In the late 2010s and early 2020s, the coalition's focus shifted towards ideological centrism and constituency-based politics;[14][15][16] however, the coalition maintained an emphasis on fiscal responsibility.[17] The Blue Dog Coalition remains the most conservative grouping of Democrats in the House.[13]
The Blue Dog Coalition was formed in 1995[20][21] during the 104th Congress to give members from the Democratic Party representing conservative-leaning districts a unified voice after the Democrats' loss of Congress in the 1994Republican Revolution.[22]
The term "Blue Dog Democrat" is credited to Texas Democratic Representative Pete Geren (who later joined the George W. Bush administration). Geren opined that the members had been "choked blue" by "extreme" Democrats on the left.[23] It is related to the political term "Yellow Dog Democrat", a reference to Southern Democrats said to be "so loyal they would even vote for a yellow dog before they would vote for any Republican". The term also refers to the "Blue Dog" paintings of Cajun artist George Rodrigue of Lafayette, Louisiana as the original members of the coalition would regularly meet in the offices of Louisiana representatives Billy Tauzin and Jimmy Hayes, both of whom later joined the Republican Party – both also had Rodrigue's paintings on their walls.[24][25] An additional explanation for the term cited by members is "when dogs are not let into the house, they stay outside in the cold and turn blue", a reference to the Blue Dogs' belief they had been left out of a party that they believed had shifted to the political left.[26] At one time, first-term Blue Dogs were nicknamed 'Blue Pups'.[24] Starting in the twenty-first century, the caucus began shifting its ideology and began adopting more socially liberal stances in order to align more closely with mainstream Democratic Party political values.[14]
Disputes within the Democratic Party
Many Blue Dogs voted for George W. Bush's Bush tax cuts.[27] In 2007, 15Blue Dogs in safe seats rebelled, and refused to contribute party dues to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. An additional 16Blue Dogs did not pay any money to the DCCC, but were exempt from party-mandated contributions because they were top GOP targets for defeat in 2008. One reason for the party-dues boycott was contained in remarks made by Rep. Lynn Woolsey of California, encouraging leaders of anti-war groups to field primary challenges to any Democrat who did not vote to end the war in Iraq. Woolsey later stated that she was misunderstood, but the Blue Dogs continued the boycott. Donations to party congressional committees are an important source of funding for the party committees, permitting millions of dollars to be funneled back into close races.[28]
In the summer of 2009, The Economist said the following regarding the Blue Dog Coalition: "The debate over health care ... may be the pinnacle of the group's power so far." The Economist quoted Charlie Stenholm, a founding Blue Dog, as stating that "This is the first year for the new kennel in which their votes are really going to make a difference".[29] In July 2009, Blue Dog members, who were committee members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, successfully delayed the House vote on the Health Insurance Reform Bill (HR3200) until after the summer recess.[30][31] It was during this recess that the term 'Obamacare' was first derisively adopted by Republicans on Capitol Hill.[32] Blue Dog opposition to a potential "public option" within Obamacare, together with the contentious town hall meetings faced by House members during the 2009 summer recess, gave the healthcare bill's Republican opponents the opportunity to further escalate their attacks on Obamacare. The Blue Dog's refusal to include the pre-recess bill's public option, subsequently forced that central feature to be dropped from ACA's final text.[33] On Nov. 7, 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Affordable Health Care for America Act 220 - 215[34] - a bill that would "provide health coverage to almost every American.”[35] While, a majority of the Blue Dogs actually voted for that final healthcare bill, by a 28 to 24 margin, they did so with that central public option removed from the ACA's final passage.[36]
The Washington Post stated that the Blue Dogs, with over 50 members, were the most influential voting bloc in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2010.[37]
2010s decline
The Blue Dog Coalition suffered serious losses in the 2010 midterm elections, losing over half of its seats to Republican challengers. Its members, who were roughly one quarter of the Democratic Party's caucus in the 111th Congress, accounted for half of the party's midterm election losses.[38] Including retirements, Blue Dog numbers in the House were reduced from 59 members in 2009 to 26 members in 2011.[39] Two of the coalition's four leaders (Stephanie Herseth Sandlin and Baron Hill) failed to secure re-election.[40][41]
In the 2016 elections, future Blue Dogs accounted for over half of the Democrats' gains in the House.[44] In 2018, for the first time since 2006, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee partnered with the Blue Dog PAC (the Blue Dog Coalition's political organization) to recruit candidates in competitive districts across the country.[45] After the 2018 House of Representatives elections, the caucus grew from 18 members to 24.[39] All incumbents were re-elected and Rep. Kyrsten Sinema was elected to the U.S. Senate from Arizona.[46] The caucus also added 11 new members who defeated Republican incumbents in the 2018 election in districts that had voted for Donald Trump in 2016.[47]
2020s
The Democratic Party lost seats in the 2020 and 2022 House of Representatives elections, including the Blue Dog Coalition. As of April 2024, during the 118th Congress, the coalition had 10 members.[48]
At the start of the 118th Congress in January 2023, six of the 15 members of the Coalition departed following a failed attempt to rename the group to the "Common Sense Coalition".[49] Freshman representative Don Davis, who was expected to join the Blue Dogs, also chose not to do so.[18] After this split, the group reorganized and began an effort to stabilize, rebuild, and maintain influence on policy proposals in the closely divided 118th Congress.[50] The effort included a recruitment drive which prompted Mary Peltola (AK-AL), Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez (WA-03), and Wiley Nickel (NC-13) to join, bringing the number of members back up to 10.[51] Under the leadership of Peltola, Perez, and Representative Jared Golden, the caucus shifted its focus towards ideological centrism and pragmatic, constituency-based (especially rural and working-class) politics.[15]
The Blue Dog Coalition is the most conservative grouping of Democrats in the House. It "advocates for fiscal responsibility, a strong national defense and bipartisan consensus rather than conflict with Republicans". It opposes legislation that its members perceive to be too far to the right or to the left on the political spectrum.[17] In the 2010s, the Blue Dogs became more demographically diverse and less conservative.[14]
In the early years of the caucus, the Blue Dogs were viewed by some as the political successors to Southern Democratic groups such as the Boll Weevils or conservative coalition.[62][63] The Boll Weevils may, in turn, be considered the descendants of the Dixiecrats and the "states' rights" Democrats of the 1940s through the 1960s, and even the Bourbon Democrats of the late 19th century.[64]
In 2014, there was no mention of social issues in the official Blue Dog materials.[65] By January 2019, McClatchy reported a transformation of the Blue Dogs from a coalition of 'southern white men' to 'a multi-regional, multicultural group.' At that time, the coalition included two African-American members, one Vietnamese-American, one Mexican-American, and only five members from Southern states.[39]
As of April 2024, the coalition included 10 members. At that point, the coalition's membership was smaller than it had ever been since its formation.[18][61]
Best, Samuel J.; Ladewig, Jeffrey W. (2024). Toppling Trump: How Party Elites Steered Joe Biden to the Democratic Nomination and Victory in the 2020 Presidential Election. Springer Series in Electoral Politics. p.39. doi:10.1007/978-3-031-55401-8. ISBN978-3-031-55401-8. ISSN2524-8111. In the 116th U.S. Congress that took power after the 2018 midterms, 44% of the 233 Democratic members of the House of Representatives participated in the ideologically moderate New Democratic Coalition, 41% of the members aligned with the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and 11% belonged to the ideologically conservative Blue Dog Coalition.
Keppel, Emmanuel (2023). "New Americans and the New Right: Hispanic Voting Trends in the Trump Era of Politics". Political Science Honors Projects (9). Macalester College: 34. All three were on the conservative end of the Democratic party, with all three serving as part of the conservative Blue Dog Coalition of mostly rural Democrats (Blue Dog Coalition 2023).
Gachon, Nicolas (2021). Bernie Sanders's Democratic Socialism: Holding Utopia Accountable. Palgrave Macmillan. p.89. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-69661-0. ISBN978-3-030-69661-0. Some of them, like Charlie Stenholm (D-Texas), a leader of the conservative Blue Dog Democrats, considered that having a socialist in the caucus may meet with fierce opposition from their constituents.
Moody, Kim (2022). Breaking the Impasse: Electoral Politics, Mass Action and the New Socialist Movement in the United States. Ingram Publisher Series. p.50. ISBN978-1-64259-726-4. While the liberal Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC)—only 9 of whose "progressive" members endorsed Sanders in 2020, compared to 32 for Biden before Bernie withdrew—grew by 24 percent from 78 to 97 members in the House (plus Bernie alone in the Senate), the militantly centrist New Democrat Coalition shot up from 59 members to 103 or by 75 percent, with the conservative Blue Dog Democrats making a comeback from 15 to 27 members or by 80 percent.
Perez, Andrew (2021). "Bg Pharma's Demo Crats". AMASS. 26 (1). Society For Popular Democracy. Stephanie Murphy (Fla.), the co-chair of the conservative Blue Dog Coalition, who is the House's fifth largest recipient of donations from the pharmaceutical and health products…
Borosage, Robert L. (May 27, 2022). "The DCCC and the DSCC Are Not On Our Side". The Nation. Schrader, the chair of the House Democrats' conservative Blue Dog Coalition, is infamous for being one of the three Big Pharma Democrats who worked to block legislation that would lower prices for prescription drugs.
Gachon, Nicolas (2021). Bernie Sanders's Democratic Socialism: Holding Utopia Accountable. Palgrave Macmillan. p.89. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-69661-0. ISBN978-3-030-69661-0. The Blue Dog Coalition is a caucus of U.S. Democratic representatives who identify as fiscally conservative, centrist Democrats.
Riis Damstrup, Anne Sophie; Tosti Madsen, Sofie; Coscia, Michele (2024). "Unsupervised Learning via Network-Aware Embeddings". p.16. arXiv:2309.10408 [cs.LG]. This should not be a surprise, because Cuellar is considered one of the most conservative Democrats and he is part of the Blue Dog caucus, representing the center-right in the Democratic Party whose members are mostly elected in Republican-leaning districts.
Sammon, Alexander (June 26, 2023). "Adam Schiff Is Crying All the Way to the Bank". Slate. And Schiff, a former member of the center-right Blue Dog caucus, is the most conservative member of the group of contenders for the sought-after seat.
Budryk, Zack (September 19, 2019). "Pelosi to introduce plan to lower cost of prescription drugs: report". The Hill. "We appreciate that Speaker Pelosi took the time to meet with the Blue Dogs to discuss a path forward to lower the cost of prescription drugs," Rep. Stephanie Murphy (Fla.), co-chair of the center-right Blue Dog Democrats, said after a meeting with Pelosi Tuesday on the proposal, NPR noted.
Grim, Ryan; Fang, Lee (January 23, 2018). "The Dead Enders". The Intercept. For the first time since 2006, the Blue Dog Coalition, the right-leaning Democratic group that prides itself on promoting socially conservative, business-friendly lawmakers, has worked with the DCCC to select the party's candidates for the 2018 midterms.
Caine, Eric (January 6, 2022). "Was the (not) Adam Gray Tweet a Trial Balloon?". The Valley Citizen. Harder's win and subsequent cruise to victory over Republican Ted Howze in 2020 upset the conventional wisdom about Valley politics, which dictates that, in order to win, Democrats must become "Blue Dogs" who follow the lead of former Congressman Gary Condit, one of the founders of the Democratic Blue Dog Coalition in 1995. Gray was formerly married to Condit's daughter, Cadee Condit Gray. They are now divorced. Blue Dog Democrats lean to the right.
Sammon, Alexander (October 13, 2021). "The Undignified Demise of Centrism". The American Prospect. Democratic moderates (called "center-left," but more accurately center-right) were riding high as a political camp. The Blue Dog Coalition sported record membership numbers in 2009 and 2010.
Richter, Stephan; Bott, Uwe (July 27, 2018). "US: The Incredible Cowardice of the Democrats". The Globalist. In 1995, conservative members of the House formed the Blue Dog Coalition to give a greater voice to center-right Democrats to achieve that.
"In Memoriam: Former Congressman Charlie Stenholm (D-TX)". Concord Action. June 23, 2023. He was first elected to Congress in 1979, aligning himself with the Boll Weevils before co-founding the House Blue Dog Coalition, a group of center-right, fiscally conservative Democrats.
↑Jenkins, Jeffery A.; Stewart III, Charles (August 28, 2023). "Fighting for the Speakership: An Update". p.44. doi:10.2139/ssrn.4553501. SSRN4553501. The Blue Dog Caucus, which originated in 1995 after the Republicans took control of the House, had been a growing problem for Speaker Pelosi, before they had their ranks cut in half in the 2010 midterms.
↑Kane, Paul (January 15, 2014). "Blue Dog Democrats, whittled down in number, are trying to regroup". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on January 16, 2014. Retrieved July 23, 2014. Four years ago, they were the most influential voting bloc on Capitol Hill, more than 50 House Democrats pulling their liberal colleagues to a more centrist, fiscally conservative vision on issues such as health care and Wall Street reforms.
↑Paschold, John C. (2025). "Left Turn? Progressive Caucus Characteristics & Influence in the 117th Congress". Honors Theses Student Research. University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository: 51. A leader of the moderate-conservative House Democratic Blue Dog Caucus fought back against Pelosi and progressives, noting that if progressives were to block the infrastructure bill, all public faith would be lost in Biden's legislative agenda (Lillis, Marcos, & Wong 2021).
↑Parton, Heather Digby (November 12, 2014). "Bye-bye, blue dog "Democrats": What the end of conservative Dems means for America". Salon. Retrieved December 24, 2016. Not that the members weren't traditional values types. Most were. And they surely ran for office on those issues as well. But there is not one word in the official Blue Dog materials about social issues.
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