By Jim Miller
Last week I had the pleasure of going to see a talk at Alliance San Diego by Steve Phillips, author of Brown is the New White: How the Demographic Revolution Has Created a New American Majority. The central point that Phillips makes is that, at present, we already have a new American majority of 51% of the electorate comprised of progressive people of color and like-minded whites.
The problem we face, Phillips argues, is that we are failing to mobilize that majority because many in the consultant class and the upper reaches of the Democratic Party don’t believe the numbers and/or are stuck in an old pattern of chasing after the elusive “swing voter” typically identified as white who could be persuaded to vote for a Republican or a Democrat.
Hence, those of us in progressive and Democratic circles may be missing a historic opportunity by wasting a huge amount of resources nationally and locally on organizing and electoral tactics that fail to deliver. Instead, Phillips insists, we should be investing in short and long term efforts to talk to and mobilize the new majority of voters, many of whom are currently being ignored.
Those underrepresented voters, largely people of color, have become completely invisible to campaigns that focus exclusively on the “likely voter.” Such voters may not have shown up in the past but, Phillips’ argument goes, would show up if they were offered bold policy proposals that had a real impact on their lives.
What kind of proposals? In an excerpt from his book published in The Nation, Phillips notes that:
America has a gargantuan racial wealth gap, and that gap impacts nearly all public policy issues affecting the New American Majority—an electoral bloc I define as made up of progressive people of color and progressive whites. (That’s 51 percent of all eligible voters.) The median wealth, or net worth, of a white family in 2013 was $134,000, while the median wealth for a black family was $11,000. Latino families have a net worth of $13,900, and Native American families have a net worth of $5,700. For Asian American families that amount is $91,440, and much of that is attributable to the fact that 74 percent of all Asian American adults are immigrants, with many of them coming from the professional class of their home countries . . .
Today’s racial wealth gap is a modern-day manifestation of the fact that America was built on land stolen from Native Americans and Mexicans and developed by the backbreaking labor of African Americans, Latinos, and Asian Americans. Given this reality, we all have to ask ourselves what is the right and just thing to do from a public policy standpoint to close this gap in a country that professes a belief in justice and equality. If progressives want to vastly improve the conditions in underserved and underdeveloped communities, capture the imagination of the New American Majority, and secure its lasting loyalty, then bigger and bolder policy solutions are required.
In that same piece, Phillips argues that proposing things like reparations for African Americans and returning stolen lands to Native Americans might be the kinds of ideas that start to excite and activate those who have previously been on the outside of the political process. The point is not that these things are politically “realistic,” but rather that they would stir the imagination.
Phillips continues by admitting that:
I don’t expect these things—returning of land and reparations—to happen anytime soon, but if they sound outrageous, then by comparison, other policy proposals to correct injustice—making massive investments in public education, enacting comprehensive immigration reform, establishing universal voter registration, ending mass incarceration, adopting “Polluter Pays” taxes nationwide, and imposing a wealth tax on the richest 1 percent—should seem modest by comparison.
Championing economic justice is more than moral and just. It’s also the way to win elections. In a changing population where people of color are nearly 40 percent of the country and white allies and advocates of justice make up another quarter of the country’s population, speaking boldly and unapologetically to the causes of inequality has proven to be good and smart politics. Ironically, progressive leaders and influencers are doing exactly the wrong thing by going after small goals. Politics and policy are inextricably intertwined. People of color vote in lower numbers because many of them feel that most of the US public policy agenda has little relevance to their lives.
Thus a politics that asks “What is Justice?” should be seen not as an impractical exercise to be dismissed; instead it is a practical tool to mobilize a winning majority for progressive goals. The night that I saw Phillips, he spoke not of reparations as a solution to the racial wealth gap but of a “wealth tax” that could end poverty in the United States.
As I sat and listened to Phillips’ proposal, I thought of both the energy that similar ideas have brought to the Sanders campaign nationally and the irony that a big part of the new American majority that he speaks of is now being seen by the Clinton campaign as a “fire wall” against the “political revolution” Bernie is trying to spark. By emphasizing the politics of identity as opposed to the politics of class rather than looking at the profound ways in which they intersect, the Clinton campaign may successfully divide and conquer to win the primary but end up diffusing rather than coopting populism on the left. This would be a shame.
At the same time, I could also not help but think of the potential power of a movement that was able to overcome this dilemma and marry these political ends as Phillips suggests. Of course, to do this would mean moving away from neoliberal politics and charting a course that many in the Democratic Party establishment are loathe to engage.
Finally, it was hard to miss how aptly Phillips’ critique of the failure of many in the pundit and consultant class to envision the possibility of mobilizing this new majority applies to San Diego. The fact is that we live in a city where the potential of the demographic shift has simply not lured enough people in progressive circles to see the benefit of bringing in less likely voters and building a new San Diego majority. Instead, we are trapped in a defeatist narrative that only sees a road to victory that leads North of 8 and West of 5.
But perhaps, following Phillips’ lead, as we limp through the sadly wasted opportunity that is the 2016 election cycle where (Godspeed to the last minute candidacies of the moment) local Democrats have failed to offer a well-planned, strategic challenge to Faulconer, we can start the hard, long-term work that it takes to build a progressive base for the future making use of the minimum wage fights in June and November and other issues as focal points.
This means we need to dedicate more resources to organizations like Alliance San Diego who are already engaging and mobilizing underrepresented voters but could do so at a much larger scale. It also means fostering progressive candidates rather than waiting for saviors from the political establishment. As I’ve written before, we need to build a bench.
In addition to this, we should take Phillips’ advice and offer not bland moderates and gutless triangulation but true progressives and big ideas that might actually get people to start thinking about what a more just San Diego would look like even if that scares a few white suburban swing voters.
The bottom line is that before progressive ideas can win the day, we need to change the narrative rather than accommodate ourselves to the story that we are doomed to fail.
Jim Miller
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This is exactly what Bernie Sanders is doing. He’s taking the arcane world of finance and the tax code and breaking it down into simple terms that make it clear what has been going on that has caused all the economic gains to go to the 1% and what needs to be done to decrease the inequality gap and benefit the 99%. Tuition free college, Medicare for all and taxing the rich to pay for it are simple concepts that most people can wrap their heads around and appreciate without getting into credit default swaps and hedge fund activities.
Rewriting the tax code to benefit the 99% and diminish inequality is the most realistic way to correct what’s wrong; a wealth tax would also be propitious. Bernie breaks it down into simple terms so that the majority of citizens can understand what’s going on without having to read Piketty’s Capital.
The new demographics should be sufficient to elect a Democratic President. The gerrymandered Congress will take longer before the will of the majority makes itself felt.
Building the bench is really what the Dem party leaders fail to see. Great article.
And that means getting more political participation at the very local levels of government: school boards, water boards, hospital boards, special district boards. I find that gives great name recognition, networking opps, and a real clear view on dedicating oneself to public service.
Let’s get those toes wet folks and keep on going up and up.
Thanks for a good summary of our changing demographics and the slow response of political parties to these transitions. Parties are designed to maintain the political status quo. Don’t count on them to respond any time soon to these emerging younger/more diverse voters.
Likewise, participating in politics is not just about running for office. It’s important to first try serving on boards and commissions, volunteering for non-profits, and organizing other volunteers to support policy changes on issues that people care about- all important tasks that will help with an actual campaign, and work in elected office.
These are also authentic and valuable ways to learn leadership skills and develop problem solving strategies in the community. (Ideally: we should have “service learning” in schools to give young people an early introduction to this concept: learn by doing, contribute to your neighborhood.)
Few successful candidates for an elected position are overnight sensations. Chances are, they have been doing this type of “behind the scenes” community work for many years, before actually running for office.
PS- Ed Harris and I will have effective mayoral campaigns. Not traditional, but certainly more effective than the non-campaigns that were the case before we filed our candidate papers yesterday.
And while it’s true both of us entered the process late, at least we had the courage to enter at all.
Both Ed and I are committed to a better future for San Diego. We know that won’t change without a mayoral campaign and debates, community discussions and conversations about leadership (or lack it) in City Hall.
I have historically rejected much of what the current political status quo has offered. As a “No Party Preference” candidate this year, I welcome the support of thoughtful voters, including progressives, people of color, non-traditional voters, and independent thinking people of any and all political persuasions, who are tired of San Diego’s “politics as usual.”