Mar.17

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

One Democratic Group Releases Its Plans for Fighting Back

Democrats are adrift and don't know what to do. They have almost no power and they don't dare use the little power they have, like the filibuster, for fear of being blamed for the consequences. One group, the center-left Third Way think tank, is about to launch an 18-month program, the Signal Project, to focus on what polling says the voters care about, even if it is not what Democrats care about. For example, Democrats are furious about Donald Trump releasing the Jan. 6 rioters, degrading the civil service, claiming that Ukraine invaded Russia, and the endless crimes he is committing on a daily basis. But many voters don't care about any of this. Instead, Third Way's focus will be on the following issues, which polling shows do resonate with voters.

• Prices: Voters are extremely sensitive to prices and inflation. Trump promised to lower them on Day 1. He didn't. Harping on "he lied to you" puts the blame on him, not on the voters' own stupidity for expecting a miracle. Talking about how groceries, housing, cars, gas, and other things are going up and will go up further due to Trump's tariffs could be a very strong argument. Democrats shouldn't overpromise what they can't deliver, but they can say: "He doesn't care about you but we will do our best to help you" without making concrete promises. It is about demonizing the fact that Republicans don't care about them.
  
  
• Food Safety: Elon Musk killed off the team at the FDA that ensures that formula is not poisonous to babies and that E. coli is not found in applesauce or hamburgers. A pitch of "They killed off the people who protect our food supply in order to give billionaires a bigger tax cut" could work. People care about food safety.
  
  
• Nuclear Security: Musk fired the people who protect the country's stockpile of nuclear weapons (although some have been rehired). But the argument that Republicans don't think it is worth spending money to make sure our nuclear weapons are stored safely and don't fall into the wrong hands could be effective.
  
  
• Protecting Children: Never waste a good crisis. People care about their kids not dying. The measles epidemic in Texas is not directly Trump's fault, but it forms a great background for saying: "Measles is not a joke. It is a killer and the guy Trump appointed to head American health care, Robert Kennedy Jr., is a lifelong opponent of vaccinations, which prevent measles, polio, and other once-feared diseases from killing your children. Kennedy and Trump don't care about your children."
  
  
• Air safety: Musk has fired hundreds of people involved in air safety in many forms. There was a plane crash in D.C. on Jan. 29 in which 67 people died. There was a plane crash in Philadelphia on Jan. 31 resulting in six deaths. Two private jets collided in Scottsdale on Feb. 10 resulting in one death and four injuries. A Delta plane landed upside down in Toronto on Feb. 17. These aren't the only aviation incidents this year. The Democrats need to emphasize that Musk firing air traffic controllers and others involved in air safety can have fatal consequences.
  
  
• Veterans: This is a no-brainer. Veterans are sacred in America. Musk firing 80,000 people at the V.A. is sure to reduce care and increase delays for filing claims. Is this efficiency? Democrats need to harp on the fact that they would never do anything to reduce the care veterans receive, but all the Republicans care about is tax cuts for billionaires and killing government regulations that prevent companies from polluting the air and water and cheating customers.
  
  
• Protecting Personal Information: Spreading the word that Musk has allowed his band of twenty-something hackers to plunder the Social Security Administration's databases so they can copy your personal information, which is protected by law, onto their notebooks for some future nefarious use is a winner. People don't like it at all. Emphasize that no Democrat would ever, ever permit that and that under them, anyone caught doing it would end up in prison very fast.
  
  
• Social Security and Medicare: If there is anything that can enrage seniors more than talking about cutting Social Security and Medicare, we don't know what it might be. Musk is closing Social Security offices and cutting Medicare's telehealth services for rural voters (and nonvoters). The funding cuts are forcing rural hospitals to close. This is an issue that not only plays well with seniors, but also with rural voters of all ages. Democrats should flog it for all it is worth, and then some.
  
  
• Gutting Medicaid, "Obamacare," and SNAP: Republicans have already gutted or are planning to gut Medicaid, Obamacare, and SNAP (food stamps). These cuts are extremely unpopular. Democrats need to promise to do everything they can to reverse them, but they need to capture both chambers of Congress to even try. By tying the promise to at least try to fix this specific condition, they could make the 2026 elections about this and the other items.
  

Many Democrats will find this approach deeply unsatisfying. They want voters to hate Trump for being an autocrat who breaks laws left and right. But the voters don't care. The blue team has to go with the voters they have, not the voters they would like to have. But there are plenty of issues, like the ones above, where Trump and the Republicans are doing things the voters don't like. Better to go after them for things the voters do care about than things the voters don't care about. Needless to say, Democratic candidates for all offices up and down the ballot would be advised to pick a few of these and give them plenty of attention, depending on local polling. (V)