How one moderate Republican Congressional district could doom Trump

Nebraska gives us a peek into middle America politics

…by Jim W. Dean, VT Editor

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First published … October 19, 2020 

Nebraska is one of only two states to apportion its electoral votes by Congressional district. Maine is the other. If the Biden-Trump battle swings by one vote, then the Omaha, Nebraska district could make political history.

The district is not an outlier, but a clear representation of Trump’s slippage in middle America, the folks that bought Trump’s promise to ‘drain the swamp’. But then after a year of having qualified people in his administration, all of whom knew more than he did, Trump started firing them one by one, so he could keep all of the media focus on him and drown out competing voices.

As VT wrote many times, Trump’s overkill was going to be his undoing. His attempts to regain control of the narrative have failed because more people were on to his con.

“If you look at the struggle that Trump has going on in the suburbs, it’s just super consistent,” said Ryan Horn, a Republican media strategist based in Omaha. “What you see in Nebraska 2 you’ll see in Dallas, Texas, you’ll see in Charlotte, North Carolina, you’ll see in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, you’ll see in Orange County, California … It’s super, super consistent.” [from Politico]

The Omaha World Herald has endorsed Biden, motivated by hearing talk from Chamber of Commerce people that it would be hard to vote for Trump this time.

“Trump’s departure from the White House,” the paper opined, “would benefit not only the country but also the Republican Party, by unshackling GOP officeholders from the slavish deference they’ve felt obligated to display to the president’s years-long series of eccentricities and embarrassments.”

Ouch! No Trump rally can turn this kind of damage around. That is why Trump seems to have given up trying to win. He is being outspent in Nebraska 6 to 1 for one electoral vote. He looks to be going out in a blaze of glory via his non-stop tour in regions where his supporters see no wrong in one of the most corrupt Americans ever to rise to the highest office.

Even Omaha’s current Republican Congressman, a moderate, was willing to state the obvious, and he might win reelection even if Trump goes down. In his own words…

 “We’re also Nebraska nice … and we want more diplomacy and decency, and I think that’s what hurts the president.”

Nebraskans on the other hand are not extremist territory…but just the opposite. They don’t view having a Biden presidency as the end of their ideological identity.

…“Nebraskans are fairly moderate on the one hand, but also are super independent and progressive on the other,” said Jane Kleeb, chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party. And Biden is a less polarizing nominee than Clinton was. Clinton, Kleeb said, “just didn’t connect with folks,” while Biden is someone people see as “having their backs.”

Something not well covered in the Democrats’ turnaround is that their current standing is, to a large degree, due to Trump’s destroying himself like that was his goal in life, and in addition, the foundation that the Democrats laid when they took the House in 2018.

The bridgeheads built then were ready to be expanded by Trump impaling himself on his ‘fake virus’, the one he later claimed was just going to go away some day.

And last, the Democrats dug up their rainy day money, deciding this was the time to use it. Small donors have established financial political muscle with the huge success of the online platforms where their donation data was saved, and when Trump said something that pissed them off, they could fire a donation bullet at him with one click.

That is not a power the Democrats are going to forget they had. Jamie Harrison’s huge Senate race fundraising against Lindsey Graham, who is right up there in the top ten most hated Republicans, has been one of the historical highlights of the election. Even if he loses, he will not disappear into political oblivion as many do.

But the issue is still in doubt until the fat lady sings. This election has seen registration computer glitches in a half dozen states that had plenty of time to get prepared for the expected surges. VT smells a rat there, and sadly no one seems to have the time to investigate possible hacking.

Biden has to win by an amount too big to rig, and too huge to lose, as Glenn Kirschner says. I think Biden knows that, as was shown when the Democratic Senatorial effort got cranked from its initial two seat goal to seven, and outspending Trump by multiples in races where the Republicans never expected serious competition.

We have 15 days till the voting battle is over, and the counting battle begins. Trump lawyers have already prepared attacks claiming that the mail in ballots were fraudulent.

To turn the country around, we need masses of straight ticket Democratic voting as a lesson to the Republican Party, which should have impeached their own president and saved some honor for their Party.

Jim W. Dean

Jim W. Dean is VT Editor Emeritus.  He was an active editor on VT from 2010-2022.  He was involved in operations, development, and writing, plus an active schedule of TV and radio interviews.  He now writes and posts periodically for VT.

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