Forging America: My Campaign Manager is Roosevelt

Chapter 357 - 171: Pitching a Tent

Pittsburgh City Hall, the Mayor’s Office.

Smith and Byers had just left. Leo returned to his desk, opened his computer, and started a video conference.

It was a scheduled internal communication meeting, and he was already ten minutes late.

The screen lit up, splitting into two video feeds.

On the left was Daniel Sanders’s serious face. The background was his Senate office, where he was nearly buried under mountains of draft legislation.

On the right was John Murphy, sitting on a speeding campaign bus. Outside the window, the Pennsylvania countryside flew by.

"Leo," Sanders spoke first, his voice hoarse. "I heard you made a big move in Pittsburgh. The so-called Industrial Revival Alliance... word in Washington is you’re trying to go independent in Pennsylvania."

"Not independence, Senator," Leo replied calmly. "Expansion."

"I want to show you something. Or rather, give the Democratic Party a big gift."

"Ron Smith, the Mayor of Erie. Joe Byers, the Mayor of Scranton."

Leo stated the two names.

"Just ten minutes ago, they reached a consensus right here in my office."

Leo paused, then said, "They are preparing to publicly announce that they are leaving the Republican Party to join the Democratic Party."

"What?!"

On the campaign bus, Murphy shot upright, nearly hitting his head on the ceiling.

His eyes were wide as saucers, his face a mask of disbelief.

On the other end of the screen, Sanders took off his glasses. His usually half-lidded eyes were now wide open.

"Are you kidding me, Leo?" Sanders asked. "Ron Smith? That old diehard from the Lake Erie shoreline who’s spent twenty years calling us liberal softies? He’s joining the Democratic Party?"

"He had no choice," Leo said. "Warren cut off his funding, backing him into a corner. I gave him a lifeline. The only condition was that he switch jerseys."

Leo looked at the two political heavyweights on the screen.

"This is just the first wave. Once we’ve opened this door, once the factories in Erie are running again, once the workers in Scranton get their paychecks, the other mayors who are still on the fence—like the ones in Johnston and Altoona—they’ll all follow suit."

"We are going to tear a huge hole in Warren’s backyard—the Pennsylvania Rust Belt, which the Republican Party has dominated for decades."

"We’re going to turn this sea of red, blue."

This should have been incredibly good news.

For any political party, a mass defection of incumbent mayors from the opposing camp is a major victory worth popping the champagne for.

But Sanders wasn’t smiling.

Not only was he not smiling, but his brow furrowed even deeper, his face etched with profound concern.

"Leo, you’re too young. You only see the votes, not the trouble."

"Look at the kind of people we’re dealing with here."

"Ron Smith is a staunch pro-life supporter, a lifetime member of the National Rifle Association, and he once said in a public speech that global warming is a hoax fabricated by the left."

"Joe Byers, while a bit more moderate, opposes any form of carbon tax, supports unlimited shale gas fracking, and holds a hardline stance on immigration policy."

Sanders’s voice grew stern.

"These men are classic conservatives. Their values run completely counter to the core tenets of our Democratic Party—environmental protection, equal rights, gun control."

"Let them into the party?

Sanders scoffed.

"The Democratic National Committee will go crazy. The environmental groups, women’s rights organizations, and minority groups will be blockading the doors of the Democratic National Committee Headquarters by tomorrow."

"They’ll accuse us of selling our souls for votes. They’ll accuse us of letting a Trojan horse into the city."

"This will cause a huge rift within the party."

"Leo, you’re just making trouble for me."

Sanders’s concerns were not without reason.

Politics in the United States today is highly polarized. Parties are not just coalitions of interests; they are fortresses of values.

Purity tests within the parties were becoming increasingly intense. Accepting a group of heretics like this was tantamount to playing with fire.

Leo was about to argue back, to try and persuade Sanders with a logic of ’survival first’.

"Wait."

Murphy, on the campaign bus, suddenly spoke up.

He interrupted both Leo and Sanders.

"Senator."

Murphy looked into the camera, his tone firmer than ever before.

"We need their votes."

"Whether they’re pro-choice or pro-life, whether they like guns or not."

"We need them."

Murphy pulled out an electoral map of Pennsylvania.

"I’ve seen the latest data. In Philadelphia, my support has already peaked. Even though Monroe lost the primary, the elite crowd he left behind is still on the sidelines. They don’t trust me."

"In the rural areas, Warren’s base is still solid."

"These industrial cities—Erie, Scranton, Johnston—are home to over a million blue-collar voters."

"This is the game-changer."

"Without these mayors’ endorsements, without them mobilizing local administrative resources and union networks to get out the vote for me, I can’t beat Warren in the statewide election."

Murphy’s voice rose a few notches.

"To lose control of the Senate for the sake of so-called purity, just so we don’t upset a few spokespeople from environmental groups..."

"Senator, that would be the real crime."

Sanders was stunned.

He looked at Murphy on the screen, as if seeing this young man who had been his protégé for years for the very first time.