Pennsylvania governor urges party to ‘swing for 370’ electoral votes
Democrats spent two days in Denver trying to make sense of a political position the party has rarely occupied lately: victory. The What’s Next conference was planned months ago as a standard post-midterms working session — strategists poring over the latest results and plotting a path forward in a country dominated by President Donald Trump. Instead, the party arrived still celebrating what it considers a dream election, having won virtually every contested race, flipped U.S. Senate seats in Mississippi and South Carolina, turned Texas blue and won big majorities in Congress.
Stephanie Valencia, a political consultant and co-founder of Equis, which researches Latino voters, had figured the gathering would be more of the same. “I did not expect to be coming here with so much hope,” Valencia said. “For the first time we can see the outlines of a post-Trump era.”
The optimism stretched toward ambition. Speakers tossed around the word “supermajority,” and one data analyst casually discussed pushing for 60 seats in the Senate while displaying a slide suggesting there were winnable races in places like Missouri and Utah.
Former Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, one of several potential presidential candidates who attended, put the mood plainly. “Everybody’s happy about the results, but everybody’s looking over their shoulder saying, ‘Can we really be happy about this?’” Buttigieg said. He urged the party to celebrate while not taking future wins for granted.
Some at the conference warned that voters had not fallen back in love with Democrats, but were turning to them out of frustration over high prices, the Iran war and concerns about government corruption. No clear recipe emerged to address widespread dismay about affordability and the economy, though attendees expressed hope that they had the power to figure it out.
The new landscape was still sinking in for the activists who had worked the campaigns. Jason Delattre and several friends came to Denver from the Rio Grande Valley after working on Democratic campaigns in Texas, stunned at the opportunities now open to them. “We have to figure out what we’re going to do next,” said Delattre, who wore a cowboy hat and a pin for winning U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico. “We have so much power we didn’t have before,” said his friend, Jose Robbie Juarez.
Others saw longer-standing goals suddenly within reach. Some attendees voiced hope that statehood for Puerto Rico was finally possible. “It finally feels we’re going to get it done,” said Luis Davila, the Democratic chair on the island.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a possible White House contender, suggested the party should aim for a landslide win in the next presidential race. Rather than “going out and scrapping for 270” — the minimum electoral votes for victory — Shapiro said Democrats should be “fighting hard to swing for 370.” That would be five more Electoral College votes than Barack Obama won in his historic 2008 presidential campaign, the party’s previous high-water mark this century.
The setting encouraged the mood: a well-known music venue in one of Denver’s hippest neighborhoods, concert-style posters of politicians and operatives plastered on the walls, and distant snow-capped peaks framing the horizon outside.
Not everything fit the theme. A handful of protesters from the Sunrise Movement demonstrated outside the gathering Friday, complaining that it was sponsored by Majority Democrats, a group they described as more centrist and funded by wealthy businesspeople.
Inside, a couple of protesters interrupted what was supposed to be a triumphant appearance by Hakeem Jeffries, the likely new House speaker. They demanded a Green New Deal and an arms embargo against Israel, and one man shouted profanities at Jeffries and called him a “traitor” while being led from the auditorium. Jeffries brushed it off. “I’m from Brooklyn,” he said. “This is light work.”
Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, who is challenging New York Sen. Chuck Schumer for caucus leadership, appeared at the conference Friday. Van Hollen has allied himself with the party’s liberal wing and argued that voters have demanded change.
Many attendees waved off the signs of discord. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, who may run for president again, called the leadership fight a “family conversation” the party would have in Washington and welcomed signs of dissent. “I think this is a wonderful thing that we have right now, that we’re having a real discussion,” Booker said in an interview. “At a conference like this you’re seeing the future,” he added. “A new day is dawning in America.”
Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado said Democrats were “the big tent party.” “We have an ideological spectrum that covers virtually every element of Democratic thought,” Neguse said in an interview. “And I think that’s exciting.”