Here is the second part of this piece. This piece will cover the next six elections, which makes 13 out of 34 complete. The remaining three pieces will contain seven sections like the first piece did as oppossed to being like this one. I decided to shorten this one to six because I spent an extra long time ranting about Mitch McConnell. I swear, that last time you saw a turtle this evil it was kidnapping princesses. Speaking of evil…

Idaho

Idaho is a deep red state at this time that is currently under a Republican trifecta. Both Senators, Representatives, and Idaho’s Governor are all Republicans. Idaho has not had a Democrat in the Senate since 1981 so whoever runs against incumbent Jim Risch is going to have their work cut out for them.

Republicans have complete control of Idaho, so there is nothing stopping its politicians from being complete shit goblins. It may as well be redundant to say that Jim Risch is a homophobe but I’m still going to say it anyway; Jim Risch is a homophobe. He completely skips the “same sex marriage should be left to the states” euphemism of most conservatives and instead flat out says he thinks same sex marriage should be illegal on the federal level. If that was not telling enough, he also voted in favor of legal discrimination against gay people in the work place, against the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, voted to remove protections for LGBT youth from the “Runaway and Homeless Youth and Trafficking Prevention Act” and to rescind domestic abuse protections against LGBT people,” and co-sponsored a bill that would allow colleges and universities to legally discriminate against gay people as long as they claim they did it because god said so. On top of this, Jim Risch also supports Trump’s military ban on trans people.

But Risch doesn’t just hate LGBT people, he also hates women. In addition to voting to defund Planned Parenthood like every other conservative shithead, he voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, to cut funding for Violence Against Women prevention programs, and voted in favor of Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh’s nominations to the Supreme Court. Oh, and he also voted to to prevent tribal courts from prosecuting white people who rape Native Americans.

Yeah, he’s a real piece of shit isn’t he? Needless to say, he fits right in with the Trump administration. He has voted with Donald Trump 90.2% of the time, hasvoted in favor of all 22 of Trump’s cabinet nominees, has voted to strip 32 million people of their healthcare, has voted in favor of declaring a National Emergency to fund Trump’s monument to white supremacy, voted against reinstating net neutrality, voted in favor of SESTA/FOSTA, voted against the Green New Deal, andis a climate change denier.

Of note is that there is no confirmation as to whether or not Jim Risch is going to run for a third term, but it’s going to be a tough fight since Idaho is a crimson red state. Thus far, the only declared opponent against Risch is businesswoman Nancy Harris. Taking a look at Nancy’s campaign page, one can see that she has some very strong leftist values and I hope she gets the nominee. Some may say she will have a hard time winning in a state as red as Idaho, but we could very well see something at least similar to Stacy Abrams and Beto O’Rourke’s 2018 campaigns that will open the door for more progressive challengers in the future even if she does lose.

The highest profile contender seems to be Idaho’s 2014 Democratic Gubernatorial nominee, A.J. Balukoff. Considering that he lost that election with 38.6% of the vote and that he doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page, this is not very reassuring. On the other hand, 2014 is cited as a terrible year for democrats so maybe he has a better shot given the significant leftward shift the US electorate has had. Other potential candidates include State Senator Mark Nye and Idaho Senate Minority Leader Michelle Stennett.

The up side is that there has been increased turnout among left leaning voters in Idaho in 2018, and that this might continue into 2020. Unfortunately this means there will need to be a lot of them if there is any hope of dethroning Jim Risch. This just makes it all the more important that any Democrats in Idaho get out to vote for whoever runs against him in 2020. If there is no changes to the political climate of Idaho, than we can most likely expect 367,993 people to vote Republican and 207,303 to vote Democrat.

Illinois

The Illinois senate seat up for re-election in 2020 belongs to Dick Durbin, the four term Democratic incumbent and the current Senate Minority Whip. Dick Durbin is your pretty standard liberal who has mostly voted in favor of progressive causes such as civil rights and not being Trump, but also doesn’t try to veer too far left as shown with his lack of support for the Green New Deal, voting in favor of SESTA/FOSTA, and the fact that he voted in favor of DOMA back when Democrats still thought being homophobic shitheads was okay. This is a problem with liberals in general so it’s unfair to single out Durbin, but it is rather problematic that most of us are not given a choice further to the left.

More and more people are moving leftward not only due to the rise of the far right, but also because of a lack of satisfaction with neoliberals who seek to compromise with fascists rather than stand up to them. I am clearly not the only one who thinks this way considering that Dick Durbin’s approval rating was the 10th lowest out of anyone in the US senate at the end of 2018. Note that five of the nine senators who ranked lower than Durbin did not win re-election in 2018. That being said, I will at least give Durbin credit in that he is much further to the left than someone like Doug Jones or Kyrsten Sinema.

Neoliberal politicians seem to be under the impression that being centrist will appeal to both parties and help win over Republican voters, but that comes at the cost of alienating younger leftists like myself and many other who have the most to lose from compromise with the far right. I can understand being a neoliberal Democrat in a deeply red state, but in a state as blue as Illinois we can definitely do better.

Enter Anne Stava-Murray. Thus far she is the only Democrat who has declared candidacy against Dick Durbin, and she looks very promising from what i could gather. While she doesn’t have much presence given that she is merely a member of the Illinois House of Representatives, such a victory on her part would be far from unprecedented. Her victory in 2018 came despite the fact that she only spent $30,000 in her campaign when most campaigns for state legislature require at least $100,000.

Nonetheless it is a pretty big leap to go from State Representative to US Senator. To put it in anime nerd terms, it’s like going straight from Frieza to Beerus and skipping two entire arcs. Stava-Murray’s power level just isn’t high enough to manage that now, and it took Goku a year to become strong enough to beat the androi… oh fine I’ll stop with the Dragon Ball Z references.

But in all seriousness, it is quite a long shot for Stava-Murray to beat Durbin, but I am genuinely hoping she pulls off an upset. The reason why is because I get a similar vibe from her that I get from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Just read this Facebook post of her’s for instance. I get the impression from her that she genuinely wants change as opposed to more of the same. It is almost representative of the conflict between leftists and neoliberals as a whole. If I had to describe what the difference between a liberal and a leftist is in one sentence, it would be that liberals look at the current status quo and think it’s perfectly fine while leftists look to the future and think of ways we can create a better world.

I will always prefer liberals over conservatives because the latter are also dissatisfied with the current status quo but instead prefer to look to the past and to set things back while ignoring the common faults of that era, while the former instead think the current status quo is fine and everything is great.. The fact that Stava-Murray is planning to run for Senate this soon after only holding her first political office shows that she has genuine ambition and passion, and that is what is missing in the Democratic party these days. We NEED women like Stava-Murray and Ocasio-Cortez if we are to have any hope of creating a better future. They may not fix all of our problems, but we also need as much as we can get.

I feel I should also talk about the other two rumored Democratic candidates that may also run against Durbin. The first of these is Cheri Bustos who also seems to be your fairly typical liberal. While she does seem to have some fairly consistent progressive values and has been vocally opposed to Trump and voted against him most of the time, she also did give the questionable message that the Democratic party’s “anti Trump” message was not good for votes. While she isn’t a terrible person from the sounds of it, you may as well just re-elect Dick Durbin if you want a neoliberal to win 2020, and that’s what I am pretty sure will happen.

The other major candidate is the former Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan who has a much better record on progressive values and I think it would be pretty sweet to have her take Dick Durbin’s place if Stava-Murray doesn’t make it.

Update: Anne Stava-Murray has sadly dropped out of the race. Thankfully there are two progressive alternatives to Durbin with Marilyn Jordan Lawlor running for the Democratic nomination, and 2016 Presidential candidate Willie Wilson running as an independent.

It would be remiss of me to mention the competition that either Stava-Murray, Bustos, Madigan, or Durbin will have to face from the GOP though. There are two currently registered republican candidates. The first of these is Omeed Memar, a dermatologist  who was convicted of health care fraud in 2018. The other is Peggy Hubbard whose campaign website literally states she’s “the radical left’s worst nightmare” and as a radical leftist, I’d say that’s just about accurate.

Within her “meet Peggy” page, she claims that Planned Parenthood employees tried to “hold her down and force her to kill her child,” was a personal friend of the police officer in Ferguson, Darren Wilson, who was involved in the shooting of Micheal Brown and predictably dismisses those who were upset as a “leftwing mob.” She also proceeds to brag about being an opponent of Antifa and Black Lives Matter and being an early supporter of Donald Trump. In short, Peggy Hubbard IS the far left’s worst nightmare; a fascist.

Other potential candidates include Rodney Davis who supports Trump’s ban on trans people from the military, voted against the “save the internet act,” voted in favor of Trump declaring a national emergency to fund his monument to white supremacy, and is against religious institutions providing birth control but is also against abortion so it’s clear he just doesn’t like women.

Update: He’s not running.

There is Erika Harold who said back in 2000 that she would rather have a child in the hands of an abusive straight couple than a loving gay couple. She claims she has changed her views but forgive me and the rest of us if we are skeptical.

Update: She’s not running either.

There is Darin LaHood who has voted in favor of Trump’s ban on trans people from the military, voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, voted against Net neutrality, and voted in favor of Trump’s national emergency declaration.

Update: Darin LaHood isn’t running.

Lastly there is former Illinois governor Bruce Rauner who signed a law banning the use of conversion therapy on minors, signed a bill making it easier for trans people to change their birth certificates, marched in Aurora and Chicago pride parades, donated thousands of dollars to Planned Parenthood and the ACLU’s Roger Baldwin Foundation, and officiated a gay wedding in 2018. Wait a minute, he is a Republican right? I think I actually kinda like this guy.

Nope… spoke too soon. He claimed that Mike Pence is “one of the greatest public servants in America today.” One must wonder why someone like Rauner could hold such leftist views yet also support Trump, but I think I know why. I’ll just quote the Chicago Reader on this one.

Trump’s proposing to give a $100 billion tax cut to America’s wealthiest people by changing the way capital gains get calculated. (A capital gain is the profit from selling an asset, like stock or property. )

Say you purchased $100,000 worth of stock in 1980 and sold it today for $1 million. Under the current rules, you’d pay a capital gains tax on $900,000 worth of profit.

Trump wants to adjust the original purchase price for inflation. To go back to our example, since $100,000 in 1980 is worth about $300,000 today, the president’s proposal would lower the taxable gain to $700,000. That amounts to a $40,000 tax break on this one deal, according to the New York Times.

Add up all the breaks on all the stock transactions, and eventually we’re talking about a tax break for the wealthy of about $100 billion or so.

This is a twofold victory for Rauner Republicans.

One, it means greater tax breaks for them.
And two, it means less money for government. As I’ve written before, one of great missions of Republican “free-market” ideologues like Rauner, the Koch brothers, and Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform is to starve government of the money it needs to function.
…
Trump’s capital gains proposal is such a blatant break for the rich and such a bad deal for the rest of us that only a politician unconventional enough to start a Twitter war with LeBron James would dare to try and get away with it.

Trump may act like an idiot—but he’s a useful idiot. Especially for Republicans like Rauner.

So yes, Rauner may be nice us gays and to Planned Parenthood, but only as long as it lines his pocket. This just goes to show you that even the best Republicans available are inferior to the worst Democrats in their respective state. That’s just how low this party has sunk.

Update: Rauner isn’t running either.

I’ve been fairly harsh on Dick Durbin here but you can at least count on him to openly oppose Trump AND vote in favor of minority rights (unless those minorities happen to be sex workers). Granted I still think hope Stava-Murray or Lisa Madigan gets the nomination instead, but Durbin is still better than the party of President Pussygrabber.

Thankfully Illinois is a pretty blue state so it’s unlikely that this seat will change colors any time soon. If things go down like they did in 2018, then we can expect around 2,757,540 people to vote blue and 1,754,449 to vote red.

Iowa

Iowa is a red state that got a bit less red in 2018. While both Senators and the Governor are Republicans, three of the four house seats belong to Democrats and Kim Reynolds only won re-election with 50.4% of the vote. Also of note is that white supremacist shithead Steve King won re-election 2018 but with the lowest lead he ever had, so this is more than likely going to be his last term. But we are not here to talk about him, and we are instead here to talk about Senator Joni Ernst.

I was hoping that Joni Ernst might not be too much of a scumbag, but unfortunately she is definitely a bag for the scum. First of all…. say it with me… she’s a homophobe. She thinks it’s a “state rights” issue but will support a federal ban if one is put in place…

…and she also co-sponsored a failed bill to legally define marriage as “one man one woman” in Iowa. She has voted against equal social security and veteran’s benefits for same sex couples, protections for LGBT youth, treating same-sex spouses the same as opposite-sex spouses with regard to veteran’s benefits, and civil rights protections to LGBT students.

But never fear! Joni Ernst may be a woman herself but that doesn’t mean thatshe can’t also hate when women have access to valuable and life saving medical treatment. It also doesn’t meanshe can’t hate when rapists are not appointed to the supreme court either (and also thieves who steal their seats from Merrick Garland). It doesn’t meanshe can’t vote against sex worker’s rights! It doesn’t mean that she can’t vote to strip 32 million people of their healthcare! Yeah I know, the last one isn’t directly related to women’s rights but it’s still fucked up!

Just like how it’s fucked up that she wants to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency and thinks the clean water act is “damaging for business.” Just like how it’s fucked up that she supports Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accords and hasten the destruction of our planet. Just like how it’s fucked up that she voted against the Green New Deal.

It’s also fucked up how Joni Ernst supports ICE and thinks its abolition “would allow dangerous criminal aliens,” and she also supports Trump’s national emergency over his racist wall. Also as an aside,she also thinks Obama was “a dictator who needed to be impeached“ yet is suspiciously silent on President Pussygrabber. We can let the fact that she voted in favor of all 22 of Trump’scabinet nominees and has voted with Trump 91.5% of the time speak for her.

But Trump is not the only racist douchebag that Joni Ernst is in full support of. She also has strong ties with the previously mentioned Steve King. I’ll just let her Wikipedia page sum this one up.

Ernst’s relationship with Steve King, a House Representative known for his racially charged rhetoric and support for far-right politicians, has stirred controversy. In 2016 when King faced a primary challenge for his House seat, Ernst endorsed him, saying he “stands strong for life and liberty.”^[140][141] When King stirred controversy in 2017 by saying “we can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies” and by supporting European far-right politicians, Ernst said she did not condone King’s behavior but she would not ask for his resignation.^[142][143] In 2017, the Des Moines Register wrote a scathing editorial against King, which criticized Ernst for endorsing him in the past and not condemning him.^[144][145] In 2018, she appeared with King at a rally in his district after King had endorsed a Canadian politician with neo-Nazi ties.^[146] In 2019, amid extensive criticism of King by Republican politicians after King made controversial remarks about white supremacy, Ernst rebuked him.^[147] The New York Times wrote that Ernst’s belated distancing to King might harm her 2020 re-election efforts, as she previously “had spent years embracing Mr. King.”^[148] Art Cullen, editor of The Storm Lake Times, condemned the belated response by Ernst, describing it as “hypocrisy” for her to condemn him only weeks after campaigning with him and when his views had been well-known for a long time.^[149] The editorial board of the Des Moines Register questioned why it took national condemnation for Ernst to rebuke King.^[150]

I’ll tell you why it took her so long; it’s because Joni Ernst is perfectly fine with everything Steve King has said, and the only reason she bothered to rebuke King is because it would cost her even more votes than she is already hemorrhaging. Given the fact that Democrats flipped two house seats in 2018 and came pretty close to beating Kim Reynolds AND Steve King, this means that we might have a chance at booting Joni Ernst out of office in 2020 (and Steve King while we are at it).

There are two declared candidates thus far, and and the first is attorney Kimberly Graham, whose pitch can be read here. One may have noticed a pattern in that there have been a lot of political newcomers running on strong progressive campaigns. My theory is that more and more people are becoming dissatisfied with the current status quo, and this is leading to a lot of political newcomers deciding they can do a better job. It started with Bernie Sander’s 2016 Presidential campaign (who wasn’t a newcomer himself, but it did inspire a a lot of them), but I think it really hit its peak with the election of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Considering that just about every Democrat with serious brand recognition is now chasing after a pie in the sky Presidential Race, this is a good thing since we need people like Kimberly Graham will be naturally appealing to the group of people that want genuine change. Kimberly Graham is my preferred choice, although 2018 congressional candidate Eddie Mauro would definitely be a fine choice as well. If you couldn’t tell from the subtext, he’s the other candidate.

Other potential candidates include former Iowa Governor Chet Culver, Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer, 2018 congressional candidate Theresa Greenfield, 2018 Democratic nominee for Secretary of State Deirdre DeJear, former Iowa Senate candidate Amber Gustafson, Linn County Supervisor Stacey Walker, former State Senator and intelligence officer Steve Warnstadt, State Senator Robb Hogg, other State Senator Liz Mathis, and other 2018 congressional candidate J.D. Scholten. There is little doubt that any of these candidates will be a major improvement over Joni Ernst.

Update: Theresa Greenfield is running. J.D. Scholten, Abby Finkenauer, Amber Gustafson, and Stacey Walker have declined to run.

If the the votes proceed the way they have been, then there will likely be 664,676 people voting Democrat in Iowa and 612,338 voting Republican if there are no anomalies. This may not be the most accurate measure considering that Kim Reynolds won the 2018 gubernatorial election with 667,275 votes despite there being more votes for Democratic Representatives overall. This one could go either way, so be sure to show up to vote Joni Ernst out when the time comes.

Kansas

The current 2020 incumbent for Kansas is Pat Roberts. I would love to go into how much of a scumbag Pat Roberts is (and Goddess knows I have a ton of material for that) but he’s retiring in 2020. Thus far the only declared Republican candidate is Kansas state treasurer Jake LaTurner. It’s a fairly smart move on the part of Roberts to retire because it would be much harder for him to win re-election in 2020 than for LaTurner to do so. Given the 2018 victories of Laura Kelly and Sharice Davids, it’s quite apparent that there is a surge in Democratic votes in Kansas so they need something different from just another old racist white guy… like a YOUNG racist white guy! Brilliant I say!

On his website, he pledges to “protect out country, build the wall” yet claims that his inspiration is actually former President Ronald Reagan. Because we all know his famous quote, “Mr. Gorbachev, build this wall and make East Berlin pay for it!”

That’s not to whitewash Reagan’s actual legacy though, and I don’t mean the revisionist garbage peddled by conservatives either. Reagan was still responsible for letting the AIDs epidemic spread because he didn’t like gay people and wanted them to die, for selling weapons to Iraq and resulting in one of the most shocking and devastating terrorist attacks this country has ever experienced, and for screwing up our economy so badly that it still hasn’t fully recovered decades later. But despite all this, President Pussygrabber still makes us yearn for the days of Dubya and Reagan, and it’s depressing how even his own party is too scared to admit that his policies are exactly what they want and that the worst thing he did in their eyes is say the word “pussy.”

Also of note is that Jake LaTurner doesn’t like “activist judges.” Note that “activist judge” basically means any judge that isn’t a homophobe. It means they want gay marriage to be illegal. To further remove any doubt, he also provides more homophobic euphemism judges, oh I’m sorry “religious freedom” judges. “Liberals often take cases before activist judges in order to reshape our culture” he says. It’s telling that he thinks it’s a bad thing for laws to actually protect minorities instead of subjugating them.

Update: Jake LaTurner has withdrawn and is running for a House seat instead.

Other potential Republican candidates include representative Roger Marshall, who has voted against net neutrality, voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, voted in favor of Trump’s national emergency over his racist border wall, and voted in favor of Trump’s ban of trans people from the military. He also supports repealing Obamacare, and reducing the authority of the EPA.

Update: He’s running.

Another potential candidate is former Kansas Governor Jeff Coyler who pushed the Obamabirth certificate conspiracy and tried to prevent Obama’s name from appearing on the Kansas ballot in 2012. If that was not enough, he also signed a bill that allows adoption agencies to keep children out of a loving home if their parents are gay and refused to reinstate LGBT worker protections that his predecessor Sam Brownback rescinded.

Update: He’s not running.

There is also incumbent Kansas Attorney Derek Schmidt who said his office would fend a policy of withholding funding from Planned Parenthood, blocked a number of regulations proposed by the EPA, prevented same sex couples from changing names on state drivers licenses, receiving spousal health benefits, or filing state taxes as married couples, and supports stripping 32 million people of their healthcare.

And then there is former Secretary of State Kris Kobach who pushed the Obama birth certificate conspiracy theory, has written a Breitbart column where he falsely claims that immigrants are disproportionately criminals and cites white supremacist and holocaust denier Peter Gemma, and claimed that Hillary Clinton only won the popular vote because “millions of people who voted illegally.”

Update: Kris Kobach is running, much to the dismay of his party.

So there is no shortage of Republican shitheads to take the place of Pat Roberts it seems. Thankfully there is also a fair amount of Democratic contenders as well. Thus far the only declared candidate is database developer Eliot Adams. He seems like my kind of candidate from what little I could find. He did express his support for Bernie Sanders after all. Unfortunately he has announced he is dropping out of the senate race, but still has his eyes on 2020.

The potential Democratic candidate with the highest profile seems to be former United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, former Governor of Kansas, and former Kansas Insurance Commissioner Kathleen Sebelius. I would definitely be in support of Sebelius if she chose to run considering she has a fairly decent progressive track record having recently penned a piece to The Wichita Eagle praising current Kansas Governor Laura Kelly’s support of LGBT rights (and she also opposed a ban on gay marriage in Kansas that unfortunately passed with 70% approval in 2005). She also pushed for recycling efforts across the state and vetoed multiple bills for constructing coal-fired power plants.

Update: Sadly, Kathleen Sebelius has declined to run.

But she’s not the only contender we have for the Democratic nomination. We also have Congresswoman Sharice Davids, who was the first openly LGBT Native American elected to congress, the first openly gay person to be elected to congress from Kansas, and the first Native American woman to be elected to congress (along with Deb Haaland from New Mexico).

Other potential candidates include former Kansas District Attorney Barry Grissom, Congressional candidates Brent Welder and James Thompson, 2014 Democratic candidate for Governor and former Kansas House of Representatives Minority Leader Paul Davis,  former US Representative Nancy Boyda, journalist and author Sarah Smarsh, former Congressional nominee Robert Tillman, and Kansas State Senator Barbara Bollier. I am sure that any of them will be an immense improvement over Pat Roberts, Jake LaTurner, or any of these other Republican douchebags. So be sure to get out and vote for them.

Update:  Robert Tilman, state Senator and former Republican Barbara Bollier and Manhattan Mayor Pro tem Usha Reddi are the current candidates.

If things continue at their current rate, we can expect around 562,401 to vote Republican and 464,239 to vote Democrat. This may not be entirely accurate though considering that Laura Kelly won the gubernatorial election in 2018, but it does seem to go along with Pat Robert’s and Jerry Moran’s 2014 and 2016 elections respectively. Hopefully Kansas Democrats come through again like in 2018.

Kentucky

Well, we’ve finally reached perhaps the section where I get to talk about Mitch McConnell. This fuckhead has done the single most damage to this country out of any of our current members of the Senate, and perhaps in all of congress. McConnell has been the subject of a lot of backlash as of late due to his Trump pandering in hopes it will win him yet another re-election in the red state of Kentucky, but at the end of 2018 his approval rating was the lowest out of any senator to make it to the 116th congress, and for good reason.

McConnell is the current Senate Majority Leader and had just as much power to stop Trump’s month long government shutdown as President Pussygrabber himself did, but he chose not to. He is also well known for leading the Republican’s underhanded obstructionist campaign against then President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland to replace the deceased Antonin Scalia in the Supreme Court, in part of an attempt to pack the Supreme Court with as many conservative justices as possible. And of course, McConnell is proud of this monumentally scummy achievement of his. So you have him to blame for Neil Gorsuch being added to the Supreme Court for life and for every shitty decision they have made since then… like deciding to ban trans people from the military for instance. If that wasn’t enough, he is a staunch defender of Brett Kavanaugh and played a key role in his confirmation.

McConnell may be well known for his most recent acts of malice, but it is important to remember that this jackass has been part of the Senate for over 30 years, and since then he has been a consistent opponent of LGBT rights. Here is a list of his votes against LGBT people and in favor of anti LGBT legislation. Note that there is not much easily available online about LGBT legislation prior to 1990, and I’m still researching that stuff for a future piece.

• In 1993, McConnell voted to bar immigrants with AIDs from entering the United States. This could very well be interpreted as an attempt to prevent “the gays” from entering the country considering the prevalent stigma of gay men having AIDs.
• In 1996, McConnell voted against the Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA) to prevent legal discrimination based on sexual orientation, and voted in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) that banned Same Sex Marriage on the federal level. As an aside, the Venn diagram on Republicans who would support this amendment if it were reintroduced and who say gay marriage should be “left to the states” is a circle.
• In 2000, McConnell voted against the Hate Crimes Amendment to add gender, sexual orientation, and disability to the definition of “hate crime.” Thankfully the bill passed anyway.
• In 2002, McConnell voted against the Hate Crimes Billthat would have added sexual orientation, gender, and disability to the list of categories covered by federal hate crimes.
• In 2004, McConnell Co-sponsored and voted in favor of the Federal Marriage Amendment that would have prohibited individual states from recognizing same sex marriage. It thankfully did not pass.
• In 2006, McConnell Co-sponsored and voted in favor of the Same Sex Marraige Resolution that would have prevented individual states from recognizing same sex couples or offering them the same benefits as straight couples. It did not pass.
• In 2010, McConnell voted against the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The bill passed anyway.
• In 2013, McConnell voted against Employment Non-Discrimination Act of 2013 (ENDA) to prohibit employment discrimination on the bases of sexual orientation or gender identity. He also voted in favor of an amendment to the aforementioned bill that would have allowed “religious exemptions” to laws against legal discrimination. The amendment failed and the bill passed as is despite McConnell’s opposition.

And these are just his votes. Mitch McConnell has been consistently packing US Courts with far right anti LGBT judges and has been one of the most constant threats to LGBT equality in this country. last year he even appointed the head of the anti LGBT hate group Family Research Council to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. I would highly recommend reading that last link if you want to understand just how evil and vile Tony Perkins is, but I’ll post some of the highlights from Tony Perkin’s anti LGBT record.

• Insists Target’s trans-inclusive bathroom policies have turned their facilities into “crime scenes” like a “live rendition of CSI.”
• Claims LGBTQ activists are going to “start rolling out the boxcars” and carting away Christians (a reference to the Holocaust).
• Despite what health experts have said, insists that pedophilia is “a homosexual problem.”
• The Family Research Council has distributed a pamphlet that claims gay men are more likely to molest children, and supports “reorientation therapy” for gay people.
• Compares LGBTQ legal advocates to terrorists: “[B]ack in the 80s and early 90s, I worked with the State Department in anti-terrorism and we trained about 50 different countries in defending against terrorism, and it’s, at its base, what terrorism is, it’s a strike against the general populace simply to spread fear and intimidation so that they can disrupt and destabilize the system of government. That’s what the homosexuals are doing here to the legal system.” (0:31).
• Paid $82,500 to use the phone bank of former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke for an election run-off.
• Equates LGBTQ pride with drunkenness and adultery: “The month of June is Gay Pride Month. Now, I have not yet seen where they have declared Adultery Pride Month, I have not seen where they have declared the Drunkenness Pride Month.”
• Claims Uganda bill (with death penalty attached) simply “upholds moral conduct.”

Oh and here’s a good one

• Says about gay people: “They are intolerant. They are hateful. They are vile. They are spiteful”…”pawns” of the “enemy.” (See 1:30 mark.)

And Mitch McConnell has no problem with this guy and thinks he is perfectly fit for such an influential role in our government. Just let it be known that Mitch McConnell is more than just a boring old white guy who looks like a turtle. He is pure evil. He is also perhaps the most dangerous member of congress, possibly even more so than Trump himself. It is absolutely imperative that he does not win re-election!

Oh wait… I haven’t even talked about the rest of his record. Lets talk about his voting record on women’s rights. Throughout his career, McConnell has voted against the use of federal funds to distribute contraceptives (yes he is also pro-life despite the fact that contraceptives would definitely decrease the amount of abortions), has voted against bills that would have put harsher punishments on those that pay women less then men on five different occasions… Hold on, let me make a list because there are too many to hyperlink them all in that last sentence…

• HR 2831 – Equal Pay Bill (2008)
• S 181 – Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009
• S 3772 – Paycheck Fairness Act (2010)
• S 3220 – Paycheck Fairness Act (2012)
• S 2199 – Paycheck Fairness Act (2014)

Yet anti feminist douchebags say there is no pay gap and that any woman who is paid less than men was done so illegally. Yet Bitch McConnell here wants to make sure its easier for sexist businessmen to pay women less than their male counterparts. Isn’t he such a gentleman? I’m sure he can’t keep the ladies away.

He also voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act… twice… and voted to defund Planned Parenthood and in favor of SESTA/FOSTA, but after all this shit that almost feels meaningless. It’s like, of course! It’s only normal to want to defund company that provides valuable and often life saving treatment. Can’t have our government funds going towards abortions… even though government funds already aren’t used for abortions and abortions make up only 3% of Planned Parenthood patient treatment. But yes, Planned Parenthood has to lose funding cause Republicans just hate ̶w̶o̶m̶e̶n̶ abortions THAT much!

But as I said, this is just usual republican scumminess. I mean, we already established that he was responsible for putting a rapist on the Supreme Court Bench for life. Oh Goddess, I can only imagine how Ruth Bader Ginsberg feels being a major figure in women’s rights yet being on the same bench as a fucking rapist. Oh, I figure I should mention that McConnell also compared Kavanaugh’s treatment to that of Robert Bork in 1987.

For those that don’t know, Robert Bork was a Supreme Court nominee in 1987 who, similarly to Brett Kavanaugh today, marked extreme backlash in response to his nomination. Unlike Kavanaugh, Bork’s nomination was not confirmed due to the intense backlash over his anti gay, anti women, anti black, and overall far right views. I think then senator Ted Kennedy said it the best.

“Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists would be censored at the whim of government, and the doors of the federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is often the only protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy

Again, Mitch McConnell does not see anything wrong with Robert Bork having ruled that it should be illegal for gay men to have consensual sex in the privacy of their own homes, or having supported the Jim Crowe laws. It just goes to show you that Trump getting elected was not just a fluke; this is what the Republican party wants. They’ve just gotten good at hiding it. That being said, as despicable as Robert Bork was, he at least was not an accused rapist (as far as I know), so confirming Kavanaugh is a new low even for them, and if there is any justice in this world then every scumbag who voted to confirm Kavanaugh would have their careers ruined over it.

On top of this, McConnell has been a frequent opponent of net neutrality, voted in favor of Trump’s national emergency temper tantrum over his racist wall (in addition to causing the preceding month long government shutdown), voted against a bill to provide federal aid to victims of hurricane Katrina, has been a consistent climate change denier, was one of the 22 senators who urged Trump to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement while also coincidentally receiving $1,542,084 from the Oil and Coal companies, voted against the Green New Deal, and voted to strip 32 million people of their health care.

Mitch McConnell is among one of the scummiest and most corrupt people in the country, which is really saying something given how many corrupt and scummy people there are in this country. I can continue to rant on how awful he is all year, but I need to talk about his opponents at some point.

The only declared candidate thus far is Medicare for All activist Steven Cox. I can’t find much info on Cox but I have liked what I found. In addition to medicare for all, Cox also promises to combat climate change and expresses support for the Green New Deal, which is a very good sign considering that every current Senator either voted nay or abstained from voting on it. It is also worth mentioning that he supports legislation that cuts the influence of corporate lobbyists.

Unfortunately the lack of information about Cox other than what his website says, in addition to the fact that he doesn’t have a Wikipedia page, leads me to believe that he doesn’t have much brand recognition and may have a difficult time getting the nomination or beating McConnell if he does. Thankfully Cox is not the only one considering a run.

While he has yet to declare candidacy, liberal sports radio host Matt Jones has stated that he will run if McConnell seeks re-election. Some may be skeptical given our previous track record with electing non-politicians into office, but Matt Jones may actually be my preferred pick. I think he put it best himself.

I’m not a politician. I’m an ideologue, and I think we’re in a time when ideologues win

He has a point. People are becoming more radicalized these days, and are either drifting to the far left or the far right. Trump ran on a lot of anti establishment language and talking points and most likely won against Hillary Clinton because she was about as boring of a politician as you can get. This is why you had some stupid people who voted for Bernie in the primaries but Trump in the general election; they wanted someone who would disrupt the status quo. This can also be seen with the strong following among Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who run on strong anti-establishment principals.

The following paragraph from a Politico article sums up why he won’t be just another centrist democrat.

Jones talks about running for office often, both on and off the air. In 2015, he was recruited by national Democrats to oppose Republican Andy Barr in Kentucky’s 6th Congressional District, but after a political boot camp in Washington, he came away disillusioned with the Democratic Party. He recalls one prominent congresswoman advising the room of recruits that their stances on issues were not important, that raising money was all that mattered. “And that was one of the most depressing things I’d ever heard,” says Jones. He opted not to run that year, and when he made his decision the National Republican Congressional Committee released a statement celebrating the loss of the Democrats’ “last, best, and only” hope in the Kentucky 6th.

We also know that he has a lot of brand recognition in Kentucky and can appeal to both leftists and to moderate Republicans who are also sports fans. There are a lot of signs that Matt Jones is the best chance we have of booting McConnell out of office.

Update: Sadly, Matt Jones has declined to run. Thankfully progressives still have Steven Cox, Eric Rothmuller, and potentially Charles Booker.

Other potential candidates include former Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer, 2018 Democratic congressional nominee Amy McGrath, former State Auditor Adam Edelen, Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear (depending on how his gubernatorial bid turns out), former Lexington Mayor and 2016 Senate nominee Jim Gray, and actress and political activist Ashley Judd.

Update: Amy McGrath is running, but she’s running as a “pro Trump” Democratso she’s screwed. Andy Beshear will likely not be running since he was just elected Governor.

If there are no anomalies and things proceed at the same rate as usual, then there will likely be about 780,836 people voting Republican and about 468,241 voting Democrat. This sadly goes along quite well with McConnell’s last win in 2014 and Rand Paul’s win in 2016, but Matt Bevin’s gubernatorial win in 2015 occurred at a close margin. This is why it’s important that anyone who lives in Kentucky gets out to vote Mitch McConnell out of office and to rid the white house of perhaps its biggest and scummiest obstructionist of the past few decades.

Louisiana

In my 2018 Midterm piece, I stated that Louisiana is a state so red that it belongs in a burn unit. This already tells us that Democrats have a tough fight. Despite this, there is actually a Democratic governor in Louisiana who is up for re-election this year, but I already wrote about him. We instead have two Republican senators, one of whom is up for re-election in 2020.

The Senator in question is Bill Cassidy. Thus far Cassidy is one of the more tame Republican incumbents, but he’s still pretty bad nonetheless. As with most republicans, his record on LGBT rights is atrocious. In his career, Bill Cassidy has Co-sponsored the Marraige and Religious Freedom Act,voted against the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, voted to prevent federal funds from being used to legalize same sex marriage, voted in favor of removing LGBT protections from the Violence Against Women Act, voted to strike protections for LGBT youth from the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act, voted against providing equal social security and veteran’s benefits for same sex couples, and voted against extending civil rights protections to LGBT students.

He also has consistently voted against women’s rights, including voting against multiple equal pay bills, voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, has voted to defund Planned Parenthood on more than one occasion, voted in favor of SESTA/FOSTA, and voted to confirm both Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the the Supreme Court for life. Again, I’m sure he can’t keep the ladies off of him.

Among other stupid things, Bill Cassidy has been a vocal opponent of the Affordable Care act and has thus voted to strip millions of people of their healthcare multiple times, and was even half of the namesake for the infamous “Graham-Cassidy bill,” the other half being named after Lindsey Graham whose seat is also up for re-election in 2020.

If it was not obvious enough, Bill Cassidy is yet another Trump flunkie who has voted in favor of his national emergency over his racist wall, has voted in favor of all 22 of his cabinet pics, and has voted with him 93.6% of the time. Cassidy has also voted against reinstating net neutrality, and while he isn’t a climate change denier, he is still pro fossil fuel and thus is still a “doing anything about climate change” denier. And he voted against the Green New Deal because of course he did.

So yeah, Bill Cassidy is your standard Republican Congressman in the Trump era. It’s admittedly kind of tough to escalate the severity of his actions we’ve just so many abhorrent scumbags. When you put Bill Cassidy next to Martha McSally, Tom Cotton, Cory Gardner, David Perdue, Jim Risch, Joni Ernst, or Mitch McConnell, he’s definitely going to look kinda “not too bad.” Forgive me though, if I think that this is setting the bar pretty low.

It’s setting the bar really low that this is even a debate. Yes, it is bad to be homophobic. It is also bad to be transphobic. It is bad to be a misogynist and it is bad to be racist. It is bad to support blatant corruption and power grabs. It is bad to confirm rapists to the supreme court. It is bad to deny climate change and destroy the planet. This isn’t a matter of “left Vs right,” this is a matter of good vs evil.

And no, I don’t think all Democrats are inherently good, but the values for which most leftist voters are voting for are; and they vote for Democrats because despite their incompetence, they are a hell of a lot better than the alternative. And also because the Republican party has become a cesspit of the worst aspects of modern American culture, and have taken the party of Abraham Lincoln and turned it into the party of hate. History will look back on 21st century Republicans the same way they do 19th century Democrats; with disgust and contempt.

Bill Cassidy may not be as bad as the previously mentioned senators, but he does help them. He furthers their agendas and his presence gives those ideas more staying power in congress. Hence why he needs to be voted out in 2020. Unfortunately there aren’t many contenders for the spot. Current Governor John Bel Edwards has been cited a few times as a potential contender by people who seem to not have confidence in him winning re-election this year. I dunno about you, but if he loses re-election then I have a hard time believing he will win a Senatorial election only one year later, but I’d still vote for him if I lived in Louisiana.

Other potential candidates include State Senator Eric LaFleur and former Lieutenant Governor and New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu. Some may have noticed that Landrieu is currently running for President and may assume that he’s be occupied with that, but let’s be honest here. He’s not going to win the primary. I hadn’t even heard of him until I started writing this piece. Also there are a ton of contenders in the Democratic Presidential primary. There are so many candidates with immensely stronger followings than Landrieu that he’s almost definitely going to drop out, but the plus side is that he might have more brand recognition to take on Cassidy that way.

Update: Better Boys Initiative founder Antoine Pierce is running, and his campaign looks quite promising.

If there are no anomalies in the election then one can most likely expect about 835,715 people to vote Republican and about 553,904 to vote Democrat based on the 2018 votes. This rate is consistent with Cassidy’s 2014 win and John Kennedy’s win, but not with Democratic Governor John Bel Edwards 2015 gubernatorial victory, so I guess it means we have a shot as long as they pick a good candidate.

–

That is about it for this piece. I had this already pre-written at the same time as the first piece was, but I needed to make sure it was up to date before posting it. The rest of the piece is not completed though so you will see it when I finish it. Anyway take care everyone, and make sure to vote out any Republicans when the time comes.

–

Previous Part

Next Part

–

If you would like to support this series and my other work then please consider pledging to my Patreon. If you would like to help spread the word about this cause then please consider sharing my writing with friends or on social media with the hashtag #PinkTsunami. Anyway thanks for reading, and let’s hope for the best!