Cornell Belcher Calls for Expansion of 50 State Strategy with Focus on Youth and People of Color

Via Marc Ambinder, I found this memo (attached below) from Cornell Belcher - pollster for the Obama campaign and the DNC - to Howard Dean. The memo describes the arc of Dean's tenure as Chairman of the DNC, noting how the political landscape has changed, how the Democrats' new "pluralist majority" arose, and what the DNC must do in the coming years to solidify those gains.

Belcher identifies three main trends behind the Democrats rise to power in 2006 and 2008:

• Democrats eroded the Republican brand on key issues (culture of corruption). This was especially potent in 2006.
• Democrats competed more broadly and successfully in moderate and Republican areas - aka the 50 State Strategy.
• Democrats performed better among a range of demographic groups, notably in communities of color and among youth.

I want to spend the rest of this post focusing on the third item on this list. With a new Democratic Party Chairman taking the reins at the DNC, we have an opportunity to remake how the Party itself engages young people. At this point, that outreach is limited to a severely underfunded College Democrats operation (now facing stiff competition from Students for Barack Obama), a growing, but limited involvement of young people within the party structure itself, and no real mandate to the states to engage youth locally.

As Belcher's memo documents, youth support for the Democratic party - particularly among young people of color who make up roughly 40% of the Millennials - surged this year. Even among young white voters there were significant gains made. However, these new votes primarily benefited Obama in 2008 (emphasis mine):

The surge among new voters of color was incredible. Thirty-eight (38) percent of our new electorate was either Hispanic or African American. It is becoming increasingly clear that the key to sustaining and growing our Democratic majority coalition lies with younger and more diverse voters who are clearly trying to turn the page. Younger white voters are far more open to supporting Democrats than their parents (whites under age 35 broke for the Democratic House candidate by +14 points in our polling), but Democrats must work hard to fully bring home these voters who primarily surged in support of Obama. Our post election poll data shows that Democrats down the ballot left a good number of younger votes on the table as 20 percent of voters under age 35 dropped off after casting a presidential ballot rather than voting for a House candidate. These younger and browner surge voters are, by and large, Obama‘s right now, not necessarily the Democratic Party‘s. If Democrats are to strengthen our majority coalition going into the off year, we will clearly need to reach and engage these voters with some party persuasion. Again, the Party must continue to aggressively build in the off year—the time to let up on the 50 state strategy is not now. We must expand upon it with a particular youth and minority focus.

As we've all seen, the youth numbers this year are amazing, but that 20% downballot drop-off is staggering. Imagine how many close House and state legislative races we left on the table, and what the political map might look like today if Obama had bigger coattails among youth?

Belcher does not see loyalty to the Democratic Party among these newly engaged youth as fait accompli. It's going to take work to convert Obama supporters into Democratic Party supporters. He also correctly notes that young voters are far more persuadable than older voters, to which I would add that it is also cheaper to persuade younger voters, making youth outreach/engagement much more attractive than outreach to older groups from a pure cost/benefit standpoint.

Younger white voters were more secular in their values and closer to the middle on election issues than older white voters (Figure 5). This presents a key opportunity for Democrats, as this younger group will be more likely to side with Democrats on faith vs. secular issues. However, the younger group is to the center on issues, and could swing in either direction on the issues in future elections. The Party must look to specifically build here among these younger whites. Working to move this younger group of voters toward the Democrat end of the issues spectrum should be a strategic focus in our off year work to solidify them for Democrats for the long term.

Middle age white voters were more compelled by the Republican positions on the issues than their younger counterparts. Although senior whites tilted slightly toward the Republicans on the issues, they were much more compelled by religious values than the other age groups. This makes older whites a real tough get unless we continue to undermine Republicans arguments that have largely defined the values playing field.

At the end of his memo, Belcher recommends that the incoming chairman increase resources for the 50 State Strategy and provide a mandate for that strategy to focus in part on youth. I couldn't agree more. Indeed, this is exactly what a number of youth within the party - at the DNC Youth Council, Young Voter PAC, YDA and us here at Future Majority - have been saying for years. However, I would go even further than Belcher. He's right that long-term party building requires a greater focus on youth outreach. But the most effective way to do that will be to make youth engagement part of the structure and strategy of not only the DNC, as Belcher suggests, but also the party committees and state parties. The party committees wield enormous influence in how campaigns are run, and outreach to youth at the local level has to come from the state party and it has to be 24/7/365. It can't come from a national organization parachuting in during the last 8 weeks of an election.

Obama will not be on the ballot in 2010 - or in many future elections - and we need to decrease that 20% ballot drop-off and solidify our gains among Millennials. I hope Governor Kaine, Executive Director O'Malley Dillon, and other incoming senior staff at the DNC heed Belcher's advice.

The DNC is currently asking supporters to welcome Chairman Kaine to the DNC and send him your questions. I recommend that everyone encourage Chairman Kaine to read the Belcher memo, and ask if he will beef up the 50 State Strategy and include a mandate for engaging youth and young people of color.