Vote-Stealing Battle in Florida Portends More Distrust in System for 2020.
* Florida emerged from the 2018 midterms with a fortified reputation as the nation’s most competitive battleground, a state whose political culture most closely reflects the slashing political style of its adopted son, President Trump — with candidates focused on energizing voters with visceral, at times over-the-top, messages.
That approach is “not a good long-term strategy for the party or for the country,” said Miami-area Representative Carlos Curbelo, one of two Republican House members in Florida to lose their seats to Democrats.
“A lot of Republicans are happy because we had successful statewide candidates, but those races were very, very close, and we lost some races too, especially in South Florida,” said Mr. Curbelo, 38, who bucked his party by adopting moderate positions on environmental issues and immigration. “As for 2020, I’m really worried that it is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.” . .
A number of Democrats have also started to question the legitimacy of the electoral process in much starker terms. In addition to raising the usual questions about voter suppression and sinister motives by G.O.P. lawmakers, Democrats are flipping the script and using Republicans’ tactics against them.
Mr. Booker said last week that the governor’s race in Georgia was being “stolen” from Stacey Abrams, an African-American, by Brian Kemp, who as secretary of state pushed for the kind of strict proof-of-identity voting requirements that Democrats say are intended to disproportionately impact poorer and minority voters. . .
Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio made the same claim, albeit more bluntly. “If Stacey Abrams doesn’t win in Georgia, they stole it. It’s clear. . .
As Mr. Nelson and Mr. Gillum ended their campaigns over the weekend, Democrats began regrouping and assessing lessons learned — and began fretting, yet again, that they had failed to match the Republicans’ intensity. . .
During the 2000 recount, Al Gore was criticized for not fighting with the same hardnose tactics as Republicans, who employed an aggressive political and public relations component to accompany their legal efforts.
But not all Democrats think that borrowing the Republicans’ rhetoric is sound strategy.
“It’s not constructive at all, and it’s just appealing to our base,” said Ed Rendell, the former Democratic governor of Pennsylvania who advised Mr. Gore’s campaign in 2000. “It’s destructive to the process.”
Other Democrats insist that they are simply adjusting to the new reality.
“In a better world, when they go low we go high,” said Philippe Reines, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee at the time of the 2000 recount, and a longtime aide to Mrs. Clinton. “In the world we’re living in, it’s hell no, we’re not giving up that seat without a fight.”'
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/18/us/politics/florida-recount-voter-fraud.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
