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What Is That Crowd? It’s the Field of Candidates. Now Pick One.

LOWELL, Mass. — It is a clown car of a congressional race, with so many Democrats running for an open seat in this district, northwest of Boston, that they do not all fit on one stage. In their first debate, when 14 candidates were in the race, one had to sit in the audience.

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What Is That Crowd? It’s the Field of Candidates. Now Pick One.
By
KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
, New York Times

LOWELL, Mass. — It is a clown car of a congressional race, with so many Democrats running for an open seat in this district, northwest of Boston, that they do not all fit on one stage. In their first debate, when 14 candidates were in the race, one had to sit in the audience.

At another event, the contenders took part in a form of speed dating called “candi-dating,” switching chairs every 15 minutes to try to charm a new set of voters.

As the candidates try to stand out from the pack, voters are left scrutinizing an unwieldy Denny’s-size menu of options.

“It’s annoying that there are so many candidates,” said Carol Carbonell, 73, a retired schoolteacher who attended a “meet and greet” at an art gallery in Lowell for one of them.

Linda Copp, 69, a writer and Carbonell’s partner, said she hoped some would drop out. “Otherwise,” she said, “someone is going to win with very few votes.”

Her fear is well founded. The only independent poll of likely Democratic voters shows the leader of the pack with just 11 percent of the vote — with 58 percent undecided ahead of the September primary.

Across the country, record numbers of candidates are running this year for House seats, especially those in which the incumbent is not seeking re-election. Democrats in particular, and women especially, have been galvanized by their antipathy toward President Donald Trump and their belief that the party has a shot at taking back the House.

In New Hampshire, nine Democrats are competing for an open seat based in Manchester. In Tuesday’s primaries in California, voters will face a dizzying list of at least 16 names on the ballots in each of three districts; Democrats are terrified that their glut of candidates will splinter the vote and allow Republicans to slip through under the state’s top-two system.

Multicandidate races suggest robust engagement in participatory democracy and offer voters a wide range of choices. But the surge of candidates means that in some districts, the winners are likely to win primaries with far short of a majority — raising questions of whether crowded fields bolster democracy or undermine it. In a suburban Philadelphia district, where 10 Democrats competed in a May primary, the victor received less than 29 percent of the vote.

“In these races with lots of candidates, you usually end up with one who wins only a plurality,” said Joshua Dyck, a political scientist at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.

“The danger is that that isn’t necessarily the person who has the greatest support,” he said. “And you’re violating simple principles of majority rule.” Such packed fields are spurring more talk of ranked-choice voting, in which voters rank their choices and a winner must obtain a majority.

Massachusetts has seen crowded congressional primaries before, in which candidates won with little more than 20 percent of the vote. That is the likely outcome in the Democratic primary in the 3rd Congressional District, which stretches from the old mill towns of Lawrence and Lowell to the graceful homes of historic Concord.

The decision by the district’s representative, Niki Tsongas, a Democrat, not to seek re-election has created a rare open seat. Members of the state’s all-Democratic congressional delegation usually stay as long as they want, and once in office, they are hardly ever challenged. This job security — combined with anti-Trump fervor — helps explain why so many candidates (15 at one point; 11 at last count) have flooded the field.

Except for a brief period in the mid-1990s, the 3rd District has been reliably Democratic since the 1930s, though its boundaries have shifted. The winner of the Democratic primary, on Sept. 4, is all but certain to win in November. Only one person is running on the Republican side.

“Whoever wins this seat will hold it for a long time — for decades, not years,” Dyck said.

This melting pot district is highly diverse, both ethnically and economically. And so is the field of Democratic candidates, which at this point includes five men and five women. Among the men: the former ambassador to Denmark, who is gay (Rufus Gifford); a constitutional lawyer who would become the first Indian-American in Congress (Beej Das); and an organizer and self-described muckraker who has exposed exploitation of factory workers in Asia (Jeff Ballinger).

Among the women: a former Navy intelligence analyst, who is transgender (Alexandra Chandler); a Cambodian-born woman who spent her childhood in refugee camps and is now a banking executive (Bopha Malone); and a Latina who emigrated from the Dominican Republic at age 5 and upset the political establishment in 2016 with her election to the state House (Juana Matias).

The candidates pretty much agree on most issues, favoring universal health care, creating a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants and repealing the tax breaks passed last year by the Republican-led Congress.

Their near unanimity on policy has forced them to be creative in their bid for attention. Das’ campaign made a video spoofing his name, joking that poll respondents had confused him with an organic chip dip.

But mostly, candidates are exploiting their biographies and touting their endorsements from local officeholders, who can serve as guideposts for voters who don’t know the candidates.

Chandler said in an interview that her unusual background had been a plus in breaking through the clutter. “Whether I like it or not, I am a transgender woman, and that’s something people remember,” she said. “But then I have to close the deal.”

Lori Trahan, the chief of staff to former Rep. Martin Meehan and now an entrepreneur, emphasizes her local roots, hoping that will distinguish her from others who moved into the district to run. “I was born here, I was raised here and I stayed here,” she told voters at a recent debate. “My story is your story.”

Another candidate, Dan Koh, who was chief of staff to Mayor Martin J. Walsh of Boston, has a slogan (“Let’s go”) and never fails to mention his Korean-Lebanese heritage. But he may be best known at this point for raising more money (and winning more union endorsements) than anyone in this race — an astounding $2.5 million, which is one of the biggest congressional war chests in the country.

State Sen. Barbara L’Italien has won election several times, but on the stump she emphasizes her role as a mother and advocate for her autistic son, calling herself “a mom on a mission.” In an interview, she said she would be well-served by the fundamentals — name recognition, a geographic base and “an intact machine, a field operation.” From her perspective, a crowded field is good, she said, because it would reduce the amount she had to win by.

Gifford, the former ambassador, who raised $1 billion for President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign in 2012, starred in a reality television show in Denmark called “I Am the Ambassador,” in which he humanized the job of diplomat. On the campaign trail, he tells voters he wants to restore their trust in government.

Voters say that sorting out the candidates is like taking a final exam when you haven’t attended class. As a result, many are trudging to events, asking questions, taking notes and comparing and contrasting styles.

Thomas Schilling, 52, a psychology professor at Fitchburg State University, attended a recent debate, held on the Fitchburg campus, because he wanted to look the candidates in the eye, hear about their passions and gauge their sincerity. The biggest issue for him is reducing inequality, in income, education and opportunity.

But after almost three hours, most of the candidates addressed that issue but did not stand out, and he was not any closer to choosing one to back.

“Now it’s a much more difficult job,” he said. “I became more aware of some of the lesser-known candidates and found them quite impressive, so I’m leaving here with a tougher choice than I came in with.”

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