St. Louis Republicans and the Art of Being Realistic
I am a lifelong St. Louisan, born and raised. I have visited many other places, and maybe because my friends and family are here, there is no place else I would rather live. St. Louis is certainly not a perfect place, but for the cost of living, there is no beating the Midwest. As a proper St. Louisan, I will answer the “Where did you go to high school” question, that would be McCluer North. I have spent a lifetime cheering on the Cardinals and Blues and eating toasted ravs and gooey butter cake. As I became an adult and developed an interest in politics, I also learned that St. Louis is a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat city. Republicans in both St. Louis City and St. Louis County, also Democrat-leaning, can be a rare find, so when we do discover each other, we tend to form clubs and committees and the like. Even though we might be outnumbered, we are still willing to engage in the fight because we still believe that we can elect those who share our views.
What the city and county do share, is the fact that we make up the same congressional district, Missouri’s First Congressional District (CD1). CD1 has a, well, interesting history. Here is my experience with that history. In 1968, when I was three years old, William Lacy Clay Sr. was elected to represent CD1. Clay was the first African American elected to Congress from Missouri and one of just two black House members elected from states west of the Mississippi River. A pretty major distinction for Missouri. In 2001, William Lacy Clay Jr. was elected to his father’s old seat and remained there until 2021. I have never been good at math, but what I can figure out, is that one family represented myself, and the rest of CD1 from the time I was three years old until I was 56 years old. One family represented the area for 53 years, most of my lifetime, and I suspect most of the lifetimes of many other CD1 residents. In 2020, the Clays were finally defeated by Cori Bush.
We now know that, if CD1 was going to be represented by Democrats, we didn’t know how good we had it. Cori Bush was a Ferguson agitator, and her time in Congress has proven her to be a racist, and basically a Socialist. She has become less than popular even with her fellow Democrats. Many Republicans even in the days of the Clay dynasty, felt that there should be a strong, viable GOP candidate to run against either Clay Sr. or Jr. Did those candidates appear? Yes, they did, several of them. But the conventional wisdom by the powers that be was that it was just too solid of a Democrat seat. That and what might be called an old “urban legend.” A story about a deal being made. A deal between Missouri Democrats and Republicans. Republicans would not challenge Democrats in any serious way in either St. Louis City or Kansas City, thus keeping Missouri’s first black Congressman in office as long as he wanted to be, and Democrats would leave the rest of the state to Republicans. Was it true? Who knows. Anyone who might have had some knowledge of said deal gave no deathbed confessions.
But what has happened since, sure leads one to believe that something took place. Because whatever it was, took every bit of fight out of St. Louis area Republicans. In fact, in 2014, one GOP candidate running for Congress in CD1 was told by then Missouri GOP Chair Ed Martin, that they should “be realistic” about CD1. Realistic? It is hard to find a Republican who cares to run a strong, viable, and serious campaign in CD1. We seem to have hit some sort of rock bottom. The best example of that came in 2020, and the heralded candidacy of Anthony Edwards. Edwards billed himself as a “comedian,” but nothing was funny about this. He showed up at a local GOP meeting in shorts and a T-shirt, looking as if he had spent the day playing video games in his mom’s basement. He didn’t stay long, just long enough to drop a few f-bombs and generally be rude and disgusting.
In 2022, local businessman and former St. Louis City mayoral candidate Andrew Jones threw his hat in the ring. He was smart, articulate, and a solid conservative who had real solutions for the problems plaguing CD1, and the best part, he could run circles around Cori Bush in a debate. He is again, running for Congress in CD1 in 2024. Welcome news to those like me, who have watched years of Democrat neglect take its toll on where we live. But the support seems to end at the district’s edge. Andrew Jones will get no support from the state party, in financial form or any other. State Republican party grand poohbahs love to talk about “flipping seats” at election time, but if that were really the case, they would take a good hard look at CD1, because there has never been a better time to flip a seat, or does that go against the agreement made long ago?
You might think Republicans in other neighboring districts might have an interest in what goes on in CD1. After all, aren’t we all working towards the same goal? CD1 residents are asked to care about what goes on in neighboring districts by those other Republicans. The way it seems to work is that we support others, but the “others” can’t seem to travel north of Interstate 64 and have trouble finding CD1 on a map unless it suits them. Not all, but many area Republicans are too busy with other things, like deeming themselves the best able to determine who is a “real” conservative and who isn’t. Do you believe exactly the same things I do? No, sorry, you are not a real conservative. Do you go to church? No, sorry, you are not a real conservative. You can see where this can be a time-consuming endeavor, determining who is worthy and who is not. Maybe that’s why we don’t have time to find real candidates. Note to approved conservatives: you are canceling out a lot of qualified people to run for office.
The political leaning of CD1 may not change anytime soon. But there are plenty of people, some who have lived in CD1 their whole lives, who are pretty damned tired of the participation trophy.