Democrats Are Their Own Worst Enemy

Democrats assumed that taking on Donald Trump would be easy. That has not turned out to be true. Once it seemed that the Democratic opposition was assured of at least taking control of the House in this year's midterm elections, but the result now seems increasingly like a tossup. There are several reasons for this, but looming large among them is the Democrats' own tendency to overreach and make unforced errors.

The Democrats' first miscalculation was on DACA. Democrats forced a shutdown over DACA in January even though President Trump offered them a sweetheart deal. In the end, Democrats rejected the deal and eventually caved, allowing the shutdown to end with nothing to show for it. It was an ignominious defeat similar to the 2013 Republican shutdown over Obamacare.

In their surrender, the Democrats lost a chance to please their base and split the GOP at the same time. Instead, Democratic leaders angered both progressives and Dreamers. In a stunning turn of events, some DACA recipients have even protested against the Democratic National Committee.

Of course, the risk in accepting the deal would have been to hand Trump a victory on immigration and the possibility of losing their grip on the Hispanic vote. The best course for Democrats would have been not to force a shutdown in the first place while continuing to press for a DACA deal.

The second Democrat error of 2018 was their overreach on gun control. When President Trump extended an offer to help Democrats with their gun control effort, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) literally jumped for joy and the party jumped at the chance.

What emerged from behind the closed doors of the Democrat caucus was a bill that included a laundry list of gun control measures that will likely mobilize gun owners to get out the vote in November. Chuck Schumer's (D-N.Y.) bill includes an “assault weapons” ban, expanded background checks and gun violence restraining orders which would allow family members to get a court order to prevent dangerous individuals from getting a gun. A second bill, introduced by Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.), would ban the “sale, transfer, production, and importation” of 205 semi-automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns that can hold more than 10 rounds.

While President Trump might have embraced a more modest gun control bill, these Democratic bills have almost no chance of becoming law. With Republicans in control of Congress, Democrats would need 11 Senate Republicans to defect in order to get cloture. That won't happen without significant arm-twisting from President Trump, which is unlikely.

The third Democrat error was unveiling a new plan to raise taxes if they win control of Congress. The Democrat plan is a multi-faceted approach with an increase in the top marginal income tax rate, increasing the corporate tax rate to 25 percent (tax reform cut this rate to 21 percent from 35 percent), bringing back the alternative minimum tax (AMT) and restoring the standard deduction for the estate tax (i.e. the “death tax”) to its pre-reform level.

The Democrats' gamble here is two-fold. First, they assume that tax reform has remained as unpopular as it was before passage. In reality, as companies announce expansion plans and employee bonuses in the wake of tax reform, the new tax law is increasingly popular. The New York Times found that a majority of Americans currently approve of the Republican law.

The second gamble is that voters will favor the Democrat plan if it is cloaked in the guise of “soaking the rich.” The proposal seems specifically designed to not directly affect the average voter, but to target “other people's money.” Few voters are in the top income tax bracket or have estates worth more than $5.5 million.

A platform of tax increases and gun control may please progressives, but it is unlikely to inspire the moderate and independent voters needed to sway an election. In fact, the Democrat agenda seems more likely to send Republican voters to the polls with an attitude of “at least they're better than the Democrats” than to win new converts. Paired with the disillusionment of immigration voters in the Democrat base, the results could be disastrous for the opposition party.

A better strategy for Democrats would be to appear nonthreatening and positive, a sane and rational alternative to President Trump. Instead, the current plan seems to be to convince voters that Democrats are coming for their guns and money. That may play well with the Democrat base in deep blue districts, but it will be less effective in the purple heartland areas that Democrats need to win in order to take control of Congress.

To be fair, Republicans, led by President Trump, also seem to be actively trying to avoid becoming too popular with voters. The new tariffs and potential trade war may undermine pent-up economic growth that is already starting to result from tax reform.

With both parties making errors and advocating for unwise policies on a daily basis, a reliable forecast for the midterm elections is impossible. In the end, the outcome of the elections may depend on the news cycle when voters go to the polls.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump Sees DACA Deal As Win-Win

Chaos broke out last night after a dinner between President Trump and Democrat congressional leaders Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Nancy Pelosi (D- Calif.). In the wake of Trump’s deal with Democrats on the debt ceiling, there were late-breaking reports that the three had reached an agreement to extend President Obama’s DACA program.

Fast forward a few hours to this morning and President Trump is denying almost everything. In a tweet, the president said, “No deal was made last night on DACA. Massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent. Would be subject to vote.”

The president continued, “The WALL, which is already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls, will continue to be built.”

Then, in a third tweet, President Trump changes tacks. “Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military?” he asks. “Really!” He continued in that vein in a fourth tweet, “They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own - brought in by parents at young age. Plus BIG border security”

Taken together, the tweets indicate that President Trump may not have a final agreement on an extension of DACA, but he wants one. Even though Trump ran his campaign as a hardliner on immigration, he gave several indications that he was not firmly committed to the issue.

In August 2016, three months before the election, there were reports that Trump was flip-flopping on immigration. He denied the charge, telling Fox News at the time, “We want to come up with a fair but firm process. Fair but firm."

In December 2016, the president-elect directly addressed the “Dreamers” in his “Person of the Year” interview with Time magazine. “We’re going to work something out that’s going to make people happy and proud,” he said. “They got brought here at a very young age, they’ve worked here, they’ve gone to school here. Some were good students. Some have wonderful jobs. And they’re in never-never land because they don’t know what’s going to happen.”

The signs were there all along that President Trump would cut a deal. And there are benefits for the president if he does. Its unpopularity among Republicans notwithstanding, most Americans like DACA and don’t want to deport the Dreamers. For many people, how President Obama created the DACA program, usurping congressional legislative authority, is more of a problem that the program itself. And let’s be honest, many people don’t even care if Obama exceeded his executive authority to create the program. Recent polling shows that most Americans approve of DACA by double-digit margins. Even a third to a half of Republicans support continuing the program.

Not just any illegal immigrant is eligible for DACA. Candidates must have come to the country illegally or overstayed a visa when they were younger than 16 and have continuously resided in the United States since 2007. The must be in school, have a GED or high school diploma or have been honorably discharged from the US military. A felony or more than three misdemeanors is not allowed. Participants also had to pay $980 in initial fees and $465 for renewals, all for a program that did not give official legal status. Whatever DACA was, it was not amnesty. The prospect of prosecution and deportation was still there.

Most voters also approve of President Trump’s first deal with the Democrats. Rasmussen found that two-thirds of voters think it’s good for the country if Trump and the Democrats work together.

President Trump likely sees a DACA deal as a win-win. He can become more popular by reaching across the aisle to enact a policy that he likes anyway. From a pragmatic perspective, the Republicans have been unable to get anything done, so a pivot to the left makes sense.

Could Republicans block collaboration between Trump and the Democrats? Assuming the Democrats all vote together, in the Senate, a deal would need 13 Republican votes for cloture and three votes for passage. In the House, 23 Republican votes would be needed for a simple majority. Between Republican moderates who support DACA and Trump supporters who will follow the president’s lead, a Trump-Democrat deal would be hard to stop.

The problem with a nonideological president is that his principles and platform are not firmly grounded. If he wants to accomplish things – anything – and be popular, he won’t necessarily continue to dance with the voters who brought him to the Washington.

And what of the Trump base that voted for the Wall and deportation?

“I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters,” Trump famously said of his base during the campaign.

His pivot on DACA may be about to put that theory to the test.

Originally published on The Resurgent

Trump and Democrats could form alliance on some issues

One potential problem for the Trump Administration is that since Trump is a newcomer to the Republican Party, he holds different views than many other Republican elected officials. During the campaign, Trump’s views on many set him apart from other candidates in the primary. They also set him apart from other members of his party in the general election.

Trump made many promises that he may find his Republican colleagues unwilling to back up. The Republican Party has traditionally been a free trade party, but Trump is openly hostile to trade deals. Republicans fought tooth and nail against Obama’s infrastructure stimulus, but Trump has hinted at a similar spending program. Trump’s proposed childcare plan is the sort of entitlement expansion that Republicans have opposed when put forward by Democrats.

Some Republicans are undoubtedly confirmed passengers on the Trump Train, but many others will require much persuasion. Many Republicans supported Mr. Trump only reluctantly as the only alternative against Hillary Clinton. Conservative members of the party are unlikely to be willing to blindly follow Trump down a path of progressive policies.

The rub is that the Republican Party isn’t as conservative as it used to be. While few Republicans have voiced support for Mr. Trump’s childcare entitlement, anti-trade sentiment and isolationism had been growing in the GOP even before Trump burst onto the stage.

The libertarian faction of the GOP has been arguing against foreign involvement for years. When President Obama drew a “red line” in Syria, it was a bipartisan coalition of anti-war Republicans and Democrats that revolted against a military strike against the Assad regime’s chemical weapons facilities. Likewise, the Trans-Pacific Partnership was tagged as “Obamatrade” by Republicans who sided with Bernie Sanders to kill the trade deal.

Following these examples may provide Trump with a strategy to enact some of his less-than-conservative ideas. It is not beyond question that President Trump could reach out to forge bipartisan coalitions to push through policies that lack conservative support.

For example, the base of the Republican Party has moved left on trade. A September poll in Politico found that 85 percent of Republicans believed that free trade cost more American jobs than it has created. Only 18 percent believed that trade deals had helped their communities.

Even though many voters have shifted, many congressional Republicans remain favorable to free trade. President Trump is unlikely to be able to rely on Republicans to rubberstamp an anti-trade agenda of higher taxes and more regulation. The answer might well be to find a majority by combining protectionist Republicans and Democrats into one voting bloc.

Trump is hardly hostile to the idea of reaching across the aisle. Last January, early in the primary season, Trump said on MSNBC, “I think I'm going to be able to get along with [House Minority Leader Nancy] Pelosi — I've always had a good relationship with Nancy Pelosi.” Trump also said he was “close to” incoming Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer “in many in ways.” Trump said in the Washington Examiner in July that he wouldn’t mind being a “free agent” when dealing with Congress.

Trump’s cabinet appointments also show a willingness to go outside the Republican Party. Wilbur Ross, Trump’s pick for Commerce Secretary, was a Democrat until after the election.  Steven Mnuchin, Trump’s Treasury Secretary, worked for Goldman Sachs and George Soros. Mnuchin, like Trump, was a big donor to Democrats before this election cycle. Trump’s pick for National Security Advisor, Michael Flynn, is also a registered Democrat.

Would congressional Democrats work with Trump? They seem open to the possibility.

“If he truly wants to revise U.S. trade policy, he is going to have to come and work in a bipartisan manner to do that. It's always been a substantial majority of Democrats who oppose these agreements," Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) said in US News.

Even new Senate Minority Chuck Schumer is reaching out. “To the extent that the president-elect and the Republican majority pursue policies that help Americans and are consistent with our values, we stand ready and willing to work with them,” Schumer recently said in a speech quoted in Yahoo News. Schumer suggested that an infrastructure stimulus, tax reform and trade might be areas where Democrats and Trump could find common ground.

On the other hand, some Trump priorities would find little, if any, support from Democrats. A repeal of Obamacare or hardline immigration reform would be largely party-line issues that Schumer says Democrats would fight “tooth and nail.”

At this point, we can only speculate what the Trump Administration will be like. From his performance in the campaign, we can assume that there are few ideas that President Trump will be strongly committed to, but one of those is a protectionist trade agenda. To accomplish his goal of imposing large taxes and restrictions on trade, Trump, the former Democrat donor, is very likely to make a deal with congressional liberals.

Originally published on The Resurgent