民主党人正在以创纪录的人数竞选州议会席位，但这会提高拜登的胜算吗？
【中美创新时报2024 年 6 月 17 日编译讯】（记者温友平编译）多年来，威斯康星州的民主党人发现很难让候选人考虑竞选州议会席位。共和党长期以来一直主导麦迪逊的首府，这在很大程度上要归功于严重偏向共和党的选区地图。这些地图开启了立法机构中不成比例的多数时代，尽管民主党经常赢得全州选举。《波士顿环球报》记者萨姆·布罗迪（Sam Brodey）对此作了下述报道。
“在选区划分不合理的地图上招募选民很困难，”威斯康星州参议院民主党少数党领袖黛安·赫塞尔拜因说。“人们知道自己面临的是什么，有时这让一些候选人感到有点沮丧。”
但今年 2 月，共和党同意了民主党州长托尼·埃弗斯提出的更具竞争力的立法区划分图，而不是将这个问题留给威斯康星州自由派倾向的最高法院。
现在，有了真正获胜的机会——而且受到堕胎权等问题的鼓舞——民主党人纷纷出面竞选威斯康星州立法机构。
20 年来，该党首次在威斯康星州每个参议院选区都派出了候选人，该州 99 个众议院选区中有 97 个都有民主党人参选。
虽然重新绘制的地图使威斯康星州的情况变得独一无二，但其他许多州也上演着类似的故事。在全国范围内，今年竞选州立法机构的民主党人比过去几年都多——这一发展对全国各州首府的权力平衡具有重大影响。
在北卡罗来纳州，民主党在所有 50 个州参议院选区和 120 个州众议院选区（除一个选区外）都派出了候选人。他们的目标是削弱共和党在罗利的绝对多数，这些多数通常会推翻民主党州长罗伊·库珀的否决权。堪萨斯州民主党人也面临同样的情况，他们的招募人数也非常可观。
民主党在几个共和党占主导地位的州也迎来了招募高峰年，这些州的当前目标只是在首府重新确立相关性并重建有竞争力的政党。
爱达荷州民主党主席兼州众议员劳伦·内科切亚 (Lauren Necochea) 表示，自 1991 年以来，爱达荷州首次每个州立法区都有一名民主党人参选。在阿肯色州，民主党在 100 个州众议院选区中的 64 个选区派出了候选人，而在 2022 年，超过一半的选区都没有派出候选人。
民主党立法竞选委员会主席希瑟·威廉姆斯 (Heather Williams) 是该党负责州立法竞选的官方机构，她表示：“今年的候选人招募非常令人兴奋。”
“我们在各处竞争，”威廉姆斯说。
即使今年民主党大批候选人中有些不被看好获胜，该党扩大州级竞选范围也可能产生强大的连锁反应。
立法竞选委员会瞄准的州与决定谁控制白宫和国会的州之间存在很大重叠。进步组织 Run For Something 的联合创始人阿曼达·利特曼 (Amanda Litman) 表示，通过在更多选区派出候选人——并向可能多年未听过的地方传递信息——民主党可以让选民有另一个投票的理由。
2020 年大选后，利特曼的组织进行了一项研究，发现在之前没有竞争的州立法区派出民主党候选人，可以将该党在该选区的整体投票率提高 0.4% 至 2.3%。
“这是该州众议院、参议院、州长或总统竞选的胜利幅度，”利特曼说。“如果我们能在其中一些地方输得更少，这对每个人都有帮助。”
这种影响可能对拜登总统特别有利，他在关键州的支持率远远落后于民主党参议院候选人。州立法领导人看到了推动威斯康星州参议员赫塞尔拜因所说的“泡沫”效应的机会。
“热情将在候选人名单的顶端涌现，”她说。
威廉姆斯表示，州立法候选人可以在社区宣传的同时“让总统的议程和总统的成就栩栩如生”。
共和党州领导委员会是共和党负责州立法机构竞选的官方机构，该委员会没有回应置评请求。但该委员会已公开表示相信拜登的不受欢迎将拖累整个民主党竞选，并押注选民对移民和经济的担忧将促使他们选举共和党人。在威斯康星州，共和党人淡化了民主党在保守地区竞选的影响。
不过，民主党州立法候选人可能不仅仅是国家政治中的一股边缘力量，这一观点是一个相对新颖的概念。在巴拉克·奥巴马执政期间，该党跌至州一级权力的历史最低点。到唐纳德·特朗普上任时，共和党控制了 32 个州立法机构。民主党只控制了 14 个。
虽然民主党逐渐开始解决他们在州一级的深层次问题，但最高法院在 2022 年推翻了罗诉韦德案，这一努力发生了改变。似乎一夜之间，州立法机构变成了争取堕胎权斗争的前线。
民主党在 2022 年取得了巨大进步，完全控制了密歇根州和明尼苏达州的立法机构，并控制了宾夕法尼亚州的众议院。如今，共和党控制着 28 个州的立法机构，而民主党控制着 20 个。
当民主党谈论他们在 2024 年的招募成功时，多布斯裁决的持续影响是一个反复出现的主题。“很难不把它与罗伊案的失败和多布斯裁决联系起来，”威廉姆斯谈到招募人数的增加时说。“它改变了围绕州议会和州立法竞选影响的讨论。”
即使在短期内几乎没有希望扭转反堕胎政策的州，堕胎权也一直是候选人关注的一个问题。
2022 年 8 月，爱达荷州共和党人颁布了可能是该国最严格的堕胎禁令，导致医疗服务提供者逃离该州，而孕妇则被空运到其他州接受紧急护理。
爱达荷州民主党主席内科切亚指出，两名民主党女性之所以竞选州议员，是因为她们所在地区的妇产科医生离开了该州。她说，她们参选的决定不仅证明了党的组织更加强大，也表明爱达荷州“共和党绝对多数制定了如此极端的政策，人们觉得有必要采取行动。”
阿肯色州也有类似的说法，共和党州长、前特朗普新闻秘书萨拉·赫卡比·桑德斯 (Sarah Huckabee Sanders) 已经激励民主党人竞选州议员，阿肯色州民主党战略总监威尔·沃森 (Will Watson) 说。
“萨拉·桑德斯在分化人们、团结人们采取行动方面发挥了不可估量的作用，”沃森说，并引用了她在堕胎权和教育方面的极右翼议程。“现在是参与红州民主党招募的真正有趣的时机。”
民主党全国委员会认为在更多边缘州进行投资有好处；周一，该机构宣布将拨款 200 万美元，以促进一些坚定的民主党州以及南达科他州和犹他州的组织活动。
然而，在威斯康星州，争取赢得州众议院席位的民主党人正努力应对更为紧迫的期望。赫塞尔拜因说，在那里，候选人有独特的机会为全州更广泛的民主党议程辩护。
“人们可能不知道竞选高层到底做了什么，”赫塞尔拜因说。“但他们了解他们的邻居。”
题图：麦迪逊的威斯康星州议会大厦。SCOTT BAUER/ASSOCIATED PRESS
附原英文报道：
Democrats are running for state legislatures in record numbers, but will they help Biden’s chances?
By Sam Brodey Globe Staff,Updated June 12, 2024
WASHINGTON — For years, Democrats in Wisconsin found themselves hard-pressed to get candidates to even contemplate a run for the state Legislature.
Republicans had long dominated the capital in Madison, thanks in large part to district maps heavily skewed in the GOP’s favor. These maps ushered in an era of disproportionately massive majorities in the Legislature even as Democrats routinely won statewide elections.
“Recruitment during gerrymandered maps was tough,” said Dianne Hesselbein, the Democratic minority leader of the Wisconsin Senate. “People knew going into it what they were up against, and sometimes that felt a little demoralizing for some of the candidates.”
But in February, Republicans agreed to far more competitive legislative district maps proposed by Democratic Governor Tony Evers rather than leave the issue to Wisconsin’s liberal-leaning Supreme Court.
Now, with a real opportunity to actually win — and animated by issues like abortion access — Democrats have come out of the woodwork to run for the Wisconsin Legislature.
For the first time in 20 years, the party has fielded a candidate for every Wisconsin Senate district, and a Democrat is running in 97 of the state’s 99 House districts.
While the redrawn maps make Wisconsin’s circumstances unique, a similar story is playing out in many other states. Nationally, more Democrats are running for their state legislatures this year than in years past — a development with significant implications for the balance of power in state capitals around the country.
In North Carolina, Democrats have fielded a candidate in all 50 state Senate districts and in all but one of the 120 state House districts. Their goal is to chip away at the GOP’s supermajorities in Raleigh, which routinely override the veto power of Democratic Governor Roy Cooper. Kansas Democrats, facing the same situation, have seen strong recruitment numbers as well.
Democrats are also having a banner recruitment year in several GOP-dominated states where the immediate goal is to simply re-establish relevance in capitals and rebuild competitive parties.
In Idaho, there is a Democrat running in every state legislative district for the first time since at least 1991, Idaho Democratic Party chair and state Representative Lauren Necochea said. And in Arkansas, Democrats are fielding a candidate in 64 of 100 state House districts after not mustering a candidate for more than half of those districts in 2022.
Heather Williams, president of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the party’s official arm for state legislative races, said “the candidate recruitment this year is flat-out really exciting.”
“We are competing everywhere,” Williams said.
Even if some of this year’s Democratic bumper crop of candidates are not favored to win, the party’s expansion of the state-level playing field could have a potent ripple effect.
There is substantial overlap between the states targeted by the legislative campaign committee and the states that will decide who controls the White House and Congress. By fielding candidates in more districts — and delivering a message to places that may not have heard it in years — Democrats can give voters another reason to turn out, said Amanda Litman, cofounder of the progressive group Run For Something.
After the 2020 election, Litman’s group conducted a study that found fielding a Democratic candidate in a previously uncontested state legislative district boosted overall turnout for the party in that district anywhere from 0.4 percent to 2.3 percent.
“That is the margin of victory for a House race, a Senate race, a governor’s race, or for the president in that state,” Litman said. “If we can lose by less in some of these places, that helps everyone.”
That effect could be particularly helpful for President Biden, whose approval ratings in key states are flagging well behind Democratic Senate candidates. State legislative leaders see an opportunity to drive what Hesselbein, the Wisconsin state senator, calls a “bubble up” effect.
“The enthusiasm is going to bubble up at the top of the ticket,” she said.
Williams said state legislative hopefuls could “bring to life the president’s agenda and the president’s accomplishments” while canvassing their communities.
The Republican State Leadership Committee, the GOP’s official arm for state legislature races, did not respond to requests for comment. But the committee has publicly expressed confidence that Biden’s unpopularity will drag down the entire Democratic ticket and are betting that voters’ concerns over immigration and the economy will spur them to elect Republicans. In Wisconsin, Republicans have downplayed the impact of Democrats running in conservative areas.
Still, the notion that Democratic state legislative candidates could be more than a marginal force in national politics is a relatively novel concept. During the Barack Obama years, the party slumped to a historic nadir of state-level power. By the time Donald Trump took office, Republicans controlled 32 state legislatures. Democrats held just 14.
While Democrats gradually began to address their deep state-level problems, the effort was transformed by the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade in 2022. Seemingly overnight, state legislatures turned into the front lines of the struggle for abortion access.
Democrats made huge gains in 2022, capturing full control of legislatures in Michigan and Minnesota and flipped control of Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives. Today, Republicans control 28 state legislatures, while Democrats control 20.
The continued fallout of the Dobbs decision is a recurring theme when Democrats talk about their recruiting successes in 2024. “It’s hard not to tie it back to the fall of Roe and the Dobbs decision,” Williams said of the rise in recruits. “It changed the conversation around the impact of state houses and state legislative races.”
Abortion access has been an animating issue for candidates even in states where they have little hope in the short term to reverse antiabortion policy.
In August 2022, Idaho Republicans enacted what might be the country’s most restrictive abortion ban, that has caused medical providers to flee the state, while pregnant women are being airlifted to other states to receive emergency care.
Necochea, the Idaho Democratic Party chair, pointed to two Democratic women who were inspired to run for the state Legislature because the OB/GYN doctors in their region had left the state. Their decision to run, she said, is not only a testament to a stronger party organization but the feeling Idaho has “such extreme policies being enacted by the Republican supermajority that people feel the need to act.”
There’s a similar refrain in Arkansas, where Republican Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a former Trump press secretary, has galvanized Democrats to run for state Legislature, said Will Watson, director of strategy for the Democratic Party of Arkansas.
“I cannot overstate the effect that Sarah Sanders has had on polarizing people, solidifying people into action,” Watson said, citing her hard-right agenda on abortion rights and education. “It’s a really interesting time to be involved in Democratic recruitment in a red state.”
The Democratic National Committee sees upside in investing in more marginal states; on Monday, it announced it would spread $2 million to boost organizing in some solidly blue states but also in states like South Dakota and Utah.
In Wisconsin, however, Democrats campaigning to win the state House are grappling with far more urgent expectations. Hesselbein said that there, candidates have a unique opportunity to make the case for the broader Democratic agenda across the state.
“People might not know exactly what the top of the ticket has done,” Hesselbein said. “But they know their neighbor.”
