Racial Liberalism Resurgent: Connecting Multi-Racial Protests and Electoral Politics Today

Author(s):  
Sanford F. Schram ◽  
Richard C. Fording

Abstract In this paper, we consider the changing nature of today's protest–election connection by looking back to the Blue Wave of the 2018 midterm elections that led to Republicans losing control of the House of Representatives. We ask whether White voters' participation in the Blue Wave of the 2018 elections is related to the multi-racial participation in the #BlackLivesMatter protests of 2020. Could it be that White participation in both is symptomatic of a larger resurgence of racial liberalism that is likely to continue to play a significant role in our politics going forward starting with the 2020 election?


2010 ◽  
Vol 43 (04) ◽  
pp. 639-641 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfred G. Cuzán

Historically, statistical models for forecasting the outcome of midterm elections to the United States House of Representatives have not been particularly successful (Jones and Cuzán 2006). However, in what may have been a breakthrough, most models correctly predicted that the Democrats would re-emerge as the majority party in 2006 (Cuzán 2007). One successful model was estimated using 46 elections, beginning with 1914 (only the second time that 435 representatives, the present number, were elected). The model was relatively simple, making use of national-level variables only (Cuzán and Bundrick 2006). Using a similar model, I generated a forecast for the 2010 midterm election.



The Forum ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 495-513 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamie L. Carson ◽  
Aaron A. Hitefield

Abstract The 2018 midterm elections resulted in record levels of turnout, campaign funding, and the representation of women and minorities in Congress. Moreover, Democrats regained control of the US House of Representatives while Republicans shored up their minimal majority in the Senate. What made such a historic outcome possible? This article examines the candidates, expectations, outcomes, and implications of the 2018 midterm elections. In doing so, it offers an analysis into the primary elections, suggesting that the 2018 midterm results in the House were largely a result of successful nominations of quality Democratic candidates who were able to capitalize on the unpopularity of President Donald Trump despite an otherwise strong national economy. It closes with an in-depth analysis into the implications of the 2018 midterm election on both the incoming 116th Congress as well as the upcoming 2020 Presidential election.



2013 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Schickler

Few transformations have been as important in American politics as the incorporation of African Americans into the Democratic Party over the course of the 1930s–60s and the Republican Party's growing association with more conservative positions on race-related policies. This paper traces the relationship between New Deal economic liberalism and racial liberalism in the mass public. A key finding is that by about 1940, economically-liberal northern white Democratic voters were substantially more pro-civil rights than were economically-conservative northern Republican voters. While partisanship and civil rights views were unrelated among southern whites, economic conservatives were more racially conservative than their economically liberal counterparts, even in the south. These findings suggest that there was a connection between attitudes towards the economic programs of the New Deal and racial liberalism early on, well before national party elites took distinct positions on civil rights. Along with grassroots pressure from African American voters who increasingly voted Democratic in the 1930s–40s, this change among white voters likely contributed to northern Democratic politicians' gradual embrace of civil rights liberalism and Republican politicians' interest in forging a coalition with conservative white southerners. In attempting to explain these linkages, I argue that the ideological meaning of New Deal liberalism sharpened in the late 1930s due to changes in the groups identified with Roosevelt's program and due to the controversies embroiling New Dealers in 1937–38.



Significance She was originally appointed in April when Thad Cochran resigned and will serve to January 2021. The win means the Republicans will have 53 Senate seats for 2019-21, a net gain of two after the November 6 midterm elections. However, the Democrats will be the House of Representatives majority party. Impacts Democrat-led states will pass laws to protect voters’ voting rights. Republican-led states will push voter identification-related laws. Preparing for 2020, Congress Republicans could distance themselves from Trump, running different political messaging.



Significance This follows high-level China-US trade talks restarting after a November 1 Trump-Xi telephone conversation, November 6’s US midterm elections that delivered a Democrat-majority House of Representatives from January 2019 and US-China trade-related frictions at the APEC Summit (November 15-17) preventing a joint communique’s immediate release. These frictions have sparked fears of a US-China ‘trade war’, or worse, and what scenarios and drivers might see this avoided. Impacts China may eye further trade renegotiations with the next US president, from 2021 or 2025. Democrats would want any trade deal to include human rights and environmental protections; Beijing would certainly resist the former. China might offer intellectual property concessions on paper, since there are multiple ways to circumvent such restrictions. Trump could sell a ‘partial’ deal politically, but he may calculate that ‘China-the-adversary’ rhetoric will win more 2020 votes.



Subject Prospects for US politics to end-2018 Significance The midterm elections on November 6 will see the full 435-seat House of Representatives elected and one-third of the 100-seat Senate. Elections will also be held for most state legislatures and 36 of 50 governors. The onset of the midterms will influence what legislation is passed beforehand, what the outgoing Congress pursues in its 'lame duck' period after November and the political arithmetic post-January 2019, when the new 116th Congress convenes.



2003 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-164
Author(s):  
Lex Renda

Variations in the loss of seats in the House of Representatives by the president's party in midterm elections between 1854 and 1998 are analyzed from a historical perspective. Whereas in the latter three-fourths of the nineteenth century the president's party lost, on average, 22% of its share of House seats, in the twentieth century the average loss was 13%. Using district-level data, the author attributes the problematization of “midterm decline” to the growing power of incumbency (a consequence of the development of the Australian ballot), the decline in the number of partisanly competitive districts in open-seat elections, and the limitation, since 1912, of the size of the U.S. House of Representatives.



Author(s):  
Jeffrey Alexander Greenberg

The 2014 Midterm Elections saw Republicans sweep the House of Representatives and retake the United States Senate. This paper examines how select Democrats survived this wave election by analyzing the case of Florida's 18th Congressional District, Patrick Murphy (D-Incumbent) vs Carl Domino (R). The analysis uses descriptive statistics of the district as well as precinct and county election results from 2012 and 2014 in order to show change in the political success of the Democrat Murphy. It then uses advertisement data and campaign finances, as well as personal interviews to find a reason for the change. The author concludes that a focus on the localization of district issues created a variety of effects that both aided Murphy and harmed the challenger Domino in 2014. This chain reaction, including the interaction between local and national politics and parties, would come to define the success of Democrats in the 2014 Midterms.



Subject The US political influence of the religious right. Significance By determining which party holds a majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate, November's midterm elections will influence the final two years of President Donald Trump’s current term. Given the historically relatively low voter turnouts in off-presidential-election-cycle election years, Trump’s fortunes depend heavily on his ability to mobilise core conservative voters on behalf of the Republican Party. The religious right is currently Trump’s most intensely loyal constituency and his best hope for retaining Republican majorities in Congress. Impacts Trump will nominate more social conservatives to federal judgeships. Recent gains in special elections do not prove a Democratic resurgence but imply turnout will be higher in November than normal. A Democratic gain of one or both houses of Congress would dent the religious right’s national influence. If the Republicans retain Congress, the religious right will increase its influence further at the federal level. So far, allegations against Trump over his private life do not appear likely to diminish his core support.



2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
pp. 652-656
Author(s):  
Bryan T. Gervais ◽  
Heather K. Evans ◽  
Annelise Russell

ABSTRACTThis article considers whether candidates strategically use emotional rhetoric in social media messages similar to the way that fear appeals are used strategically in televised campaign advertisements. We use a dataset of tweets issued by the campaign accounts of candidates for the US House of Representatives during the last two months of the 2018 midterm elections to determine whether candidate vulnerability predicts the presence of certain emotions in social media messages. Contrary to theoretical expectations, we find that vulnerability does not appear to inspire candidates to use more anxious language in their tweets. However, we do find evidence of a surprising relationship between sad rhetoric and vulnerability and that campaign context influences the use of other forms of negative rhetoric in tweets.



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