On Monday's MTP Daily on MSNBC, during a panel discussion of the challenges Democrats have to overcome to win elections, Democratic strategist Zerlina Maxwell received no pushback when she complained about "voter suppression" hurting Democrats, and even asserted that Democrats disproportionately moved to states like California because red states have policies that are "harmful to marginalized communities."
After MSNBC contributor Nick Confessore recounted that Democrats have to win using a coalition that includes some "working class white voters," Maxwell jumped in to claim "voter suppression" is a substantial problem. Maxwell:
But here's what you're leaving out of your analysis -- voter suppression. So voter suppression impacts young people, millennials, people of color, and that's the Democratic base. So when you're looking at --
Substitute host Katy Tur played along with her premise as she injected: "Do you think voter suppression is going to get somehow cured, and it's going to be fixed in the next three years?"
Maxwell added:
I think what we need to do is we need to focus on it more. We didn't really talk about it in the leadup to the election because there are studies that say if you talk about it, then that actually suppresses the vote more. But when you're looking at a state like Wisconsin, where the margin was 70,000, and you look at the data that says 200,000 black voters were not able to vote because of cross check --
As Tur injected, "Yeah," Maxwell continued:
-- then you get into a point where, yes, we can win without as much of the white working class base as Donald Trump won.
Host Tur then wondered:
Why would the Democratic party not just recruit people from California to move to Michigan and to Wisconsin? And that seems like such a simplistic answer. I have friends who brought this up repeatedly when we've talked about the problems of the Democrats.
After Confessore injected, "Democrats have more voters, but they're in the wrong places," Maxwell complained that Republicans make red states inhospitable for Democrats:
There's one reason why that is -- because there's a lot of policies in red states that are harmful to marginalized communities, and that's why we choose to live in places like California and New York.
Tur merely responded, "Got it," before then wrapping up the segment.
