Tuesday's Bellwether North Carolina Election Did Have a Trump Factor by Larry C Johnson

Tuesday's election in North Carolina's 9th Congressional District was a bellwether and is good news for Donald Trump despite punditry and media nay saying.

But you would not know this from watching or reading the so-called journalists who are being paid to report news. They are  a pathetic, feckless, lazy lot. The special Congressional elections in North Carolina on Tuesday (September 10) exposes their incompetence and bias. The fake-news cable channels prior to Tuesday's election were painting a dire picture for Republican candidate, Dan Bishop. The nitwit pundits on CNN and MSNBC were describing the contest between Bishop and Democrat Dan McCready as a bellwether. Bishop was down in the polls by 17 points and McCready barely lost the fraud tainted election in 2018.

You must first understand why North Carolina was holding this election in an 0ff-election year. The 2018 contest, which was ostensibly won by the Republican candidate, Mark Harris, was declared invalid. The New York Times reported:

Mark Harris, the North Carolina Republican who nearly won a seat in Congress last year but saw his political fortunes collapse after the revelation that his campaign had financed a fraud-tainted voter-turnout effort, said on Tuesday that he would not run in a new election. . . .

Mr. Harris’s decision was not especially surprising in the wake of an evidentiary hearing last week in Raleigh, where state officials and witnesses described an absentee ballot effort that was rife with misconduct. Although Mr. Harris denied any personal wrongdoing, he testified that he had hired the contractor at the center of the scandal, L. McCrae Dowless Jr., and he acknowledged that he gave “incorrect” testimony to the state board last Thursday.

What a great set up for the Democrats. A corrupt Republican who tried to steal the election. And the Democrat? Dan McCready, a young, attractive and articulate candidate who served his country as a Marine. Cannot get better than that unless you change his name to Jesus Christ.

And the Dems and punditry were very excited about this new bite at the apple. The Washington Post's Jen Rubin weighed in:

In sum, the NC-9 is undergoing a rerun due to fraud that the GOP state party could have nipped in the bud, and the GOP nominee is the fellow who invested in a far-right website home to white nationalists. How is the GOP getting away with this?

Well, Evan McMullin and Mindy Finn, former Republicans who ran as an independent conservative presidential ticket in 2016 and now operate the nonpartisan StandUp Republic (SUR) and American Values PAC dedicated to good government, defense of the rule of law and opposition to racism, decided to step in. McMullin and Finn’s organizations plan to spend a total of $500,000 in the final weeks of the upcoming special election in the 9th Congressional District for advertisements across digital, broadcast television, cable and radio.

And North Carolina's major newspaper, the Charlotte Observer, went all in for the Democrat:

It should come as little surprise that this editorial board is endorsing Dan McCready in North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District special election. We endorsed McCready, a moderate Democrat, in the 9th District race last fall that was tainted by absentee ballot fraud. “McCready has far more potential to effectively represent the 9th, and to help change the tone in Congress,” we said then.

We still believe that, and we believe that McCready’s opponent in this special election, Republican Dan Bishop, has shown himself unfit to represent the 9th. Bishop is the unrepentant author of HB2, a discriminatory law that cost Charlotte and North Carolina millions of dollars in business and lost events. “There’s no Mecklenburg legislator we can remember who has done more damage to Charlotte,” we said about him in 2016.

How could the Democrats not win? I think there is only one answer--Donald Trump. Prior to Tuesday's election the Democrats were feeling very confident that voters angry with the racism and arrogance of Trump would turn out in mass and put another Democrat into Nancy Pelosi's stable.

Whoops. Republican Dan Bishop won by a significant margin--almost 4000 votes compared to the narrow win by Harris in 2018 (only 905 votes separated the winner from the loser). Any mea culpas from the lame stream media pundits. Nope. They went into full spin mode. They broke out the lipstick and started doing a pig makeover. But lipstick on a pig does not change the reality--the pig is still a pig.

I believe the numbers for the 2018 contest and the results from this week's election tells a different and, I think, a dramatic story.

In the November 2018 election Republican candidate Mark Harris eked out a win with 49.30% of the vote. His Democrat challenger got 48.9%. It was a 905 vote difference--139,246 for Harris and 138,341 for Dan McCready. And he did that with some cheating.

So what happens with no cheating? Are the Democrats so energized that they will march through a brick wall to get to the polls? Are the Republicans so demoralized that they will sit home and pout? And the answer to these questions is a resounding NO.

Dan Bishop won by 3,937 votes. Quite decisive compared to 2018.

The real story is the paltry turnout for an election that attracted a lot of Democrat and Republican money. In 2018 there were 277,587 total votes--139,246 for the Republican and 138,341 for the Democrat. With so much ostensibly on the line this time, the conventional wisdom of the pundits was that energized Democrats would come out en masse and send a message to Trump.

Nope. Total votes? 188,225--96,081 for Republican Bishop and 92,144 for two time loser McCready.

Despite the Washington and media hype surrounding the election, North Carolinians treated this like any off-year election--with a shrug of the metaphorical shoulders.

Democrats and anti-Trump Republican groups pumped money into the election and got nothing. The Republicans also pumped money in and gained ground in terms of vote margin compared to the 2018 tainted contest.

If the Democrats are pinning hopes for victory in 2020 on a campaign built around demonizing Donald Trump, the results from the 9th District of North Carolina strongly suggest that is a fool's mission. Trump's best ally are the Egyptian Democrats. Why the Egyptians? Because the Democrats are in DeNial (i.e. The Nile--my apologies for a lame pun). A typical example of the Democrat denial comes courtesy of Politico:

While the GOP can celebrate the election of a new congressman, Dan Bishop, his 2-point victory in a district President Donald Trump carried by 12 points in 2016 continues a worrisome trend for the party, which suffered heavy losses in the 2018 midterms and has not seen the political environment improve as Trump gears up for reelection.

Trump cannot win a second term without improving his political position, and Democrats know it, casting Bishop’s narrow win as a sign of progress in North Carolina. But Democrats also saw worrying trends of their own on Tuesday, as their candidate Dan McCready benefited from a surge in metropolitan support that would have brought them victory — if not for an even stronger swell in rural support for Bishop and the GOP.

There was no surge for either candidate. Democrats and Republicans attracted fewer votes this go round compared to 2018. But, the victory belonged to the guy who tied himself to Donald Trump. I call that a Bellwether.

Comments

[Factotum]

In 2018, Democrats ran a stealth campaign telling voters Trump was going to take away your Medicare and Social Security.

Pelosi claimed they won their new house majority in 2018 making "health care" their central campaign issue. Trump in fact was trying to reform both Medicare and Social Security so it would not be "taken away". Pelosi turned his reform attempts into a scare campaign.

Be careful in 2020, there is the Democrat (1) public campaign, (2)their underground below the radar campaign and (3) their real agenda - take back the power of the public checkbook to hand out favors to their friends.

How do you become a third world nation (city, county or state): raid the treasury and hire your relatives. That is the Democrat's real agenda.

[akaPatience]

Yep, the NC-9 election was considered a major bellwether -- until the GOP candidate won! SO delicious a development.

I wonder if Sharpiegate may have helped matters? Cable news remained hung up on that absurdity far too long, until the John Bolton story mercifully (for them) displaced it. BTW, why do I suspect he may have a future with CNN???

The leftist MSM seem to wish for the stupidity of its consumers, constantly gaslighting them in the hope of distracting from current peace and prosperity that the POTUS is delivering, perhaps clumsily at times, but much more welcomed than the insane blather coming from his potential 2020 opponents.

Thank you Larry for providing salient election statistics, AND for the usual riotous, non-PC metaphor ..."Cannot get better than that unless you change his name to Jesus Christ." LOL!

[blue peacock]

Larry

I'n not sure this is a bellwether. While the "political" media is always in horse-race mode and everything is always so consequential to them, the voters by and large are not really paying much attention.

If I recall correctly, Trump was 1% in the polls this time in 2015. And we know how well the "polls" did in the 2016 general election. I remember the NY Times with their "stellar" pollster Nate Silver giving Hillary something like a 90% probability of winning.

At the end of the day the 2020 election will depend on many factors not least being who the Democratic opponent will be and the state of the economy. Next summer will be a good time to start paying some attention on the state of play in the elections.

Having said this it seems to me that the Democrats still haven't got the zeitgeist that elected Trump in the first place. They've spent a good 2+ years on "Russia Collusion" that has turned out to be a turd for them and what are they focused on now? For all the chaos they accuse Trump of, they seem to be even more chaotic in their lack of strategy.

[Diana C]

I watched coverage of the Trump rally in NC. It was clear that Trump was working hard for Bishop. Trump clearly knows how much he needs more Republicans in the House in order to further his many agendas.

I have never been one to attend outdoor concerts for rock stars, much less politicians. So, it is always puzzling to me that so many people attend Trump's events. I want to be persuaded by logic, not emotion. That is the reason my boys call me a Vulcan. But.....my father's youngest brother, my uncle who is more like an ornery older brother, just promised that he was coming to get me with an extra MAGA hat in hand for me to wear if Trump ever showed up in a location we could get to easily. (He is a true Trump fan. I'm more interested in getting my state to rethink the person who is now in our Governor's mansion.

But my point is.... after watching that rally, I went to bed that night KNOWING the Republican would win.

[MP98]

"From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.”
― Alexander Fraser Tytler

His other quote is when a people discover that they can vote themselves free money, it is the beginning of the end of democracy.

[Jack]

Tocqueville noted that too.

[Diana C]

We are all "useful idiots" as far as the leftists who have gained status as the powerful elite are concerned. They believe we are just too stupid to understand anything.

[vig]

Larry, Trump (as GOP unifiar from TeaParty to Trump Partisan of American interests) sets America on its best way forwards, while the Democrats were: Always? The countries traitors, concerning the American Interest and its basic values?

******
It's not that I envy your emotional heights, besides I am way to old to care about the future much. But longterm the re-alignment he necessarily produces might be interesting. Concerning all non-America-Firsters it might be interesting to watch. Alas ...

[eakens]

The republicans will merely just point out what the democrats have been spending the past 2 years doing for the people....

[James Lung]

We're in Greensboro and not able to vote in that election. Sincerely hoping that the results are an indication that Gov. Cooper will not get a second term. Was not aware that Bishop had so much to do with HB2. Good for him.

[Fred]

Factotum,

You left out "Russia!" and the Mueller Report = Impeachment. If you watched any of the Democratic debate last night you would have been treated to a firm consensus on the left that America was founded on racism, they will be doing gun confiscation, open borders, immediate citizenship for DACA reciptients and free everything for everone.

[Thirdeye]

A bellwether is a sheep with a bell hanging off its neck, with the rest of the flock trained to follow the sound of the bell. It has nothing to do with weather.

[Jim Ticehurst]

Larry...I took an Interest in this 9th District Race..and looked up some facts about Mecklenburg County...and Charlotte..N.C. and can understand why so many Democrats there voted for the Republican Dan Bishop..That area is the 2nd Most Religious City in the United States..with Moderate Democrats..who Have Bibles..and are gun owners..They don't like the TONE of the New Socialist Democrat party..that tends to be HUumanist..and wants to take Guns away..It was also interesting to do a NC Web search on Population Growth.. see all the Data on Charlotte..Get down to Population Growth..See The Pie Charts..and note The Dramatic Increase In Migrant Immigration to Charlotte by Race.. in the last Few years..through 2017..18..making it the 2nd fastest Growing City in the United States.Population Wise..This is all Urban Growth...so is there and attempt to Gerrymander..by manipulation of Urban Populations...Interesting Stuff....