The Off-Year Elections and What They Mean

Tea Party nemesis Republican Chris Christie won a second term as New Jersey governor by a wide margin - more than 20 points - over the Democratic challenger.  Across the river in New York, progressive Bill de Blasio won in a landslide, 73-24, over his Republican opponent, thereby becoming the first Democratic mayor of New York in two decades.  In Virginia, Democrat Terry McAuliffe won the governorship by 2.5% over Tea Party favorite Ken Cuccinelli.

So what is the significance of these off-year election results and what do they  mean for 2014 and 2016?

Bi-partisanship works in a blue state.  Democrats generally believe that government can help people and will work with a Republican who is not too extreme.

• Christie is a popular governor who has made much of his ability to work with Democrats.  His handling of the damage wreaked by Superstorm Sandy was universally praised.  Christie had the support of several state Democratic leaders and politicians and he was endorsed by most of the state's newspapers, including the Newark Star-Ledger. 
• According to exit polls, Christie won majorities of women and Hispanics and increased his vote among African-Americans and union households.  Still, his percentage of the vote (60%) was less than the 1985 victory of Republican Tom Kean (69%).   
• New Jersey Democrats retained control of the legislature in spite of Christie's landslide win.

The Tea Party is down but not out.  They are still passionate about their causes and vote in droves when they are.

• Tea Party extremism is not as popular in New Jersey as in many other states.  Christie's victory there says nothing about his ability to win the Republican Presidential primary should he choose to run in 2016. 
• Even after the government shutdown, Republicans almost managed to win the governorship in Virginia.  Republican candidate Ken Cuccinelli made "Obamacare" the issue in the weeks after the shutdown and almost pulled off a victory. 
• Six per cent of the vote in Virginia went to the Libertarian candidate.  This was double the margin of McAuliffe's victory.  Though no one can say how this Libertarian vote would have split, I think it's fair to say that McAuliffe owed his victory almost as much to this as Bill Clinton did to the Ross Perot vote in 1992 and George Bush to the Florida Ralph Nader vote in 2000.  (Okay, hanging chads and the Supreme Court had more to do with Bush's victory than the Nader vote.  Still Nader's 97,000 votes dwarfed the 537 vote margin by which Bush won Florida and thus the Presidency.)

Money and voter turnout (still) win elections. 

• McAuliffe had a big edge over Cuccinelli in money spent as did Democrats in the New Jersey legislative races.
• Thank God for the Democrats of (especially) northern Virginia.  As they did in the Presidential elections of 2008 and 2012, voters in the northern counties turned out in enough numbers to counteract the majority Republican vote in other parts of the state.
• Obama's Presidential victories in 2008 and 2012 were the result of the same dynamics.  He outspent his opponents and voter turnout was key. 
• Citizens United will bring essentially unlimited money into the 2014 and 2016 elections, primarily on the Republican side. Democrats had better begin planning now on how they will energize their base to a) not lose the Senate in 2014, b) pickup at least a few seats in the gerry-mandered House districts, and c) win the 2016 Presidential election. 

New York City is (still) overwhelmingly Democratic, progressive and ethnic.

• In electing progressive Bill de Blasio by nearly 50 points, New Yorkers returned to their roots.  The most liberal of the candidates in the Democratic field, de Blasio campaigned on a program to lessen New York's gap between the rich and the poor - provide universal pre-K, end stop-and-frisk, build or preserve 200,000 units of affordable housing.
• He is the fourth Italian-American to serve as mayor of the city.  He joins fellow Italian-American New York Governor Andrew Cuomo in running one of the most progressive cities in one of the most progressive states in the country.  De Blasio's  maternal grandparents were Italian immigrants.  He is married to an African-American woman and his inter-racial family was at the center of his campaign. 
• At 6' 5", he is 15" taller than the first Italian-American mayor of New York, Fiorello LaGuardia.  Let's hope height is not inversely proportional to ability.  Fiorello LaGuardia, a progressive, reformist "New Deal Republican", is widely regarded as one of the 2 or 3 greatest mayors in US history.

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The photo of Governor Christie and President Obama is from The Governor's Office/Tim Larsen.