In 2018, local Democrats helped flip seven Congressional seats in California districts, which provided over one-third of the seats Democrats needed to take control of the House. As the November election approaches, Santa Monica Democrats are organizing to protect these seats in Orange County and other swing districts.
Tomorrow at 6 p.m. the Westside Democratic HQ in coordination with the California Democratic Party and Democratic Party of Orange County will host a “Save the Seven” reception on Zoom featuring guest speaker Rep. Adam Schiff, and the seven congressional candidates running in tough districts: Katie Porter, Mike Levin, Gil Cisneros, Harley Rouda, Josh Harder, TJ Cox, and Christy Smith. The online event seeks to connect a network of Democratic activists and raise money for these competitive campaigns.
“The key thing is defense of these regions. These are districts that were just won and are traditionally fairly Republican so it’s definitely going to take some efforts just to hold them,” said Domi Piturro, a member of the Santa Monica Democratic Club and one of the organizers of the “Save the Seven” reception. “LA has a lot of Democrats, but surrounding it there is still a fair amount of Republicans, so we decided we don’t need to focus on stuff here instead let’s start helping our brothers and sisters out in other districts.”
In the 2018 election cycle, Piturro led several canvassing trips from Santa Monica to Orange County, where Democrats flipped all four of OC’s Republican-held Congressional seats. This election cycle organizers face new challenges as traditional strategies—like canvassing, holding rallies or hosting donor dinners—are rendered unfeasible by the pandemic.
As a result, Democrats participating in the Save the Seven Campaign are doubling down on phone banking, text banking, and postcarding efforts. These strategies strive to ensure Democrats in these districts vote and convince Republicans to consider swapping their vote.
“When you grandstand with Republicans, that tends to push people away. They don’t really understand you or they just feel like you are attacking them,” said Pitturo, who has participated in political organizing since he was a child. “It’s better to find common ground. You are trying to unlock what’s going to get them to first converse with you and then talk about the issue and come to a compromise. Try something like education, children, or the environment. Those are issues everybody cares about where you can usually find some middle ground.”
This is the approach that helped Democrats win over Orange County voters during 2018 canvassing trips and that the Santa Monica Democratic Club will be applying to its virtual organizing efforts, according to Piturro.
The seven candidates speaking at tomorrow’s reception are campaigning in California’s 10th, 21st, 25th, 39th, 45th, 48th, and 49th Districts, which all have near equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans. The 25th District is of particular interest where in 2018 Katie Hill became the first Democratic Representative in 28 years before resigning in Oct 2019 amid allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior. Christy Smith, current California State Assemblywoman in the 38th District, is running in the 25th after being defeated for the same position by Republican Rep. Mike Garcia in a special election this May.
Assemblywoman Smith will speak at the virtual reception alongside the six Democratic incumbents.
