Most years when a mayor runs for higher office, the pitch is simple: They’ve managed smaller governments, so they’re ready for a promotion. This year, they’re looking to tap into something deeper and more basic: a demand for government to do something. Anything.
All the clichés about there not being a Republican or Democratic way of picking up the garbage or being answerable to constituents take on extra resonance in the era of President Donald Trump’s Twitter tantrums and shutdowns where Congress takes two weeks to debate how to keep the government open for a few more weeks.
That’s the message mayors overall are pushing at the winter meeting of the Conference of Mayors that convened this week in Washington. “We may see some people send out tweets, but we’re fixing the streets,” was Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti spoken-word formulation.
But the number who are adopting that message this year in campaigns for higher office this year has taken many by surprise.
