The Limits of Trumpism

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/11/democrats_breathe_sigh_of_relief_after_virginia_victory.html

Nov. 8 2017 1:27 AM
The Limits of Trumpism
Republicans learn a hard lesson about the president’s appeal.
By Jamelle Bouie


It is difficult to overstate the magnitude of the Democratic Party's victory on Tuesday.

In the night’s most closely watched contest, a surge of Democratic voters—from moderate and liberal suburbanites in Northern Virginia, to college students in cities like Charlottesville, to black Americans in Tidewater—gave Ralph Northam a 9-point margin of victory, catapulting him over Republican Ed Gillespie in the race for governor of Virginia. Justin Fairfax and Mark Herring, the Democratic nominees for lieutenant governor and attorney general, respectively, won with similar margins in their races. (Fairfax became only the second black American elected to the office in Virginia's history.) And all of this fueled a potential upset in the House of Delegates, where Republicans have held a majority for nearly 20 years. (As of this writing, officials are still counting votes in a handful of close races.)

This means real things for real people. With a near-majority in the House of Delegates, Democrats have a real shot at expanding Medicaid, which would extend health coverage to hundreds of thousands of Virginians. And with the governor's mansion, they have veto power over redistricting. Democrats, in short, have a chance to reshape Virginia's political landscape.

In New Jersey, Democrats repeated that feat. They easily reclaimed the governor’s mansion after eight years of Republican rule, as voters roundly rejected Chris Christie’s lieutenant governor, and they won surprise victories in down-ballot races against incumbent Republicans. In New York, Democrats captured a handful of local offices in the Hudson Valley and New York City—the kinds of suburban victories that could decide control of the House in next year’s midterms.

There are lessons here, for all sides. With this potent anti-Trump energy, Democrats have even more reason to step up recruitment and find candidates for every race. For the first time in years, Democrats contested local races across the country, and it paid tangible dividends. Republicans, in turn, have a couple of test cases for "Trumpism without Trump," of what happens when a traditional Republican candidate runs a Trump-like campaign, without embracing the president himself.

The limits of that strategy will be the enduring effect of the race in Virginia, regardless of which party ends up capturing the House of Delegates. "Trumpism without Trump" is just a euphemism for the politics of white identity—for campaigns tuned to white racism and designed to stoke white racial resentment. This politics consumed the last weeks and months of the Virginia election, and its decisive defeat is one of the most important outcomes of Tuesday's voting.

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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2017/11/republicans_discover_there_is_no_trumpism_without_trump.html