Hillary Clinton’s loss last November highlighted the stunning collapse of the Democratic Party in the Rust Belt.
And a new report from The Boston Globe’s Victoria McGrane illustrates just how difficult a task reconnecting with Rust Belt voters will be for Senate Democrats from these states, including Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey, with Washington liberals like Elizabeth Warren emerging as the new face of the party:
John Randazzo is a registered Democrat who twice voted for Barack Obama, whose 2008 visit to the Avenue Diner near Wilkes-Barre is memorialized with a plaque and a special red stool at the counter. In 2016, Randazzo was among Rust Belt defectors who helped put Trump in the White House — the sort of voter who prompted the president to boast last month that he was giving the GOP a rebirth as the “party . . . of the American worker.’’
“I honestly feel that he’s thinking like the average American right now, what he wants to get done,” said Randazzo, 70, a retired hydraulics company manager who has watched the quality of life here slip as the decades passed. “I’m on board. I know he’s trying hard.”*
He doesn’t think much of the Democrats clamoring to win voters like him back.
Asked about Warren, Randazzo suggested that the Massachusetts senator, who is arguably the Democrats’ highest-profile advocate for the working class, is out of touch and lumped her in the same category as the entrenched House Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi.
“Her and Pelosi, they’ll never get my vote the way they’re acting,” said Randazzo. “They are completely the opposite of what Donald Trump stands for. He says one thing, they disagree and it’s the other thing, and it’s ridiculous.”
And Democrat leaders, including former Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, are publicly expressing concern at Warren’s ability to connect with Rust Belt voters:
Not all Democrats believe Warren can appeal to working-class voters outside of true-blue coastal bastions and among urban and campus elites. Former Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell, a Democrat, said Warren’s words on their own would resonate with Trump Democrats, but she herself is seen as too liberal and too associated with the type of identity politics that turns off white, working-class voters.
“Her message is a good one, there’s no question about it, she’s very good at attacking and stripping back the hypocrisy,” he said. “I’m not sure she’s the best messenger for that type of voter.”
“Washington Democrats like Bob Casey have lost touch with Rust Belt voters,” said NRSC Spokesman Bob Salera. “Casey’s decision to join with Elizabeth Warren and the left in their obstructionism will only further alienate him from Pennsylvania voters.”