He was a careful investigator and a keen observer. directors Robert Mueller and James Comey, which praised his “outstanding” work recruiting confidential sources and exposing terrorist financing networks. Most of his career he had spent in counterterrorism, investigating sleeper cells and racking up commendations signed by the F.B.I. He was a 16-year veteran of the F.B.I.: 38, tall and powerfully built, with buzzed black hair and a black goatee. special agent, lived with his wife and two young children, and he lay in bed for a few minutes, running through the mental checklist of cases and meetings and phone calls, the things that generally made him feel as if his life was in order. It was not yet dawn in Shakopee, Minn., the Minneapolis suburb where Albury, an F.B.I. 29, 2017, Terry Albury awoke with a nagging sense of foreboding.
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He was an adviser to Governor Jim Hunt (00.) He blogs at Support local journalism with a subscription to The Fayetteville Observer. Gary Pearce is a former journalist and political consultant. Given all that, as they look to 20, Democrats might ask how they got tagged with the most toxic political label of 2020. Kennedy in 1960 to Joe Biden this year, Democrats usually nominate moderates over liberals for President. This year, Latino voters showed they’re not monolithically liberal or Democratic-leaning. How about Black Democrats? In 2019, Pew said, 43% called themselves moderate, 29%, liberal and 25%, conservative. More than half said they are moderates (38%) or conservatives (14%). Who are they? A Pew Research survey last January found that 47% of Democratic and Democratic-leaning registered voters describe themselves as liberal. As they say, “It’s about who we are as a party.” The slogan is a flash point now as Democrats debate the future of the party.
One legislator in North Carolina told me Democratic candidates here had a hard time deflecting TV ads and mailers tying them to “defund the police.” Other candidates didn’t have Biden’s armor. It’s hard to paint your opponent as soft on crime when you attack him for being too hard on crime. In the second debate, he attacked Biden for passing a tough crime-fighting bill in the 1990s. Trump undercut his own argument against Biden. He promised he wouldn’t take away private health insurance. He promised he wouldn’t raise taxes on people making under $400,000 a year. Third, he made clear where he stood in the fall campaign.īiden told 60-70 million Americans who watched the debates that he wasn’t for defunding the police. Second, he had an image as a moderate he even was criticized for it in the Democratic primaries, where he vanquished more liberal opponents. How did Biden escape the damage? How did he win a 306-223 electoral vote victory, exactly the same as Trump’s victory in 2016?įirst, Biden was a familiar figure. That suspicion and fear hurt Democrats in some Latino communities and helped Trump win some Black male votes. Democrats, as one critic put it, can come across as “moralistic snobs.”īut nothing cut as deeply as the suspicion that Democrats excused crime, looting and rioting, as well as the fear they would handcuff the police and fail to protect innocent citizens’ lives and property.
There were cultural, even personality, factors. As did fears that Democrats would raise taxes, take away health insurance, hurt small businesses and kill jobs - the familiar “socialist” litany. More: Democratic Whip James Clyburn: 'Defund the police' cost Democrats seats, hurt Black Lives Matter movementĭemocrats might wonder how goals like “end police racism,” “stop unjustified killings” and even “reform the police” got so far out of whack.Ĭongressman James Clyburn, whose endorsement of Biden was the most decisive event in the presidential race, blamed “defund the police” for Democrats losing a congressional race in South Carolina.Īs we get distance from and gain perspective on the election, it’s clear Donald Trump energized a “white wave” of working-class voters that overwhelmed Democrats’ hope of a “blue wave” that would sweep Republicans from control of the U.S. More: Trump loss proves urban areas cannot be ignored More: Boosting rural voters in NC and elsewhere will improve healthcare “Defund the police” was the most damaging. The simplest explanation is that Biden was able to separate himself from a cluster of negative issues and images that cost other Democratic candidates. It demonstrates why Democrats lost races for Congress and state legislatures in North Carolina and nationwide even as President-elect Joe Biden won a sweeping victory. In science and philosophy, it’s called “Occam’s Razor:” The problem-solving principle that the simplest explanation is usually the right one.