Black vote renominates Mississippi GOP U.S. senator

By Christopher Tidmore
Contributing Writer

State Senator Chris McDaniel blamed his 49.1 percent to 50.9 percent or 6000 vote loss to incumbent U.S. Senator Thad Cochran in the Mississippi Republican Primary on “liberal Democrats” who infiltrated the polling precincts. He was half right. Cochrane’s margin of victory came from African-American Democrats who choose to break party lines and support the next Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, if the GOP wins the Senate. Black Democrats came out to vote in the most unfriendly place possible, a GOP primary, to insure that their State’s seniority in Washington is preserved over ideology. It’s an appeal that Mary Landrieu prays will help her over the top in November.

As Josh Kraushaar, writing in National Journal pointed out, “There was clear evidence that Cochran’s attempt to boost Democratic African-American turnout paid off in a big way. In Jackson’s Hinds County, where two-thirds of the population is Black, Cochran won 73 percent of the vote, seven points higher than his performance in the primary. Turnout was up significantly in heavily African-American counties in the Mississippi Delta, like Quitman, Sharkey, Humphrey, and Coahoma, where Cochran increased his primary-election margins over McDaniel. Over 347,000 voters cast ballots in the runoff, a higher total than in the primary—marking the first time in 30 years that has happened in any Senate race.”

Cook Political Report analyst David Wasserman agreed tweeting, “Looking at county data, Cochran’s #MSSEN win is almost entirely attributable to a large turnout increase among black voters b/t 6/3 and 6/24.”

Though he was largely written off during the runoff, Cochran realized that he had a secret weapon. Democrats can vote in the other party’s primary, and as such, he made overt appeals to the state’s sizable African-American electorate, including several television ads featuring the senator campaigning with Black voters. It was a gamble to be sure, but Cochran bet that as heir presumptive for Appropriations Chair, the ability to bring resources back to Mississippi might encourage Black voters to come to the polls.

McDaniel’s supporters worried about this outcome, posting poll watchers. An obscure Mississippi law requires voters to promise to support the party’s candidate if they choose to vote in the primary. Since it is a secret ballot, such a law is unenforceable, but McDaniel hoped that reminding voters of this could suppress Democratic turnout. It did not.

In contrast, Cochran reached out to Black leaders. The New York Times reported that the leading pro-Cochran super PAC, Mississippi Conservatives, employed African-American opinion-makers to get out the vote for the senator in the runoff.

In Mississippi, like Louisiana, African Americans constitute roughly one-third of the state’s voters,and they are overwhelmingly Democratic. In 2008, a whopping 98 percent of African-Americans supported President Obama, while only 11 percent of whites voted for the president that year. Needless to say, African-American turnout in a GOP primary occurs very rarely.

It’s easier in an open primary, such as Louisiana. Incumbent U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu has banked her campaign on arguing that the state cannot afford to lose her newfound chairmanship of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and has specifically reached out to poorer, predominantly Black voters in her call for Medicaid expansion in her state. She has noted that many of Gov. Jindal’s budget cuts to state hospitals would not have occurred if the expanded Medicaid dollars under the Affordable Care Act had been accepted. She also adds for New Orleanians, that the extra funds would underwrite operations at the new University Medical Center.

This article originally published in the June 30, 2014 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.