Progressives face steep odds in ousting incumbent Democrats

Progressive candidates are launching primary challenges against incumbents like Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), though many will likely face a steep climb in capturing the same set of circumstances that propelled Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) to the House last year. 

Justice Democrats, the group that backed Ocasio-Cortez, has already announced its support for challengers to Cuellar and Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), but has yet to recruit more candidates or spell out how it intends to help support challengers. The group spent only $2.5 million in the 2018 campaign cycle. 

{mosads}Meanwhile, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democrats’ campaign arm, has said that it will not do business with consultants who work with primary challengers, a restriction that has infuriated progressives. 

Strategists also warn that incumbents are more prepared this time around than former 10-term Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.) was when he was ousted by Ocasio-Cortez in 2018. Both Engel and Cuellar, for example, easily won reelection in 2018 and are proven, adept fundraisers. 

Moreover, primaries are largely fought on local issues or are shaped by local circumstances, much like how Ocasio-Cortez also benefited from a diversifying district, these strategists warned. 

“We saw a lot of progressive candidates lose in 2018. They did not win,” Jennifer Holdsworth, a Democratic strategist and senior vice president of issues management at MWWPR, told The Hill. 

“It goes back to the old adage of all politics are local. If you’re a progressive challenger, you need to make sure that your district in the general election will respond to the policies and the policy prescriptions that you are proposing.” 

Challengers to incumbents have historically struggled. Besides Ocasio-Cortez, the only other progressive Democrat to defeat an incumbent last year was Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), who beat Rep. Michael Capuano in a heavily blue Boston district. 

Both ran on progressive platforms and proved superb campaigners, but they also benefited from changing demographics that were particularly well-suited to insurgent challenges against older, white lawmakers. 

Any element of surprise will also be missing in 2020, as incumbents are now more likely to take any challenge seriously. 

Engel, currently in his 16th term in the House, is facing two progressive challengers. But he won his 2018 primary handily, defeating three challengers and receiving roughly 74 percent of the vote.  

Meanwhile, Cuellar, now in his eighth term, is being challenged by his former intern, immigration lawyer Jessica Cisneros. But his campaign committee had $2.5 million cash on hand as of the end of 2018 — showing the perks of incumbency in raising money. 

Other progressive challengers could be facing even steeper odds to topple incumbents, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) challenger, Shahid Buttar, and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s (D-Md.) challengers, Briana Urbina and Mckayla Wilkes. 

That is not to say that incumbents will coast by. 

Progressives believe constituents are hungry for fresh policy ideas and new faces in a party that is veering left in key issues like health care or climate change. 

Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) have both emerged as top contenders for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, campaigning heavily on progressive policies such as “Medicare for All” or free tuition at public colleges. 

“The center of gravity in the country and in the Democratic Party is moving in an economic populist direction, and even without dramatic changes in primaries, we’re seeing a greater willingness from Democratic nominees to challenge power and take on big corporations,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Committee, in an interview with The Hill. 

Research conducted by the Progressive Change Institute, which was also co-founded by Green, found that 65 percent of 2018 House freshmen campaigned on Medicare for All, expanding social security or another Medicare policy action.

Many of this cycle’s batch of progressive primary challengers are also younger, and they give voice to a new generation of Democratic voters eager for bolder and more left-leaning proposals.

“What I’m hearing is, it’s time for a change. That’s an echo throughout my campaigning and throughout my district since we launched a month ago. It’s time for a change. Congressman Engel has been there for 30 years,” educator Jamaal Bowman, who is one of Engel’s primary challengers, said in an interview with The Hill.  

Bowman, 43, is also one of two primary challengers that has been endorsed by Justice Democrats.

“When AOC was elected, I was at home. I had just come home from work, and seeing it all over social media and the news, it was really exciting because I saw myself in her,” Cisneros, 26, told The Hill. “Like a lot of people were sending me text messages [saying] like ‘hey look, this is happening.’ ”

Some of the progressive challengers also noted that their bids are necessary to send a message to incumbents about the need to accommodate wider voices within the party — and their districts. 

“A number of people said you’re not going to surprise him,” said Lindsey Boylan, who is one of three Democrats challenging House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) in the district’s primary. 

“I’m not trying to surprise him. I want him to be ready, and we’re going to push for what constituents of the district need and the future of the district, and fight for it.”

The desire to have a voice in the policy debate has powered progressive groups like Justice Democrats and the Sunrise Movement, which has agitated for stronger action on climate change.

“In order for us to really, I think, shift the political landscape in the way that we need to win things like a Green New Deal, Medicare for All, we have to not just challenge Republicans,” said Alexandra Rojas, the executive director of Justice Democrats. 

Yet whether having that debate play out in primaries will ultimately help the Democratic Party is in doubt, however.

Democrats took over the House in a wave election in 2018 with a diverse crop of candidates, but many of the key wins were in more moderate suburban areas like Virginia’s 10th District, where Rep. Jennifer Wexton ousted Republican incumbent Barbara Comstock.

That has some strategists worried that progressives could push the party too far to the left or that they could hand Democrats loses should they prevail in their primaries.

“While I do think that some of the progressive candidates are going to be able to win their primaries, I think that they’re going to have a really tough time in the general election, and that’s just something the Democratic Party can’t afford right now,” said Holdsworth from MWWPR.