Democratic Primary. If you know people who live in Part A of Assembly District 76, please encourage them to vote for her.
Our club and the other Democratic Club in District 76 are supporting Rebecca Weintraub’s candidacy to be one of four District Leaders of the 76th Assembly District — the female leader of Part A of Assembly District 76. District Leaders are a kind of liaison between political parties and the community.
You can learn more about Rebecca Weintraub at her Website www.VoteRebecca.nyc or at Twitter @RSWinNYC or at Instagram /RSW_in_NYC or at Facebook /VoteRebeccaWeintraub. In her non-political life, she is Vice President of a public relations firm, mother of Benjamin, and wife of Evan. In her political life, she has been an active member of our club, a leader in an innovative effort collecting video responses from NYC candidates for public office used to assess who to endorse and who to vote for.
