Things I Learned Working to Primary Nancy Pelosi in 2018

A DC consultant, one of the multi-generation ones, wouldn’t look at the sample campaign plan, because the opponent was Nancy Pelosi.

Should have known, when he couldn’t get a pollster — not a Bernie pollster, not a robo-dial pollster, to even run favorables vs. the 30-year incumbent.

Almost before the first candidate announced, the hits were coming. They’d scoured the candidate’s old Facebook posts. Newspapers happy to listen.

Raised from 1,500 donors in the first six weeks. Because no one likes where our country has gone, or who’s leading it. But if the leader is your own Congressperson? Sure, wealthy San Francisco, ride along.

Nancy Pelosi suffered the lowest vote total in June 2018 since her election in 1987. Even Cindy Sheehan and her campaign to tie Pelosi to Bush over the Iraq war didn’t make such a dent.

What did it? A progressive Jew long in the tooth, a Persian law student barely old enough to run, and a Burning Man DJ and privacy activist of Pakistani-English descent — all running issue-based campaigns from Pelosi’s left.

In California’s top-two primary system, Pelosi in 2016 faced another Democrat in the general election and won handily. But this open primary with several candidates had a dramatic effect — Barry Hermanson, a perennial candidate who runs as a Green Party organizing effort, saw his vote total drop by 70%. Pelosi, who routinely clears 80% of the vote in a primary, dipped to 68.5%.

What happens next?