The Palos Verdes Democrats kicked off 2024 on January 21 with Rick Wilson, co-founder of The Lincoln Project, author, commentator, and former long-time Republican political operative. About 40 people attended in person at the Peninsula Center Library, and 72 attended via Zoom. It was no surprise that the attendance was the biggest in years.
Rick Wilson is a heavy hitter who knows what he’s talking about. He delivered the good, bad, and ugly truth about what Democrats have to do to win the Presidency this year and talked about all the ways Democrats could lose.
Many of you have already viewed the video from January 21, but if you haven’t, TODAY is the day to watch it. Rick is a dynamic speaker and he laid it all out there for us in black and white. What we Democrats do with this information is up to us.
He said Republicans and Democrats fight differently. Democrats say, ‘when they go low, we go high’ and Republicans say, ‘when they go low, we meet them in the basement with a chainsaw and a tarp’. The Republicans are relentless and will do or say anything to win. The Republican ethos is ‘Just win’ and ‘Stay on message’. He knows this because he spent years as a Republican political operative.
Rick was working from 2015 to 2020 to stop Trump and the growing MAGA movement but he was hoping to retire after Biden won. But January 6th 2021 changed everything and he knew he had to stay in the fight to stop Trump. He said “the Capitol police stood in the breach and saved this country”.
In order to win this year, Democrats need to unify, turn out the vote, and learn to take a victory lap to tout their legislative successes and winning policy messages. Talk up the economy, take what Trump says every day and use it against him, and prevent voters from drifting toward a third-party candidate. Democrats also need to recognize that there is cultural and political difference emerging between Black and Latino voters and traditional Democratic party. They are moderate to conservative Democrats, not progressive and we cannot take their votes for granted. Democratic activism should focus on AZ, MI, WI, and PA; support Democratic Secretaries of State; and flip Republican House seats in CA.
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