Democrats’ intervention in Republican primaries is now a well-documented phenomenon.
The playbook for this electioneering scheme was the 2012 Missouri GOP Senate primary contest, in which Democratic incumbent Claire McCaskill’s campaign promoted Representative Todd Akin, who she assumed was unpalatable to the Missouri general electorate. Her bet paid off when Aiken imploded after claiming in an interview with a local reporter about abortion that legitimate rape victims rarely get pregnant. Since then, Democrats have been trying to produce similar outcomes.
But now, the stakes are much higher. Democrats constantly remind us how “democracy” itself hangs in the balance. And yet Democrats have directly intervened on behalf of Trump-backed candidates in numerous Republican primaries across the country. From helping John Gibbs beat Peter Meijer in Michigan to assisting once-fringe gubernatorial candidates Doug Mastriano and Kari Lake in Pennsylvania and Arizona, respectively, Democrats seem to be doing everything they can to give the people they claim are the greatest threat to the republic a leg up.
The latest target of their cynical ploy is New Hampshire’s second congressional district, where a Democratic PAC is boosting pro-Trump Republican Bob Burns over Keene mayor George Hansel. Hansel is endorsed by Chris Sununu, one of the most popular governors in the country, and Democrats know he would pose a much more formidable general-election challenge for incumbent Annie Kuster. Burns doesn’t have the same views as Mastriano and Lake, but his MAGA bona fides set him up poorly for a general election in this swing district.
Taking stock of Democrats’ forays into Republican Party politics is crucial. For years, they’ve shed crocodile tears about the state of American democracy. To be clear, some of the threats they’ve highlighted are legitimate. But we can now see that, whatever Democrats may say about “democracy,” they’re cynical enough to play games by boosting candidates they’d otherwise disdain in the hope of improving the party’s chances in November.