The New York Times, August 11, 2020: Opinion | Who Holds the Key to a New America?
Republicans and Democrats largely ignore poor people because they do not expect them to vote at the same levels as their higher-income neighbors. But 2020 could change that. In the midst of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, campaigns that court low-income nonvoters by focusing on issues like expanding Medicare and raising wages could transform the political landscape.
The election for governor in Kentucky last year reveals the power of poor and low-income voters to do just that. Gov. Matt Bevin, an unpopular Republican incumbent who embraced austerity measures, was endorsed by President Trump, who had won Kentucky by 30 percentage points in 2016. When the Kentucky branch of the Poor People’s Campaign, which builds coalitions to address issues affecting poor and low-income people, invited organizations of low-wage workers and health care advocates in Lexington and Louisville to join coal miners from Appalachia in a movement to motivate nonvoters, the tide of the election started to shift. Low-income people began to talk to one another about how much they had in common. These new relationships helped foster a sense of commitment. These people stood together in churches and told their stories of poverty, marched together on the Statehouse in Frankfort and canvassed neighborhoods together to talk with residents about the issues that mattered to them. People who often feel ignored by political campaigns shifted the public conversation.
