In Fight for Congress, Democrats Run as ‘Team Normal,’ Casting GOP as ‘Weird’

CINCINNATI — Rep. Greg Landsman’s pitch to the voters of his politically competitive district in Ohio goes something like this: You may once have preferred Republicans, but the leaders of today’s GOP have gotten, well, too weird.

Vote instead, he argues, for someone who is “normal.”

It is a message Landsman, a Democrat, delivered recently to a gathering of moderate donors in a penthouse in downtown Cincinnati, drawing laughter. It appeared to land equally well at a predominantly Black church, where the crowd nodded along. And at a focus group of suburban voters, a former Republican told him she knew exactly what he meant.

He is not the only one. Taking a page from Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, the Democratic vice presidential nominee whose “these guys are just weird” quip about the Trump-Vance ticket caught fire on the left, Democrats in competitive congressional contests across the country are trying to make their races a contrast between the normal and the weird.

Vice President Kamala Harris highlighted the tactic Tuesday night in her debate against former President Donald Trump. As he peddled the false claim that migrants were marauding through American towns eating people’s pets, a bemused-looking Harris simply laughed and shook her head at him, muttering, “Unbelievable.”

It is a sharp pivot from the days not long ago when Democrats suffused their campaigns with dark warnings of the dangers of extremism, arguing that electing Republicans was a threat to democracy itself. Now the emphasis is on a much lighter — and perhaps more broadly appealing — theme that conjures the classic political trope of which candidate you would rather have a beer with.

And right now, Democratic candidates across the country are arguing, it’s definitely not the Republican.

Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez, D-Wash., stresses the need for Congress to elect more “normal people” like herself, contrasting her background working in an automotive repair shop against the right-wing conspiracy theories pushed by her Republican opponent Joe Kent, who is challenging her for the second time.

“Far-right weirdo Joe Kent is back, and the sequel is worse than the original,” her campaign wrote on Instagram.

In the battleground state of Michigan, Curtis Hertel Jr., a Democrat who is seeking an open seat in a competitive district that includes the state capital, contrasts his profile as a regular dad who coaches his children’s basketball team with that of his Republican opponent, Tom Barrett, who is known for wearing a fetus pin on the floor of the state Senate.

“I think wearing a little fetus pin on the floor of the body is weird,” Hertel said in an interview. “I think that trying to restrict people’s rights is weird.”

And in California, Will Rollins, a Democrat who is trying for a second consecutive cycle to unseat Rep. Ken Calvert, tries to appeal to longtime Republicans by commiserating with them about how downright odd their party has become.

“I think voters just appreciate you saying, ‘We’re sorry about what’s happened to your party, but you’ve got a temporary space with us right now,’” Rollins said. “People are like, ‘Oh yeah, I want a normal person — Team Normal.’”

Few use the pitch more consistently than Landsman, a former public-school teacher who is known as a centrist in the House.

At times, his campaign seems as focused on mocking Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, the Republican vice presidential nominee who lives in Landsman’s district, as any specific policy pitch or knock on his actual opponent, Orlando Sonza.

It’s not that the issues are not important, Landsman says; it’s that humor is a better tool than fear for persuasion.

Democratic operatives argue that while voters’ ears have started to become numb to apocalyptic warnings about the end of democracy, the phrase “weird” rings true. Martha McKenna, a Democratic ad maker and strategist, said the “weird vs. normal” frame was working for the party’s Democratic congressional candidates because it broke through to a Republican ticket whose sensibilities often appeared to be stuck in elementary school.

“‘Weird’ is a new word in politics,” she said. “It catches people’s attention because it’s new.”

In Landsman’s district, it seems to be resonating. He invoked the contrast while speaking to a group of donors in Cincinnati last week, noting that Vance was his constituent and lived down the street.

“He and I both grew up in Butler County,” Landsman said. “We both live in Cincinnati. We both ran for national office in 2022, but I ended up winning this district, our district, by five and a half. He lost by 9. If there’s a big difference between the two of us, it’s that I’m very normal.”

The crowd laughed. A woman shouted: “He’s weird!”

Republicans have hit back, seeking to brand Landsman and other Democrats as the truly strange.

“The only thing that’s weird is Greg Landsman’s obsession with the dangerous, far-left agenda that has led to open borders, higher prices and unsafe communities in Ohio,” said Mike Marinella, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee. “Landsman is an extreme and ignorant politician who will make up any lame excuse to completely disregard his voters and the issues they actually care about.”

In some ways, the battle to be defined as the “normal” candidate in the race is a return to the politics of the past. Candidates have long sought to position themselves as the Everyman, a universally relatable figure in whom voters can see themselves.

But it also indicates a distinct shift from the Democratic messaging that has dominated the Trump era, particularly since the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021.

After a pro-Trump mob violently overran the Capitol, Democrats leaned heavily into casting Republicans as the enemy of their party and as existential threats to democracy.

Landsman defeated Rep. Steve Chabot, who at the time was a 13-term congressman and the dean of Ohio’s Republican congressional delegation, by arguing that his vote to overturn the 2020 election results was disqualifying.

Redistricting had made the area more favorable terrain for Democrats, and Landsman sensed an opportunity. He declared his run on Jan. 6, 2022.

“Just because your guy lost doesn’t mean you can throw out an election,” Landsman said at the time. “You cannot do that.”

It worked; he won by 5 percentage points.

This year, he faces Sonza, an Army veteran and prosecutor. Landsman has outraised Sonza 5-1, and the Cook Political Report rates the race as “likely” to stay in the hands of the Democrats.

Still, Landsman is not taking any risks and has not returned to Jan. 6 as a major theme of his campaign.

“He’s a far-right guy,” Landsman said of Sonza. “And this is happening all over the country. Even though this is a very moderate, pragmatic, middle-of-the-road district, they’re having a hard time finding those people who are willing to run or run and win in a primary. This is somebody who Trump is his big priority.”

Sonza has tried to turn the weird vs. normal attack back on Landsman.

“Where I come from, weird is voting to let biological men play in women’s sports and backing a presidential candidate who wants taxpayers to fund transgender surgeries for illegal immigrants and to decriminalize all drugs,” he said. “Last time I checked, that’s Greg Landsman’s record.”

For his part, Landsman is working to find every opportunity to tie Sonza to a Republican presidential ticket he seems to delight in ridiculing as bizarre. On a recent Wednesday afternoon, he huddled with his staff trying out new lines mocking Vance’s disdain for “childless cat ladies.”

“Do the kids cancel the cats out?” he said. “The cats cancel the kids out? Like, how’s this work? JD, are we doing it wrong?”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times .