Down-ballot losses can have a negative impact up the chain as well. When state and local-level candidates lose, it cuts off the supply of new talent for higher office, leaving the national party with a short list of old, familiar faces. That process left Florida Democrats with Charlie Crist, the former governor who went from Republican to Independent to Democrat, as their 2014 gubernatorial candidate, in large part because no one else who was willing to run was remotely viable. After Charlie, what? After Charlie, whos their great hope? If they dont win with Charlie Crist, it has to be stunt casting because their bench is so weak, GOP strategist Rick Wilson joked last year in an interview with NPR affiliate WUSF. It wasnt just a partisan jab: Crist, who lacked, to put it mildly, strong ties to the party, lost to Republican incumbent Rick Scott, one of the least popular governors in the country.
That disparity is on display in Floridas 2016 open-seat Senate race, which is open only because its current holder, Marco Rubio, emerged as one of the top contenders for president and is not running for re-election. The Democratic frontrunner is, like Crist, another GOP refugee: Patrick Murphy, who until 2011 was a registered Republican, but was elected to Congress as a Democrat in 2012. The partys paucity of formidable statewide candidates didnt happen overnight, said Scott Arceneaux, executive director of the Florida Democratic Party, pointing out that Republicans have controlled the statehouse for nearly 20 years. You got a whole generation of folks who werent locally elected to office . . . the result is that our bench is a lot shorter than theirs. The problem is evident at the presidential level as well: Hillary Clinton faces thin opposition while the Republican field is so crowded that TV networks have to limit the number who will participate in the main debates to ten. The function of any party, Joe Trippi told me, is to develop winning candidates. Go local, go small, put a lot of energy into recruiting and finding people, Trippi said. Because later on, they are the people who are going to be able to get $20 million contributed online.