| | | | |  | | By Melanie Mason | With help from Jesse Naranjo, Ella Creamer, Rishika Dugyala and Teresa Wiltz
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GOP Rep. David Valadao has proved remarkably durable in his battleground California district. | POLITICO illustration/Photo by Getty Images | What’s up, Recasters! Former President Donald Trump asks Justice Juan Merchan to spring him from his hush money criminal trial so he can attend his son’s graduation, House Speaker Mike Johnson plans two different votes on aid to Israel and Ukraine, and the Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether the Jan. 6 insurrectionists can be convicted of obstructing congressional business. But today, we’re looking at how working-class voters of color will impact things in November. On paper, a House district deep in California’s farm belt should be a lock for Democrats. The party has a 15-point registration advantage. President Joe Biden beat Donald Trump there by 13 points. The electorate is nearly 60 percent Latino. Yet nonpartisan campaign forecasters such as Inside Elections give Republicans a slight edge for the seat this fall. The district, California’s 22nd, is a much tougher slog for Democrats than its party registration and demographics may suggest. GOP Rep. David Valadao has proved remarkably durable even in a blue-tilted, working-class and heavily immigrant district. His rival, Democrat Rudy Salas, lost by 3 percentage points when they ran against each other two years ago. Salas is hoping that more turnout in a presidential year will lift him to victory, making him the first Latino congressman from the Central Valley ever. The race is a microcosm of the promise — and the potential heartburn — the state holds for Democrats as they try to retake the House in November. The party needs to pick up just four seats nationwide to reclaim the majority. Deep-blue California offers them multiple chances to pick off vulnerable Republicans sitting in diverse districts that sided with Biden in 2020.
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But the party is grappling with the uncomfortable question of whether they’ll actually have the edge in a high-turnout presidential election. Lower-propensity voters of color had largely been seen as a boon for Democrats. But there are signs that they have lost a step when it comes to wooing these working class voters of color — especially Latinos.
The rightward drift of Latinos has been examined throughout the country — with considerable handwringing from Democrats. But it’s got a particular psychic weight in California, where Democrats’ dominance in the state has been deeply entwined with Latino political engagement.
|  Former Democratic Assemblymember Rudy Salas, pictured in 2019, will face Valadao in a rematch. | Rich Pedroncelli/AP | As the (oversimplified) narrative goes, Proposition 187, the 1994 ballot measure denying services to people in the country illegally, soured Latinos on the Republican Party, sending the state GOP into a downward spiral of decline and irrelevance. But in recent years, Republicans have chipped away at Democrats’ commanding advantage with this voting bloc. “Two things can be true: Over the last two cycles, Democrats have lost vote share with Latino voters … and they are still winning them by sizable margins nationally,” says Molly Murphy, a Democratic pollster. This shift was apparent in 2020, when Trump improved his numbers by as much as 20 percentage points with Latinos throughout the country, in states as varied as Florida, Wisconsin and Nevada. Now, that trend is starting to show up in California. “You’re now seeing Latino Republican registration dramatically increase. And you’re seeing the gap between Democrats and Republicans in strong Democratic districts narrow significantly, which means Latino Democrats, Latino independents are voting more Republican,” says Mike Madrid, a Sacramento-based strategist who has studied the Latino electorate for decades. “California prides itself as this barometer of things to come,” he says. “The truth is, in this large, massive ethnic transformation, California is behind the rest of the country.” Madrid has been one of the loudest voices observing this sea change. Once the political director for the California Republican Party, he broke with his longtime party over Trump, whom he says is a threat to democracy and now plays a Cassandra-like role, warning Democrats that their grip on working-class voters of color is less firm than they think.
|  | | His forthcoming book, “The Latino Century: How America’s Largest Minority is Transforming Democracy,” offers a hypothesis on what’s happening: As Latinos increasingly assimilate into American society, their voting patterns are breaking down much like white voters. Working class voters without a college education, especially men, are trending more conservative. Those with college degrees are aligning with Democrats. He’s observed the same pattern among Asian American voters, who make up a significant share of two Orange County districts that will be prime battlegrounds in the fall. Madrid’s view is not universally held, although several Democratic strategists working on House races this cycle generally agreed with his thesis. One major tell that the politics of courting Latinos has changed is the messaging from Democratic candidates. Democrats’ go-to appeal to Latinos for decades centered around immigration, echoing the legacy of Proposition 187. Republicans in heavily Latino districts knew they were vulnerable on the issue and politicians like Valadao would strategically break from their party to support the Dreamers and other immigrant-friendly policies that would be particularly resonant with the many farmworkers in the electorate. But immigration no longer appears to be the key to unlock Latino votes. A recent poll found more than 40 percent of Latino voters support building a border wall and a similar proportion want to deport all immigrants who are in the country illegally. Biden has pivoted to seeking tougher restrictions on the border. Valadao, meanwhile, joined his fellow House Republicans in backing the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas — the type of vote that he would have probably avoided in the past. “Secretary Mayorkas must be held accountable for refusing to comply with federal immigration laws,” Valadao said in a statement at the time of the vote.
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Valadao, center, listens during a May 9, 2018, news conference with fellow GOP lawmakers about immigration legislation. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP | | Going forward, Madrid expects the Central Valley contest — and the rest of the California battlegrounds — to hinge on an economic message tailored to the working-class voters of color, whom both parties are now assiduously courting “Whoever can talk about a multi-ethnic, multiracial working-class economic agenda,” Madrid says, “is going to win.” As always, we’ll be keeping tabs on how this all plays out. (And in the meantime, read more about California’s congressional races here.) All the best,
The Recast Team
| | | SCOTUS PUNTS PROTEST CASE
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Activist DeRay Mckesson talks to the media on July 10, 2016, after his release from the Baton Rouge jail in Louisiana. | Max Becherer/AP | The Supreme Court yesterday declined to hear a case from a federal appeals court that could have wide-ranging consequences for protest movements and their leaders. The case in question, Mckesson v. Doe, centers on whether leaders of protests are legally liable for violence and injuries that occurs at their rallies — even if they had no direct involvement with them, reports Jesse Naranjo. In 2016, during Black Lives Matter protests in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, following the police shooting of Alton Sterling, some protesters allegedly threw objects including concrete at law enforcement officers. One of those officers, only identified as John Doe, sued Black Lives Matter and noted civil rights activist DeRay Mckesson in federal court, claiming Mckesson was liable for the injuries caused by the other protesters. For his part, Mckesson argued that the Supreme Court’s 1982 ruling in NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. found that states couldn’t infringe on peaceful, politically motivated protests under the First Amendment. Because of that, he argued, the case should be dismissed; a federal district judge agreed with him. But the officer appealed to the more conservative-leaning 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which reversed the dismissal, claiming that Mckesson had reason to believe the protest could turn violent. After being denied a rehearing from the appeals court, Mckesson appealed in 2020 to the Supreme Court, which sent it back to Louisiana state court to clarify the specific tort law in question. In short, the case has been stuck in a back-and-forth between Mckesson, the Louisiana Supreme Court and the 5th Circuit, which most recently ruled the lawsuit could proceed. As the Supreme Court is refusing to hear the case now, in effect the 5th Circuit’s ruling that the lawsuit against Mckesson can proceed stands. And that could set a tough precedent for protest leaders in the event that individual protesters commit civil violations. The 5th Circuit’s area of jurisdiction includes Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. In a statement accompanying the decision, Justice Sonia Sotomayor noted that the 5th Circuit should be expected to take into account the high court’s more recent ruling in Counterman v. Colorado, a case involving the distinction between punishable threats of violence and free speech. In that case, the court ruled there needs to be a reckless intent in making statements that could be interpreted as “true threats.” Mckesson criticized the original lawsuit in a statement, saying, “The goal of lawsuits like these is to prevent people from showing up at a protest out of the fear that they might be held responsible if anything happens.” And the ACLU, which was among the attorneys and groups who backed Mckesson in the case, pointed to Sotomayor’s statement as an encouraging sign. “After today’s news, people should not be afraid that they’ll face a ruinous lawsuit if they exercise their rights to protest,” said Vera Eidelman, staff attorney with the ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project, in a statement.
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Iranian protesters chant slogans as some of them wave Palestinian flags during an anti-Israeli demonstration in Felestin Sq. in downtown Tehran, Iran, March 24, 2024. | Vahid Salemi/AP | ACTIVIST LEFT VS. MODERATE DEM RIFT GROWS — The response to Iran’s recent attack on Israel is the latest example of a growing rift between leftists and moderate Democrats that’s been widened by the Israel-Hamas conflict. Both sides are entrenching their positions, report POLITICO’s Shia Kapos, Dustin Gardiner and Joe Anuta. BAY AREA PROSECUTOR ON THE DEFENSIVE — Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price, whose jurisdiction includes Oakland, will face a recall less than halfway through her first term after crime spiked in the area. She’s not the first California prosecutor to face recalls in the face of dissatisfaction with crime, and she’s fighting for her political life, reports POLITICO’s Jeremy B. White. SANTOS COMEBACK IN QUESTION — Former New York GOP Rep. George Santos, who was expelled by the House after an indictment and amid an ethics inquiry, recently announced plans to primary another Long Island-area lawmaker, but the new campaign committee he set up didn’t raise any money in March, calling into question the possibility of a comeback for him, POLITICO’s Jessica Piper reports.
| | | THE RECAST RECOMMENDS Novelist Salman Rushdie has written a new memoir, “Knife,” recounting the time he was attacked on stage in honest and gripping detail. “The Long Game” re-imagines the true story of the San Felipe High School Mustangs, a group of young Mexican American caddies who created their own makeshift golf course and rose to become Texas state champions. It’s in theaters now.
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| Don’t miss it: The season finale of “RuPaul’s Drag Race” airs at 8 p.m. Friday on MTV. Nymphia Wind, Plane Jane and Sapphira Cristál battle it out to win. Jazz bassist Linda May Han Oh gives us a Tiny Desk concert. Melodious alto saxophone and eclectic piano effects bring out Oh’s intricate rhythms. Winnie Harlow hits the club in the visual for “We Still Don't Trust You,” the eponymous track of a new album by Future and Metro Boomin.
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