Former Obama Administration Officials Vie to Unseat House Republicans

[babylonsister]

Former Obama Administration Officials Vie to Unseat House Republicans
Large contingent is part of Democratic effort to create a counter to President Donald Trump’s efforts to roll back policies they helped put in place
By Natalie Andrews
Updated Dec. 31, 2017 12:18 p.m. ET


At least a dozen former aides and policy staff who worked for President Barack Obama have entered the midterm races, running for office for the first time.

The Obama administration alumni are part of a Democratic Party effort to take back control of the House of Representatives and create a counter to President Donald Trump’s efforts to roll back Obama-era policies. In many cases, these new candidates are opposing GOP incumbents who have been identified by House Democrats as potentially vulnerable to a challenge.

Brian Forde, former White House technology adviser, moved back to the southern California district where he was raised and is running against Republican Rep. Mimi Walters. Former Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense Elissa Slotkin is challenging GOP Rep. Mike Bishop while living on her family’s farm in Michigan. And two former Obama administration alumni are taking on Rules Committee Chairman Pete Sessions—Colin Allred, who worked in Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of General Counsel and Ed Meier, who worked in the State Department focused on military-to-civilian transition in Iraq.

“We’re in the middle of a civic reawakening right now and that opportunity means that we need to reopen the barn doors,” Mr. Forde said.

snip//

After scoring election victories across the country in the past two months, Democratic leaders are optimistic the party can harness voter energy built in large part on discontent with President Donald Trump. The Cook Political Report rates 63 GOP-held seats as competitive to some degree—17 as tossups and 46 as “likely” or “lean” Republican. Democrats will have to play defense too: Cook lists 21 Democratic seats as competitive, including four tossups.

Democrats need to win a net 24 seats to take back the majority. Democrats have 193 seats in the House, compared with the GOP majority of 239.

The Obama alumni have formed a network and text each other. Should they win, the new Democratic candidates would join a smattering of former Obama alumni already in Congress, including Rep. Ro Khanna (D., Calif.), a Freshman Democrat from California who served as a deputy assistant secretary in the Obama Commerce Department. Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth was an assistant secretary in Obama’s Veterans Affairs Department before running for Congress.

more...

https://www.wsj.com/articles/former-obama-administration-officials-vie-to-unseat-house-republicans-1514721600?mg=prod/accounts-wsj

[marble falls]

1. President Obama - the gift that keeps on giving. We need to support these candidates.

[benld74]

2. Very large blue wave coming

[padah513]

3. Please tell me we have somebody

Running against Geist(?) and De Santos. Nunez is already covered, but I'd like to see somebody running against every house member who carries Trump's water. Send them all back into public life and let those crooks earn an honest living for a change.

[iluvtennis]

4. Ditto....brillant.

[AllyCat]

5. This is great. We still need to preserve the right to vote b

Is there a place to get information on registering voters and how to manage voter rolls so legal voters don’t get dropped?

[Scurrilous]

6. K&R