Morning all,
Want to be a popular governor?
The recipe seems to favor a member of the minority party.
Maryland’s Larry Hogan and Massachusetts’ Charlie Baker, both Republicans, top the list of popular governors, according to the Five Thirty Eight website.
Finishing behind the two Republicans was Steve Bullock, the Democratic governor of Montana, a solidly Republican state.
Delaware Gov. John Carney, a Democrat who has taken some heat for his budget measures among the left fringe of his party, finished 16th.
His Democratic counterparts in Pennsylvania and New Jersey are further down the list.
The reasons for the popularity of Walker and Horgan are easy to decipher.
A governor from the minority party has little choice but to work in a bipartisan manner. The governors have also placated Democrats by keeping their distance from President Trump. Hogan has walked a tightrope by stopping short of endorsing lawsuits against the Trump administration.
Trump, meanwhile, has rarely taken on Hogan or Baker.
The business community benefits with a governor from the minority party staying firmly in the center and not giving into impulses for an endless array of well-intended pieces of social legislation. Some measures give employers compliance headaches and don’t help the state’s business-friendliness rating.
Democrats have championed such measures in Dover to the exclusion of badly needed reforms in dealing with a seriously flawed budget process.
Here’s hoping your week is off to a good start. The newsletter returns tomorrow. – Doug Rainey, publisher
