MW: What have I learned from this?
Rob: I'll assume that going from the primary in 2012 to the loss, to the primary in 2014, which you won, you learned something there; and now you're engaging in what sounds like a very uphill battle.
MW: You know what I've learned most importantly -- you mentioned the uphill battle -- is that just because you're expected to lose, you don't have to feel like it's loss if you're accomplishing the things you believe in. Look at the black people in the civil rights era. There was no possibility that they would get any kind of equality -- I mean they're the underclass -- it was structurally designed to keep them as the underclass. It was legally okay to treat them unequally and it was commonly practiced to beat people and even lynch them -- you've probably even seen the photographs like I have of picnics being held on the lawn at lynchings. That far outside of society and yet within 9 years from Brown vs. The Board of Education, Martin Luther King wins the Nobel Peace Prize. The world can change when you stand up against something, even if it's impossible odds. The fact that I've continued to campaign and received all sorts of physical and emotional abuse, has turned out to be super-inspiring to folks who felt defeated in this state. And that's the most important thing I've learned. It's like every time I go into something where I'm told I'm guaranteed to lose, I don't feel like I'm coming out like a loser.
We expected to get an improvement over the previous candidate of about 15%. Now can you imagine in a congressional race if you could change the result 15% - wow, that's huge, right? Well of course it's still loss at 37% (because 22 + 15)...well below 51%; but if I accomplish that -- wow, what a huge accomplishment, what a huge impact, maybe.
If I and my legislative candidates that I'm working with and the state party efforts come together the way we want, we can affect the outcome of some really critical state elections. Right now, 2014 cycle, Arizona's electing their governor, Secretary of State, Attorney General, Treasurer, the education guy, the corporation commission people -- all those are statewide races; and the party is, as noted, the underdogs. In 2012 we didn't win any statewide races; but after two years of working, you know, instead of licking my wounds when I lost the primary in 2012, I just continued to build and when the 2014 primary came, there was a shift in my race of 23,000 votes and there was only 85,000 votes cast. The republicans...
Rob: Only 85,000 votes cast for...in 2012 in your district for the congressional race?
MW: No, in 2014's primary there were 85,000 votes cast. So the primary we just had.
Rob: Okay.
MW: And of those 85,000 votes, my opponent dropped 13,000 votes in his primary, and I gained 9,000 votes in my primary. So he still has the lead, but it's closer....and it's close enough where it can start to matter for our statewide candidates -- Fred DuVal is running for Governor; and Felecia Rotellini running for Attorney General, Terry Goddard running for Secretary of State, he's a former Attorney General. These races are close enough to where a strong rural turnout -- it doesn't even have to be a victorious rural turnout -- but a strong rural turnout, along with what we already have going in the urban districts, can change the outcome of the statewide race.
Rob: So in other words, if the....it's usually urban voters tend to vote democratic...
MW: Yes.
Rob: So your 15% increase over the previous election could be enough to swing some....help swing some statewide elections.
MW: That's true. In 2006, when the state party still had more resources -- we've been decimated through the economic downturn more than most communities I'm sure -- but when they still had some resources and they invested in building the rural party, we won the governorship in a state that's predominantly republican. The democrat, Janet Napolitano; her reelection as governor...she was expected to be defeated but it was the rural that turned it around and so that's our intention this round is to see if we can make that happen once more. If that happens, you know, then my continuing commitment to political change makes a lot of sense for 2016. I'm already in the process of working on the marijuana reform for 2016; we intend to just continue my campaign, whether or not it's about Mikel Weisser becoming congressman, it's definitely about getting some progressive values in a state that's famous for being racist and redneck and anti-progressives.
Rob: What are your demographics of your constituents?
MW: Of the 9 congressional districts in Arizona, mine, congressional district 4, is the oldest, whitest, and the second poorest; only Ann Kirkpatrick's congressional district number one is more poor -- it's primarily Indian reservations. We have a significant Hispanic population. I actually was hired to work in Arizona por que yo hablo poquito Espa????ol, I came from central Illinois to go work in a school that was 65% Hispanic -- that's in Bullhead City. There's other places that are particularly Hispanic -- Yuma of course, and Cottonwood comes to mind; but by and large, it's retirees; Caucasians -- Anglos is what I grew up saying because I grew up on the border of Texas. People, let's say, with conservative values -- folks who wish that the 20th century was still going on, are scared of change and scared of Mexicans, of anything different. I believe that my role as an activist, and now as campaigner, is to make sure that we move into the 21st century. Republicans, in particular, the conservative values agenda folks are doing what they can to hold back America, to keep it from changing, be it in response to climate change, in response to the world refugee crisis, in response to unemployment, universal healthcare, whatever -- they want to keep things the way that they once were and it's my role as a progressive to empower society to wrest that control from these few who aren't doing us any good.
Rob: So how has your opponent been behaving in terms of dealing with you? Does he pay attention to you? Does he attack you or does he ignore you?
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