\nSo this governor race is shaping up to be {best of two Democratic Salem bigs, one county commissioner and Nick Kristof} vs {best of a reasonably strong Republican field} vs a state legislator running as the old, rural white working class Cascadian Democrats, as a reminder there are no maximum limits on Oregon state political donations
Reminder that\ufffc Oregon’s rural heritage is more working-class lumber than smallholder farming and the Democratic Party (which never really faced Civil Rights-era realignment in thoroughly white Oregon) still retained a lot of old-school loyalty there, this one could be the one where that snaps.
This in particular constrains governor Kate Brown from pursuing any further COVID restrictions or even slowing the lifting of existing ones in reaction to this “Omicron” variant if she wants to leave the mainline Democrats with a positive reputation outside Portland
And this is the first state election since everyone else saw what happened in Portland last year. I could easily see rural old-line Democrats (or even around Bend, where Californian arrivals create tension, or college town Eugene which cracked down hard) saying “yeah but we’re not the kind of Democrats who let that happen”
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