Party Train: Rhode Island’s Presidential Preference Primary

On April 26, Rhode Islanders will head to the polls to cast ballots in the 2016 Presidential Preference Primary. In my mind, I hear the voice of Samuel L. Jackson in Jurassic Park, cigarette dangling from his mouth as he keystrokes the execute program for the park tour and says, “Hold on to your butts.”

This year, the usual turbulence has encountered some serious wind-shear. After eight years of America’s first person of color ever to win the oval office prepares to vacate the seat for the next graduate of America’s Electoral College, we Rhode Islanders, devoutly Democratic and geographically unable to escape the adage that all politics is very local, are in the unfamiliar situation of being relevant.

To be clear, we are relatively insignificant on the Republican side. With the looming prospect of a contested convention, everyone may be insignificant, with the exception of those who are actually at the convention. I am not a Republican and I am grateful, more so now than ever, given the choice between an agent of xenophobic chaos, flying from methamphetamine conventions to KKK rallies in a gold-plated jet, like some poorly drawn, comic book villain; or the Senator who won his Texas seat with a laughably small voter turnout of 632,000 in a state of nearly 27 million people. Let us not forget the third Republican who has no chance of winning a majority of delegates … or a plurality of delegates … scratch that, actually. You can forget him.

And, that is all I have to say about that.

It is the clash of the Democratic titans that has captured the attention of the likely Democratic voters. Due in part to a change in the Preferential Primary schedule set in motion by former Secretary of State Ralph Mollis in 2011, Rhode Island’s 33 delegates have been deemed worthy of competition by candidates Senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Rodham Clinton. In past primary contests, Rhode Island was tossed in with so many other states on Super Tuesday. The state’s low delegate count made it a less appealing choice for candidates who had to choose where to dedicate their time from states with much higher delegate yields.

Another reason is the ongoing challenge by the unlikely competitor, Senator Sanders (I, Vermont), who emerged from relative obscurity to mount a spirited fight against the former secretary of state, New York senator, and first lady during Bill Clinton’s eight years as President in the 1990s. The Vermont politician was elected to office as mayor of Burlington for three terms as a self-described Socialist before being defeated in 1987. He, then, ran for United States Congress as an Independent in 1990. In 2006, he was elected from the House to the US Senate where he has remained as the junior senator from Vermont, and the longest serving Independent member of Congress.

When Hillary Clinton ran against Senator Barack Obama in 2008, she won Rhode Island, but ultimately (and obviously) lost the nomination. Her eventual loss to Obama, in spite of being favored at the outset of her campaign, was understandable given Obama’s gift for oration, his tactical ability to coalesce Democratic organizations and resources with his message of hope and change, and his brilliance with delegate math. After President Obama tapped Clinton for secretary of state, not only did he forge an alliance with his former opponent, he granted her the opportunity to test her knowledge of international affairs and add to her already formidable resume. She proved to be a capable addition to an historic administration.

It is here that the challenge of Sanders manifests itself as a surprise.

While Clinton inherited the Democratic Party’s coalition, following Obama’s wildly successful administration in the face of the most partisan and obstructionist Congress in the nation’s history, Sanders has managed to win a sizable chunk of the states and their delegates by running what has been, for all intents and purposes, a single-issue campaign. His rallies have generated record numbers of supporters for the protest candidate bringing in enough in campaign contributions to outspend Clinton in major ad-buy markets.

Secretary Clinton, a veteran of the political battlefield, has had to tip her hat to the shockingly adept political skills of Sanders, who began the race promising to run an issues-based campaign, free of personal attacks and negativity. Yet, he has since enlisted a corps of surrogates and an army of online supporters, using them to divide the party between those who he has painted as a part of the Wall Street establishment from the rest: namely, himself and his supporters. Sanders has very effectively used his nearly invisible presence over a two-and-a-half decade political career to his advantage, when compared with the national spotlight fixed on Hillary Clinton since her husband ran for President in 1991.

Hillary Clinton has, herself, admitted that she is not a great politician, like President Obama and her husband. She is much more of a policy-driven leader. Her nuanced and detail-oriented plans for bridging gaps and building coalitions lack the simplicity and flash of the ready-fire-aim rhetoric that has inspired so much youthful devotion for Sanders. Hillary has apologized for what she feels were errors she has made in her career. Sanders, on the other hand, gives no ground and shows no such weakness. He does not apologize. The fiery speeches he barks for upward of an hour to thousands of fans have proven ground-zero for their highly contagious form of righteous anger.

Ultimately, I believe that the overall experience and enduring strength of Hillary Clinton will secure for her the nomination, the candidates’ joint custody of party enthusiasm notwithstanding. No, she may not be the most “qualified” candidate to run for president. She is, actually, the second most qualified after Thomas Jefferson. Furthermore, her path to victory has been planned well enough to give her a comfortable lead with a downhill finish, as compared to Sanders’ much longer uphill battle. Will Clinton win Rhode Island? Probably. If turnout is high, she will probably edge out Sanders. Rhode Island awards pledged delegates proportional to percentage of votes. I call Rhode Island at 53% to 47% in favor of Clinton.

The deeper question is: Have Sanders supporters invested so much in dividing themselves from the Democratic party in order to conquer Hillary Clinton that they will refuse to vote for her in the General Election? Clinton supporters almost unanimously agree they would vote for Sanders, if he becomes the party’s nominee. I hope, for all of our sake, that Senator Sanders, and his supporters, will do the same, and avoid (to steal a phrase from former Congressman Barney Frank) luxuriating in the purity of their own irrelevance. I hope they will vote for the Democratic nominee for President, whomever it turns out to be.