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Nonpartisan Conservatism

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According to Democratic politicians from Joe “vote for me our you ain’t black” Biden to Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass) saying “Democrats don’t need any more black faces that don’t want to be a black voice,” if you’re Black, you’re expected to be a liberal Democrat.

Ward Connerly, the man who led the campaign to end affirmative action in California’s universities back in 1996, and came out of retirement in 2020 to defend an attempt to reinstate affirmative action, is not a liberal Democrat. But that isn’t the only stereotype he’s breaking.

Connerly recently posted a series of tweets that asserted his willingness to vote for a Democrat, even though he identifies as a conservative. His tweets, and the argument they put forward, are not going to trend, because they send a message dangerous to liberal Democrats – it’s not your ideology or your party that we object to. It’s your countless policy failures that are too obvious for anyone to ignore. If you would fix them, we might vote for you.

His series of tweets merits posting in their entirety:

1/ At the outset, I was prepared to reject the Recall if Governor Newsom gave a credible defense of the policies that bother so many of us. Instead, he simply fell back on his disingenuous theme of “Republican Recall,” appealed to partisanship and race, and tried to dismiss the

2/ Recall by bullying those who are worried about the current course of our country and our state. True leaders don’t operate that way. I knew Governor Deukmejian personally and Governor Pete Wilson is a very close personal friend. I know that they regarded every citizen as

3/ a person of value and to be respected. Sure, they were also partisans, but once elected, they sought to suppress their partisan instincts. The inherent flaw of one-party rule in a democracy is that it eventually results in lack of accountability, arrogance and contempt for

4/ those who reject blind party loyalty or who are not of your party. This Governor did not learn that lesson as the mayor of SF or the second in command to Governor Brown. Let’s vote!”

The life work of Ward Connerly has been to fight racism by demanding equal treatment. In an irony that certainly was not easy, how Connerly fought for equal rights was rejected by liberal Democrats. And yet he demonstrates his willingness to put partisanship aside, if the ruling Democrats in California were willing to acknowledge their policy failures and come up with new ideas. Instead they engage in the same pandering that motivated their countless attempts to undercut California’s ban on affirmative action.

Equal rights. Equal treatment. That is the only genuine way to show respect for all people. Ward Connerly gets it. And there is nothing partisan about it.

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Ward Connerly Fights to End ALL Discrimination in America

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When the leftist cabal that runs California tried to bring affirmative action back via a ballot initiative in 2020, Ward Connerly came out of retirement to fight them off. Connerly was no stranger to this fight. Back in 1996, Connerly led the effort behind Prop. 209, a ballot initiative approved by California’s voters that banned affirmative action.

The only way laws passed by voters via ballot initiatives can be overturned in California is via a new ballot initiative, and in 2020, it was Prop. 16 that was designed, if approved, to overturn Prop. 209 and restore affirmative action.

The coalition Connerly built to stop Prop. 16 relied on an emerging political giant in California, an increasingly politically active, left-of-center Asian community. These Asian activists, already discriminated against in college admissions, realized that if Prop. 16 passed, their presence in California’s public universities would be reduced to their percentage of the population.

When Asian students represent half of the National Merit Scholars in California, but only 15 percent of the population, one may understand how restoring affirmative action might seem not only unfair, but a dire threat to the future of their children.

Prop. 16 was defeated with surprising ease, losing 57 percent to 43 percent. But without Ward Connerly’s outspoken defense of Prop. 209, and his relentless efforts to help mobilize California’s Asian community, they might not have won.

Connerly, a former businessman who once served as a University of California Regent, is now looking into a ballot initiative for 2022 that will target critical race theory. Reached for comment on his new project, Connerly said “There is a growing recognition that the country is in trouble and California is leading the way.”

With respect to the Asian activists he enlisted once, Connerly believes they are now permanently awakened. “There is a concern among Asians in California that our institutions are collapsing. They are frightened and eager to get involved. There are a lot of them and their network is very formidable,” he said.

Ward Connerly is another example of a Black patriot with an uncompromising vision of justice and fairness who will never get the mainstream media attention he has earned. But behind the scenes, he is quietly building a coalition that may achieve election breakthroughs nobody thought possible. He is a man to watch.

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