I live in the heart of what is now known as “Trump Country”. Coal is king here, and Trump’s coal promises and Hillary’s anti-Coal sound bite plagued our radios, and TV screens.. We knew it was going to be bad when we began to see life long Democrats putting up Trump signs.. My county here in central Appalachia went 83% for Trump last November.

These are the results from my Congressional District Virginia’s 9th.. In total almost 70% for Trump.. Note this map is from the Congressional Race but the results are almost the exact same. Here is the link: www.vpap.org/...

It was not always this way. Southwest Virginia, especially the Coalfields in the farthest corner of Southwest Virginia, places like Buchanan County, and Russell County were once the stronghold of the Democratic Party in the state. As you can see all that has changed.

The slow slide from being the stronghold of one party to another..

This year we have a Governors race in Virginia, right now the polls have the Democratic candidate Ralph Northam way ahead. Northam has a pretty good plan for rural Virginia that if it was implemented would really benefit Southwest Virginia and the rest of rural Virginia. The problem is no one is Southwest Virginia (and probably the rest of rural Virginia) is hearing about it.

As of today, I have not seen the first Northam ad on TV in Southwest Virginia. Not one. Nothing. His plan for expanding UVA-Wise could be huge for Southwest Virginia, it would be a massive economic engine for coalfields. It could make Wise County which a few months ago was struggling to find the money to fix the roof of an elementary school (Here is the link to that story: www.roanoke.com/ … ) would have tax revenue out their ears, but yet the voters of Wise County and the surrounding area are not hearing this. What they are hearing is that Ed Gillespie “Reinstate Coal tax credits” and “Cut taxes and red tape to help economic growth”.. In a campaign what good is a great economic platform for rural Virginia if Rural Virginians never hear about it?

After last November I would hope that we had learned our lesson about ignoring rural voters.

It would be one thing if there was some kind of great ground game to combat that narrative, but there isn't. Most of our committees do not even have handout cards for our statewide candidates so we couldn't go out and knock doors for them if we wanted too. Which brings me to the point of this article… If you want to win back rural voters there are a couple things you need to understand.

#1. If you let your opponent dominate the conversation and tell your story for you then duh, of course people are not going to vote for you.

#2. There is no one single policy issue that will make Rural voters run back to our party. Moving to left or to the right wont fix this... Talking about rural issues is incredibly important but it is going to take time to regain their trust.

#3. Elections in rural America are won on the ground. No amount of TV ads or social media presences can replace a solid door to door ground game. This is how Democrats in Southwest Virginia on the local level are still winning and winning big, which leads into my next point…

#4. The Democratic Party should never surrender a single inch of ground to the Republicans. Anywhere. Especially not now in this age of Trump. Especially not in Appalachia. Here is why Democrats could do a whole lot better in Southwest Virginia and rural Virginia ….

This is the current Party control of the Treasurers seat in the 9th Congressional District

Now many will argue that there is “a huge difference between local politics and state/federal level politics.” But really looking at that map do you really think that we couldn't win here?

Need more proof?

That's the Party control of the Commonwealth Attorneys seat in the 9th...

Looking pretty good huh? Maybe this R+19 District is winnable?

Still a lot of Blue….

Surprising right?

Yup… Dems can win in rural America

So doesn't this make you think Democrats should invest a lot more in winning rural Southwest Virginia?

Local candidates talk local issues, they knock a lot of doors in their communities. People know the candidates, they trust them. We need to rebuild their trust in us the same way, the old saying “All politics is local” is still true.

So inn short this is how we win back rural America:



#1 We invest in Rural local committees and Candidates. This builds our bench and will help us build trust in rural communities and voters. Money, tech support, and resources like signs (which yes those do have an effect in rural America), hand out materials etc. will go a long long way in rural committees. Give us the tools to fight with and we will.

#2 Help provide some funding for rural candidates for offices like House of Delegates, State Senate, and Congress even if the numbers say they don't have a chance to win. Why? These races offer an opportunity to help build the party infrastructure we need to win future elections, and it forces the Republicans to spend their money to beat us while we counter the Republican narrative of “Democrats are bad, Republicans are good”. Plus …. Our current strategy of hoping the top of the ticket will have a huge turnout which will mean more votes for those candidates of the same party on down the ticket (I know that this is backed up by a lot of evidence that winning big on the top of the ticket will result in some down ballot wins but hear me out) sounds an awful lot like a campaign strategy version of the republican trickle down economics… Trickle Down Politics? Why not have a bottom up strategy? Win local up instead of Governor’s mansion down or Presidency down… Just a thought… I understand those seats take priority.

#3 Have candidates show up. I understand that big states like Virginia it is hard to get everywhere you want, when you want, as much as you would like. But folks, our candidates have got to show up in rural parts of the state and country, and not just in front of a roomful of party faithful, but out in front of voters who may or may not be voting for us. Shaking hands and kissing babies still means something..

And lastly we have to have some patience. This is going to take time, maybe a lot of it. But we can do it, as you can see it is possible.