Whistling Past the Graveyard

Odd year elections are typically quiet affairs tending not to make a whole lot of splash or national news. In the hyperpoliticized era of President Donald J. Trump, these elections have captured quite a bit more attention, in part because they offer something of a glimpse into more important elections on the horizon (midterms and Presidential year elections).

Last night, with the exception of the Louisiana governor runoff, the major 2019 races were decided.  Several of the centerpiece elections, a Republican winning the open Mississippi governorship and Democrats narrowly capturing both houses of the Virginia legislature, went to current form.  But the most interesting race of the night – the Kentucky gubernatorial election – did not.

Matt Bevin, the Republican Governor of Kentucky, is not a popular man among his state’s voters.  As several Kentucky sources (including a very well-connected one) have informed this blogger, Bevin is deeply unpopular among many Kentuckians.  One of them stated that he has “never met a more personally disliked politician,” and both expected Bevin to lose the race despite outside political handicappers’ anticipation of a Bevin victory (due to the overwhelmingly Republican nature of the Commonwealth of Kentucky).

The same source who detailed Bevin’s deep personal unpopularity has previously noted that Bevin’s against-the-grain 2015 victory rendered him rather unsurprised about Trump’s 2016 narrow national win.  Running an outsider’s campaign against a state GOP apparatus that never embraced him (Matt Bevin tried to primary Mitch McConnell in 2014 and lost badly), Bevin surprised the Kentucky GOP establishment by securing the Republican gubernatorial nomination, and then surprised the entire state, including the Democratic establishment, by winning the general election in surprisingly easy fashion, with a pretty healthy number of 2015 Kentucky voters going third party (more on this later).

Subsequently, as Governor, Bevin alienated large swaths of Kentucky voters with his cantankerous, combative style (and a few policy positions).  Four years later, despite a solid GOP downballot showing, Bevin paid the ultimate political price and lost his office despite the significant GOP lean of reddening Kentucky.  An ultimate price secured in large part on the back of a hideous suburban performance, with Bevin collapsing in the northern Kentucky suburbs of Cincinnati and the tony areas of metro Louisville.

Does the story of Matt Bevin sound familiar?  It sure should, as it mirrors the story of one Donald J. Trump.  While Matt Bevin was winning the 2015 Kentucky gubernatorial race, Donald Trump was savaging the Republican establishment and shortly thereafter scraping through a divided GOP field with about 40% of the contested primary vote.  After being dismissed by many as a sure general election loser, he shocked the country, and the Democratic establishment, with a surprisingly large Electoral College victory (although not one as decisive in the popular vote), spurred in part by healthy third-party voting.  Subsequently, while the trajectory of the US has remained on a positive track, President Trump has deeply alienated large swaths of the American public with his combative, bombastic personal style.

Moreover, the electoral weakness of Matt Bevin – dramatic underperformance in wealthy, upper middle, and even middle class urban and suburban areas – mirrors the electoral weakness of Donald Trump and his GOP.  These “suburban” voters (most by zip code and nearly all by mentality),* many of whom held their nose and voted for Trump in 2016, have stopped swallowing hard about the state of the Republican Party and started pulling the Democratic lever.  It happened in 2017, it happened again in 2018, and it happened yet again in 2019.  This time, Matt Bevin paid the price.  Next time, barring a Democratic candidate that alienates the suburban electorate from Phoenix to Philadelphia (and there are a few such Dems out there), it will be a certain reality TV star who pays the ultimate electoral price in 2020.**

*The suburban voter mentality is characterized by center right fiscal beliefs, very moderate social views, and a disdain for the culture wars generally.

**Last night’s results should again raise giant red flags for Republicans in Arizona and, yes, Texas.  The electoral power of Arizona is hugely concentrated in Phoenix, and the Republicans have dominated that stated via control of its suburbs.  While the state of Texas possesses a larger rural firewall, Texas is still an urban state whose growing population and prominence is centered upon the four major metros – Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin – where suburban GOPers have formed the backbone of a 25-year statewide winning streak.