Splitsville in the Democratic Party?

 

Wesley Knott

 

 

The dyspepsia in the Democratic Party is generational. I see the rising tide of younger, sharper, more confrontational candidates as the yeast producing the gas that makes the dough rise, and my sympathies are almost entirely with them. I was pretty yeasty myself in my youth and had Bobby Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy to inspire me (not that McCarthy was any spring chicken by then, but he didn't think like an old man).

So I'm fairly philosophical about the kerfuffle that's erupted in the Wake County Democratic Party over the party chair's open and public endorsement of the insurgent Nida Allam, the 32-year-old Durham County Commissioner, over the "safer" incumbent Congresswoman Valerie Foushee. Endorsements in party primaries are supposed to be off-limits for party officers, and some county parties adhere rigidly to that hands-off principle (like the Watauga County Democratic Party, sometimes to its actual detriment). What party officers are not supposed to indulge in, individual rank-and-file Democrats can. Any Democrat can advocate for whomever they favor, loudly and obnoxiously if necessary.

But here's the thing: that principle of non-interference by our party leaders is already in tatters. The Governor himself made very public endorsements in more than one primary for General Assembly seats (and his candidates all won), while the state party chair cut off campaign resources for several NC House members who had voted with Republicans on veto overrides (and all those candidates lost). So I'm almost amused to see a petition arise in Wake County to eject Wesley Knott from his position as party chair, because he endorsed Nida Allam over Valerie Foushee in the 4th Congressional District primary. When asked about his coloring outside the lines, Knott, a 29-year-old who just became party chair last year, articulated the generational judgment of Foushee, the 70-year-old political veteran with municipal, county, and General Assembly elected positions behind her and a history of taking AIPAC money (the Israeli lobby). Knott called Foushee “risk-averse,” a “carefully-calculated” friend of the status quo who has failed to inspire voters. 

"Risk aversion" cuts succinctly to the point. In the current situation of both the NC General Assembly and the US Congress, where Trump Republicans rule and in NC's case rule almost absolutely, some Democrats become hesitant to advance ideas or initiatives that they know can't win approval (because, math) and they become simultaneously resigned if not outright comfortable sitting on their small seats of advancement and doing nothing to raise hell for policies that make sense and that need public drum-beating. Wesley Knott is a drum-beater.

I wrote about the younger version of Wesley Knott in 2022 when he himself ran a primary against Democratic House incumbent Sarah Crawford in NC House Dist. 66 and came within 140 votes of actually beating her. I was impressed then by the way he put things:

"I’m a mixed-race progressive who grew up in the Deep South. Politics isn’t abstract to me. I didn’t need critical race theory to learn about racism, and I didn’t need a policy analysis to know the importance of Medicaid. So when I talk about policy, it’s from a place of shared experience. I know what’s on the line. That’s why I’m running."

 

To get rid of Wesley Knott, who by other accounts has been an effective ball of fire for the Wake County party, strikes me as a foolish cutting off of one's nose to spit one's face.

 

The Human Cost of a New Map

 

You should already know that Democratic Congressman G.K. Butterfield, who's served in the US House representing the (old) CD1 since the election of 2004, saw his residence moved into the new 2nd, which he recognized would be next to impossible for a Democrat to win. So he's retiring. “North Carolina is the battleground,” Butterfield told The N&O Friday. “I’ve looked at all of this and weighed all of the circumstances and I’ve just decided that I don’t want to run on that map that is gerrymandered. That is unfair ... This map is the most partisan and racially gerrymandered I have ever seen. It is extreme. Every political party pushes the envelope a little with redistricting but this is extreme to have 11 Republican seats out of 14. On a good day 10 out of 14 seats is unlawful, unconstitutional and undemocratic,” Butterfield said.

Meanwhile, former state Sen. Erica Smith, who lost the US Senate primary to Cal Cunningham in 2020 and was an announced candidate again for the Richard Burr Senate seat in 2022, has left the Senate race to run in the new 2nd CD. She wasn't getting any traction in the Senate race. Maybe she can flip what has become a much more Republican district. DavesRedistricting.org scores it 65% Republican, 33% Democratic, and 68.8% white.

Democratic candidate Richard Watkins, a political novice but an accomplished scientist, has also left the US Senate race, where he was completely overshadowed by Cheri Beasley and Jeff Jackson, and says he will now run for Congress in the new 6th CD, where the dean of liberal Democrats David Price has announced his retirement. The new 6th is one of the "safe" Democratic districts, where there's already a pile-on of new candidates. State Sen. Wiley Nickel announced first, followed by Durham County Commissioner Nida Allam, a Muslim woman who made a big splash, followed by state Sen. Valerie Foushee, who instantly became a front-runner.

Former U.S. Rep. Mark Walker, a Republican who has been getting nowhere in the Republican primary for Richard Burr's Senate seat (despite or because of the endorsement by Madison Cawthorn), is rumored to be launching a 7th District race, where state Rep. Jon Hardister, also a Republican, is also considering a run. That's the district where football star and Yale graduate Bo Hines ("the educated Madison Cawthorn"), who once upon a time in the recent past said he was going to challenge Virginia Foxx, has finally landed his nascent congressional campaign. He's a Trumper. The new 7th CD is 78% Republican.