Election Reflection 2019
The 2019 election was nine days ago, but due to Ranked Choice Voting tabulation and some recounts, all of the major results were only finalized today. As both a political science nerd and an activist, I follow elections really closely, but mainly looking at a handful of very specific areas. Since I spent so much time researching these races, I thought I’d put them all in one place. If you have the exact same interests as me, this is the only article you need to read about the 2019 election — and if you want to dive deeper into anything, check out some of the links.
My five focuses:
Portland, ME and broader Maine politics
Cannabis reform votes in towns & cities
District Attorneys in races with reformers
The spread of Ranked Choice Voting
Major shifts in partisan politics (go Democrats)
MAINE: ANOTHER NEW MAYOR FOR PORTLAND & VICTORIES FOR IMMIGRANTS
Local politics first: my city of Portland, Maine had our third election for mayor (we switched from an appointed mayor to an elected one in 2011), and in a 4-way non-partisan race using Ranked Choice Voting, former school board chair Kate Snyder beat incumbent mayor Ethan Strimling. This was a really intense race which ended up being mostly about the vision for the office of mayor itself, with Strimling seeing himself as the city’s chief advocate for progressive policies like mandatory paid sick leave (causing conflict with the conservative city manager, who manages the city’s operations), and Snyder viewing the mayor’s role as working collaboratively with the more moderate city council and letting them lead.
I really like Ethan Strimling. When I first moved to Portland in March 2018, I reached out to all of my elected officials asking to meet them and learn about my new city. Mayor Strimling responded to me the same day, and later that week I was in his office in city hall talking with him about everything from the city’s history to why the airport is called a “jetport” (he didn’t know, and even after taking flying lessons there I still have no idea). On top of appreciating his stances on important policies, I was amazed at his availability to his constituents and his advocacy for people of all income levels.
That being said, I think Kate Snyder will do a great job, and I look forward to working with her and other public officials to make our awesome city even better.
Here are the final results:
| Round 1 | Round 2 | Round 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kate Snyder | 39.33% | 42.08% | 61.89% |
| Spencer Thibodeau | 28.23% | 29.29% | 38.11% |
| Ethan Strimling | 25.28% | 28.63% | -- |
| Travis Curran | 7.16% | -- | -- |
In a city of 66,147 people, only 18,275 cast ballots for mayor, serving as a reminder that non-voters could easily swing most elections.
In my own city council district, Tae Chong won a non-partisan 5-way race using plurality voting, filling an open seat. He had 42.13% of votes, so probably would have won under RCV anyway, but I still wish that we had been able to use it (if you want us to use it next time, please support Fair Elections Portland). While I preferred Adam Volk, I was very happy that all five candidates in this race supported opening safe injection facilities in Portland, and I’m hoping to work with Councilor Chong and others to make that hap
Elsewhere in Maine, Lewiston elected 23-year-old Safiya Khalid to its City Council. She’s the first Somali refugee elected to serve on the council, and her victory (along with the uncontested re-election of Pious Ali to the Portland City Council) were widely seen as victories for the immigrant community in Maine and throughout the country. It’s great to see the state growing and changing, and the government starting to represent its people (about one-third of Lewiston’s 36,000 people have Somali roots).
Also in Lewiston, a city council race was decided by three votes. THREE VOTES. This is a good reminder that voting does matter, especially at the most local levels, where government also has the biggest impact on your life.
LOCAL CANNABIS REFERENDA: 10 WINS, 14 LOSSES
Speaking of local government having a big impact on your life, 24 towns and cities across the country held votes on cannabis policy. In five states with legal marijuana (CO, IL, ME, MA, and MI), these were votes on whether to allow cannabis businesses to operate locally, since most state laws give municipalities the power to ban licensed businesses within their borders. But in Ohio, where marijuana is only legal for medical patients, there were six votes on decriminalizing cannabis possession for everyone.
Cannabis reform won 10 of the 24 races, which is less than a 50% win rate but still moved the ball forward. These are great results for the people in those 10 municipalities, and there will be many more opportunities to fix cannabis policies in future years.
The full results:
| Pro-cannabis reform | Anti-cannabis reform | |
|---|---|---|
| Colorado | Louisville | Loveland, Mead |
| Illinois | Deerfield | Arlington Heights |
| Maine | Camden, Newry | -- |
| Massachusetts | -- | Agawam |
| Michigan | Crystal Township, Lincoln Park, Northfield Township | Allen Park, Hudson, Keego Harbor, Marenisco Township, Mount Pleasant, South Haven, Walled Lake |
| Ohio | Bremen, Nelsonville, Northwood | Adena, Amherst, Wren |
Beyond these local referenda, Marijuana Moment has a great article on how the 2019 election could impact cannabis policy.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM: SAN FRANCISCO GETS A REFORMER D.A.
On Saturday (11/9) it was announced that Chesa Boudin, a reformer and public defender, won the race for San Francisco District Attorney. This is a huge victory for criminal justice reform, as the D.A. holds a tremendous amount of power on how the law is enforced in their jurisdiction — things like police accountability, cash bail, and cannabis enforcement. All of my politically active friends in the Bay Area are very excited about Boudin’s win, and I trust their judgment on who was best in a race between all Democrats.
This was a 4-way non-partisan race that used Ranked Choice Voting, and they had to do multiple rounds of tallying. Boudin actually won on the 3rd round after two candidates were eliminated. Unfortunately I could only find data on the first and final rounds, so I’m not sure how many Dautch voters went to each of the other three candidates.
| Round 1 | Round 2 | Round 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chesa Boudin | 35.7% | ??? | 50.8% |
| Suzy Loftus | 31.1% | ??? | 49.2% |
| Nancy Tung | 19.3% | ??? | -- |
| Leif Dautch | 13.9% | -- | -- |
Boudin would have won in a plurality race too, and his lead actually shrunk using RCV. But Ranked Choice Voting is still a great system no matter which candidate it helps, since it more accurately measures support among all voters.
Elsewhere in the country, reform-minded candidates won some important races for D.A., and lost some others. In Virginia, five reformers won major races; in New York, two establishment candidates kept their seats; and in Pennsylvania, a progressive won one race while two fellow progressives lost theirs. If you want to support the national push for progressive District Attorneys, make a donation to the Real Justice PAC.
RANKED CHOICE VOTING: PASSAGE IN NYC
RCV was adopted in two municipalities: Easthampton, MA (population 16,053) and New York, NY (population 8,398,748). This vastly increases the number of people using RCV, as Maine is the only state to adopt it and our population is only 1,338,404 (though as shown above, some major cities like San Francisco, CA use it too).
Unfortunately, NYC’s RCV is limited, and only applies to local primary and special elections. However, in a city dominated by a single party (the City Council has 51 members, 48 of which are Democrats), primaries are where most of the meaningful voting happens. Using RCV in the primaries still eliminates the “spoiler effect” in races with more than two candidates, and will ensure that primary winners have the support of a majority of party voters.
When this is your city council, primaries are really important.
Keeping RCV to primaries does mean NYC will miss out on one of the other major benefits of Ranked Choice Voting, which is decreasing the power of the two-party system and making it more feasible for minor parties and independents to win elections. Hopefully, after voters use it a few times and get even more comfortable with it, NYC will expand RCV to cover general elections and other offices.
PARTISAN POLITICS: DEMS WIN VA, MONEY STILL DOESN’T BUY ELECTIONS
In Virginia, Democrats won control of both houses of the state legislature, which Republicans previously held by slim majorities. With Democratic Governor Ralph Northam (elected in 2017), Democrats now control the entire state government for the first time since 1993 (26 years ago, when I was only two years old). This should open the floodgates for all sorts of progressive policies, from taking down Confederate statues to ratifying the federal Equal Rights Amendment.
Today, the race for Kentucky’s governor officially ended, with Republican incumbent Matt Bevin conceding to Democratic challenger Andy Beshear. While it looked like Beshear was going to win on election night, Bevin took the unfortunately familiar Republican route of claiming voter irregularities and demanding a recanvass (basically a recount of county results). The recanvass happened today, and thankfully Bevin conceded after seeing that the results did not change enough to alter the result.
In Washington state, Seattle City Councilor Kshama Sawant, a member of the Socialist Alternative party, won re-election. She is a major critic of Amazon, which spent $1.5 million on city council races this year. Building on my experience of living in Connecticut when Linda McMahon wasted $100 million of her own money losing two U.S. Senate races, this further convinces me that money can’t actually buy elections, and can even be counterproductive when obviously pushing the interests of rich people.
LOOKING FORWARD: HERE COMES 2020
On the topic of rich people, I’m hoping billionaire Tom Steyer drops out of the Democratic presidential primary, and that billionaire Michael Bloomberg stays out of it. My current favorite is millionaire Bernie Sanders because of his massive activist base and his good stances on everything from cannabis and unions to gun rights and foreign policy. I also like millionaire Elizabeth Warren, millionaire Cory Booker, and millionaire Andrew Yang (in that order). I’m really hoping millionaire Joe Biden doesn’t win because of his awful record on criminal justice policy. The next debate is November 20.
Since I live in a swing state (Maine gave one of its three electoral votes to Trump in 2016), I’ll vote for the Democrat no matter who wins the nomination, and encourage other swing state votes to do the same. Trump is the most corrupt president in history, a friend to dictators, and a supporter of awful domestic policies, so it’s incredibly important to get him out of office. If you live in a safe state, donate some money to the Democratic nominee and vote however you want.
2020 will also be a big year for Maine, with U.S. Senator Susan Collins up for re-election. Collins used to be a popular moderate, but over the past decade she has fallen much more in line with the GOP, voting in favor of Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court and generally supporting the Trump Administration when she should be a leading critic. She also refuses to stand up for the adult use cannabis industry, despite Maine voters legalizing marijuana in 2016. Maine House Speaker Sara Gideon is the current front-runner for the nomination; I met her at a fundraiser last week and she would definitely be a huge improvement over Collins.
Next year we’ll see many states voting on cannabis policy, as activists in Mississippi already turned in signatures for a medical marijuana initiative (with 67% support), and South Dakota reformers have submitted signatures for separate medical and adult use initiatives. Arizona and Florida have well-organized campaigns for adult use questions underway, and there’s even a small chance that legislators in New Jersey will put an adult use question on the ballot.
Since so much is at stake in 2020, please do all you can to support good causes and candidates in your own local area, in your state, and throughout the country. Living in a democracy is a big responsibility and can be a lot of work, but it’s worth it.