October 5, 2022
Connecticut’s chattering classes are abuzz because the conservative Leora Levy easily vanquished media favorite Themis Klarides in the Republican U.S. Senate primary. It’s not that any of these media liberals would vote for Klarides over Senator Blumenthal. They simply find it revolting that someone like Levy is the candidate. They prefer moderate Republicans who roll over and play dead for the Democrats, rather than the tough and charismatic Levy who is giving the voters a clear choice.
Levy’s biggest problem at this point are bogus polls designed to demoralize Republicans and dry up her ability to raise money. For example, the recent Quinnipiac poll shows her losing by 17% to Blumenthal.
But Quinnipiac polls are notorious for being inaccurate. For example, Quinnipiac’s 2020 presidential poll two weeks before the election predicted Trump would receive only 41% of the national vote. In actuality, he received 47%, a huge statistical error that is virtually mathematically impossible to make. Furthermore, the Western New England poll showed a huge 11% lead in Republicans over Democrats in the enthusiasm gap for 2022.
Given this inherent bias, it is more likely that Levy is behind by around 10%. Assuming around 1.4 million voters (as in the last non-presidential election year) and dividing Connecticut’s towns into four groups, this is a reasonable representation of Levy’s situation now.
So how does Levy win? Let’s look at the chart. In order to win, Levy needs to shift 70,000 votes from Blumenthal’s column to hers. This is doable.
The middle class and cities are where the votes are. However, most members of the chattering class are suburban upper middle class white liberals who exist entirely in that social circle. This demographic is now close to 70% Democratic. Issues such as inflation, gas prices and illegal immigration are not that important to them. In fact, they have seen large increases in the value of their homes because of inflation.
What matters to these voters are social issues. They are strong supporters of abortion rights, gun control and the climate change agenda. They have been winning on these issues because of bureaucratic and judicial decisions. But President Trump’s three Supreme Court appointees combined with three judicial conservatives already on the Court ruled in the summer of 2022 that these issues should be decided by elected representatives.
Many wealthy suburbanites are now upset but are unaware that the Senator Blumenthal supports abortion even in the ninth month of pregnancy. Few western democracies allow this. Furthermore, the tanking stock market will could help Levy. Also, there has been an uptick in crime in the suburbs, and the perpetrators are frequently repeat offenders released because of the lax bail laws promoted by the Democrats.
But Levy’s main focus is to use her resources to win over votes in the cities and middle-class towns. And the cities are ripe for the picking. Many Hispanic and Black voters are cultural conservatives and Virginian Republican Governor Youngkin actually won the Hispanic vote in 2021. In Connecticut, the Republicans gained 4 to 5% over their 2016 performance.
Levy’s pro-life position – if advertised aggressively in urban areas - will be a tremendous help. The BLM (Black Lives Matter) movement has now been extended to cover unborn Blacks. When the legislature voted to make Connecticut an abortion sanctuary state, 14 of 20 Democratic urban representatives voted against it!
During the debate Rep. Treneé McGee, a Black Democrat from West Haven, stated “I want to speak to the history of this industry [abortion] and why I think it’s destructive to my community. Black women make up 14% of child-bearing population yet obtained 36.2% of all reported abortions. Black women have the highest abortion ratio in the country — 474 abortions per 1,000 live births.
The pro-choice Democrats propped up a white liberal to primary Ms. McGee. He spent his entire campaign slamming McGee for her pro-life position; but she crushed him winning with 67% of the vote! Blacks are tired of Planned Parenthood setting up shop in their neighborhoods.
Furthermore, Planned Parenthood is promoting gender-conversion therapy in the poorer neighborhoods. Is this what the denizens of the inner cities want for their children? These voters must know that Levy opposes this.
Finally, as Levy pointed out in a recent op-ed she penned, illegal immigrants are bringing Fentanyl into Connecticut. This has caused thousands of over dose deaths in the rural and middle-class towns. The wealthy socially-liberal suburbanites have little sympathy for this situation and enjoy the cheap labor these illegals provide by fixing their roofs, mowing their lawns and cleaning their toilets. But rural Connecticut has been decimated.
If Levy can raise the cash to target these groups, the election night returns may look as follows:
It may well be that no strategy can result in a Levy victory. Connecticut is now Deep Blue and no Republican has won a senatorial race in forty years. Furthermore, Linda McMahon of WWF fame spent over $110,000,000 in two Senate races and lost both times by double digits.
But if anyone can win this, it is the intrepid and charismatic Levy as long as she runs an aggressive campaign without fear of irritating the chattering classes. But if she is unsuccessful, she and her supporters will have the satisfaction of knowing that she went down swinging, rather than going down groveling, like so many other Republican candidates.