The Sanford Solution

Democrats are outraged by President Trump’s actions, but few Republicans are saying anything against him.  In fact, many Republicans are defending the President, even using disproved “conspiracy” theories to justify his actions.  What will it take to get Republicans to acknowledge his abuse of power?

Figures

Pete Nix, my first Principal, had a favorite phrase:  “figures lie, and liars figure”.  He knew that you could make numbers say whatever you wanted them to say, and that sometimes you had to use something simpler:  common sense.

I’m going to use some figures here, and hopefully in the end it will make common sense.

Columbus

Franklin County is in the center of the state of Ohio.  The State Capital, Columbus, is located there, as is THE Ohio State University (along with Columbus State, Capital, and Otterbein.)  It’s a big, sprawling town, with the Columbus city limits pressing up against farmland on the edges.   And it’s not just Columbus City. Dozens of smaller towns from Grove City in the south to Worthington and Westerville in the north house the suburbs for the industry and businesses that thrives there.

More than 1.2 million people lived in Franklin County in 2016.  799,673 of them were registered to vote.  That’s a pretty high number of registrations. When you subtract those less than 18 years old and those who aren’t US citizens, over 90% of eligible voters were registered.  

Primary Elections

In Ohio, the Party candidates for office are chosen by an election called a Primary.  Only those voters who declare that they belong to a political party can vote for the candidates in that party.  The “declaration” is made at the table where they get their ballot: they ask for Democrat, Republican, Green, or Non Partisan.  Then they get to vote in that party’s primary.

The March 15^th 2016 Primary election on was important, a “high-turnout” Presidential Primary.  On the Democratic side it was in the middle of the Hillary versus Bernie battle. On the Republican side Donald Trump was just emerging as the eventual winner.  Still, less than half of the registered voters showed up to vote, in fact, only 41%.

That 41% was split pretty evenly between Democrat and Republican, about 20% and change a-piece, with less than one percent voting in the Green Party. 

In a “high-turnout” primary election, 20% of the registered voters determined who was going to be the candidate for office for each political party.   The turnout in the general election in November was closer to 70%, but by then the candidates was already picked.  It was down to the “binary choice,” Republican or Democrat.  There wasn’t a menu of options.

After all of this figuring, so what?

The Twenty Percent

Franklin County is pretty evenly divided between the political parties.  But most of the Congressional Districts in Ohio are not.  They’ve been “gerrymandered” to heavily slant to one Party or the other, so that Jim Jordan’s 4^th District will always be Republican, and Joyce Beatty’s 3^rd will always be Democrat.  Since the “party outcome” of the general elections is pre-determined, the representative in those districts is determined in the majority party primary election.

And who votes in those primaries?  It’s the twenty percent, the most highly motivated “members” of the political parties.  And those most motivated tend towards the more extreme, less moderate voters.  In those “gerrymandered” districts, it is that high motivated twenty percent who determine the outcome.

Mark Sanford

It’s not just true here in Ohio.  In South Carolina the First District dilutes the Democratic town of Charleston by including the southern half of the town with the beaches and islands up and down the Atlantic Coast.  It stretches from the Georgia border, through Hilton Head and Edisto Islands, up through Folly Beach, Fort Sumter, and on up the vacation coast.  

For six years Republican Mark Sanford represented the First.  Sanford was a conservative Republican, but as a former Governor of the state, had a higher profile in Congress than most.  He was known for his strong stands against public debt, and his unusual (for a Republican) criticism of President Trump.  Sanford spoke out against the Muslim ban, and Trump’s frequent “untruths.”  Regardless, only four Republican Congressmen voted for Trump proposals more than Sanford did.

Public Criticism

But Sanford’s criticism was too much for the President.  In the 2018 primary election, Sanford had an “easy” opponent in Katie Arrington, a state representative.  But Arrington received a tremendous boost from a last minute Presidential tweet.  Trump called Sanford “very unhelpful” and “nothing but trouble” just hours before the polls opened.  

It was a primary election, and the “motivated few” chose the candidate.  In a surprise upset, Arrington won, 33,153 to Sanford’s 30,496.  When the “most motivated” voters got to pick, they followed the President’s advice.

From the Republican Party perspective, Arrington’s victory wasn’t helpful.  She wasn’t as strong a candidate as Sanford, and she was seriously injured in a car accident midway through the general election campaign.  In November, for the first time since 1981, a Democrat won the seat.

Profiles In Courage

But that didn’t do Mark Sanford any good.  And perhaps more importantly, it taught the rest of the Republican Congressional delegation a lesson: go against the President, and get “primaried” out of office.  Donald Trump could lay a heavy “Twitter” blow on any opponent:  either stay in line or face “the base” aligned against you.

As the actions of the President become even more outrageous, Congressmen confront the question of impeachment and removal from office.  The Democrats are filled with legitimate indignation, but most Republicans are silent. 

John F. Kennedy authored a book about taking principled political stands called Profiles in Courage.  He chose eight Congressmen or Senators, who stood up for what they believed, often to their own political detriment.  It began with John Quincy Adams leaving his (and his father’s) Federalist Party, and ends with Ohio Senator Robert Taft criticism of the Nuremburg Trials that costs him the 1948 Republican Presidential nomination. 

But the message politicians get from the book is this:  almost all of these courageous “profiles” damaged or destroyed their political careers.  The tale of Mark Sanford tells them the same thing.  

Perhaps silence is the best we can expect.