The Working Families Party Plays it Safe by Endorsing Andrew Cuomo for Governor
http://www.thenation.com/article/180084/working-families-party-plays-it-safe-endorsing-andrew-cuomo-governor
Has New York states Working Families Party come up with the formula for forcing centrist Democrats to the left and delivering bread-and-butter progressive policy? That was the hope on Saturday night outside Albany, where the party gathered to make its endorsements for state races later this year. Faced with losing the ballot line to a challenger who tapped into resentment over his estate tax cuts, charter-school championing and failure to deliver campaign finance reform, Governor Andrew Cuomo won the partys designation only after promising to fight for Democratic control of the state Senate and deliver a progressive policy wish list.
Progressives in the Empire State are getting used to hearing that their moves serve as a model for the broader movement. That was the take on Bill de Blasios mayoral victory last fall, and its how Cuomos backers cast the endorsement vote this weekend. The eyes of the country are on you, said Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to the party faithful in the ballroom of the Desmond Hotel. Schneiderman and de Blasio put their solid progressive credentials to work for Cuomo in pushing Working Families state committee members to back the governor and not Zephyr Teachout, the academic and activist who had emerged as a progressive alternative.
The sales pitch worked: Cuomo won a solid (if not commanding) 59 percent of the vote to Teachouts 41 percent.
But the endorsement vote and the deal that secured it dont represent success. The real test of the WFP approachhoned since its founding in 1998 and facilitated by hard work in hundreds of contests for local and state officewill be whether Cuomo delivers, which wont really be clear until his second term is under way.