What do Mississippi Democrats have to do for their future?

[Suburbia]

Support bringing back slavery.

Come on...

[H. Ross Peron]

Hope the Republican candidates turns out to be a pedophile rapist.

More seriously, given severe racial polarization Democrats probably need to focus on the very youngest white voters (under 30 Millennials and Zoomers) whose voting patterns may be less "set" and white migrants from out of state.

[TodayJunior]

They need to work to elect their own to local, non-partisan offices in areas which are now Republican.  This is a bit of a stealth operation, but it can be done over time.  There are many state and local offices in MS that are NOT partisan elections. 

What they need to do is be socially conservative on guns, abortion, and social issues, but progressive on bread and butter issues and healthcare.  They won't do this, but such a tack would elect more Democrats at the state and national level than a position of being pro-choice, but economic conservatism. 

This, but this scenario also requires the republican to be absolutely terrible like Roy Moore.

But a winning Dem candidate in MS has to be a white moderate overall who's conservative socially, liberal economically in an exceptionally favorable environment for Democrats. 

[Crumpets]

Have babies and wait.

[Flyersfan232]

I don't think there is a simple, easy or guaranteed solution. I think ideology has next to no role at this point; the Deep South is sufficiently racially-polarized that white moderates and black progressives alike are going to be viewed as "the black candidate" by pretty much everybody not guaranteed to vote Democratic in the present day.

From a racial standpoint and in the aggregate/statewide result, it means there's no more room left to fall based on the race of the candidate - something that I think has only became a reality post-Trump. Take a look at Hood and Epsy (as well as Abrams and Barrow): each basically got the same percentage of the vote as their counterpart, but through somewhat different coalitions.

The end result is that an "Espy" is going to leave just as many prejudiced whites on the table as a "Hood" will leave black voters unmobilized. The maps may look somewhat different and there may even be incredible differences in some counties, but statewide, it averages out. The problem developing for some time is that there is no one candidate who can simultaneously maximize black turnout and white support; who can thread the needle perfectly to build that winning coalition. This is why the fate of most of the South is tied to demographic shifts.

what if we combined the two?

[walleye26]

I know DeSoto is trending left, but what about Madison and Rankin? I know Rankin is pretty white, but why is Rankin more Republican while Madison is slowly moving left?

Also one last question: are the whites in places like Gulfport and Biloxi more socially moderate than upstate MS? Like, are they transplants from the Midwest?

[Del Tachi]

Hope the Republican candidates turns out to be a pedophile rapist.

You chide, but Mississippi has a much higher floor for Democrats than neighboring Alabama because Blacks are a much larger share of our electorate (38% in MS vs only 26% in AL.)  If you transpose the 2017 AL-SEN special to Missisisppi, you probably get something like a 53-45 win for Jones or some other seemingly unfathomable decisive margin. 

[DINGO Joe]

I don't think there is a simple, easy or guaranteed solution. I think ideology has next to no role at this point; the Deep South is sufficiently racially-polarized that white moderates and black progressives alike are going to be viewed as "the black candidate" by pretty much everybody not guaranteed to vote Democratic in the present day.

From a racial standpoint and in the aggregate/statewide result, it means there's no more room left to fall based on the race of the candidate - something that I think has only became a reality post-Trump. Take a look at Hood and Epsy (as well as Abrams and Barrow): each basically got the same percentage of the vote as their counterpart, but through somewhat different coalitions.

The end result is that an "Espy" is going to leave just as many prejudiced whites on the table as a "Hood" will leave black voters unmobilized. The maps may look somewhat different and there may even be incredible differences in some counties, but statewide, it averages out. The problem developing for some time is that there is no one candidate who can simultaneously maximize black turnout and white support; who can thread the needle perfectly to build that winning coalition. This is why the fate of most of the South is tied to demographic shifts.

what if we combined the two?

I tried to look at precinct level  for Espy and Hood's most recent runs and if you gave the Ds their best result in each one you basically were 50-50 ( no actually spreadsheet/program behind this)

[Adam Griffin]

I don't think there is a simple, easy or guaranteed solution. I think ideology has next to no role at this point; the Deep South is sufficiently racially-polarized that white moderates and black progressives alike are going to be viewed as "the black candidate" by pretty much everybody not guaranteed to vote Democratic in the present day.

From a racial standpoint and in the aggregate/statewide result, it means there's no more room left to fall based on the race of the candidate - something that I think has only became a reality post-Trump. Take a look at Hood and Epsy (as well as Abrams and Barrow): each basically got the same percentage of the vote as their counterpart, but through somewhat different coalitions.

The end result is that an "Espy" is going to leave just as many prejudiced whites on the table as a "Hood" will leave black voters unmobilized. The maps may look somewhat different and there may even be incredible differences in some counties, but statewide, it averages out. The problem developing for some time is that there is no one candidate who can simultaneously maximize black turnout and white support; who can thread the needle perfectly to build that winning coalition. This is why the fate of most of the South is tied to demographic shifts.

what if we combined the two?

That was my point: it's almost impossible to do so. In order to accomplish such in a state like MS, you'd need some equivalent of a "Southern Obama" (which given the state, likely means a white male with incredible persuasive skills; while my OP more or less stated that there is little to no benefit from running a white versus black candidate now and based on current performance, getting to 50% is a different story and I highly doubt there are as many mobilizable black voters as there would be persuadable whites given support levels for Ds among each). A special election a la Doug Jones' victory could be a different story, though.

[Utah Neolib]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

[GM Team Member and Deputy PPT WB]

wait for demographic shifts really. There are little to no swing voters in the state from my understanding so the best way to try and win is to go hard on the turnout game.

[Chips]

Really work on a black turnout machine.

[Adam Griffin]

I don't think there is a simple, easy or guaranteed solution. I think ideology has next to no role at this point; the Deep South is sufficiently racially-polarized that white moderates and black progressives alike are going to be viewed as "the black candidate" by pretty much everybody not guaranteed to vote Democratic in the present day.

From a racial standpoint and in the aggregate/statewide result, it means there's no more room left to fall based on the race of the candidate - something that I think has only became a reality post-Trump. Take a look at Hood and Epsy (as well as Abrams and Barrow): each basically got the same percentage of the vote as their counterpart, but through somewhat different coalitions.

The end result is that an "Espy" is going to leave just as many prejudiced whites on the table as a "Hood" will leave black voters unmobilized. The maps may look somewhat different and there may even be incredible differences in some counties, but statewide, it averages out. The problem developing for some time is that there is no one candidate who can simultaneously maximize black turnout and white support; who can thread the needle perfectly to build that winning coalition. This is why the fate of most of the South is tied to demographic shifts.

what if we combined the two?

I tried to look at precinct level  for Espy and Hood's most recent runs and if you gave the Ds their best result in each one you basically were 50-50 ( no actually spreadsheet/program behind this)

FWIW, I did this at the county level for 15 counties that were either large and/or had huge differences between the two elections (37% of state's vote), and came away with a narrow Hood statewide win of 0.7 points if all other counties had behaved the same as these 15. It's worth noting that Hood did better than Espy in counties making up 81% of that grouping.

Given that Hood only did 2.2 points better than Espy statewide, it means that the remainder of the state was basically a wash (Hood did roughly 0.1 point better than Espy there), while Hood did 5.7 points better in the aforementioned 15 counties combined.

[UncleSam]

Encourage Dems to have lots of children. They’ll dominate the state again in ~20 years that way.

There are no swing voters in MS so there’s no point trying to strategize for it. Wait for the demographics to get more favorable then dump a ton of resources into it to build up infrastructure like Stacey Abrams did in GA. That’s probably at least 10-15 years down the line, if not more.

[OneJ]

Is there any particular reason why Hood did worse than Espy in DeSoto? I knew that in his past performances there Hood was always relatively weak up there compared to almost everywhere else, but it stands out that it's not majority-black and is not part of the Delta. I haven't been able to think of a good reason as to why he didn't do that well there.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

As long as there is Trump or DeSantis D's can forget about South including GA, they have resonated their base but Beshear can win back2 back Govs like JBE did

The best thing for D's to do to retain Senate after 2024 is sure up MT and OH, Cooper is term limited in 2024, Rs are likely to win that Gov seat

[Adam Griffin]

Yes, there are no swing/persuadable voters in Mississippi...just like there were none in GA in 2016 when Clinton got 20% of the white vote, only for Biden, Warnock and Ossoff to get 30% 4 years later.

Clinton got 13% of the white vote in MS; Espy 20% and Hood 25%.

[TML]

Yes, there are no swing/persuadable voters in Mississippi...just like there were none in GA in 2016 when Clinton got 20% of the white vote, only for Biden, Warnock and Ossoff to get 30% 4 years later.

Clinton got 13% of the white vote in MS; Espy 20% and Hood 25%.

Now tell me, does Mississippi have any bustling metropolitan areas with influxes of highly-educated, liberal professionals and a booming economy with an array of high-paying jobs, like Georgia has (Atlanta)?

[Adam Griffin]

Yes, there are no swing/persuadable voters in Mississippi...just like there were none in GA in 2016 when Clinton got 20% of the white vote, only for Biden, Warnock and Ossoff to get 30% 4 years later.

Clinton got 13% of the white vote in MS; Espy 20% and Hood 25%.

Now tell me, does Mississippi have any bustling metropolitan areas with influxes of highly-educated, liberal professionals and a booming economy with an array of high-paying jobs, like Georgia has (Atlanta)?

Whites in GA didn't shift 20 points to the left in 4 years because of demographic shifts, just like whites in MS didn't shift 20-25 points between different types of contests due to a lack of persuadable voters.

It's just ridiculous to argue that a black Senate candidate and a white gubernatorial candidate in MS got as much/more of the white vote in 2018/19 than Clinton did in GA in 2016 without any persuadable voters existing whatsoever.

Mostly, the Democratic infrastructure in MS is a joke/non-existent, and hordes of potential persuadable voters and non-voters alike are being left on the table. GA was in a similar situation pre-2016 as well. State and local Democratic leadership likely needs to be purged or overhauled to a large degree, with national orgs taking more interest (i.e. investing more resources) to solve this problem.

[S019]

Assuming no demographic shift or whatever, it'd be to become racist again, we're assuming that's a nonstarter, so the smart answer is just to wait for demographic shifts to materialize. Also, I don't think Georgia is a good example here because it has lots of college educated white voters, while the white population in Mississippi is more uneducated therefore more Republican.

[chalmetteowl]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

there isn't much of a difference anymore... look at what JBE's done and we thought he was gonna be the supreme dixiecrat, but he's fallen in line with the rest of Democrats on COVID and the recent trans rights bills

i think someone told him he has a chance to one day win Cassidy's Senate seat

[Utah Neolib]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

there isn't much of a difference anymore... look at what JBE's done and we thought he was gonna be the supreme dixiecrat, but he's fallen in line with the rest of Democrats on COVID and the recent trans rights bills

i think someone told him he has a chance to one day win Cassidy's Senate seat

Or John Kennedy’s seat

[smoltchanov]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

there isn't much of a difference anymore... look at what JBE's done and we thought he was gonna be the supreme dixiecrat, but he's fallen in line with the rest of Democrats on COVID and the recent trans rights bills

i think someone told him he has a chance to one day win Cassidy's Senate seat

Well, there IS some difference at least. IIRC - he is strongly pro-life, for example, while 98+% of recent Democratic candidates in country are pro-choice... Though, of course, you will hardly find ANY 1950th-1960th-style Dixiecrat elected even for local office now..

[chalmetteowl]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

there isn't much of a difference anymore... look at what JBE's done and we thought he was gonna be the supreme dixiecrat, but he's fallen in line with the rest of Democrats on COVID and the recent trans rights bills

i think someone told him he has a chance to one day win Cassidy's Senate seat

Or John Kennedy’s seat

Kennedy is going nowhere with great approval ratings here, but we're gonna remember Cassidy's vote to impeach Trump (if he runs again).

the only chance Louisiana has to flip a Senate seat is if JBE runs against Cassidy. Other than that, nope. Can't see any other D winning and can't see any other R losing

[Spectator]

Unabashedly progressive winning statewide race in Mississippi? Good luck with that. May be - after 2050.

Exactly. Ain’t no old Dixiecrat voting for a Bernie progressive

there isn't much of a difference anymore... look at what JBE's done and we thought he was gonna be the supreme dixiecrat, but he's fallen in line with the rest of Democrats on COVID and the recent trans rights bills

i think someone told him he has a chance to one day win Cassidy's Senate seat

Well, there IS some difference at least. IIRC - he is strongly pro-life, for example, while 98+% of recent Democratic candidates in country are pro-choice... Though, of course, you will hardly find ANY 1950th-1960th-style Dixiecrat elected even for local office now..

That is probably a good thing that we don’t have any more Dixiecrats like that, giving racist speeches on a daily basis in Congress.