Million-member organization that supported Sanders in 2015 withdraws endorsement of Northam in VA

[GaryCnf]

62. On a personal level

I accept the "binary choice" ultimatum. I always vote for the candidate who has a (D) next to their name OR who has a proven track records of voting with the Democratic caucus because the alternative is worse. I admit voting for candidates with whom I do not fully agree and even being bludgeoned into voting for some candidates whom I find almost reprehensible. The (R) is always worse.

That, however, is not the question. The question is whether Ralph Northam's campaign's best course of action is to rely on intimidating voters (who will be directly and intimately harmed by his promised blocking of any city-level effort to establish sanctuary cities) by threatening "Vote for me or you'll get that racist, gerrymandering puke Gillespie" or whether the better course would be to come out with a statement about how the reaction to his recent anti-sanctuary city statements has shown him how important this issue is and how he now takes the position that he will never even consider overruling democratically-elected local officials who have decided that their communities should offer a respite for the most immediate victims of the Trump administration.

This discussion is critical to the future of our party if for no other reason than that using the "binary choice" ultimatum on loyal Democratic constituencies may not harm us when it comes to the percentage of votes we get from these constituencies, however, it is not inspiring them to get to the polls and that is costing us elections. See, Wayne County, Michigan.

Moreover, while openly standing with these constituencies may alienate some privileged, white, upper-middle class, middle of the road voters (who many claim are the key to electoral victory), the fact of the matter is that we have catered to those voters with such tactics as opposing sanctuary cities and still are not getting a majority of those votes. It is time to build our coalition around our loyal constituencies and that segment of white, upper-middle class, middle of the road voters who have the human decency to stand with those without privilege.