Kentucky Democrats and GOP push for support in Trump-Harris race

Flanked on both sides by houses with flags supporting Donald Trump, Amy and Krista Heckmann say they have become accustomed to pedestrians stopping on Clarks Lane to take a photo of Kamala Harris’ flag hanging from their porch.

“We’ve gotten mail from neighbors we don’t know and have never met saying, ‘Thank you so much for your flag; we’re hoping for the best in November,'” Amy said last week in a conversation about the family. porch in the Schnitzelburg neighborhood of Louisville.

The couple said they have a “cordial” relationship with their two neighbors — one did not answer when a Courier Journal reporter tried to make contact that evening, while the other homeowner was unavailable. But with the presidential election looming next week, they are aware of the optics their three houses exhibit.

“They’ve been very respectful neighbors. We’ve never had any problems,” Amy said. “…But we probably don’t have much in common.”

The Heckmanns use their home to get their message across. Others are still busy knocking on doors in the final days of the 2024 campaign season, with Trump and Harris at the top of the ballot, but also races for all 100 seats in the State Houseas well as openings in the Kentucky Senate, Louisville Metro Council and other boards.

As Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz campaigned in Louisville last week, Kentucky was deep red the first state called for Trump on Election Day four years agoand you can expect the Republican former president to wear it again in 2024. He won the state by more than 25 points in both 2016 and 2020, and University of Kentucky political science professor Stephen Voss expects a similar margin this year.

Bobbie Coleman, chairman of the Republican Party of Hardin County, just south of Louisville, said support for Trump in her neck of the woods is stronger than ever. Republicans in the region do are starting to embrace early votingshe said, after many Republican voters let their guard down four years ago.

But Logan Gatti, chairman of the Democratic Party of Louisville, said that while Kentucky is not a swing state, that does not mean party members are caving to the Republican Party. The stakes are too high.

“Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina were not considered Democratic states for a long time, and now suddenly they are — well, not all of a sudden — but now they are states that are in play,” Gatti said Thursday. “We clearly have a significant deficit when it comes to our presidential turnout for the respective candidates. But you know what? We are going to try to shift the narrative as much as possible.”

An increase in voter interest

With 1,659,088 registered Republicans, 1,508,617 registered Democrats and 380,431 voters in other parties, Secretary of State Michael Adams expects high turnout across Kentucky, although he did not have a formal forecast last week. Long lines at polling stations are possible on November 5, he encouraged early voting between October 31 and November 2.

Like Adams, Bob Babbage has kept a close eye on voter registration numbers.

The former Democratic state auditor and secretary of state said recent trends have shown more people are registering — the most recent four-year allotment included about 12,500 voters, he said, a figure three times higher than the previous four-year period . Of that group of voters, about 20% did not register as Democrat or Republican, but of the approximately 10,000 remaining individuals, “for every Democratic registrant, you had 15 Republican registrations.”

“It’s usually more Rs than Ds. It’s been more Rs than Ds for about a decade,” says Babbage, who now works as a lobbyist. Co-founder of Babbage. And while he recommended against drawing sweeping conclusions from these numbers, “that is an indicator of some Republican interest that perhaps no one saw coming.”

Needless to say, Babbage expects Trump to win the Bluegrass State by his usual margin. And Voss, who spoke to The Courier Journal about an hour before attending last week a forum in Louisville with US Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnellWhile we may see “a small shift in support for Trump,” you can still expect the former president to carry the state again.

However, how his presence on the ballot affects Republicans in competitive local races will be worth monitoring.

Some candidates in Kentucky have tied their own campaigns to Trump.

In Northern Kentucky, candidate TJ Roberts’ campaign website touts him as someone who “has dedicated his life to protecting the constitutional principles that made America great,” a nod to the former president’s famous slogan, and an outspoken Trump -supporter. online.

Josh Calloway, an incumbent from Irvington, keeps track of social media of how many days it has been since the second assassination attempt on Trump. His district includes parts of Hardin County, where Coleman said a large majority of yard signs supported presidential candidates behind Trump — he took 62.5% of the vote there in 2016 and 61% in 2020.

But Trump “has damaged the Republican brand” in suburbs and affluent areas bordering Kentucky’s larger cities, Voss said, along with factors such as a crackdown on abortions in the wake of Roe v. Wade’s repeal and other culture war issues that have affected the alienated voters. . Ken Fleming, a sitting president in Louisville, makes no reference to Trump on his campaign website but highlights how he has sponsored bills supporting maternal health care and access to child care.

“Voters are tired of political polarization, but it’s the kind of trap they can’t get out of because they’re actually responding to these messages that they find so annoying,” the professor said. “As long as fear mongering pays off for campaigns, they will continue to use it no matter how many voters regret their own sins.”

Presidential race rhetoric that is difficult to escape

“Fear mongering,” as Voss put it, is virtually impossible to avoid these days. Both presidential candidates have framed the race as one where democracy is at stake.

Harris labeled Trump a “fascist” at a town hall last week, citing reporting by The Atlantic that the former president praised Adolf Hitler’s generals during his term of office. That’s what her campaign said she plans to give her closing speech this week at the site where Trump spoke on the morning of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

Trump has now called Harris a “fascist” at least five times. The New York Times reported this in Septemberand told participants at a rally last month that they “will no longer have a country” if she is elected, underscoring debunked claims that migrant gangs taking over cities in the US because of the border policies she and President Joe Biden supported.

It’s all hard to escape, even in a state like Kentucky, where Trump is almost guaranteed to win next week. And investigators have seen it firsthand as you’ve been knocking on doors across the Commonwealth.

Gatti is clear about his position. Trump is “an objectively bad person who should not be on this stage presiding over the shining beacon of democracy,” he said. He doesn’t want to sound negative when he encourages voters to go to the polls, he said, but “right now we’re talking about democracy at stake, so we should actually go down that path.”

“We are the ones focused on making investments in infrastructure and public safety and an economic plan that helps all people,” the head of the Louisville Democratic Party said. “…And when we talk about Donald Trump, we talk about chaos, instability and tweeting.”

Coleman, the Hardin County Republican Party chairman who spoke Friday ahead of a busy evening of canvassing Calloway and other local candidates, had a different view. She worries about political polarization and hopes the country can “find a way to bring us all back together,” but the current administration’s border policies and stance on gender issues have left the nation in “dangerous, dangerous positions’.

“We have a lot to fix in our country without people feeling isolated,” she said. “I wish I had that total answer. I haven’t, but I hope one day we’ll see that.’

When McConnell was asked specifically about the rhetoric during last week’s presidential race in Louisville, he pivoted and instead said voters should “vote based on how happy you are with the current administration.” Two days later, he released a statement alongside U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, calling on Harris to “end the dangerous rhetoric.”

“To label a political opponent as ‘fascist’ risks inviting another potential murderer to deprive voters of their choice before Election Day,” they wrote, without admonishing Trump for using similar language.

It’s exhausting, Babbage said. And it could convince some voters to stay home on Election Day.

“You heard the term about three months ago, ‘double haters’ – people who hated both choices,” the former secretary of state said. “What I’m hearing more of is ‘double doubters’ – doubts about the two leading candidates because of some inconsistencies and some incomplete answers and just the frustration and the hatred and the vitriol and the name-calling that actually has nothing to do with it. to what we talk about when we sit together on the weekend and try to make decisions as family or friends.”

It’s also tiring on Clarks Lane, where the Heckmanns’ flag still flies a week after election day.

When people see the three houses, Krista Heckmann says she hopes people see that “there is still hope, and that they encourage people to vote — and to be smart and informed about your vote.”

It’s awkward, Amy added, but “even if your neighbor is different, you can still be neighbors.”

Reach Lucas Aulbach at [email protected].