Bernie Sanders Has Already Won California
Bernie Sanders Has Already Won California
DAVID DAYEN
New Republic
Does the outcome of next Tuesday’s California primary matter? Conventional wisdom says no; news outlets are already pinpointing the precise time of the evening when Hillary Clinton will clinch the nomination that evening with victories elsewhere—three hours before the polls close in the Golden State.
Naturally, this perturbs Bernie Sanders fans, who see it as one more way the Democratic nomination contest has been rigged from the start. But they should know that the election in California is of critical importance—not to deciding the 2016 Democratic nomination (already a done deal), but to determining the future of the Democratic Party. The coalition Sanders has assembled in California, and the way he’s campaigned in the state, is a sneak preview of the next generation of liberal politics, in a state that’s always seen as a bellwether for the rest of the nation. In a sense, the final vote tally really doesn’t matter—because, in the most important and lasting ways, Sanders has already won California.
“You have the power to choose a new direction for the Democratic Party,” Sanders says in “California,” the aptly named ad he’s been running in the state. It sounds like typical political happy talk, but his campaign has actually borne it out. Sanders has camped out in California for weeks, campaigning in spots that haven’t welcomed Democrats in many years, including Central Valley towns like Visalia and Vista and Bakersfield and Santa Maria, which are now between 45 and 70 percent Latino.
Demographically, California represents the Democratic Party’s future. Latino voters in the state are young, in many cases the sons and daughters of immigrants who were born and raised elsewhere. And these voters have been engaged by an explicitly progressive message. That will matter long after this presidential race is over. Assuming that national Democrats don’t completely alienate the Latino electorate, the changing face of California’s voter population will determine a new generation of leadership. A realignment is happening in California, where the most powerful politicians in the state—Jerry Brown, Dianne Feinstein, and Barbara Boxer —are all septuagenarians or older, and either termed out, retiring, or on the way. (To those watching the Democrats’ geriatric presidential primary, this may sound familiar). Young, ambitious, and (mostly) nonwhite politicians will fill those seats, and could lead the nation someday. At the least, they’ll lead the biggest chunk of liberal America, whose ideas and policies will resonate across the country.
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Bravo!
