Majority Savers continues the Sleeper Races week by heading to the outskirts of the St. Louis metro area in Missouri. Mapmakers in the Show Me State took a district which was basically a draw and severely gerrymandered it to save the incumbent, Rep. Ann Wagner. However, if the backlash to Dobbs is severe enough, this is the sort of district that will fall. That is why I am profiling Trish Gunby, our candidate for Missouri’s 2nd district!
If you want to find my previous entries in this series, I recommend following me or searching for #MajoritySavers as a tag! Majority Savers is also a group now, thanks to 2thanks!
Trish Gunby for Missouri-2!
Donate | Volunteer | Campaign | FaceBook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube
Candidate Background
I had to heavily rely upon her campaign website for information about Trish Gunby. If you know her or have more information about her, feel free to add it in the comments. Even her campaign website doesn’t have a lot of detail.
- She graduated from the University of Tulsa with a degree in political science, which is often a degree that helps people run for elected office much later in life.
- She chose to be a stay at home mom while her husband built a medical practice in the greater St. Louis area.
- She decided to run for office in a special election in 2019, which she surprisingly won by a wide margin. She serves the 99th district in the Missouri legislature.
Signature Issues
Gunby ran as a progressive in the special election, but she also sounds some bipartisan notes at times. It is likely she would be pragmatic if somehow she were elected to Congress. While she wouldn’t shed her progressive nature, she also wouldn’t be a moderate either.
Abortion: This is issue #1 for Gunby, and rightfully so. The results in Kansas show that even GQP states do not like the Dobbs decision, and she is hoping that Missouri’s near total ban will work in her favor. Gunby would obviously codify Roe and work to protect women’s health from politicians.
Defending Democracy: In the state of Fist-Pump Hawley, this is another no-brainer issue for her. She would protect the right to vote by passing the Freedom to Vote Act and John Lewis VRA Act. She would also work to overturn Citizens United and promote voting methods as much as possible.
Gun Safety: Another issue that plays well in the suburbs, Gunby would ban assault weapons, ghost guns, and implement better background checks. She would also work to end the immunity gun manufacturers have from mass shootings with their brands of weapons.
Elections History
Recent Elections —
2020 President: TFG (R-inc) 53.1%, Joe Biden (D) 45.3%
2020 House: Ann Wagner (R-inc) 51.9%, Jill Schupp (D) 45.5%
2022 PVI: R+7
2022 Race Rating: Safe Republican
The St. Louis Metro area used to host three districts. The 1st district was centered on St. Louis and was very reliably Democratic. The 3rd district was centered on the close in suburbs and was a swing seat that leaned Democratic. Finally, the 2nd district took in the outer fringes and was reliably Republican. To give you an example, Rep. Todd Akin was from the 2nd district.
This pattern lasted until 2010 redistricting, when Missouri lost a district. The 3rd district was largely eliminated, as the bluest parts were attached to the 1st district and the rest was clearly gerrymandered between many different districts. The 2nd was slightly weakened, but not to the point of it being in trouble. Rep. Ann Wagner replaced Akin in 2012, and it seemed to be no issue.
By the end of the decade, the 2nd district was clearly a swing seat. In the 2018 blue wave, Wagner had an unexpectedly close challenge that she only repulsed 51-47. This district was the closest in the country by presidential results in 2020, and it is truly so close that either TFG or Biden may have won the district. Regardless, Wagner won again 51-46 and still is “representing” the 2nd district.
Missouri heavily gerrymandered this district to make it safer once again. They eliminated some of the suburbs by placing them in the 3rd district, and of course the 1st district needed more population. I expect this district to be a swing seat by the end of the decade once again. It may be too early in 2022 (hence Safe Republican), but it is still worth exploring this race, just in case.
Political Tour of the District
This district was heavily gerrymandered to try and protect Rep. Ann Wagner for another decade. I question whether or not this district will hold as a GQP district until 2030, but those are elections in the future. For now, it is a comfortably Republican district, unless there is a severe Dobbs backlash.
Here’s where this race will be won in the 2nd district.
- St. Louis Suburbs: The remaining suburbs are still blue, even though most of them have been removed to another district. It will take flipping some previously GQP voters because of the abortion decision for Gunby to get the margins she needs to win this seat.
Here’s where we need to keep the margins down, or we lose.
- St. Louis Exurbs: The farther you get outside St. Louis, the more unfriendly the precincts are for Gunby. While there are blue precincts even in the exurbs, they tend to be light blue ones surrounded by red precincts. Gunby will have to squeeze every vote possible out here.
- Rural Areas: St. Charles County (only part of it), Franklin, and Warren Counties are added to the district to make sure that it continues to vote for Rep. Ann Wagner. These areas supported TFG upwards of 70% of the vote, so Gunby isn’t going to be competitive in the furthest reaches.
Activism — Help How You Can!
The main problem, as with all longshot candidates, is a lack of campaign funds. Trish Gunby only raised $136k for the second quarter, which isn’t enough to run a competitive campaign on hostile turf. To make matters worse, she only has $81k cash on hand as of the end of June. Maybe she pulled in a good haul for the third quarter, but somehow I am skeptical.
This contrasts to Rep. Ann Wagner, who has all of the money she needs to nuke Gunby if the race tightens. Wagner raised $570k for the second quarter, which is sufficient. She also has a cash stockpile of about $2.03 MILLION dollars that she is sitting on. It is hard to ask for a donation for a race that may be a blowout. Donate to Trish Gunby to make it a real race!
DONATE TO TRISH GUNBY HERE
Volunteers are more important for a chronically underfunded campaign than for one that has a lot of money. To pull of a shocking upset, these types of campaigns need to pound the pavement and try to persuade voters to switch allegiances. The way to volunteer for Trish Gunby’s campaign is by going to https://www.mobilize.us/trishgunby/ and signing up.
In terms of social media presence, Gunby is right where challengers typically are — a small but growing presence on multiple platforms. On Twitter, she has about 7.4k followers, which is nothing to sneeze at but not truly spectacular either.
She also has a presence on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. The latter in particular contains quite a few political ads, but I don’t think they have reached the television stage yet because that is too expensive a proposition for her.
Another race that could be competitive under the right circumstances, this was a last minute decision by me to write about this race. I just don’t see Trish Gunby being able to pull it off. Maybe if it were 2028 and demographics had another six years to shift to the left, then I could see it happening. But it will be difficult to win a 53-45 TFG seat under any type of environment.
Trish Gunby for Missouri-2!
Donate | Volunteer | Campaign | FaceBook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube