Could Amy McGrath lose in the primary to Charles Booker?

Charles Booker is one of the few black state representatives in Kentucky and the only prominent black candidate in Kentucky’s U.S. Senate Democratic primary, which is on June 23. So if the campaign became about racial injustice issues, he stood to benefit electorally. And it has. Booker, who represents an area in predominantly-black West Louisville, has been very involved in the nightly protests and demands for reforms in the wake of the police killings of Breonna Taylor in Louisville and George Floyd in Minneapolis. If you are a white Democrat in Kentucky, voting for Booker is now a tangible way to advance the causes of racial inequality that you might have been attending protests or posting on social media about, since Kentucky, like many states, has never had a black U.S. Senate nominee or senator. 

So there has been growing buzz about Booker’s candidacy for the past week, and that in some ways culminated on Sunday with him getting an endorsement that could really matter. 

“After a lot of thought, I’m voting for Charles Booker,” popular Kentucky sports radio host Matt Jones said in a video he posted last night. “And here’s why. I’ve watched him for the last few weeks take on a leadership role that is exactly the type of person I want fighting for Kentuckians in Washington.” 

“Charles has a big heart and he cares. And in the last few weeks, I’ve watched him develop into a leader that Kentucky can be proud of,” Jones added. 

Jones isn’t just some random radio host---he is a very popular figure in the state, with a lot of fans who aren’t in the Louisville area that is Booker’s base. Jones’s backing of Booker over Amy McGrath, who is the favorite in this race, isn’t totally surprising. Last year, Jones considered running for this Senate seat himself and later complained publicly about how U.S. Senate Democrats in Washington had essentially anointed McGrath as the party’s choice to take on Mitch McConnell without getting much input from people locally. 

So could McGrath actually lose? My best answer is I don’t know--there haven’t been any recent publicly-released polls of this Senate primary. But even though Booker has a lot of buzz right now, there are six reasons to be not overly optimistic about his chances: 

McGrath probably has the highest name ID of any of the candidates. McGrath has raised way, way more money than Booker and has been running tv commercials for months. Also, because Washington Democrats endorsed her and she has this huge fundraising advantage, reporters in the state (myself included) have often covered Kentucky’s 2020 Senate race as McGrath v. McConnell, not McGrath or Democrat X vs. McConnell. So Kentucky voters who aren’t following the race closely may really only know who McGrath is. 

“I am SUPER annoyed that NOW everyone is interested in Charles Booker,” a Democratic activist in the state told me last night in a Twitter message. “It’s too late.” 

“Nobody outside of Louisville has even heard of Booker,” the activist added. 

Louisville is not Kentucky. About 30 percent of the people who voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 in Kentucky live in Louisville. In last year’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, about 25 percent of the votes came from Louisville. So a strong performance in Louisville because of his presence at the protests is a necessary but not sufficient condition for Booker to win this primary. It’s not clear how popular or well-known he is in other areas of the state. 

McGrath is well-known in the state’s other urban center. In 2018, McGrath won a competitive Democratic congressional primary in the Lexington area, the home of the University of Kentucky and about 10 percent of the state’s Democrats. She then narrowly lost (51.0 percent to 47.8 percent) to Republican Andy Barr, that area’s congressman since 2013 and a fairly skilled politician. So I would assume Booker is an underdog against McGrath in the Lexington area. 

The protesters may not represent the broader Kentucky Democratic electorate--There have been protests about police brutality the last week all over Kentucky, even in overwhelmingly-white areas. So I think Booker will do well with more activist types throughout the state, not just in Louisville. That said, the protests do seem to be drawing a fairly young crowd and may not be representative of the broader electorate. 

There is another candidate who might siphon off anti-McGrath votes from Booker. Before the protests, Mike Broihier, a farmer who is an ex-Marine like McGrath, was the person getting buzz and attention as a liberal alternative to McGrath. He is running as both an outsider (he has never held or run for political office before) and a wonk (his platform and political style are kind of like Elizabeth Warren.) Andrew Yang has endorsed Broihier, as has one of the state’s main Indivisible groups. 

Lefty candidates often don’t win Democratic primaries. McGrath endorsed Joe Biden’s presidential campaign and has avoided taking more lefty positions like Medicare-for-all. Booker has embraced Medicare-for-all and endorsed Bernie Sanders for president. I tend to think that while Booker-style candidates often get more buzz, “Twitter is not real life” and many rank and file Democrats, particularly in a red state like Kentucky, prefer a more centrist Democrat. 

This analogy is not perfect because more progressive Democrats often struggle with black voters in particular, but Booker is black (and research shows black voters often do lean toward black candidates.) That said, unlike say Georgia or South Carolina, Kentucky does not have a large black population that is an advantage to black candidates running in Democratic primaries. Only 8 percent of the state’s population overall and something like 20 percent of the state’s Democratic voters are black. 

But I’m listing those reasons only to explain the general structure of the race, which favors McGrath. I’m not sure if she will win. Booker is having a moment. And the more engaged Democrats in the state have never really been that excited about McGrath, viewing her as both foisted on the state’s Democrats by Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer and running on too centrist and bland of a message. 

Also, the conditions of this election are highly unusual. It’s likely many if not most people will vote by mail because of COVID-19. Kentucky doesn’t usually have early voting, but for this race it does, and Booker may be on the minds of people getting their ballots in the next week or so. Most of all, we are seeing truly unusual events right now—nightly protests across the city of Louisville and the country, Mitt Romney tweeting “Black Lives Matter,” the NFL reversing itself on NFL players kneeling. A Booker win would be a major upset, but anything could happen—and seems to be happening. 

It’s worth emphasizing that no matter who wins this primary, he or she will be a clear underdog against McConnell. Any of these candidates knocking him off would be one of the bigger political upsets in recent history. On the other hand, McConnell is quite unpopular, polls suggest Trump is declining even in more conservative states, so again, anything is possible. 

Thanks for reading. 

This is the fifth edition of what will be an occasional newsletter focusing on government and elections but really power in Louisville and Kentucky, helping explore who has it, who is gaining it, who is losing it and why. You can subscribe here. 

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