2018 General Election Elected 62 – 38
This note is unnecessary.
I don’t know if I should write this note. The point of these Political Notes is to urge support for Democrats, support for endangered incumbents and aspiring candidates who have a chance to win. There are two categories of endangered incumbent Democratic Members of Congress:
- Those who were elected in 2016 by very small margins
- Those who were elected in 2016 from districts that Donald Trump carried
The Notes provide enough information so readers can choose specific individual candidates to support. Someone who wants, instead, to provide general support to US Senate candidates can donate to the DSCC (Senate), to the DCCC (House), to the DLCC (locals).
Cheri Bustos http://www.cheribustos.com/ was one of those few Members of Congress elected in a district that Donald Trump carried. She is probably not endangered. She won in 2016 by twenty points. Democrats do not ordinarily win this district by twenty points (although redistricting helped). Cheri Bustos beat a Republican incumbent by 7 points in 2012. In 2014, she beat him again — by 11 points. She overwhelmed a new candidate in 2016 in what was a Republican year.
Her remarkable victory led to a profile in the blog Politico which is the principal source of some of this Note. Had she not won by twenty points, the title of this essay might be: Where does Bustos belong? Washington or Illinois?
The answer would be both. Cheri Bustos belongs in Congress and in her district. Her husband is a local county sheriff. Her father was a newspaper reporter in Springfield. Her Bachelor’s degree is from the University of Maryland. Her Master’s degree is from the University of Illinois, Springfield.
Though she was elected an alderman in Moline before she ran for Congress, her trajectory was not local reporter, alderman, Member of Congress. Her father left his reporting job in Springfield to become an aide to Illinois Democratic Senators: Paul Simon, Alan Dixon, and Dick Durbin. She was a babysitter for the Durbins. Cheri Bustos knew something about politics before she became a politician.
Cheri Bustos also knew something about health care. Before she was a politician she was a top executive for a health care provider covering the Quad Cities area — her district and more in Illinois and eastern Iowa. She took a pay cut to become a member of Congress. Her net worth declined.
Politico sees Cheri Bustos‘ success as a product of being a willing listener, an aggressive listener – constantly asking questions. Cheri Bustos really want to know about her constituents’ work, about their problems and priorities. They see that. Her campaign priorities were
- balancing the budget,
- creating jobs and growing the economy,
- protecting Medicare and social security
- fighting for veterans.
Politico asked her about controversial issues. Cheri Bustos said that she prefers to talk about her priorities; talking about guns and abortion are no-win propositions. Politico asked her about guns. She said her husband wears a gun to work, she owns a gun, her sons own guns. She said reasonable gun controls ensure that deranged people and people on terrorist watch lists do not own guns. Politico asked her about abortion. She said she is a pro-choice Catholic. On other issues, she supported the Keystone Pipeline and seeks improvements in the Affordable Care Act.
Politico quotes admiringly a Democratic political consultant who said that Cheri Bustos is the future of the Democratic Party. That can’t be quite right. Cheri Bustos avoids discussions of race or immigration. Many of the Congressional candidates I have been writing about come from Districts that resemble Bustos‘. These are the districts Democrats have not been winning, need to win, and should win. The people of these districts are among the people who Democrats intend to help have a better life. These people are part of the future of the Democratic Party, but they are not its entire future.The future of the Democratic party also rests with urban and suburban Democrats, Democrats from districts with diverse populations and well-educated populations. The best future of the Democratic party includes a resolution of the conversation among us that ensures that those in need, those striving to be part of the middle class, those striving to stay in the middle class, people of various races and heritages and regions, men and women, and those some think are unconventional all have opportunities to be integral to and successful in our society.
Support CheriBustos. http://www.cheribustos.com/. She may not need individual support as much as others I’ve written about. But she needed more than $3.5 million to achieve her 2016 victory. Her biggest donors were or were affiliated with Democratic Leadership PACS, public sector unions, and women’s groups. Join them.
