While running for President, Donald Trump promised to build a wall. Well, there is going to be one. Just not between the United States and Mexico. The wall will be an ideological wall. Democrats will do their best to take back the House of Representatives, the Senate, state legislatures, and governor’s mansions. This wall will prevent the more noxious parts of Trump’s agenda and for that matter, the conservative agenda.

I do not have the pull as an organization such as Daily Kos or many other places. But I do have an endorsement portfolio. I have structured my endorsement portfolio similar to Daily Kos’s endorsement page. Which by the way, you should check out.

Offices

I am going to focus on state legislative races and the U.S. House of Representatives. Primarily, those are my biggest interests and less expensive races than statewide races for U.S. Senate and gubernatorial elections. Although, this could potentially be changed if I ever had enough of a reach that would make a difference. The main statewide office that I would focus on if I did believe I could make a difference would be Secretary of State. The Secretary of State in various states have more control over voting rights and increasingly have a bigger effect on their priority legislation. If there was another statewide election, it would be Attorney General. Attorney Generals have some control over legislative priorities. There may be some other offices that I would potentially look at to endorse. The local offices would be city council and mayor for certain cities.  It would depend on other factors as set forth, largely below. Over the next year, I will be rolling out endorsements for candidates for various positions. I wanted to be transparent with how I was going to roll out my endorsements.

Political parties

I don’t want to make it a 100% rule that I will only endorse Democrats. As a general rule, in an open seat, I would endorse the Democrat over a Republican. But in a red seat, where a material change could take place, I would endorse a more moderate Republican. If a moderate Republican is the best person that could win a seat and the other option is insane, I would endorse the moderate Republican. If it is a Democrat who doesn’t fit into my endorsement criteria, I would not endorse the Democrat.

Choosing a candidate

1. The most important thing that I am looking for is a winnable candidate. I am looking for someone who can win if they get the right resources, attention, and information about the candidate. So what I am looking for is the right district, the right state, or the right precincts to be able to determine if someone can win.
2. I want my endorsement to stand out and to make a difference. Part of why I am only choosing smaller races is that I want an endorsement or a small influx of cash to be able to make a difference in a race. So drilling down from choosing the right races to get involved in, I want to see how much the funding is for the opponents in the seat to be able to try and make a difference and how expensive the media.  market is for the seat.
3. The district or the precincts matter. What matters, inherently, is that I am choosing the right person for the job. I want my candidates that I am endorsing to hold favorable positions but I do not need them to necessarily follow a checklist for my endorsement. I have two non-negotiables: (A) the candidate cannot support vote suppression policies. A candidate cannot support mandatory voter id bills. Or any other bill that would impose id requirements on voters who are merely attempting to vote. Candidates who oppose automatic voting rights restoration for felons will never get endorsed. In an ideal world, my endorsed candidate would support automatic voter registration either by co-sponsorship of legislation or by vote. They will also support the restoration of voting rights to felons. (B) I support pro-choice policies. I understand that pro-life Democrats or even pro-life Republicans will sometimes need to be endorsed at various times and need to be elected for the greater good. I also understand that in some positions these opinions on abortion will not even come into play, such as Mayor of cities. But there are some places where a pro-choice Democrat cannot be elected. So I do not necessarily view support of pro-choice policies as absolutely critical. But if you do vote or support traditional pro-life policies, you have to support policies such as Medicaid expansion or policies to expand healthcare access to all. Further, I would like to see the care of children expand beyond the unborn to the entirety of a child’s life.