Often, especially amid Donald Trump’s chaotic second presidential administration, we like to separate the local GOP, seemingly focused on limited taxes and a fiscally conservative platform, from the authoritarian and racially exclusive aims of the national party.
With this approach, it is sensible for certain voters, who tend to be wary of tax increases but are also reticent to support the GOP’s Trumpian arm, to cast ballots for local Republicans while sitting out national contests — or even perhaps voting to send Democrats to Washington, D.C.
But this is a deeply flawed understanding of the current political climate. For one, the old guard of the Republican Party — including local officials who have held their seats for years upon years — have stuck with the party despite the poison it has imposed on civic life.
Moreover, there is no longer a clear distinction between the local and national parties. As seen in the ascendant MAGA sect of the local GOP, conservatism in Hamilton County is largely aligned with the larger Republican project.
Ultimately, however, what really unifies Republicans of all stripes — local or national — is policy.
The reason why the latest $1.1 billion Hamilton County budget, passed by a Republican majority with the help of a few moderate Democrats, cuts nearly $3 million from public health, shuttering the county’s dental clinic and general clinics in Ooltewah and Soddy-Daisy; essentially rewards the Sheriff’s Office for separating immigrant families by increasing its funding; and fails to adequately invest in public education is simple: This is what Republicans do.
Just like in D.C., the local GOP is committed to tax cuts and heavy-handed law enforcement at all costs — even if it takes gutting public services that residents, especially the working poor, depend upon.
If voters casting ballots for Hamilton County Commission in the upcoming Aug. 6 election want change, allegiance to the old ways of the Republican Party must end. We must get partisan and look to the only viable alternative: The Democratic Party.
Click below to read each endorsement:
District 1 — Mona Petro
District 2 — Amanda Sovago-Royal
District 6 — David Sharpe
District 7 — Laura Bertrand
District 8 — Josh Wichman
District 11 — Montrell Besley