After two of his fellow Democrats endorsed his primary opponent, a seven-term Illinois congressman is learning the hard way that veering even slightly from the current progressive agenda — and especially being pro-life — makes one persona non grata in today’s Democratic Party.
Representative Daniel Lipinski, a Democrat from Chicago, has been in Congress since 2005, when he succeeded his father, William Lipinski, who had held the same seat the previous 22 years. Daniel Lipinski is considered a centrist in his party. That he has earned a 20-percent lifetime score on The New American’s Freedom Index, which analyzes fidelity to the Constitution, is a measure of just how far left the party has shifted; his father might actually have qualified for the label with his score of 41 percent.
While he generally votes with the rest of his party, Lipinski voted against ObamaCare and the DREAM Act and was the only House Democrat not to endorse the Equality Act, which would add sexual orientation and gender identity to federal anti-discrimination law. Worse yet, from the perspective of the Left, he not only votes against abortion but even speaks at the March for Life — that is, until this year.
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Lipinski did put in an appearance at the Chicago March for Life on January 14, and he “was highlighted as one of the top speakers for this year’s rally” in Washington, according to BuzzFeed. But something happened between Sunday and Friday to change his mind.
The congressman claims it was President Donald Trump’s last-minute addition to the speakers’ roster. “I have been critical of many things the President has said that have been offensive to the dignity of many individuals and groups. Unfortunately, no one knows what the President may say at any time,” he said in a statement. “Knowing this, I chose not to speak at the Washington March for Life because I did not want to put myself in a potentially morally compromised situation.”
Lipinski “made no [advance] announcement of his change of plans,” and “many of the national March For Life’s organizers seemed unaware of Lipinski’s decision to skip the event until after the march had ended,” reported BuzzFeed.
Trump’s appearance may have been the cause of Lipinski’s absence, but it may also have provided him with cover for ditching the march after two other longtime Chicago Democratic congressmen publicly condemned him and endorsed his primary challenger. On Wednesday, Representatives Janice Schakowsky and Luis Gutierrez held a Capitol Hill press conference in which they threw their support behind Marie Newman, a little-known marketing consultant backed by far-left groups such as NARAL, MoveOn.org, and the Human Rights Campaign, in her efforts to unseat Lipinski.
“It’s not easy to endorse a challenger over a colleague in the House of Representatives,” Gutierrez said, “especially when that colleague is a member of your party. But I think this is a very special and at the same time a very dangerous time.”
Schakowsky said the move was “not personal” but was “based on issues.” She added that she was hoping her endorsement would encourage donations to Newman’s campaign.
According to Politico, “Gutierrez framed the public shunning as a necessary response in the Donald Trump era: Democrats needed to unite against the president, and Lipinski couldn’t be counted on to vote reliably with Democrats.”
Lipinski told Politico “he wasn’t surprised at all” by the endorsements, but he argued that reading him out of the Democratic Party would be detrimental to its future: “I think we have to acknowledge that the way to get back into the majority [in] the Congress and pick up seats is to make sure we are a big-tent party and reaching out to people [who] are moderate and not just push to the left.”
Lipinski still stands a good chance of prevailing. He has huge name recognition, and his family has built up decades of goodwill in the district. In addition, he’s been strongly endorsed by the AFL-CIO, which intends to back him with contributions and volunteers.
Nevertheless, the fact that he is under attack for daring to buck the progressive agenda on a handful of issues, particularly life, signals that the hard Left, having learned nothing from Trump’s election, remains on the ascendant in the Democratic Party.
Photo of Daniel Lipinski: House.gov
