Here’s something for conspiracy theorists. What if it were revealed in a few years by a Democratic operative that he had launched and manipulated the Tea Party Movement as a means to make the Republican Party uncompetitive in most of the country thereby insuring Democratic dominance of the White House and Congress? It sounds farfetched, I know, but bits of evidence already exist that would bolster such a claim.
In the first election in which the Tea Party played a role, the 2010 mid-terms, Republicans fully expected to take back Congress. They succeeded in winning the House in a wave election but came up short in the Senate, in part because Tea Party backers nominated unelectable extremists in Colorado, Delaware and Nevada. The Tea Party bailed out Harry Reid who seemed destined to lose to anyone but the Tea Party preference. And in Delaware, where Democrats conceded that they could not defeat the state’s GOP congressman who was running for the Senate, the Tea Party rallied behind a woman who began her general election campaign with the startling statement that, “I am not a witch.” That’s not an assurance that most candidates have to give the public.
In 2012 Republicans had a second chance to win the Senate but once again the Tea Party rescued the Democrats. Tea Party activists saved the most vulnerable Democrat in the Senate when the GOP nominee in Missouri assured listeners that women could not get pregnant as a result of “legitimate rape.” Another Tea Partier defeated Senator Richard Lugar, the GOPs’ leading expert on foreign affairs, and cost Republicans the Indiana Senate seat.
After seemingly being on the ropes in 2014, the Tea Party has rebounded to help the Democratic Party. So far the Tea Party has not nominated any clearly unelectable Senate candidates. But its defeat of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in the Virginia primary may ultimately do more harm to the GOP than the selection of a string of unacceptable Senate candidates.
As with most social phenomena, Cantor’s stunning loss cannot be attributed to a single factor. A degree of hubris was involved. Relying on his own poll showing him 34 point ahead with just two weeks to go, Cantor did not get out and press the flesh but instead relied on a deluge of TV ads as he stayed in DC. This action compounded an image that as he rose in the GOP House hierarchy to become heir apparent to the speakership he lost touch with the voters back home. Moreover by relentlessly attacking his challenger, Cantor gave the unknown economics professor credibility.
In terms of policy stands, Cantor’s defeat is being explained by his having espoused a moderate position on immigration – the GOP alternative to the President’s Dream Act. Any hint of a willingness to develop a plan that would allow some undocumenteds to stay in the US makes Tea Party types see red. As the Tea Party tries to hold back the tide of people who enter the US illegally, Democrats see a wave of non-whites carrying them to an unassailable majority in the electorate. Already most babies born in the US do not have white mothers. The share of the electorate that is white shrinks every year, a trend that will continue. Within the lifetime of most Americans, whites will cease to be a majority of the nation’s population. A Republican Party that attracts only white voters will cease to be competitive in presidential elections and in many states.
As with many trends, California shows the way. In 1994 Pete Wilson faced a tough challenge in his bid for a second term as governor. He played the anti-immigration card and stressed his outrage and opposition at the state’s many undocumented residents. The ads worked and Wilson got a second term. But in doing so, he poisoned the well for the GOP. Over the last 20 years the state that provided strong support for Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan has elected only one Republican to a prominent state office and that individual, Arnold Schwarzenegger, is seen by conservatives as a prime example of a RINO (Republican in name only).
Dave Brat upset Eric Cantor with a strong anti-immigration reform message. As other Republicans contemplate Brat’s historic victory they withdraw support for immigration reform. That stance will further encourage the growing numbers of Hispanics and Asians to vote for Democrats.
The imperative of immigration reform hit the GOP leadership after Barack Obama added more than 70 percent of the Hispanic and Asian vote to his almost universal support among African Americans in 2012. This strong support gave Obama a comfortable margin although he managed only 39 percent of the white vote. Further evidence of perceived hostility to America’s growing minority populations will, with each passing year, make the task of GOP candidates more challenging.
Being tough on undocumented immigrants has a receptive audience but it is not a majority nationally. About 60 percent of Americans see immigrants strengthening the economy and favor a path to citizenship. These numbers have been growing. Heavily white districts will continue to provide a venue in which the Tea Party push back against immigration reform plays well but ultimately it is a losing hand. Already almost a quarter of US House districts lack a white majority and these districts constitute about half of what is necessary to win control of the chamber.
It is highly unlikely that Democratic operatives have been sufficiently clever to create the Tea Party Movement as a way to push the GOP further to the right thereby opening up a wider swath of the electorate for Democrats. Instead the wounds to the GOP – first unelectable Senate candidates and now an unpopular policy stance – have been self-inflicted. The bleeding has begun in many parts of the country. The South may be the last region to feel the pain but it will not escape completely.
Charles S. Bullock, III
Richard B. Russell Professor
Editor of Key States, High Stakes: Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and the 2010 Elections
