Welcome to the HoosLeft podcast, a show about Indiana politics, history, and culture from the unapologetic perspective of the Hoosier left. My name is Scott Aaron Rogers and I’m recording from Bloomington.
Here, in these couple weeks after the May 7 Indiana primary, I’ve begun to turn my attention to the general election and to think about strategy. What should Democrats and the larger left be doing to WIN in November, hopefully with a sufficient mandate to actually exercise power on behalf of the people.
I wrote a lengthy two-piece article a couple months ago on the stakes of the 2024 election at the federal level and told national Democrats how they should run this race. That’s over on my Substack; the piece is called Heart Me Out. It’s worth reading; I use the songs of classic rock band Heart as a narrative device, so there’s lots of good tunes (and some kinda cheesy ones) along the way. But, the gist is this: Democrats should highlight the conservative Project 2025 master plan - the “roadmap to fascism,” as it’s been called. If you’re not scared shitless about the prospect of ANY of that project being implemented yet, you should be. Read my piece. There’s lots of great links in it. OR read the great Substack by Andra Watkins called “How Project 2025 Will Ruin Your Life”. Have a drink ready.
In response, Democrats should offer their own comprehensive platform, filled with aggressive, progressive policies that would put the final nail in the Reagan era of trickle-down neoliberalism. A New New Deal. A left version of “Contract with America.” I like the name Freedom 250 - turns out the US has a little birthday coming up in 2026. Who do you want planning the party? It has the added bonus of sounding like the name of a NASCAR event - maybe you pick off a few race fans. But if you come up with something catchier, I’m all ears.
The final, most important, part of my strategy is to run as a bloc. President Biden’s personally unpopular. Other, individual Democrats are unpopular. In down-ballot races, Democrats struggle to gain traction, with little name recognition, and even less money. The DNC is swimming in cash. Don’t blow all that money trying to convince voters they love Joe Biden. Center the platform. Center the BRAND - the Republican brand is TOXIC. Advertise THAT. And it helps the whole ticket without having to send money TO those down-ballot candidates.
But alas, the Biden campaign is not knocking down the door for my consulting services, and I’m afraid Indiana Democrats will once again be hung out to dry by the bigs in DC.
With those limitations, we’ve got a few options.
For statewide and federal races, we can go all-in on the cities and suburbs, the population centers. With the exception of 2018, and then the COVID year in 2020, voter turnout has been terrible in Indiana. Urban turnout has been even worse. There are a lot of Democratic voters out there in the cities that most likely feel hopeless in the face of rigged Republican rule. Can Democrats turn that tide this fall? They’ll need to run up BIG numbers in the cities to overcome their deficit with rural voters, though there is hope in the increasingly Democratic suburbs, too.
But what about those rural voters? Another option is to find votes among this population Democrats have ignored for too long. Even as Republicans have increasingly dominated rural counties in the last couple decades, there are still would-be Democratic voters out there. They must feel even more hopeless in the face of rigged Republican rule, far too often having NO candidate to represent them in local races. So, even IF liberals manage to far outpace conservatives in the cities, maybe pick up a win in a statewide race here or there, Republicans will NEVER give up their supermajority in the legislature when they run uncontested in large swathes of the state.
I talked to Monroe County Deputy Chair for Rural Engagement, Ryan Still, about how the left can go about changing this dynamic in rural Indiana. In our conversation, we delved into the challenges of canvassing the countryside, overcoming stereotypes in both directions, and tying rural concerns to Democratic policy. We discussed the trust-building process and looked at some on the left who do well in this area. Finally, a question of strategy: is it worth it? Should Democrats dedicate resources to rural outreach or focus all their efforts on turning out the base?
But first, please consider supporting this project with a financial contribution.
In 2022, in the wake of the corrupted Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, I was furious on behalf of the women in my life, in this state, and across the country. The rushed Special Session of the General Assembly that summer was the first time I had participated in a political protest. I had spent my whole adult life squandering the privilege I have in this society as a straight, white man.
I knew I needed to do more, but wasn’t quite sure what that looked like. I didn’t know anybody in political circles. My time was consumed by work and family. So I started writing on Substack in what little spare time I had. I’ve branched into campaign finance research, and I started this podcast - because the world needs more basic white guys with podcasts. Apparently it’s some sort of recessive trait. Who knew?
But seriously, I know it is the unfortunate truth in this county that my voice, as a cisgender, hetero white guy is valued more than others, and I cannot waste that privilege any longer. Hoosiers, and citizens of captured, gerrymandered “Red States” nationwide are disappointed, shocked and horrified at the path our country has taken. And mad. We should be mad together, and turn our righteous fury into action.
It’s going to be a long, difficult road. We may never taste the fruits of our labor ourselves, but we put in the work so our children might. I knew this, and I knew long ago that 2024 was going to be an incredibly difficult year, but not in the way it’s gone so far. My special guy, my 19 year-old son passed away in January. My family continues to process the grief; but his 16 year-old sister in particular is not coping well, fell in with a bad crowd, got up no good, and is consequently spending an indeterminate amount of time with family out of state.
Now, I don’t mean to be flippant or dismissive, because this is my own children I’m talking about here, but they are only two of a million and a half Hoosier kids our state’s Republican supermajority and their financial benefactors harm with bad policy - by allowing guns to flood our communities, by bullying queer youth, and by poisoning our environment… or building a Christian nationalist hellscape our kids will have to navigate.
This year may have wounded me deeply, but I’m determined to keep pushing. I will continue to work to highlight Indiana’s bad actors so we can replace them with more empathetic leadership, and also shine the spotlight on the activists, organizations, and elected officials who are doing the hard work to build a more just, equitable, and compassionate Indiana for that next generation of Hoosiers. And obviously the Republicans are awful, but I’ll take on Democrats too: when they put their donors over their voters, when they talk out of both sides of their mouths, and when they fail to push back against GOP authoritarian extremism with the necessary urgency and tenacity. Don’t let red-team/blue-team politics cloud your judgment.
If you can, help me out with a paid subscription at scottaaronrogers.substack.com. For five dollars a month or $50 a year, you can help me push our state in a better direction, and maybe if we reach critical mass, I can put down my tool belt and devote my full time to you, to this project, and to Indiana’s future. I don’t put anything behind a paywall because, as author Sarah Kendzior says, “it’s not cool to paywall political content in a political crisis.” I believe in open access to information, and your support helps make this knowledge freely available to all Hoosiers. So please, before the interview, if you have the means, pause right now, go to scottaaronrogers.substack.com and subscribe at the paid level.
And while the best way to help this project is a financial contribution, if you can’t afford it at this time, you can still help. Subscribe at the free level over on Substack. Set your favorite podcast player to auto-download new episodes of the show. Rate and review the show on whatever platform you use. Follow me on social media at facebook.com/hoosleft (spell); I’m also on Bluesky at the same handle. On Instagram, Threads, and Twitter, I’m at scottrog78 (spell) and on Mastodon at scottrog78@hoosier.social. Full video episodes of the pod are now available on YouTube, with clips on TikTok: the handle on both of those is @hoosleft. Please subscribe on whichever platforms you use.
But, most importantly, share our message. Forward the articles to friends, family, and colleagues; don’t just like, but share on social media; invite others to this community of Indiana leftists. Nobody is coming to save us - we’ve gotta do it ourselves. To those who have joined this community already, especially those paid subscribers, you fill my heart and have my sincere thanks. And to everybody, thanks for listening.
Now, here’s my interview with Ryan Still.
Once again, that was the Monroe County Democratic Party’s Deputy Chair for Rural Engagement, Ryan Still.
So, toward the end there, we talked about something I asked in the introduction. Is it worth it for Democrats in Indiana, or anywhere in the country for that matter, to invest resources in rural outreach when, on a purely cynical, analytics, crunch-the-numbers level, it might be a better value to focus on urban and suburban areas, where - if nothing else - contacting voters is certainly more efficient.
What do you mean by worth it?
In dollars and cents? Maybe. Probably not. That’s the cold, passionless bet Democrats have consistently made in recent years.
But In hearts and minds? Now, that’s priceless. The seed of democracy lies dormant in many rural areas. It will eventually bear fruit if you come back to water it regularly.
Ryan mentioned the trope about white rural Americans voting against their best interests. This is true to an extent. Again thinking in purely cynical economic terms, Democrats offer better policies for working class people, urban or rural.
But only marginally.
Sure, they might have tried to file down some of the sharp edges, but Democratic economic policy was basically Diet Reagan. When Democrats embraced neoliberalism under Bill Clinton, they essentially gave up any economic difference with Republicans. The hatred rural folk have for NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement that went into effect in 1994, cannot be understated. And, while that agreement was negotiated and signed by Daddy Bush, it got pinned on Clinton, ruining the family brand - and the Democratic brand - for decades among rural Americans.
Make no mistake, it was the economic libertarian, free market fundamentalist right that gave us trickle-down, gave us NAFTA, gave us a hollowed-out rural America dominated by just a few big players. But they also gave us someone to blame. They gave us a story. And they repeated it again. And again. And again.
It really is quite a thing to behold how the capitalist class managed to leave the coalition consisting largely of the young, the marginalized, and the student-loan saddled managerial-class holding the bag when the backlash to all-out capitalism came. Just, bravo! Chef’s kiss! Brilliantly evil, perfectly executed divide and conquer strategy. Game respects game.
Democrats have had no game. Or rather, too many cashed out any credibility or moral consistency they had for a chance to play capitalism roulette - only to find the house wins every time. They sold our social democratic economic principles to played an un-winnable game. We quit offering much of any worth to rural voters.
The wealthy few have everything. They set the terms of the debate. They determine what we fight about. And while we argue about who’s human, who deserves rights, and who gets to live with dignity (correct answer: everybody over the age of born) - they make off with literally all of our dying planet’s remaining resources.
Minority and underserved populations constitute a massive portion of the Democratic Party base. Rural voters ARE an underserved population. They SHOULD be a part of the Democratic coalition and historically, until the last 50 years or so, WERE.
So it is our job, for us political sickos out here, to change the terms of the debate. To quit fighting a culture war and start fighting a class war - ALL of us, urban, rural, and everywhere in between - united against the authoritarians and oligarchs.
It’s worth it.
Thanks for listening. Thank you to my guest today, Ryan Still. You can find him on LinkedIn or email him at ryan.still9@gmail.com. As for yours truly, you can find me on Facebook, Bluesky, YouTube and TikTok at hoosleft and on most other social media sites at scottrog78. If you want send me as message, slide in my DMs on social media (do the kids still say that?) or email me at scottrog78@gmail.com. If you haven’t yet done so, when you’re finished here, please go to scottaaronrogers.substack.com and subscribe at the paid level. Help me keep this project going. Until next time, this has been the HoosLeft podcast. I’m Scott Aaron Rogers. Love each other, Indiana.
HoosLeft #37: Engaging Rural Voters From The Left
Guest: Ryan Still, Monroe County Democratic Party Deputy Chair for Rural Engagement
https://scottaaronrogers.substack.com/subscribe
https://www.monroedems.org/executive-committee
https://scottaaronrogers.substack.com/p/heart-me-out-part-ii/
https://www.incontext.indiana.edu/2023/july-aug/article2.asp
https://www.thestatehousefile.com/politics/indianas-deep-red-election-returns-leave-reformers-discouraged/article_5f261246-678a-11ed-9218-5b23cf7279b6.html
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00027162211070061
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2017/8/19/what-is-nafta-and-why-does-trump-want-it-renegotiated
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/03/20/1-trends-in-party-affiliation-among-demographic-groups/
https://www.governing.com/now/how-rural-america-learned-to-love-the-republican-party
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