From Lexington to Louisville, Paducah to Pikeville, and Hima to Hazard Alison Lundergan Grimes has gone to great lengths to portray herself to Kentuckians as a moderate Democrat willing to take on liberal special interests. It is ironic then that she was recently in Chicago being celebrated by an elite who’s who of liberal billionaires and political insiders. In fact, Grimes was a prime guest at the off-the record Democracy Alliance forum where she raised money not just for her own campaign, but also for a broad array of major liberal interest groups and Super PACs that she hopes will help propel her to the United States Senate, keeping it under the iron-fisted liberal control of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
To be sure, this was no confab of centrist or moderate political operatives. Democracy Alliance is the most extreme of the liberal left. For example, Tom Steyer, the San Francisco hedge fund billionaire whose $100 million pledge stalled the Keystone XL pipeline – the same jobs program Grimes claims to support – was there. So was George Soros’s son Jonathan, who now takes the lead on that hedge fund billionaire’s political engagement, which has historically funneled literally billions of dollars to radical left-wing causes.
Other attendees have included other iconic liberals like Nancy Pelosi, AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka, and White House Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett.
Why is a self-described moderate Democrat like Alison Lundergan Grimes welcomed by such a group? Because they know Democrats must pose as conservatives to win in states like Kentucky that overwhelmingly oppose the president’s liberal policies. And to do so they need people like Grimes who, once elected, can be counted on to keep the reliably liberal and ruthlessly controlling Harry Reid in charge of the Senate to thwart any threats to President Obama’s agenda.
First Lady Michelle Obama made this clear at a fundraiser for Grimes in New York City last year. “Barack hasn’t done any of this alone,” she said in reference to the president’s policy agenda of stimulus, Obamacare, and other liberal priorities. “That all happened because of who we had in Congress.”
“And let’s not forget about that commonsense gun legislation,” Mrs. Obama continued, using president’s draconian proposed restrictions on lawful gun owners as an example. “So it is critical that we elect Michelle Nunn, Alison Grimes, Natalie Tennant.”
The Grimes pitch to liberal Chicago donors is no doubt the same as Mrs. Obama’s pitch to New York donors: whenever her vote is really needed, Grimes will be called upon to rubber-stamp the president’s agenda, and she will oblige.
One Democracy Alliance member, Credo Action, has said the only Grimes vote they care about is the one keeping Reid in power. Although Credo has hired up lots of Obama campaign operatives for a huge national effort to stop the Keystone XL pipeline, they had no problem with Grimes claiming to support the pipeline. Indeed, the same day Grimes made her statement, Credo announced it would spend $500,000 dollars supporting her campaign. Asked about the pipeline, they said: “The most important vote for us is the vote cast for majority leader.”
Grimes is applauded in Chicago because everyone there knows what Credo knows: no matter what conservative-sounding promises she makes on the campaign trail, her race is really all about keeping liberals in charge of the United States Senate – and moving the country even further to the left.
“I anticipate the Democracy Alliance becoming both more progressive and more aggressive in the coming years,” said Erica Payne, one of the group’s founders. “That will disturb centrist Democrats.”
Yet Grimes shows no signs of being disturbed. She’s happy to conspire with the rest of the Chicago liberals – even though that aggressive move further left will hurt Kentucky more than Obama’s agenda already has. It means Obamacare continuing without repeal or remedy – until liberals can destroy the private health care system completely and institute a Canadian-style single-payer system. It means Appalachian coal and the jobs associated with it ultimately being destroyed. And it means all of our freedoms, including our Second Amendment rights, would be further threatened by more federal government interference.
They say the company you keep is a reflection of who you are. In the case of Grimes, the company she keeps is in the business of preserving Harry Reid’s power. Period.
Phil Kerpen is the president of American Commitment. Jim Martin is chairman and founder of the 60 Plus Association, and a native Kentuckian from Perry County.