Gordon L. Weil
It’s fascinating to watch a big-time gambler in high stakes games. The risks are great, but the pay-off could be huge.
This week’s news reveals the high roller is Donald Trump. Using remarkable appeal to raise cash, he has staked himself to over $100 million to spend in political games. The games are the 2022 congressional elections.
Besides Trump, the other players are President Joe Biden’s mainline Democrats, the traditional Republicans and the Democratic progressives, the party’s most liberal element.
The games will decide who controls Congress. They could show if Trump’s election and GOP takeover was an aberration or if Biden’s victory was a fluke. In either case, they might set the new normal in American politics for a few years.
Trump Republicans seek authoritarian presidential rule that produces powerful leadership at the expense of popular democracy. That type of government can produce change more easily than the intentionally inefficient democratic process. That’s why Trump retains political appeal.
The temptation for the Trumpers is to oppose anything the Democrats propose. As part of the Trump gamble, they even blame the January 6 insurrection on the Democrats.
If Trump succeeds, he will not only change American government, but would likely destroy the traditional Republican Party. He may have been a RINO – Republican in Name Only – but he would have stolen the party.
Trump’s GOP deploys voter suppression measures in some states to keep likely Democratic voters from easy access to the polls. Across the country, Republican dominated state governments are hard at work passing restrictive voting laws using the thin excuse of improving ballot security.
Beyond that, Trump’s millions flow to his favored candidates. If elected, they can flip Congress back from Democratic to Republican, proving that Biden and the Democrats are the aberration. Even a thin margin of victory could pave the way to Trump’s run for the presidency two years later.
The first test for Trump comes in the party primaries. He wants to scare away GOP candidates who are not Trumpers. Failing that, he tries to tip the vote to his favorites by pumping up their campaigns, enabling them to reach more voters.
In a GOP primary for a safe Republican seat in Ohio this week, Trump’s cash created the frontrunner, who won. He defeated a crowded field of traditional conservatives, though he fell far short of an outright majority. The turnout was light, but Trump’s strategy worked.
Even if Congress hedges its bets and reaches some compromises this year, the battle lines for next year remain. One major question is where do anti-Trump Republicans like Wyoming’s Liz Cheney or Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski end up? Both are up for reelection next year.
Biden has been trying to undermine Trump’s appeal to alienated voters through massive government programs designed to produce benefits for them. Much of the spending in his array of proposals will end up in visible, local projects. That’s pragmatic politics.
In another Ohio primary this week for a safe Democratic seat, the candidates included a Biden-style practical politician and an outspoken progressive promoter of universal health insurance. The pragmatic candidate defeated the progressive, gaining a clear majority. But the margin was small with a good turnout.
If the progressives lose their challenges to Biden’s more centrist policies, they face the question of sticking to their beliefs, sitting out the elections, and risking GOP control. Otherwise, they will have to endorse Biden’s plans for political survival and hope for another chance.
For the Democrats finally to end Trump’s influence, they have to win big. To prove they are the new normal, the Democrats would have to overcome the traditional loss of seats by the president’s party in the mid-term elections.
That will take a lot of cash and a strong effort to get out their voters and work around voter suppression. They could make a last push for the national popular vote. If they win only by squeaking by narrowly in 2022, they remain in jeopardy for the presidential election. If they lose, Biden’s last two years could be a bust.
Biden needs to keep the Democratic progressives involved and supportive. The Democrats – establishment and progressives – know how to raise money. Ultimately the question must be if they can pool it to counter Trump’s millions.
In Maine, a similar situation exists. The traditional GOP has been weakened, and it looks like the Republican Party lines up for Trumpian former Gov. Paul LePage.
Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, could be somewhat undermined by a public power referendum, which she is likely to oppose. With no ranked choice voting for governor, she has to worry about the possibility of a vote-splitting independent challenger.
No need to proclaim “Let the games begin.” They have.
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