Senate Candidate Mallory McMorrow Thinks Democrats Need New Blood, Maybe Whole Body Transfusion
Not your father's Democrat
Democrat Mallory McMorrow formally launched her campaign last week to replace retiring Michigan Sen. Gary Peters. McMorrow is currently a state senator representing suburban metro Detroit, and she gained national attention three years ago when she forcibly pushed back against a Republican colleague who smeared her as a “groomer” in a campaign email.
In her initial campaign ad, McMorrow presented herself as an “outsider” and declared that the “same old crap out of Washington” won’t solve our problems.
“We need new leaders,” she said. “Because the same people in D.C. who got us into this mess are not going to be the ones to get us out of it.” (Watch below.)
I’m usually wary of self-proclaimed “outsider” candidates because we can end up with Kyrsten Sinema or John Fetterman — Democrats who don’t see themselves as part of a team or a larger movement. They elevate themselves by dragging down the body they seek to join. However, I do agree with McMorrow that Democrats desperately need new leaders. Just the other day, Chuck Schumer said that Donald Trump’s tariffs make it harder for Americans to “upgrade their groceries.” He’s like Ron Burgundy reading nonsense off cue cards.
Of course, Democratic candidates running for swing seats have called for new leadership in the past. Back in 2017, Rep. Kathleen Rice told NBC, “I’ve been vocal about the fact that I think we need new leaders stepping up to offer new strategies and new ideas for our caucus, our party, and most importantly for the people we serve.” Later that year, Rep. Linda Sanchez called for Nancy Pelosi’s resignation as Democratic leader: “Our leadership does a tremendous job, but we do have this real breadth and depth of talent within our caucus and I do think it’s time to pass the torch to a new generation of leaders.”
Rice quit the House in 2022, and Sanchez is no longer in leadership herself. Pelosi hasn’t really gone anywhere (although she’s technically no longer the Democratic House leader).
In 2018, Sinema was coy about whether she’d support Schumer as Democratic Senate leader. It seemed like “outsider” candidates were regularly given license to distance themselves from leadership during their campaigns with the understanding that if elected they’d never actually threaten existing leadership. It’s Pelosi’s “just win, baby” strategy.
I hope McMorrow’s calls for new leadership aren’t part of the same pantomime, because I like what she’s saying.
“There’s still this idea that Democrats and Republicans are still abiding by the same rules and still believe in the same norms and systems and structure,” she said when explaining why it’s time that Schumer stepped aside. “There seems to be a lack of recognition that this is no longer the Republican Party. This is a MAGA party. And the same approach is not going to work.”
McMorrow repeated this point again on Monday, when she posted on Bluesky, “This isn’t my father’s GOP. It’s the MAGA party — one Donald Trump made in his own image hellbent on tearing government down to serve one person: Donald Trump.
That’s why we need a new generation of leadership who understands that this isn’t business as usual, and it’s why I’m running for US Senate.”
McMorrow was born in 1986, during the middle of Ronald Reagan’s second term and back when I was still buying comics off the spinner rack. Her “father’s GOP” sucked. The Reagan-era GOP had already marginalized the true Republican moderates and elevated the Religious Right. The Reagan Revolution blazed the path for what would become MAGA. I think it’s far too flattering of Trump to suggest that he molded a once-noble political party into his own twisted image. Just like in business, he just slaps his name on a structure that already exists.
It’s also worth noting that Reagan was somewhat constrained during his presidency by a Democratic House. When he nominated the far-right Robert Bork to the Supreme Court in 1987, only six Republicans voted against his confirmation. It was Democrats, led by Ted Kennedy, who fought hard (and had enough numbers) to keep Bork off the Court.
McMorrow was eight when Republicans won the House in 1994 and Newt Gingrich became speaker. Rush Limbaugh was growing in popularity and influence. The GOP went full Crucible on President Bill Clinton in the late 1990s. When McMorrow started high school, the conservative Supreme Court handed the 2000 presidential election to George W. Bush, who started a war in Iraq under false pretenses. It’s bizarre that she’d have any positive pre-Trump memories of the GOP.
President Joe Biden also claimed the current GOP “is not your father’s Republican Party.” At a House Democratic caucus event last year, he said, “Time and again, Republicans show they’re a party of chaos and disunion … They shout about a problem but then do nothing to solve the problem.” However, this accurately described the Republican Party of the Gingrich era.
“This isn’t your father’s GOP” is also an unfortunate riff on the Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme ads from the late ‘80s that boasted, “This is not your father’s Oldsmobile.” It was supposed to sell the product to the next generation but instead alienated everyone. (Watch below.)
Democrats have steadily lost ground with non-college educated voters, especially younger people, so it doesn’t make a lot of sense to keep reminding voters that the current GOP isn’t the same one from the 1980s and 1990s. Republicans don’t have a problem distancing themselves from the Reagan/Bush years, and there’s no evidence that when Democrats refer favorably to the GOP old guard, like John McCain or Liz Cheney, they win over any “Nikki Haley Republicans,” who still keep voting for MAGA candidates. This is why Democrats need leaders and consultants who aren’t frozen in amber.
Biden and other mainstream Democrats offered “this isn’t your father’s GOP” as a temporary hall pass for “normal” Republicans to support Democrats in the 2024 election. That didn’t happen. It might’ve even had the opposite effect: After all, young Black and Hispanic men are less likely to have Republican fathers. Telling them that the GOP is an entirely different party now only reinforces what they’re hearing from Joe Rogan.
Unlike Biden, though, when McMorrow says the GOP isn’t her father’s party, she seems willing to take the next, logical step and stop treating Republicans like good-faith governing partners. If she’s elected to the Senate, she’s not going to trust what Susan Collins tells her when they’re in the gym. Frankly, I’d find it even more encouraging if Democratic candidates flipped the script and declared that they aren’t your father’s (or mother’s) Democrat. This is not a new spin. The same was said of Bill Clinton in 1992, when Democrats had gotten tired of losing and stopped listening to consultants from 35 years ago.
Democrats should be able to say the GOP is a sick death cult full of eunuchs who cannot act independently of Trump, all without implying the party was ever any good. Instead, talk about how the Democrats are the party that looks out for regular people, improves their quality of life, and Republicans just loot the country in a cash grab for rich assholes and nutjobs. Nominate people who can say this bluntly, rudely and virally. People who talk like normal people you might meet at a barstool or checkout line, who don’t sound as though they workshopped every line through advisers (fine to workshop it, just don’t sound like you did).
Thanks Stephen. I'm so glad she's running for US Senate.