55 seconds ago 2009-07-20T19:07:44-07:00
Virginia Republican Congressman Tom Davis said Tuesday that the GOP will have to “retool” after the election because it has become “a white, rural, regional party.”
“We'll have to see what happens, but I suspect in urban areas across the country, Democrats will continue to make gains that they've made the last decade,” Davis said during an interview on MSNBC.
“We've become a regional party, basically become a white, rural, regional party, and not a national party. And we're going to have to retool ourselves,” he added.
Davis, a leading moderate who is retiring from Congress this year, said that Democrats have for now boxed the GOP mostly into the South, though he cautioned that the party’s gains may not hold for long.
“A lot of what happens will depend on how the Democrats govern,” the Republican said. “You know, there have been high-water marks before where records get broken, 1928, but because of governance after that the South went back to a one-party South.”
On the economy in particular, Davis said, Republicans could regain ground on Democrats if they overreach.
“If, in fact, this is about wealth redistribution and an economic realignment, then the Fairfax, Va.'s, Montgomery County, Pa.'s, and those areas that have been trending blue will trend right back again,” he added. “We've been here before. If this is an economic realignment, you're not going to hold high-income suburbs.”
