How to Influence Democrats in Power: ‘Talk Democrat’

It is no wonder that Republicans and Democrats sometimes do not see eye to eye; they speak different languages. A word that means one thing to a Republican may carry an entirely different meaning to a Democrat.

So the reality is, if your goal is to win friends and influence people in the Sacramento of today, you need to be fluent in a second language. It’s not French, it’s not Spanish, it’s not Chinese.

It’s Democrat.

“If your representative is a Democrat, you need to speak Democrat to them,” said Christina Hildebrand, who was delivering a lesson on linguistics and political tactics at the Defeat the Mandates rally last week on the north side of the Capitol Building. On hand were a few hundred people and some of the trucks and truckers who drove across country to similar rallies in Washington D.C. and Los Angeles.

“I love the Republicans, they vote with us every time,”she continued. “But they can’t make the difference we need. We need to get Democrats on our side and voting against these bills.”

Hildebrand, the founder of A Voice for Choice Advocacy group, is a familiar face in the halls and conference rooms of the Capitol. Lawmakers of both parties know her on a first name basis. In recent weeks she has taken multiple meetings with legislators and others advocating against a stack of highly controversial Covid-19-related bills now being considered in the state Assembly and Senate.

In Florida or Texas perhaps, activists like her would need to use Republican talking points to sweet-talk the power brokers, because Republicans hold sway in those states. But in California, where Democrats own the keys to the governor’s mansion and supermajorities in both houses of the legislature, you must talk a different talk. If you’re not pitching Democrat movers and shakers using Democrat phrases and buzzwords, you might as well be talking Martian  to them.

“They literally won’t hear you,” said Hildebrand, who has spent years dealing with legislators on various bills, hoping to persuade them to vote yes or no or to table it for another day. “They won’t understand what you’re saying.”

Right-wingers get all warm and fuzzy when they hear such words as:

• Freedom

• Freedom of choice

• Parental rights

• Patriot

But those same terms send left-wingers fleeing for the exits. Their hearts only begin to flutter when you coo these sweetnesses in their ear:

• Justice

• Equity

• Non-discrimination

“These are words they understand, that they are open to. So make sure you research your legislator, see what their passions are, and speak to them in a language they understand. Because literally you may as well be speaking French to them.”

Call or write emails, or set up an in-person meeting with your representative, says Hildebrand. Best of all, reach out to an organization traditionally friendly to the Democrats, such as a fire fighters union, and enlist their help. State Senators and Assembly people will naturally take calls  from groups that have forked over campaign cash in the past and may do so again next election.

Hildebrand and her supporters and allies—which include such groups as Children’s Health Defense, the Unity Project and Moms on the Ground—must be speaking the right language because they appear to have fended off, at least for now, several of the bills they oppose.

Senator Richard Pan (D-Sacramento), the most zealous of the pro-mandate crusaders, has withdrawn his attempt to require all schoolchildren in the state to get the Covid jab. Governor Newsom has done the same with his vaccine order for school kids, postponing it until next year.

Another bill that would require all workers in the state, public or private, to get the Covid jab as a condition of employment has also been pulled. As has the effort to require sheriffs and law enforcement to enforce all orders by the unelected public health bureaucracy.

Nevertheless, some Big Brother-style measures are still in play. Such as: punishing doctors who provide “misinformation or disinformation” that is not approved by the public health orthodoxy (AB 2098); allowing kids as young as 12 years old to take the injection without parental knowledge or consent (SB 866); indefinite continuation of Covid testing in schools (SB 1479); and the adoption of a Big Brother-style government database that would track all those who have been vaccinated and all those who have not.

The campaign to stop these bills, according to Hildeband, is “a marathon not a sprint.” If they expect to win this race, she and her allies must keep the pressure on—and remember to talk Democrat.