Did Voters Do the GOP a Favor Last Tuesday?
Perhaps, but rough seas are ahead for the GOP if Trump announces his candidacy Tuesday and the House Freedom Caucus implodes a tiny House GOP majority
Strategists in both major political parties continue to digest this year’s elections (we can’t call it “Election Day” anymore), and mail-in votes continue to trickle in and are counted. And we still have a US Senate election to resolve in Georgia. Who knows how that will turn out?
Interestingly, Democratic recriminations were underway before the votes were counted on the assumption a red wave would materialize. Democrats were speculating how Joe Biden might gracefully withdraw from the 2024 presidential elections and who might replace him atop the ticket. “Second Man” Douglas Emhoff (VP Kamala Harris's husband) called on Democrats to rally around his wife if Biden doesn’t run.
“We got to find somebody under 75 who can run this country,” extolls “ragin’ cajun” James Carville, campaign manager of Bill Clinton’s successful presidential election in 1992.
A lot of Republicans would agree.
But this year’s midterm elections changed the discussion. Democrats performed better than expected, beating historical norms to keep control of the US Senate and possibly the US House (unlikely, but stay tuned). That has suddenly quelled Democratic discussions about replacing Biden. Suddenly, he’s in the catbird seat, horrific job approval and all, as he shuffles toward 2024. The raison d'être for his departure has vaporized.
But a few analysts and strategists see silver linings for the GOP. Marc Theissen, a podcaster, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a Bush 43 speechwriter:
Voters did the Republican Party three big favors Tuesday: First, they reelected Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) by historic margins, turning Florida into a red state and showing the GOP the path out of the political wilderness.
Second, they appear to have given Republicans a majority in the House of Representatives — if a narrow one, from what’s clear so far — which means that President Biden’s power to spend trillions of dollars with Democratic-only budget reconciliation bills is revoked.
Third, and most important, they gave the GOP a much-needed wake-up call. According to the Fox News voter analysis survey, 75 percent of respondents said the country is on the wrong track. The same share was dissatisfied or even angry with the way things are going. Yet on Tuesday, millions voted for the status quo.
Think about that: On Biden’s watch, we have experienced the worst inflation in 40 years, the worst collapse in real wages in four decades, the worst murder rate since 1996, the worst border crisis in U.S. history, the highest gas prices ever recorded, the worst increase in the cost of shelter since 1984. Biden is the least popular president in the history of presidential polling (besides Donald Trump) going all the way back to Harry S. Truman. Six in 10 voters say Biden does not have the mental capacity to be president.
Yet despite this unprecedented litany of disasters, voters looked at the alternative presented by Republicans and said: No, thanks. Not only did the historic red wave fail to materialize, Biden might actually end up doing better in this midterm election than most of his far more popular predecessors.
How did that happen? It’s not because voters approve of Biden’s job performance; it’s because they disapproved of the GOP. It’s because in key House and Senate races, Republicans nominated candidates whose main qualification was their fealty to Trump — and voters rejected them. Americans are desperate for change, but not the kind of change that Republicans offered. And because the GOP didn’t give voters what they considered reasonable alternatives to Democrats, Republicans lost winnable races across the country.
I’ve spoken with at one GOP analyst and friend who largely agrees, although he might substitute “voters” in his last sentence above and replace it with “independents.” Republicans ran a “base” election and, in the process, gave independents little to vote for. Efforts by some to attribute Democratic success to the abortion issue or younger voters are somewhat misplaced. This was about independents and a failure of Republicans to give them something to vote for.
The GOP consultant class largely misread the electorate led by a lot of polling that overweighted Republican voters. Those who did see this election turning out the way it did were dismissed as pessimists. Oops. And the heavily sanitized House GOP’s “Commitment to America” was no factor. No one ran on it. The Senate GOP’s campaign chief, Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), said the lack of a positive agenda mattered.
“I think we didn’t have enough of a positive message,” Scott said. “We said everything about how bad the Biden agenda was. It’s bad, the Democrats are radical, but we have to have a plan of what we stand for.”
And Thiessen was not alone. Chapman University demographer and author Joel Kotkin:
For all their cautious optimism yesterday, a mild midterms victory may prove the last thing the Democrats need. If they had performed as predicted, the Democrats and their media adjuncts would now be busily dissecting their defeat. But what has to be considered a lost Republican opportunity — gaining little in a country where lifespans are now dropping — also means that the Democrats will be slower to address their weaknesses, and may be forced to accept the unpopular Joe Biden as their leader in 2024.
With no sign of a Republican resurgence, the Democrats will likely be lulled into thinking that Biden’s polarising agenda is a vote-winner, in the same way the conspiracy-minded MAGA wing of the GOP refuses to move on from 2020. Until it’s resoundingly disproved in the ballot box, stridency tends to whip up your base: Trump’s supporters have become, as the President suggested, “semi-fascist”, while his political mentor, South Carolina’s James Clyburn, goes further, decrying the GOP as the architects of a Nazi state.
When Democrats performed poorly in the past, they were forced to rethink their politics. After Walter Mondale suffered a landslide defeat to Reagan in 1984, the Democratic Leadership Council was set up to steer the ship towards the centre — and ultimately supported both a young Bill Clinton and, to an extent, Biden himself. In turn, the DLC was inspired by the moderate Coalition for a Democratic Majority, founded after Nixon’s trouncing of McGovern in 1972. Today, however, it’s hard to say that now is the time for a new political vision when virtually all the high-profile blue state Democrats won, sometimes by wider than expected margins.
So, rather than using the next two years to regroup and craft a political programme that could win the next election, the Democrats now appear stuck with a weak leader who appears unfit to deal with the global challenges that will define America in the coming decade. Internally, too, the Democrats look increasingly unstable. A stronger-than-expected Midterms performance doesn’t mask the fact that the progressives remain a dominant faction in the party — with an associated agenda that, outside of deep blue-college towns and core cities, commands remarkably low levels of support, as Barack Obama and others have warned.
While so much of our politics today defies history, there may be a modest parallel between the 2022 elections and those of 1978. Democrats retained control of the House and Senate that year and won the national popular vote by almost 9 percent, despite a weak incumbent who oversaw a 1977 natural gas crisis, along with long lines at gas pumps. Still, the GOP netted a modest three-seat gain in the Senate and 15 seats in the House. They also netted six new governors. It is important to remember that just four years earlier - the Watergate election - Democrats overwhelmed, so more robust GOP gains were expected.
But the 1978 elections set the stage for the massive GOP tide in 1980. Wikipedia: “Though Republicans’ gains were relatively modest for a midterm election, the election set the stage for the Reagan Revolution.”
Others see parallel to the 1998 midterm elections. Then-Speaker Newt Gingrich predicted a roughly 30-seat House GOP gain in Clinton’s sixth year, normally a great year for the party out of power. The GOP lost 5 seats and Newt soon resigned. George W. Bush would win the White House in 2000, but narrowly while losing the popular vote. Al Gore didn’t concede until December.
Depending on whom the nominees for President are and the political climate, Republicans could be set for another 1980-style landslide and mandate, especially in the US Senate. Democrats in 2024 must defend 21 of 34 seats on the ballot (one will be a special election to fill the expected vacancy of Senator Ben Sasse, R-NE). Or, they could be setting the stage for the controversial and highly divisive 2000 election.
But there are variables. Democrats are drooling at the prospect that Donald Trump will be the GOP presidential nominee in 2024. A equally significant issue might be very narrow GOP control of the House and how that plays out. The House Freedom Caucus currently consists of 29 House Republicans (US Rep. Ted Budd, R-NC, was just elected to the US Senate, and at least two members are not returning) and is chaired by Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA). They are making demands on GOP Leader and putative Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) that portend challenges reminiscent of former GOP Speakers John Boehner and Paul Ryan.
Under both of those Speakerships, Boehner and Ryan were sometimes forced to negotiate with Democrats on must-pass bills such as spending bills and debt limit extensions under threats of politically-mismanaged government shutdowns due largely to recalcitrant Republican renegades. They successfully engineered Boehner’s stepping down as Speaker and earned criticism from Donald Trump for opposing a GOP plan to replace “Obamacare.” They now demand a return to the legislative tactic used to depose Boehner - returning to “privileged” status the motion to “vacate the Chair.” If McCarthy relents, the motion will be used as a Damocles Sword.
McCarthy’s relationship with the Freedom Caucus has always been tenuous. They opposed his ascension as Speaker when Boehner retired. That’s when the caucus turned to the reluctant chairman of the House Ways and Committee, Paul Ryan, to fill the position. Ryan would soon retire from Congress.
McCarthy’s strong relationship with the Freedom Caucus’s first chairman, US Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), may determine the future of the new GOP House majority, assuming it materializes. If the White House is competent enough, they’ll find ways to keep congressional Republicans divided and foil their attempts at oversight, including ignoring congressional subpoenas and refusing to cooperate with, or even participate in, oversight hearings.
House Republicans, for their part, have never demonstrated great skill at congressional oversight, as Members often stumble over each other for media sound bites. Perhaps they’ve learned their lessons.
As for the US Senate, we can expect more of the same. Senate Majority Leader Schumer will no doubt make preserving and advance the political fortunes of nearly half his caucus his cause celebre, whose seats will be on the ballot in 2024.
Nobody, of course, knows how all this will materialize. But it is feasible that voters may have done the GOP a big favor leading up to a potentially promising 2024. That is, if House Republicans can demonstrate their ability to function without self-destructing.