Rural America resisting Democrats in Congress

 Politico:

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Long-tenured House Democrats from Oregon timber country to Midwest dairy land are watching their reelection races tighten even as their party presses for bigger gains in nearly every major metro area in the country. The dynamic provides a split-screen that mirrors the stark divide of 2016 and highlights the president’s persistent appeal in small-town America.

House Transportation Chair Peter DeFazio is facing his first tough campaign in years in his southwestern Oregon district. Rep. Ron Kind, who won by nearly 20 points two years ago in rural Wisconsin area, has been hit with $2 million in attack ads. Even Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairwoman Cheri Bustos’ gerrymandered stretch of northwest Illinois is looking closer.

Democratic lawmakers and strategists say they are confident most of these incumbents will hold on, particularly with Joe Biden topping the ticket and the president lagging in many polls. But the closer-than-expected races show how quickly President Donald Trump has driven GOP gains in rural America, carrying a warning that Democrats still have work to do to win back some of those once-loyal voters.

"The suburbs are super sexy right now and we’re not," said J.D. Scholten, the Democratic nominee in a farm-heavy district in northwest Iowa held by outgoing GOP Rep. Steve King. "That’s the reality. So I feel that rural Democrats have to run at least twice as hard."

And some in the party concede part of the problem is their poor communication to those voters.

“We all have to do a better job in messaging the work that we do,” said Rep. Henry Cuellar, a moderate Democrat who has the backing of many farm groups in his sprawling south Texas district.

Even Rep. Collin Peterson — chair of the House Agriculture Committee, a crucial perch for one of the nation’s top farming seats — who has resisted defeat for three decades, is more vulnerable than ever in a western Minnesota district Trump won by 31 points.
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Cuellar is wrong.  It is not their messaging.  It is their policies that are making it easier to vote against them.  They will have to change their policies to attract these voters.  Biden's energy policies are idiotic and an anathema to rural areas of the country.  Doubling the price of gas needed to go to the store or to market is not a winning idea.  Nor is doubling the cost of electricity for less reliable and less efficient electricity.  Democrats are wrong on immigration, the electoral college, and other issues that would hurt rural voters.

I have already voted and I voted against every Democrat on the ballot.