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Showing posts with the label Democratic primary

The divide within the Democratic Party is a lot more complicated than a divide between two factions

With a potentially very large field of candidates expected to seek the Democratic Party's presidential nomination in 2020, I made this observation about the divide within the Democratic Party being more complicated than a simple divide between a center-left establishment and a left-wing progressive insurgency: The 2016 primary campaign between Hillary and Bernie has probably led a lot of people to incorrectly believe that there are only two factions within the Democratic Party. In reality, it's a lot more complicated than that. — Aaron Camp (@ProgMid) December 25, 2018 Obviously, the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries/caucuses quickly became virtually a two-candidate race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders well before the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses were held that year, and became an actual two-candidate race between the center-left Hillary and the progressive Bernie after Martin O'Malley ended his longshot presidential bid after the Iowa caucuses. ...

How Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pulled off one of the most surprising political upsets in U.S. history

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old bartender from The Bronx, defeated U.S. Representative and U.S. House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley in one of the most surprising political upsets in U.S. history. With all but nine of the district's 447 precincts reporting, Ocasio held an insurmountable 57.5% to 42.5% lead over Crowley in the Democratic primary in New York state's 14th Congressional District, which is entirely within New York City and includes parts of Queens and The Bronx. Crowley has graciously conceded defeat to Ocasio. As someone who is not a New Yorker, but followed the race for the Democratic nomination in the 14th District of New York on social media, I can explain a number of reasons behind Ocasio's surprise victory: Ocasio did have some political experience prior to running for Congress, specifically, she was an intern for the late U.S. Senator Ted Kennedy while she was a college student at Boston University in Massachusetts. Ocasio, despite ha...