President Joe Biden told supporters in Portland, Oregon, Saturday that only Democrats could reduce prices and help with household bills as he deployed all his star power in a late effort to shore up the struggling campaign of his party’s nominee for governor.
Voters have been drifting away from the Democratic Party in the region, disillusioned with leaders who have softened laws on hard drugs and presided over record increases in crime and homelessness.
Now they are flirting with electing the state’s first Republican governor since 1982.
Biden arrived with a message that his administration was driving down drug costs for the elderly and had passed legislation that will reduce inflation.
He delivered it with a warning that things would return to ‘trickle-down economics’ if the Republicans made gains in next month’s midterms.
‘That’s where we’ve been,’ he said to an enthusiastic crowd in a community center hall.
‘If the wealthy do well, it trickles down.
‘Well. I’m a bubble up guy.
‘When the middle class does well working class people have a way up and the wealthy do just fine.’
His visit comes as the Republican candidate continues to hold a slight lead in the race to be governor, potentially turning the state red for the first time since the 1980s.
President Joe Biden spent two days in Portland, Oregon, in an effort to stop the state electing its first Republican governor in 40 years
He worked the phones Friday with other volunteers working for Tina Kotek, the Democratic candidate who is in second place according to the latest polls
The GOP nominee Christine Drazan has a narrow lead in polls, and has won the backing of Oregon’s richest man, Nike co-founder Phil Knight, in recent days
Only two years ago, Biden won the state by 16 points in the presidential race leading party operatives to hope he can bring disenchanted Democrats back to the fold.
Well publicized problems with crime and homelessness in the state’s biggest city of Portland have made sitting governor Kate Brown deeply unpopular, and dogged Democratic nominee Tina Kotek, whom Republicans say is promising more of the same.
A day earlier Biden joined Kotek party volunteers at a crowded union hall, where he began making calls to help deliver votes.
‘What a governor does matters,’ he said in pep talk. ‘It matters! It matters, it matters, it matters!’
Throughout the trip though they were unhelpful reminders of the challenges his party faces. He had to compete for the spotlight during his western swing with a troubling new inflation report and rising gas prices.
Some Democrats around the country have shied from campaign appearances with a president whose approval rating is stuck below 5 percent.
But there have been takers for what the White House sees as official events, like the one in Portland, where the president discusses the work of his administration.
On Saturday, Biden set out how his Inflation Reduction Act was bringing down drug costs for seniors, and would help lower other prices – even though Republicans voted against it.
‘Here’s the bottom line and please hear this: When it actually comes time to do something about inflation around the kitchen table, Republicans in Congress said no,’ said Biden.
Republicans in Oregon scent victory and are painting Biden’s intervention as a last throw of the dice.
‘The only thing you can say about that is they are scared, they are desperate,’ said Drazan, the Republican candidate, at a rally this week.
She has carefully kept Donald Trump and his claims of election of fraud at arms length, and benefited as an independent candidate has leached support from Kotek.
Drazan’s team said Biden’s appearance suggested he knew that the state was about to turn red for the first time since the 1980s.
Republican nominee Christine Drazan has moved into first place in the race to be Oregon’s next governor. Pollsters say the race is a toss-up, with an independent splitting the field
A telephone poll of 842 voters this week gave Dravan a five-point lead over her rival, with a margin of error of 3.38 points
President Joe Biden arrives in Oregon on Friday evening during his West Coast swing in an effort to bolster the campaign of Democrat Linda Kotek
Analysts say Drazan is benefiting from a divided field. Independent Betsy Johnson (right), a former Democrat, is drawing votes from Democratic Party nominee Linda Kotek (left)
‘The DC political class is in full panic mode to rescue Tina Kotek’s failing and flailing campaign,’ said John Burke, Drazan communications director.
He said the outgoing Democratic governor was blamed for homelessness, rising crime and higher costs, and that Oregonians were ready for change.
‘They know Christine Drazan is going to win this race and there’s nothing they can do to stop that from happening,’ he said.
The last time a Republican claimed the governor’s mansion was 1982.
Pollster say this year’s race is now a toss-up.
A a poll published on Wednesday by Clout Research, a GOP-linked firm, reported that Drazan led Kotek by 43.8 percent to 38.4 percent. Meanwhile Betsy Johnson, an independent, has seen her support fall to 11 percent.
Analyst Jim Moore Johnson had a huge impact on the race.
She was serving as a Democrat in the Oregon Legislature for years. Before that she was a Republican,’ he said.
‘She gave up her party registration, and she’s running as unaffiliated. And so that’s why Christine Drazen the Republican has a real shot.
Drazan has also benefited from a huge donation from the state’s richest man.
Billionaire Phil Knight, Nike co-founder, have her $1 million last week – after giving $2 million in September to the independent candidate.
So far this year, Portland is roughly on pace to match last year’s murder record
Homelessness has become gotten so bad that tented camps have moved from downtown Portland and into the surrounding suburbs, sending home price values plummeting
Enter Biden.
He is expected to appear at a grassroots event in Portland on Friday night, then deliver a speech on tackling inflation a day later. His visits ends with a reception for Kotek.
Local media reported that supporters who donate $6000 can pose for a photograph with the candidate and the president.
While many Democratic candidates have shied from appearing with Biden – whose poll rating remain underwater – political analysts said he could help deliver a boost to Kotek in Oregon.
‘The Democratic governor’s candidate has got to pull in the kind of voter that normally votes for Joe Biden in a race like this, and energizes that turnout,’ Leo Bergstein, a Portland-based public affairs consultant, told the Associated Press.
‘She’s losing too many regular Democrats and non affiliated voters to be comfortable in this race.’
But Johnson, who resigned last year from the state senate where she had served for 20 years as a Democrat, said Biden’s visit would only highlight the party’s fading grip on power.
‘I hope he comes more often so that Portland will finally clean up more of the trash and tent cities that Tina’s created between the airport and downtown Portland,’ she said.
Crime hit record highs in Portland last year in the wake of the Black Lives Matter riots, lax bail laws, general unrest brought about by the pandemic, and depleted police force. In 2022, numbers are set to match those of last year, or possibly exceed them.
Locals complain that Portland now has a deserted downtown where soaring crime rates and an epidemic of homelessness are scaring away residents and visitors.
Rolling averages of polls suggest Drazan enjoys a narrow lead over Democratic Party candidate Tina Kotek, like this survey published this week by Emerson College Polling
