2nd Congressional District 'winnable' says Alabama GOP chairman

Alabama Republican Chairman John Wahl is cautiously optimistic that a Republican can win the newly redrawn Second Congressional District in the Yellowhammer State.

The GOP nominee for AL-2, Caroleene Dobson, will face off against Democrat Shomari Figures in November. Newly released polling showed that once voters learn about both Dobson and Figures’ background and issue positions, Dobson takes a 48%-43% lead.

Chairman Wahl discussed this race earlier this week on WVNN’s “The Yaffee Program.”

“I’m very optimistic, but I am also still want to see it in reality,” Wahl said, “and I think we have to remember that this district was designed by this federal court to be a Democrat district. And that’s very frustrating.”

Wahl said Democrats are underestimating how many African American voters will switch parties and vote for Republicans.

“They made the assumption that all Black voters were Democrats,” Wahl argued. “When they redrew this district, and they were trying to create a Democrat district, what they did not realize is about 10-15% of the Black population in District 2 are now polling and saying they’re voting Republican. And that number is increasing. I ran polling just recently statewide, and 18% of African Americans said they were planning to vote for Donald Trump. And that’s a staggering number. That’s double what we’ve seen historically. More importantly, when asked their opinion on whether the court with the conviction of Donald Trump made them more or less likely to vote for him. 36% of Black voters said they were more likely to vote for Trump because of the because of the court verdict. Wow.”

Wahl said minority voters are breaking with Democrats on the economy and the cultural issues.

“We all know the economy’s bad,” he said. “That’s something we see every day at the grocery store, right? I think the hidden issue that no one’s talking about that is really driving the switch within the Black community is actually the woke policies coming out of the Democrat Party. When I ask African American voters, what is the most important issue to you? And I put in their list of items, whether it’s the state lottery, decreasing taxes, fiscal responsibility, the economy, creating jobs, protecting children from what policies, their number one issue within the margin of error…is protecting children from woke policies.”

“I don’t think they’re excited,” he added. “They are not happy with what the National Democratic Party is enforcing on states, are not happy with the actual explicit material of libraries or the where the indoctrination in our schools are. This is radical LGBTQ indoctrination. A lot of their communities are sort of a circle around the church, and they’re in their families. And so especially in rural Alabama, I think those issues are having the biggest impact on Black voters and really, the Democrats are doing our best job of recruiting right now.”

Wahl added that Democrats have been taking African American voters for granted for too long.

“I think we understand that the Democratic Party has been using them,” he said. “They don’t actually care about what’s best for their community. They don’t. They kind of just use them as a political vote, but don’t actually care when it comes to policy or making their lives better. And if that trend can continue, I think we do win District 2. It may not be this election cycle, maybe in the future, but this is going to be a winnable district, and we’re going to fight for it right now, and in 2024, and we’re going to do our best to win it.”

Yaffee is a contributing writer to Yellowhammer News and hosts “The Yaffee Program” weekdays 9-11 a.m. on WVNN. You can follow him on X @Yaffee