Obama Campaign Aides Launch Effort To Turn Texas Blue

[ProSense]

Obama Campaign Aides Launch Effort To Turn Texas Blue

Veterans of President Obama's re-election bid Tuesday announced a project to use voter registration and engagement to turn Texas into a more Democratic-friendly state. The founders will use successful strategies from Obama's campaign in the new effort called "Battleground Texas."

Jeremy Bird, who served as Obama's national field organizer in 2012 and is helping launch Battleground Texas, on Tuesday described the program as a "long-term effort" and compared it to the laborious process of turning Florida into a purple state.

"I have now sat in three presidential campaign offices and looked at a map of the country and say how do we get to 270 electoral votes and I couldn't go to the president or senior advisors and say we should put 30 percent of our budget into Texas, given where things were at the time," Bird said on MSNBC. "This is a long-term effort to do what we did in a place like florida. We had staff on the ground for six years, expanding the electorate and turning out voters who hadn't voted before in local elections."

The Washington Post has more:

- more -

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/obama-campaign-aides-launch-effort-to-turn-texas

Interesting. From the WaPo article:

<...>

Obama lost the Lone Star State to Republican Mitt Romney by nearly 16 points – 57 percent to 41 percent. The last time a Democrat won a statewide race in Texas was in 1990, when Ann Richards was elected governor.

<...>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2013/02/26/obama-campaign-veterans-launch-battleground-texas-to-turn-lone-star-state-blue/

[Arkana]

1. 41% without trying--he could have made it 45-46% if he'd seriously contested the state.

Now, I'm not saying he SHOULD have, but I think he could have put in a showing as strong as he did in Georgia at least.

[Xipe Totec]

2. I got a better name for the project - The Bluebonnet Project

[Cha]

4. So pretty those

Bluebonnets!

[Schema Thing]

6. I like that!

[Gman]

3. For 17 years we have been pleading for help in Texas

but all that ever happened was they come in, have fundraisers and suck all the money out of Texas that could have been used to keep Texas blue... yes KEEP Texas blue. But Texas had more value to the party as an unlimited ATM machine. We'll see just how much help is sent Texas' way.

[blogslut]

5. yep

[bluestate10]

12. National democrats understand the importance of Texas. If we take Texas, and Arizona and hold

Florida, Virginia, New Mexico and Colorado, our party breaks the backs of republicans, regardless of North Carolina stays red, which I doubt.

[Gman]

17. There are plenty of paths to 270 that do not include Texas

The Texas delegation is now traditionally seated in the back parking lot at the national convention. So I don't know how important they think Texas is other than an ATM.

And Texas is so gerrymandered there's little hope of taking back the legislature for at least 7 years. The time to pay attention to Texas was in 2010. It's too little too late now.

[bluestate10]

16. Look. This DU member hear you. Like Tip said, all politics are local. If Bird and his group

are smart, they will work on increasing registration AND finding and building up local candidates. I tell you one thing, if they stay on the long and narrow and don't let their heads get big or get greedy, the Castro boys are going to make your state proud.

[Jamaal510]

7. I said it before and I'll say it again--

Last edited Tue Feb 26, 2013, 07:30 PM - Edit history (1)

if Texas turns blue, then it'll be game over. All the GOP can do now is to change the way the votes are allocated in states where they have control, and to continue gerrymandering Congressional seats (aka. cheating).

[Wednesdays]

10. I said as much, too

The Electoral numbers would become insurmountable.

[bluestate10]

13. When Texas turns blue, Louisiana turns blue less than a decade after and other southern states

like Kentucky and, my god, South Carolina go seriously in play for democrats. Texas turning blue will be one of the best changes to happen for the country in my lifetime, once Texas goes blue, the back of strident republican politics is broken and serious people will have to come forward from that party, people than can help govern sanely.

[blueclown]

8. How can you compare Texas to Florida?

There isn't even remotely a comparison in terms of electorate politics between the two. Florida has always been a close state over the las t 5 or 6 elections... Texas not so much.

[bluestate10]

14. Florida has been a purple state since Carter. It goes red, but doesn't stay red.

With more young cubans becoming democrats, the southern and middle ends of the state will overwhelm the less populated northern part.

[rainbow4321]

9. I'll believe it when the next Dem POTUS candidate

spends more time down here than just jetting down here and being taken into the well off huge ass McMansion neighborhoods (in Dallas: Highland Park, Park Cities, etc..) for a 60 minute dinner at a "private home" and then jets out--using the money collected for swing states.
Because honestly, that is ALL they do. We get no rallies, no real attention, no DNC money for local/state Dem candidates....

They say this every time in between federal elections then when the time gets closer to campaign season, they don't do shit down here.

[Paladin]

11. Well Said. (nt)

[derby378]

15. Agreed - I remember when Obama, Biden, and Reid all held a public rally in Dallas

Might have been 2006, I can't recall for sure. Even then, Obama was so popular with the attendees that I could never get a good view of him.

When Reid and Biden took the stage, however, I managed to sneak up real close and get some decent photos. I might have made a Secret Service agent just a little antsy, but he didn't intervene. Unfortunately, I can't find those photos right now, or I'd share them.