It’s unclear whether growing bipartisan support for President Biden’s Ukraine policies will help Democrats in the midterm elections. But the President’s Ukraine policies are on the right track for that possibility. From Amy Walter’s “United and Still Polarized” at The Cook Political Report: “Republican voters have also cooled in their embrace of Trump’s brand of nationalism and isolationism. For example, back in February of 2021, a Pew poll found that more than two-thirds of Republicans thought that the U.S. should pay less attention to problems overseas and concentrate on our problems here at home, while just 32 percent said it’s best for the future of our country to be active in world affairs. Today, however, nearly three-quarters of Republicans (73 percent) say that working closely with allies to respond to the Russian invasion is the right approach….Republican opinions of U.S. cooperation with NATO, an institution that President Trump called ‘obsolete,’ are now overwhelmingly positive. The Pew poll found 75 percent of Republicans and 81 percent of Democrats agree with the decision to keep a large number of U.S. military forces in NATO countries near Ukraine. …Another reason for the bipartisan support for U.S. actions thus far is that it doesn’t involve American military personnel. Even as Americans are more supportive of cooperation with NATO countries, they have no appetite for sending American troops into another European land war. If Americans start fighting and dying overseas, opinions about America’s ‘role in the world’ are likely to shift.”

Ben Steverman’s “A Once Radical Idea to Close the Wealth Gap Is Actually Happening” at Bloomberg Businessweek explores the benefits of ‘Baby Bonds’ programs, which are “being embraced and implemented by governments across the U.S.” The idea, as championed by stratification economist Darrick Hamilton, proposes “to give each baby born in the U.S. a trust fund established and guaranteed by the federal government. The goal is to narrow the vast inequalities that exist at the moment of birth, particularly those related to the wide and persistent racial wealth gap. The bonds could give any disadvantaged 18-year-old resources to catch up to wealthier peers,” which they could use for education or starting a business. “The fundamental point is providing people with capital at a key point in their life, so they can get into an asset that will passively appreciate over their lifetime,” Hamilton says. And, because race correlates so closely with wealth in the U.S., the policy can be officially race-neutral while still giving a substantial boost to Black Americans who for centuries have been denied opportunities to build intergenerational wealth.” Steverman notes that “lawmakers in Connecticut and the District of Columbia recently established programs that will set aside money for thousands of babies. Washington state is taking steps toward a similar program that could launch in 2024. New Jersey’s governor has also pushed a plan to issue them. And Massachusetts’ treasurer is launching a “baby bonds task force” this spring.” The idea is winning bipartisan support. Democratic Senator Cory Booker was the first presidential candidate to propose the idea at the federal level.

Steverman notes that [Connecticut State Treasurer Shawn] “Wooden brought his baby bonds proposal to Connecticut’s legislature in early 2021, and by July it was law. The District of Columbia moved about as quickly, beginning debate in May and passing its law in December. Wooden says the combination of widespread pressure to tackle racial disparities and Hamilton’s “intellectual framework” prompted advocacy groups and legislators in Connecticut to line up swiftly behind an idea that was new to most of them. To broaden the coalition, proponents argued that baby bonds wouldn’t just heal racial divisions but regional ones, helping poor, largely Black and Democratic urban neighborhoods and poor, largely White and Republican rural areas alike. Wooden tried to demonstrate to lawmakers that there were families in every one of the state’s 169 towns, including Greenwich, that could qualify for baby bonds. “Part of the messaging around this is it’s not race-based,” he says. “This is a program that is antipoverty regardless of your race or ZIP code.”….Governments are keeping costs down by covering only the poorest children, those eligible for Medicaid. In Connecticut, that’s more than 16,000 babies a year, about half of all births in the state. They’ll start with $3,200, which could grow to more than $10,000 by the time they’re 18, depending on investment performance—the state will put the initial capital pool into a broad range of asset classes, much like a pension plan.”….The “baby” part of “baby bonds” may be what gives them uniquely broad political appeal, Hamilton says. The idea of granting a birthright to each child avoids the typical and often racially loaded debates about who’s deserving and undeserving of help. It’s hard to attack a baby for being lazy, he points out.”

With the Ukraine, inflation and Covid dominating the news, can health care reform help Democrats gain some traction that could help in November? In his Daily Beast article “Democrats Want to Party Like It’s 2018 and Push Health Care,” Sam Brodkey reports that Dems may embrace that strategy. “Asked about the party’s strategy on Obamacare, Chris Taylor, spokesperson for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said the DCCC plans to remind voters frequently about the GOP’s stances on health care….“Democrats want to lower the costs of medicines, protect health care, and lower costs for families,” Taylor said. “We’re going to make sure voters know the difference between us and them.”….It’s a good time for Democrats to refocus on favorable turf, given that the current political landscape is bleak for the party as the midterm season heats up. And with the anniversary of the law coming up next week, national and state level Democratic Party organizations have a slate of events planned to keep it on the agenda….Democrats are now trying to talk about inflation, but through the frame of health care. Increasingly, Democrats are framing their health-care talking points in the kitchen-table language of costs. That might help bail Democrats out. One strategist with access to recent polling information found that voters have given Republicans a 5-point advantage on reducing inflation. But they gave Democrats a 10-point advantage on reducing the cost of health care….congressional Democrats tried for the better part of a year to give millions more people health insurance. Some, like Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI), believe that the politics of the issue are so bad for Republicans that they wouldn’t even take a pass at Obamacare, or other key health-care programs, if they had the chance.”

On the eve of the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Republican strategy for fighting her confirmation is coming into view, and I wrote about it at New York:

Republicans must have done some focus-group work while preparing for their campaign against the Supreme Court confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson. The minute Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement became known, Joe Biden’s campaign promise to put the first Black woman on the Supreme Court drew a great deal of GOP scorn with much talk about “affirmative action” and “wokeness” as well as snide suggestions that a truly qualified justice wouldn’t need an identity-based advantage.

It got pretty offensive. Once Jackson’s nomination was announced and formalized, Republicans led by Senator Mitch McConnell came up with a new strategy of attacking her confirmation without direct and personal nastiness, as the Los Angeles Times explained:

“In statements and Senate floor remarks since President Biden announced his intent to nominate Jackson to succeed retiring Justice Stephen G. Breyer last month, McConnell (R-Ky.) has signaled he is not going to try to bludgeon Jackson’s character or experience ahead of her confirmation hearings, which are set to begin March 21.

“Instead, he is using the nomination as an opportunity to bash liberal activists championing her cause.

“’ I intend to explore why groups that are waging political war against the court as an institution decided Judge Jackson was their special favorite,’ McConnell said on the Senate floor.”

There appear to be two rationales for this approach other than the fear of looking racist or sexist, charges to which the GOP so often exposes itself. First, Republicans plan to contrast their relative civility to the “personal” attacks Democrats launched against Brett Kavanaugh in 2018 (it’s kind of hard not to be personal when the nominee is accused of sexual assault, but whatever). And second, they understand that, unlike Democrats in 2018, they have no realistic chance of winning a confirmation fight. So they will use this opportunity to reinforce their more general message that Democrats are wild socialistic radicals with sinister anti-American motives. If that happens to create the impression that the future Justice Jackson is a puppet of said socialist radicals, that will feed the GOP’s base’s desire to smite her hip and thigh without being “personal.”

Another reason for a less savage anti-Jackson message might be that Republicans are playing with house money: Their appointees control the Court by a six-to-three margin, and Jackson is replacing another Democratic-appointed justice. As Democratic senator Sheldon Whitehouse told Politico, “At the end of the day, it’s six-three before, six-three after.” And in the midst of what looks to be an aggressively conservative, even counterrevolutionary Supreme Court session, it would be unseemly for the GOP to complain too much about one Democratic appointment following three in a row for their team. Per Politico:

“”While you’ve got your gang in the house basically shoving the loot out the window, why would you want to kick up the ruckus on the front lawn?’ Whitehouse said, referring to the high court’s conservatives. ‘I do think they’ll be using it to leverage political messages for November more than attacking her specifically.'”

Indeed, if Republicans win the Senate in November, they will be in a position to come out overtly ranting and snarling if Biden gets another Supreme Court opening in the second half of this presidential term.

In “Biden States Will Decide Who Controls the Senate,” Ronald Brownstein writes at CNN Politics,

The one silver lining for Democrats on an otherwise stormy political horizon may be the map of states with competitive Senate races this fall.

All of the Senate contests both sides consider the most competitive will be in states that Joe Biden won in 2020, albeit in most cases narrowly.

That geography could provide a critical boost for beleaguered Democrats in an era when both parties are finding it more difficult to win Senate races in states that usually vote the other way for president. That dynamic has grown so powerful that each party now holds just three of the 50 Senate seats in the 25 states that voted against their presidential candidates in the 2020 election.

None of the three Democratic senators in states that then-President Donald Trump won in 2020 is on the ballot this fall, which leaves the battlefield centered overwhelmingly on terrain Biden captured. But Biden’s eroding job approval numbers could undermine that potential geographic advantage. Each side has won very few 21st-century Senate races, either with incumbents or for open seats, in states where the approval rating is lagging for a president of its party.

Brownstein quotes Democratic pollster Celionda Lake, who worked for presidential candidate Biden in 2020: “It’s not just a referendum on Biden. In Senate races you have the resources to make it a real choice; it doesn’t have to be a derivative choice of an affirmation of the president or not.”

Bronwnstein adds, “Unless Biden can get a second wind before November, especially in states that he won, the Democrats’ chances of holding the Senate will turn on whether she’s right.” He notes that ticket-splitting is more of a rarity in recent elections: “Just 1 in 6 people split their votes between presidential and Senate races in the 1990s, according to  [Alan I.] Abramowitz’s calculations. The number of split-ticket voters, though oscillating somewhat from election to election, has fallen even further during presidential contests in this century, frequently dropping to only about 1 in 10.” Further,

The numbers were even more dramatic after 2020: Republicans now hold 94% of the seats in the states that voted for Trump two times. (That reflects their hold of 47 of the 50 Senate seats in the 25 states he carried in 2020, since all of them also voted for him in 2016.) Twenty states voted against Trump both times: Democrats now control 98% of their Senate seats — all but the one held by Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine.

The remaining five states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — flipped from supporting Trump in 2016 to backing Biden in 2020. Democrats now hold eight of their 10 Senate seats.

Bronwstein argues that  the GOP’s “chances are best against Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto in Nevada, a state Trump lost only narrowly each time, but Republicans also believe they can threaten New Hampshire’s Maggie Hassan and even Colorado’s Michael Bennet if a big enough red wave develops.”

None of the three Democratic senators in states Trump won in 2020  “Montana’s Jon Tester, Ohio’s Sherrod Brown and West Virginia’s Joe Manchin — is up for reelection this fall. All might have faced very difficult odds in this political environment.” But Republicans are investing heavily in winning back seats held by Democratic Sens. Mark Kelly (AZ) and Raphael Warnock (GA), both of whom are running for a six-year term. Worse,

The clear message of midterm elections in this century is that Biden’s approval rating will cast a huge shadow over the contests in all three of these categories. In 2018, for instance, Republicans lost all 10 of the Senate races in states where Trump’s approval rating registered at 48% or below, according to the exit polls conducted by Edison Research for a consortium of media organizations including CNN.

Similarly, in the 2014 midterm elections, Democrats lost 14 of the 15 Senate races in states where Obama’s approval rating stood at 42% or less, according to the exit polls. In 2010, Democrats likewise lost 13 of the 15 where Obama stood at 47% or less. In 2006, Republicans lost 19 of the 20 Senate races in states where President George W. Bush’s job approval stood at 45% or less.

Those are scary precedents for Democrats, because Biden’s approval ratings are lagging in the key states on the Senate map. Recent public polls show his job approval at 43% in Wisconsin and between 35% and 40% in Georgia, New Hampshire and Florida. On a slightly different metric, only 3 in 10 described his performance as excellent or good in a recent Pennsylvania poll.

Brownstein notes “occasional exceptions, such as Collins’ victory in 2020 in a state Biden won comfortably, or the 2018 victories of Democratic Sens. Manchin, Tester and Brown in states where Trump’s approval rating in the exit polls exceeded 50%.” Also, “A January Quinnipiac poll in Georgia, for instance, put Warnock’s approval rating there 11 percentage points higher than the President’s — and a striking 15 points better with independents.”

Democrats shouldn’t expect much midterm benefit from Trump’s troubles, Brownstein believes. But Republicans have “flawed candidates who are stuck in vicious expensive primaries that will drain their resources and leave their eventual nominee badly out of step with the voters that decide the general election in their states,” as David Bergstein, communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, says. Brownstein calls this is “a real risk for the GOP particularly in Arizona, Colorado, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania.”

As someone who has spent a long time paying attention to the Iowa Caucuses, I have discounted a lot of ritual Iowa-bashing, but suspect the latest move against its privileged status in the presidential nominating process is real, and I wrote about that at New York.

The Iowa Caucuses have been the first stop on the road to the White House since the early 1970s, and efforts to strip the state of its privileged place are just about as old. Over the years, Iowa has protected its privileged status by linking arms with New Hampshire, which holds the first-in-the-nation primary, and by going along with a 2004 expansion of the group of “protected” early states to include two more-diverse states, Nevada and South Carolina.

But hatred of the Iowa event — some born of envy over the money and media attention the caucus attracts, and some related to Iowa’s very white demographics and its arcane and not terribly well-attended caucus system — kept building up like barnacles on a rusty boat. Then Iowa appeared to create a huge opening for its disparagers in 2020, when its Democratic caucuses collapsed under the burden of national party-reporting mandates, questionable technology, and a rickety infrastructure of volunteer labor. The state party could not report results at all on Caucus Night, and TV talking heads denied anything on which to pontificate furiously condemned Iowa, joining the long-standing criticism of its primacy.

Then a pandemic and a wild presidential election culminating in an attempted coup intervened; suddenly, Democrats had much more important things to worry about than hating on the Iowa Caucuses. It began to look like the furor over what happened on February 2, 2020, might fade before the next presidential cycle. The odds of some seismic change in the nominating process were also reduced by Republicans’ happiness with the status quo, since any move to a state-financed primary and/or coordination of calendar dates for nominating events required bipartisan cooperation.

But now it appears the desire for a “reformed” Democratic presidential nominating process has gotten a second wind. Indeed, there is an emerging plan for dumping Iowa, as the Des Moines Register reported last week:

“National Democratic leaders have drafted a proposal that could significantly reshape the party’s presidential nominating process and put an end to Iowa’s prized first-in-the-nation caucuses …

“A draft resolution, obtained and corroborated by the Des Moines Register, would set new criteria for early-voting states that favor primaries over caucuses and diversity over tradition.”

The idea is to eliminate entirely the current system whereby four “early states” are in the privileged window at the beginning of the nominating calendar. Instead, states would have to reapply for the privilege under criteria Iowa cannot possibly satisfy: the ability to run a “fair, transparent and inclusive primary” (not possible without action by the Republican-controlled state legislature); demographic diversity (Iowa is 90 percent white); and general-election competitiveness (the state has veered hard red during the last two presidential elections, and all but one member of its congressional delegation are Republicans). This is like everyone on a president’s Cabinet or corporate board being forced to resign so one miscreant can be fired. Yes, New Hampshire might experience some heartburn under these criteria, but it is a very competitive state and obviously already has a primary. More to the point, New Hampshire has a state law, fiercely and equally supported by both parties in the Granite State, that requires the secretary of State to move the primary as far back as possible to maintain its first-in-the-nation status.

So the draft proposal is clearly designed to be a “solution” to the Iowa “problem.” It was discussed at a March 11 meeting of the Democratic National Committee panel that is responsible for the nominating process, as the Washington Post reported: “The meeting of the Democratic National Committee’s Rules and Bylaws Committee came to no final decisions, but for the second time this year, a majority of speakers made clear their openness to shaking up the presidential primary calendar to better reflect what speakers described as the party’s values.”

The Rules and Bylaws Committee is tentatively planning on formally announcing the new criteria for early-state status next month. We’ll soon see how much pushback the anti-Iowa advocates encounter, and whether they have the appetite to fight and win.

Since it is very unlikely that the Iowa legislature’s ruling Republicans will accommodate some shift to a taxpayer-financed primary in order to boost the state Democratic contest’s chances for survival, the hostile move would leave Iowa Democrats with limited and unsatisfactory options. This would include keeping their current caucus event but moving it to later in the calendar, which would greatly diminish its significance; or holding a party-paid and -sponsored “firehouse primary” (so called because they typically utilize cheap or free public facilities like firehouses for their limited polling places), which might not satisfy Iowa-haters anyway.

 Iowa has overcome the haters time and again, but this may represent its biggest challenge.

 

At Sabato’s Crystal Ball, Kyle Kondik takes on “Gas Prices and Presidential Approval: There is some connection historically, but that connection is getting weaker,” and writes: “That a president would prefer to have lower gas prices than higher ones is obvious. That high gas prices actually do contribute to lower presidential approval is not as obvious, although there is some limited evidence for it based on what we’ve found in our research. But we also are in an era of fairly stable presidential approval ratings, meaning that it shouldn’t be surprising that whatever impact a single factor (gas prices) might have on presidential approval, the importance of that factor might be declining.” Kondik shares this chart:

E. J. Dionne, Jr. comments on Ukranian President Zelensky’s address to the U.S. Congress, and notes, “The power of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s video addressto Congress on Wednesday owed to something more than charisma born of clarity, tenacity and personal bravery….Five words, unlikely to make a list of Top 5 sound bites, defined why this is a battle for a generation. The confrontation in Ukraine, Zelensky declared, is a fight “to keep justice in history.”….He’s right. Allowing Russia’s aggression to succeed would mean ratifying a future that privileges power over justice, autocracy over self-determination and impunity over accountability….The potentially heartening development is that Ukraine has “woken people up to what impunity represents as a threat to global order, never mind to human rights and to human decency,” according to David Miliband, former Foreign Secretary of the U.K. and president of International Rescue Committee….“It’s woken up the liberal democracies to what is at stake,” he continued. “And it’s not just values and it’s not just interests, it’s the future, because the future is either one of impunity in which the powerful do as they please and leave the rest to do as we must, or it’s a future of accountability in which impunity is tamed.”….Democracy will not fare well in a world where impunity runs rampant….Zelensky’s performance has been commanding because of the moral commitment behind his passion. He makes an unassailable case that the struggle he’s leading is a hinge point in democracy’s story.”

I’m a bit ambivalent about posting Republican snarkage here. But in this case, it’s instructive. David Smith writes at The Guardian, “A messaging battle is under way with the White House seeking to tie Putin to the price rise. But [Republican consultant Ed] Rogers said: “Republicans have a bumper sticker. Democrats have an essay. Just see how that goes.” In other words, ‘keep it short, stupid.’ A 2014 AP/NORC study found, for example that “Overall, 41 percent of Americans report that they watched, read, or heard any in-depth news stories, beyond the headlines, in the last week” (I’d be surprised if the percentage was actually that high). Many people, including not a few swing voters, don’t have the time or inclination to read windy essays, however eloquent. Respect the target constituency’s time. Sure, it’s good to have well-thought out policy papers and articles about each issue. But don’t make them the primary messaging tools. Put more effort into getting campaign messages out with soundbites, one-liners, bumper stickers, short video clips, slogans, memes and headlines. Of course, even brevity can be overdone, and short messages must have real substance to be persuasive.

Speaking of brief messaging, SendHub has a pretty good 10-point primer on text messaging. Some excerpts: “2. Reaching a Younger Demographic….New York Times article by one political operative, no one under the age of 45 wants a phone call. Ever since peer-to-peer (P2P) texting became commonplace in the 2016 election, mobile has been a popular method for getting the word out….The SMS market is always changing and it’s important for candidates to keep up on market trends. These trends not only help you reach your audience, but they also help you stay compliant and keep your number from being spam filtered….And younger voters (aged 18-29) are almost entirely tapped into technology, so it’s crucial that campaigners use every tool in their wheelhouses to reach this key demographic….4. Did we mention open rate?….For decades, campaigns contacted voters primarily by knocking on doors and by making phone calls….According to a Medium article, “The very best at door knocking will only be able to reach 30 voters an hour at a 25% completion rate depending on the time of day. That means for every hour of human labor; you are only connecting with 5–10 voters. That means it will take a lot of hours of labor to reach enough voters to swing an election. Phone calls are even worse. Although you can contact more people per hour by calling them, they are less likely to be convinced, and the contact percentage can be as low as 2–3%.”….6. Get Responses Immediately! ….Average response rate of the text is 45%. Being that time is of the essence on a political campaign, you need to get your message read and often times you need a response! A good political field game listens to voters and collects information about who they’re supporting and what issues they value.”

Some insights from excerpts of a FiveThirtyEight chat in response to the question, “Is Biden’s Approval Rating Really Rebounding?”

sarah (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): In the last two weeks or so, President Biden’s approval rating has ticked up from 41.1 percent to 42.9 percent, according to FiveThirtyEight’s presidential approval tracker.¹ The share of Americans who disapprove of the job he’s doing has ticked down, too, from 53.6 percent to 52.3 percent.

nrakich (Nathaniel Rakich, senior elections analyst): It’s impossible to totally disentangle all the events of the past month or so, but I think the simplest answer (which is usually the right one) is the crisis in Ukraine.

According to Marist/NPR/PBS, Biden’s approval/disapproval spread on the issue of Ukraine shot up from 34/50 in mid-February to 52/44 in early March. His overall approval/disapproval increased from 39/55 to 47/50. And according to Morning Consult/Politico, his approval/disapproval on Ukraine went from 42/45 in late February to 46/42 in early March. His overall approval/disapproval went from 41/56 to 45/51 over that same span….And I think overall media coverage has had more to do with that than the State of the Union.

ameliatd (Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux, senior writer): A recent Morning Consult poll indicated Democrats and independents were driving the shift in Biden’s approval

geoffrey.skelley: It’s really hard to say. Some polls have shown Biden gaining, while others have shown his approval largely unchanged. For instance, CBS News/YouGov put Biden’s approval at 44 percent in late February, and at 43 percent (so basically the same) a week and a half into March.

nrakich: Yeah, Quinnipiac also found his overall approval/disapproval mostly unchanged, from 35/55 in mid-February to 38/51 in early March, even as Americans warmed to his handling of Ukraine, which went from 34/54 to 42/45.

sarah: So … maybe Biden’s approval rating isn’t rebounding?

ameliatd: Well, I think it’s important to remember that this is happening in the context of a big spike in gas prices — which would normally be terrible news for a president’s approval rating.

ameliatd: One thing that is shifting, though, is that Americans are more likely to see Russia as an enemy and more likely to see Ukraine as a friendly country or an ally. Interestingly, that shift is happening among both Republicans and Democrats, which could explain why we’re not seeing more of a shift in Biden’s approval rating. People are having a reaction to the war — maybe even an emotional one — but it’s dampened by partisanship.

nrakich: Well, his approval rating on the pandemic has actually improved. In fact, in our coronavirus presidential approval tracker, he rose above water in early March for the first time since early January.

sarah: There’s also some evidence that Americans don’t trust Democrats to handle the pandemic as much as they once did. A recent Wall Street Journal poll found that voters thought Democrats were best able to handle the pandemic — compared to Republicans — by an 11-point margin, but that’s down 5 percentage points from mid-November….Moreover, as Geoffrey said, the pandemic isn’t the key issue it once was for voters; instead, it’s the economy. And on that issue, Biden gets abysmal ratings. Sixty-three percent of voters said they “somewhat” or “strongly” disapproved of Biden’s handling of inflation and rising costs in that Wall Street Journal poll, with 47 percent saying they thought Republicans were best equipped to handle inflation, versus 30 percent who preferred Democrats.

All of these comments could be written in sand, depending on what happens over the next few months with headline issues, like Covid, inflation and the Ukraine. There is a historic pattern of the President’s party losing seats in congress in its first midterm election. It looks like inflation will be an additional negative factor for Biden and the Democrats, while Covid and the Ukraine crisis could play out in their favor….or not.

In addition, a host of other issues, demographic factors, candidate and campaign quality, voter suppression and partisan election counts could all play a role in midterm election outcome. Even if historic patterns prevail, Biden and the Democrats can minimize the damage with smart strategy.

The following article by Ruy Teixeira, author of The Optimistic Leftist and other works of political analysis, is cross-posted from The Liberal Patriot:

Is the GOP Becoming the Party of the Multiracial Working Class?

In my view, Democrats are far too complacent about this possibility. I discuss in my latest at The Liberal Patriot:

“Republicans have increasingly been talking about becoming the party of the multiracial working class. This is less far-fetched than you might think. After all, in a loose sense they already are. In the 2020 election, Trump carried the overall working class (noncollege) vote by 4 points (Catalist two party vote), about the same margin he had in 2016. The same data source also shows Republicans carrying the working class Congressional vote in three of the last four elections (the exception was 2018 when the working class vote was split down the middle between Republicans and Democrats).

Democrats have generally comforted themselves that their poor performance among the working class was purely a matter of white working class voters, who they presumed were motivated by retrograde racial and cultural attitudes. But since 2012, nonwhite working class voters have shifted away from the Democrats by 18 margin points, with a particularly sharp shift in the last election and particularly among Hispanics. This gives Democrats’ nonchalance about their losing record among working class voters a bit of a whistling past the graveyard quality.

Data since the 2020 election confirm a pattern of declining Democratic support among the nonwhite working class. Put another way: education polarization, it’s not just for white voters anymore. As a result, Democratic strength among the multiracial working class continues to weaken.”

Some scary nuggets from “Democrats Hispanic Peril” by Russell Contreras and Mike Allen at Axios: “A Wall Street Journal poll last week found that by 9 points, Hispanic voters said they’d back a Republican candidate for Congress over a Democrat….In November, the parties were tied….Democrats saw evidence of this shift in 2020 in House races in south Florida, Texas and southern New Mexico….Key factors, operatives say, include skepticism among Hispanic voters about programs they view as handouts. And many Hispanics are social conservatives, with what L.A. Times columnist Gustavo Arellano has called a “rancho libertarianism streak.”….The national party also needs to do better with messages that distinguish among Americans whose families hailed from Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico or Central America, several Democrats tell me…..Democrats talk about climate change, but dismiss the fact that many Latinos work in lucrative oilfield jobs in New Mexico and West Texas….Democrats talk about diversity. But by pleasing white progressives, they push out moderate Hispanic candidates….Democrats target Latinos by talking about immigration. But polls show immigration ranks 5th or 6th among the issues most important to these voters. The economy is usually the top concern.”

From Bill Scher’s “After Ukraine, Which Party Will Be the National Security Party? War changes history and politics. Putin’s bloody gambit could redraw the American political map” at The Washington Monthly: “‘We’re Zelenskyy Democrats. And they’re Putin Republicans’ would be my bumper sticker,” said Representative Sean Maloney, who heads the House Democratic campaign arm.” However, “After two massive wars and two American defeats, voters aren’t sold on either party regarding war and peace. What’s more, each party has its hawk/dove divisions.” In the optimistic scenario, Biden’s skill at building an international coalition for economic sanctions against Russia forces Putin to back off, and Biden emerges as the international leader of the ‘free world.’ That could win some swing votes, if inflation doesn’t get much worse. Biden will certainly accomplish his stated goal of making the invasion of Ukraine a painful economic disaster for Russia, if he hasn’t already achieved it. Even in the worst case scenario, Biden looks like a grown-up who can work with our allies on the international stage, in stark contrast to his petulant predecessor, who behaved like a sulking brat at the international meetings he attended.

We may be approaching the point where reasonable people can disagree about who is the head of the Republican Party. For now, however, Trump is the face in front, if not their 2024 front-runner. At Talking Points Memo, Editor Josh Marshall has a few choice words for political media that have given the GOP an easy ride for their refusal to hold Trump accountable for his disastrous coddling of Putin: “I must say that I am looking forward to the raft of articles in the works from the Times, WaPo, Politico and above all Axios about the GOP’s reckoning with the fact that their party leader (and most of his party) has spent the last several years toadying and obsequiously embracing Vladimir Putin and Russia. I jest of course since I have little hope that any of these pieces will be written. But the leader of this party has spent the last seven years fawning over the increasingly dictatorial leader of the country who has now tipped the world into the biggest international crisis in a generation and I guess we’re somehow not going to talk about that. I mean, he actually got impeached over it and for participating in a scheme to make the country Russia just invaded easier to invade.”

The U.S. Supreme Court’s “shadow docket” of rulings on emergency petitions yielded a significant decision with mixed political implications, and I tried to unravel it at New York.

When North Carolina and Pennsylvania Republicans petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn state-court decisions against their attempted congressional gerrymanders, there were two issues at hand. The most immediate matter involved the gerrymanders themselves: Was there any federal constitutional bar to state courts interpreting state laws to smack down state legislative regulation of federal elections? There was also a longer-term issue casting a big shadow on the 2024 presidential elections: Do state legislatures have constitutional superpowers that may let them override state and even federal laws governing the designation of presidential electors, as Donald Trump’s campaign claimed in 2020 as part of its efforts to overturn that year’s results?

As Mark Joseph Stern noted at Slate when rulings came down on both petitions, the Pennsylvania GOP effort to reverse a state-court redistricting decision was a stretch: “The plaintiffs demanded at-large congressional districts for the first time since the 18th century because there was no backup map in place and no time for the legislature to draw one.” So the Supreme Court rejected the Pennsylvania petition without dissent or comment.

But in the North Carolina case, the Supreme Court said “no” to the GOP gambit to overturn new court-imposed maps and “maybe” to the broader claim of legislative superpowers. Six justices — John Roberts, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett — rejected the North Carolina legislature’s petitions to overturn its state court’s redistricting ruling that could shift as many as four U.S. House seats toward Democrats as compared to the original legislative map. Three justices (Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch) dissented, with an opinion from Alito citing the famous “independent state legislature” doctrine, under which neither federal nor state courts can overrule legislative determinations of rulings affecting federal elections.

It’s not clear, however, that the Court’s majority rejected that doctrine. Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion explicitly reserved judgment on it, instead basing his rejection of the North Carolina petition on the close proximity of the 2022 elections. Chief Justice Roberts (who has expressed support for strong legislative election prerogatives in the past) and Barrett were silent.

So a short-term victory for the prerogatives of state courts interpreting state election laws (which in these two cases benefited Democrats) could later give way to a bigger defeat that puts legislatures in the driver’s seat in future election controversies — you know, like controversies over who actually won a presidential election. Trump’s frustrated 2020 effort to get Republican legislatures to overrule state-certified electoral-vote rewards might fare better in 2024 with more time to prepare the groundwork for a coup. And even if that doesn’t happen, legislatures — not courts, governors, or secretaries of State — could have the final word on election and voting procedures. As election-law expert Rick Hasen warned after the North Carolina order, we could see a “big, bad election law precedent potentially coming down the line.”

In his article, “The Coming Republican Civil War Over Russia: The crucial debate goes on hold during the invasion of Ukraine, while Republican realists remain MIA” at The Nation, Jeet Heer shares his thoughts on Republican factions of the political moment:

In a Washington Post column, Amber Phillips provided a useful taxonomy of three primary types: the Hawks, the Putin Sympathizers, and the “Why Should We care?” Contingent. (For the sake of clarity, I’ve shifted the order of her listing.) To this list one could note there is a fourth ideological type that existed in the past but now is notably missing: the Republican Realists.

The Hawks are the most familiar of the four types. These are the unreconstructed Cold Warriors, the people who never trusted the Russkies and perhaps thought glasnost and perestroika were fake. Some of them still tend to refer to Russia as the Soviet Union. Mitt Romney is the emblematic figure here. The Hawks want a strict hard-line policy of containing and isolating Russia. They want NATO to act as the guard dog that makes sure Russia doesn’t dare cast a shadow outside its own borders.

The Putin Sympathizers are the traditionalist authoritarians who have come into prominence in the Trump era. They see Putin as a bulwark against global liberalism, someone who upholds gender norms and Christian values. Although often associated with Trump, this tradition can be seen earlier in Pat Buchanan.

The “Why Should We Care?” Contingent are the heirs of the older Robert Taft Republican isolationists. They insist that America needs to look after its domestic concerns first and foremost and avoid being drawn into foreign quarrels. Missouri Senator Josh Hawley gave voice to these sentiments by saying, “Sending new troops, expanding the security commitment and expanding NATO—I just think that’s a strategic mistake.” In terms of policy, this group aligns with the Putin Sympathizers.

The Republican Realists are the missing voices in the debate. These are national security types who prioritized advancing American business interests, which often meant making deals with hostile powers and finding a way to accommodate international differences. This is the tradition of James Baker and Brent Scowcroft. Unlike the Hawks, this group both understands and values diplomacy—especially when dealing with peer rivals like Russia and China. Unlike the Putin Sympathizers or the ”Why Should We Care?” Contingent, the Republican Realists were not unilateralists. They valued international agreements and building alliances.

If the current Ukraine crisis recedes, we’re likely to see a renewed debate among the Hawks, the Putin Sympathizers and the “Why Should We Care?” Contingent. Yet all of them offer unsatisfactory solutions. They are either too militaristic or too unilateralist. The disappearance of Republican Realists means that we’re not likely to get a shrewd and prudential Republican foreign policy alternative. Which is too bad, since in a two-party system that’s something that is desperately needed.

For Democratic midterm candidates, the challenge is to benefit from the deepening GOP divisions. Yes, Dems must do a better job of promoting the Biden Administration’s real accomplishments. But Democrats, not just candidates, should also unite in branding the Republican party as elitists focused on: providing ever-larger tax cuts for billionaires, expressing contempt for democracy and having a high tolerance for bigots who trash our county’s best values (see Sasha Abramsky’s “Putin’s Republican Sympathizers,” also in The Nation).

Hit hard and often. Leverage the magic of repetition. That’s what Republicans do.