Corporate Democrats in the U.S. House tightened their hold on the caucus Tuesday as Rep. Abigail Spanberger was elected by a group of 53 lawmakers from swing states to represent them to the party’s leadership team, winning out over the more progressive Rep. Matt Cartwright.
The Virginia Democrat was elected to become the party’s first battleground leadership representative, a position created with the passage of a new rules amendment late last month.
“Matt Cartwright is someone who has shown that you can be authentic to yourself and still win tough districts, rather than falling into the normal tropes of what it takes to win a competitive district.”
Spanberger will represent Democrats who hold so-called “frontline” seats, identified by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee as the most competitive seats that were won in close races or were previously held by the Republican Party, and will convey their concerns about the party’s messaging and policy stances to leaders.
She won the race by a 30-22 margin after writing to her colleagues that she has “experience talking about and advocating for the work of our caucus where people may not automatically think that the Democratic Party is looking out for people like them.”
Spanberger, a member of the conservative Blue Dog and New Democrat coalitions, noted that she won in Virginia’s 7th Congressional District in 2018 after the district had long been represented by Republicans.
Cartwright (D-Pa.), for his part, was one of only two House Democrats who won in a district carried in both 2016 and 2020 by former Republican President Donald Trump.
Austin Ahlman of The Intercept noted that Cartwright also “ran five points ahead” of President Joe Biden in his district.
While both Spanberger and Cartwright can lay claim to their abilities to appeal to voters in conservative-leaning districts, the Pennsylvania Democrat distinguished himself in the race with his support for Rep. Pramila Jayapal’s (D-Wash.) Medicare for All proposal and outspoken criticism of corporate greed and price-gouging during his reelection campaign this year.
“Matt has done a heck of a job to hold a district Donald Trump has won twice,” Rep.-elect Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.) told HuffPost ahead of the battleground representative election. “And he’s done it running pretty boldly on, frankly, economic issues that resonate here in Pennsylvania―standing up for workers and unions, fighting to bring our supply chains back home, calling out corporate power.”
Like newly elected House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and Assistant Minority Leader Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), Spanberger has expressed hostility toward progressives in the Democratic Party in recent years. Both she and Clyburn were heard on a caucus call in November 2020, after Spanberger narrowly won reelection, blaming the left for the party’s disappointing performance in the House elections.
“We need to not ever use the word ‘socialist’ or ‘socialism’ ever again,” Spanberger said on the call, warning the party would get “fucking torn apart in 2022” if it didn’t clamp down on progressives pushing democratic socialist policies such as Medicare for All, despite the fact that exit polls on Election Day 2020 showed that nearly three-quarters of voters supported transitioning to a “government-run healthcare plan.”
Some of Spanberger’s supporters in the battleground representative race suggested her attacks on progressive members made her qualified for the position, writing in a letter last week that she had “never been shy about voicing concerns, sharing perspectives from on the ground, and suggesting strategy or messaging improvements to caucus leadership.”
Political activist Michael Beyer tweeted that Spanberger’s path to victory was “pretty simple.”
“Matt Cartwright supports Medicare for All and Spanberger is a former CIA agent who spends all her time punching left,” he said.
Historian and author Matt Karp noted that Spanberger’s new position close to Democratic leadership will help wealthy suburban voters maintain stronger representation in the party than lower-income and middle-class working households.
“Matt Cartwright is someone who has shown that you can be authentic to yourself and still win tough districts, rather than falling into the normal tropes of what it takes to win a competitive district,” one Democratic strategist told HuffPost ahead of the election.
