Enough With the Nepo Candidates, Democrats

Ms. Cottle writes about national politics for Opinion.

The Democrat Terry McAuliffe has worn many political hats over the years: mega-fundraiser, top campaign hand for President Bill Clinton’s 1996 run, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, chairman of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, the 72nd governor of Virginia. Now he is soliciting campaign donations for his wife, Dorothy, who is running for Congress in what will be a Democrat-friendly House seat if Virginia voters approve a redistricting plan this month. Looking for a boost in the crowded primary, Ms. McAuliffe’s campaign is blasting out emails from Terry with the theme: I’ve been a party player for more than four decades, so please help my wife!

I wish Ms. McAuliffe well. But I’m rooting for her path to take her somewhere other than Congress.

Sure, she is plenty qualified. A former State Department official, Virginia’s former first lady has more experience in government and politics than many other first-time House candidates. I also have no reason to doubt she is a delightful person. But as the Democratic Party tries to shed its reputation as the defender of a self-serving political elite, I do think its candidates should avoid trumpeting their status as the beneficiaries of rank nepotism.

Better still, sitting Democratic officials might stop encouraging nepo candidates. Americans are in a salty, anti-establishment state of mind. Public confidence in the federal government and in political parties is in the basement. The results of early primary elections in North Carolina and Texas last month suggested an anti-incumbent mood. Younger Democratic voters and elected officials are agitating for generational change. Polling shows people disgusted with the political status quo. Voters are sending strong signals that they want fresh faces and fresh ideas. Yet Nancy Pelosi, the formidable speaker emerita, has already endorsed Ms. McAuliffe.

Nepo candidates are an enduring, nonpartisan reality of U.S. politics. But the Democratic Party risks more than just one House race by embracing them at this moment.

The American electorate has long had an awkward relationship with dynastic politics. In theory, voters hate the idea of inherited power. In practice, they are frequently drawn to familiar names and pedigrees. In many cases, the political torch gets passed from one generation to the next. (See the Kennedys, Bushes, Cheneys, Daleys, Romneys, Gores, Caseys, Sununus, Cuomos. …) In others, it moves sideways, between spouses (Dole, Dingell, Clinton, Matsui, Bono, Letlow …).

There have been plenty of stellar political scions who reinforced the idea that certain families have a real taste and talent for public service. But there is a dark side as well. Americans’ enduring obsession with the Kennedy clan felt unhealthy long before it saddled us with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. atop the public health system.

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