Defeated Pro-Trump Democratic Mayor is Down in the Dumps

[DonViejo]

MAY 20 2017, 11:28 AM ET

by ALEX SEITZ-WALD

Last year, the mayor of a seen-better-days steel town in Western Pennsylvania became the poster child of President Donald Trump's appeal to white working-class Democrats. But he'll soon be out of work after a 26-year-old assistant band director at the local high school beat him in a Democratic primary.

Monessen Mayor Louis Mavrakis' outspoken support for Trump turned him into a media sensation. The 79-year-old former union organizer helped decode Trump's appeal in the Rust Belt on Sunday political talk shows and for major newspapers, where he was quoted saying things like: "If ISIS was to come to Monessen, they'd keep on going. They'd say someone already bombed the goddamn place."

Trump himself made a high-profile visit to Monessen, a town of just 7,500, on Mavrakis' invitation. Trump stood in front of a wall of recycled trash to slam free-trade policies and promised to bring back good-paying coal mining and steel-making jobs. But Mavrakis' coup in getting Trump to town also helped lead to his downfall.

When a group of residents protested his visit, they were led by Matt Shorraw, a local community activist whose family has been in the town for generations. "What bothered me the most was Trump's visit got our mayor a lot of press, but he basically used that press to say our city is a dump," Shorraw told NBC News. Shorraw resolved to run for mayor, even though he had never held public office and was only in his mid-20s.

On Tuesday, he narrowly defeated Mavrakis in the Democratic primary. And with no Republican on the ballot in November, Shorraw is all but guaranteed to be the youngest mayor in the town's history.

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http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/democrats-vs-trump/defeated-pro-trump-democratic-mayor-down-dumps-n762541

[Cha]

1. Good! And, Good Luck

to the new young Mayor Matt Shorraw

Easy come easy GO, Mavrakis.. you got bamboozled by trump LIES.

[Hortensis]

33. I'd vote for this face. :)

Seriously, a 6th-generation "Monessenite" who loves and is committed to his town is a great start. A huge problem for so many of them is that most vigorous, talented young people leave for "better" places with better job opportunities. This one did not.

[Cha]

37. Mahalo for the, Hortensis.. I'm quite

impressed by him, too.

[brush]

2. Woohoo! Thanks for the post.

[riversedge]

3. A big Rec. and Congrats to Shorraw.

[LonePirate]

4. This is some very good news for a lazy Saturday!

[Shanti Mama]

5. Bravo!

[LisaL]

6. Pro-Trump democrat? Shouldn't that be an oxymoron?

[JTFrog]

8. It should definitely bar one from receiving any funding from the party.

Hope the idiot is shunned from politics forever.

[crazycatlady]

16. The Trump mayor is 79

Chances are he's not running for anything again.

[diane in sf]

20. his downfall is probably from watching Fox

[cubbies01]

17. Actually

The correct term is giganticmoron

[a kennedy]

19. Exactly, and I'd like to know how many so called Dems DID vote for tRump.....

[crazycatlady]

22. This sounds like a Demosaur area

THese people are ancestrally Democratic (and still registered as such) but probably haven't voted that way in years.

[rpannier]

23. If you chart voting patterns and read up on the area

You'll find a fairly good sized number (relative to the population) that have voted Democratic their whole lives and voted Trump.
In Kentucky, Elliott County had not voted for a Republican for anything in over 100 years, voted for Il Douche and then voted for every other Democrat on the ballot
The problem, and it's been missed by many, is that the political shift is turning toward urban vs rural, and there are quite a few rural states that get 3 electoral votes and they mostly go to the republikkan, so then they just need to pick up the traditional republikkan voters in Texas, Tennessee, Alabama, Indiana, along with the rural counties in western PA and such
the demographics may be shifting away from their party, but our voters are being more and more concentrated in very limited areas

[crazycatlady]

34. I do chart voting patterns

I'm a campaign field director (about to take a race in state #10) and have worked in Appalachia before (VA). When writing my field plan in VA, I noticed the shift of voters. (This was 2012 and the area has only gotten redder).

[NastyRiffraff]

7. Good for Shorraw

And good luck to him. Glad a real Democrat will replace a false one.

[Wounded Bear]

9. A small step in the march to undo Trumpism...

Good job, Monessen for seeing the light.

[bucolic_frolic]

10. We should have been inviting him to fake rallies

to make him feel good before we voted against him

[Initech]

11. He campaigned for a con artist and got conned.

[Blue_true]

12. Good news. Vote in someone that really wants to improve the town. nt

[packman]

13. Across from my hometown

Monessen, once a steel making powerhouse of South Western Pennsylvania. Steelworkers had it made, big wages and steady jobs with a strong union tradition. Then the life began to bleed out of it (and other towns in that corner of Pa.) in the 60's with Reagan economics and cheap steel from Japan/China. The steel mill owners didn't help, refusing to modernize and the unions didn't either - seems like they went on strike every few years.

Like almost all the small towns tucked away below Pittsburgh, coal and steel were its blood and, sadly, they feel victim to forces-for the most part -that were beyond their control.

Nice little towns with strong family ties and a lot of pride, but dying on the vine.

Just a note to my fellow DU'ers - All those town, the entire area was once blue - deep, deep blue. A Republican was a rare animal. The swing to Republican is a relatively recent trend , I think reflective of the need to strike out and to blame someone, something for what gripped the area. I do believe the Democratic Party failed to make the people understand what was happening to them and the Repukes part in it.

[SunSeeker]

15. Kinda hard to make them understand when they won't listen.

All they hear is AM right wing talk radio and Fox news.

The fact is, big steel and coal is gone for good, and these folks need to be retrained to work in the modern US economy. They apparently can't or don't want to hear that. Why anyone would want to work in a steel mill or coal mine instead of an office or installing solar panels is beyond me.

I lived briefly in a small town near Pittsburgh in the early 80s and the steel industry was already dying by then. Pittsburgh itself was a soot-covered, depressing, ugly city. I understand Pittsburgh itself has cleaned up quite a bit, and modernized. But it appears the surrounding areas have not changed a bit, only gotten worse. The people I knew there moved out of state, and vastly improved their lives by doing so. The remaining population tends to be folks who won't or can't change. However, this young mayor gives me hope.

[Freedomofspeech]

26. We live in your area...

Westmoreland Co was always a Democratic stronghold. Now it's so red that I can hardly stand the smell. That damn Richard Mellon Scaife bought up all the local newspapers and would never allow the picture of a Democrat on the front page. We are not a multi-cultural area and racism is huge. The trump humpers still have their signs out and their bumper stickers on their pick up trucks. If you read, think or don't watch Faux News it is hard living here in Appalachia.

[CatWoman]

14. good

drain the swamp!!!

[FrankfurtCat]

18. LOVE it!!!

This is amazing news!

[PatrickforO]

21. Narrowly. I hope Shorraw has sense enough to do more than just talk pro-labor, but

has some real ideas that can put American workers back to work at living wages. That's why Trump won the rust belt.

And please don't tell me Hillary had great policies for working Americans - yes, she did. I know that.

But we sure didn't talk about kitchen table issues like good jobs, decent wages, health insurance, expanded Social Security, high-quality K-12, affordable college, safe working conditions, good roads, clean water and reasonable, life-saving regulations. Not in ways that resonated with independent voters. Sure, our base came out for Hillary, because....Trump....but it wasn't enough, was it? And don't blame Bernie people for not voting for Clinton, because most did.

And taxes, we need to talk about taxes not as some kind of robbery, but as the way we fund things we all need but that the private sector can't or won't supply - otherwise known as the public good. And about how corporations and rich people need to pay their fair share, because they aren't.

Yes, I know, because I've heard GOP people say, "Oh we have the highest corporate tax rate...blah, blah, blah." But here's the deal: that isn't what corporations ACTUALLY pay. Due to loopholes, we have trillions in untaxed profits held offshore in places like the Cayman Islands. That needs to STOP.

We need to talk about this stuff, and educate Americans about how this whole privatization thing takes away programs that actually help them and routes that money to corporate profits.

WE MUST RECAPTURE THE MORAL HIGH GROUND, AND LEARN TO TALK ABOUT KITCHEN TABLE ISSUES EFFECTIVELY OR ELSE WE'LL KEEP LOSING.

- 33 state legislatures in Republican control
- 32 Republican governorships
- Republicans controlling the entire Federal Government

We got pasted, and we'll keep getting pasted until we learn to get our message out effectively. So let's hope Shorraw can be a person who does that.

[rurallib]

29. she did talk a lot about kitchen table issues, but our vaunted media only covered her emails

she may as well been in a forest for all the coverage she got.

I wish we would all stop spreading that myth. She and every Dem I know spoke of health care and college and good paying jobs and strengthening SS and Medicare on and on

And the fucking media covered emails, with an occasional break for benghazi while the same media spoke at length about Trump's populism. Including NPR.

[workinclasszero]

36. But America didn't hear about Hillary's great policies for working Americans because...

[Honeycombe8]

24. There are some gems in the younger generation! Time for fresh blood.

It's heartening to see some very young people step up to the plate to become leaders. They are the future.

Time for some of the old coots to fold it up and hit the rocking chair. (Note: I'm older, myself. But you have to recognize when you're living in yesteryear and it's time for younger people to take over. A new vision, more energy, ability to speak to younger people better and relate, more in tune with the modern world).

This old coot (a DEM Trumper???) was a one trick pony, with only one issue in mind. And only one sector of the economy.

[nikibatts]

25. This young man is a perfect example of who the DNC should be supporting if only with small donations

AND the message should be loud and clear that Democrats have only to put up a good candidate in ALL those red-wing state and local elections, no matter how small the race, and we can stop or reverse gerrymandering in its tracks and win many more elections at the state and local levels.

[BobTheSubgenius]

27. Mavrakis is no Democrat.

Fuck him and anyone that looks like him.

[linnknee]

28. Congraulations to this young man and best wishes always

[rurallib]

30. too bad Mavrakis isn't smart enough to put the blame where it belongs

on Trump and rich fuckers like him who have screwed over town after town in pursuit of bigger profits.

[Crowman2009]

31. Any Democratic Party politician who supports Drumpf should have their membership

REVOKED!

[Thinkingabout]

32. My first question is WTH is a former union organizer campaigning and promoting

a Republican? Listening and believing Trump was going to bring back jobs is a terrible misjudgment on the mayors part, giving total false hope to he residents of his town is wrong.

[workinclasszero]

35. Anyone stupid enough (and racist enough) to back Trump needs to lose their

public office FOREVER!!

WTG new Mayor!