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Dems win the house in 18, it will cause a Russia investigation which is key to
democracy but a lack of legislative wins is keeping the GOP at bay now.
Daily Kos 4/29/17 (Daily Kos, Established News and Politics Publisher. Citing a CNN poll, 538, and Amy
Walter for the Cook Political Report. Democrats can take the House in 2018. April 29, 2017.
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/04/29/1657359/-Democrats-can-take-the-House-in-2018)
A new poll from CNN/ORC has results that should make Democrats optimistic about their chances of
taking over the House of Representatives in 2018. Congress has an approval rating of only 24%
compared to a 74% disapproval rating. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan has an unfavorability rating of
48% compared to 38% favorability. 55% of voters are more willing to vote for a candidate that opposes
President Trump compared to 41% that prefer a President Trump supporter. 50% said they would vote
for a Democrat compared to 41% that would vote for a Republican. As a Democrat candidate running
against Mia Love (Utah CD4), this news excites me and should give every Democrat optimism moving
forward. This is a national poll and House seats are won on a district-by-district basis. Does this poll
even tell us anything about how likely Democrats are to take the House when it wasnt conducted on
a district-by-district basis? In fact, it does. From Five Thirty Eight (emphasis mine): So if Democrats win
the national House vote by a margin in the low- to mid-single digits, that may not be enough to take
back the House. The median congressional district was 5.5 percentage points more Republican-leaning
in the presidential race than the nation as a whole in 2016, meaning Democrats are essentially spotting
the GOP 5.5 points in the battle for control of the House. And even that may be underestimating
Republicans ability to win a majority of seats without a majority of the vote. Since 2012 (or when most
states instituted the current House district lines), Republicans have won, on average, 51 percent of the
two-party House vote and 55 percent of House seats. If that difference holds for 2018, Democrats would
need to win the House popular vote by about 8 percentage points to win half the House seats.
Temporarily try to ignore the disgusting fact that the district lines are drawn in such a way that
Republicans can win 51% of the popular vote and actually pick up 55% of the actual seats. Instead focus
on that last statement If Democrats can manage to get an 8-point advantage in the House popular
vote, they are likely to win a majority of seats. According to this latest poll, Democrats are sitting at a 9-
point advantage. Democrats need to take 24 seats to win the House in 2018. There are 23 districts with
a sitting Republican that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016 (Utahs CD4 is not one of those). Amy Walter of
the Cook Political Report had this to say about 2018: In fact, if you look back at the last four midterm
elections where the party in the White House lost control of one or both houses of Congress, you see
that they share the following traits in common: the president has approval ratings among his own
partisans under 85 percent and approval ratings among independents in the 30s or low 40s. ... Among
independents, strong disapprovers outnumber strong approvers by more than 2-1 (45 percent to 18
percent). An angry voter is an active voter, which in a low-turnout election is bad news for the GOP.
...the current situation of Republican-infighting, a lack of legislative accomplishments and a
President determined to keep stoking political divisions is a very dangerous path
for the GOP. This can happen. Democrats can overcome the gerrymandered district lines and win
enough seats to gain control. There are serious questions over Trumps ties to Russia, the pillars of our
democracy are crumbling, and the ruling party in this country is looking the other way so that they can
focus on their agenda. If Democrats can take the House in 2018, real change can begin to happen.
Democrats could demand subpoenas to assist in the investigation over whether a presidential
candidate colluded with a foreign power in order to win an election. Democrats could introduce
legislation to fight gerrymandering and make our government more representative of its voters. If
necessary, Democrats could begin impeachment proceedings.
Boosting federal support for education is a top priority for a large percentage of voters
--- the plan would allow Trump to change the narrative
Garin and Molyneux 6/26 Geoff Garin, president of Hart Research Associates and chief strategist
for Clintons 2008 campaign, and Guy Molyneux, partner with Hart Research Associates for more than
20 years, 2017 (National Poll Finds Strong Opposition to Trump Administrations Education Priorities
and Budget Cuts, Hart Research Associates, Available online at
https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/memo_poll_ed-budget_62617.pdf, Accessed 7/5/2017)
Overview
By a wide margin of 62% to 15%, voters across the country believe that the federal government today
spends too little rather than too much on public education. Public education is a priority for voters,
and fully half of all voters identify education as the part of the federal budget for which they would
most strongly oppose cuts.
Voters strongly reject the Trump administrations proposal to cut spending on education by 13.5% while
reducing taxes on large corporations and wealthy individuals. Fully 74% of voters oppose this policy,
including 54% who strongly oppose it. Half (48%) of Trumps own voters are in opposition.
Large majorities deem many specific elements of the Trump administrations education budget to be
unacceptable. Cuts to programs and services for students with disabilities, elimination of funding that
public schools use to reduce class sizes, and reduction of funding for career and technical education are
examples of cuts that evoke deep opposition from voters. This opposition is shared across diverse
communitieswith large majorities of urban, suburban, small town, and rural voters saying they are
unacceptable.
Voters also reject the Trump budgets education priorities, and believe that the emphasis by Donald
Trump and Betsy DeVos on vouchers and charter schools to promote school choice is misplaced and
misguided. For example, 76% of voters say it is unacceptable that the Trump-DeVos budget takes away
funding from public schools that serve poor children while increasing funding for private school
vouchers and the expansion of charter schools; 53% say this is totally unacceptable. By 67% to 14%,
voters prioritize funding for public schools to reduce class sizes, improve professional development of
teachers, ensure access to after-school programs, address the needs of students with disabilities, and
support students from disadvantaged backgrounds over funding for private school vouchers and the
expansion of charter schools to give parents more freedom to choose which schools their children will
attend. Only 23% of Trump voters believe that funding of school choice initiatives should be the
priority over investments in public schools.
There are important political implications to these attitudes, as 63% of voters say they would be less
likely to reelect their senator or congressperson if they supported the Trump-DeVos budget cuts
including 50% who are much less likely to vote for their reelection. Only 24% say they would be more
likely to reelect someone who backs Trump and DeVos on these cuts.
Democrats will take back congress now but its super close our model is predictive
and historically accurate
Enten 6/5 Harry, senior political writer and analyst for FiveThirtyEight, 2017 ("Heres The Best Tool
We Have For Understanding How The Midterms Are Shaping Up," FiveThirtyEight, Available online at
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/heres-the-best-tool-we-have-for-understanding-how-the-
midterms-are-shaping-up/, MSCOTT)
So what does the generic ballot show right now? That Democrats are in a historically strong position,
with a 44 percent to 37 percent lead over Republicans. That is an incredible gain from the eve of the
2016 election, when our generic ballot estimate put Democrats up by only a single point, 45 percent to
44 percent.2 Indeed, at no point during the summer or fall leading up to the 2016 election did
Democrats have as large an advantage on the generic ballot as they do now, and the generic ballot was
essentially tied by November. In other words, the political environment seems to have become a lot
worse for Republicans since last years presidential election.
As Ive written previously, the generic ballot, even this early in a midterm cycle, can be quite predictive
of the outcome of the following years House elections. Once you control for which party is in the White
House, the generic ballot about 18 months before a midterm election is strongly correlated (+.78) with
the eventual House result i.e., the share of votes cast for the presidents party versus the share of
votes cast for the opposition party. Heres all the generic ballot polling we have going back to 1942:3
Generally, in the runup to the midterms, the party that doesnt control the White House (now, the
Democrats) generally sees its position on the generic ballot improve or remain stable. Given the
Democrats current 7-point advantage, theyd be expected to win the 2018 national House vote by
about 9 percentage points (assuming, of course, that past trends hold and the forecast is perfect, which
is very unlikely). But sometimes the political environment changes and the party in the White House
makes gains on the generic ballot. Ahead of the 2002 midterms, for example, when George W. Bush was
the president, the Democrats held a small lead at this point in the cycle, but Republicans took back the
advantage after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
As we approach the 2018 midterms, expect the generic ballot to become even more predictive. For the
18 midterm elections that have taken place since 1946, I compared the final generic-ballot polling of the
cycle by Gallup or the final polling average from RealClearPolitics4 with the results of the national House
vote and found that the final polling missed by an average of only 2 percentage points. Thats about as
accurate as the final national presidential polls before a presidential election.
Dems can get the midterms AHCA, low approval ratings special elections dont
matter
Paulson 6/27 Darryl Paulson, Emeritus Professor of Government at USFSP, specializing in political
parties and elections, Florida and Southern Politics, 2017 ("Darryl Paulson: Midterm elections boost
Democratic chances," Florida Politics, Available online at http://floridapolitics.com/archives/240692-
darryl-paulson-midterm-elections-boost-democratic-chances)
Democrats are looking forward to the 2018 midterm election with great hopes of regaining political
control of the House and Senate. Democrats would need to pick up 24 House seats and three Senate
seats to capture the majority.
Democrats hope to pick up anywhere between one and four seats in Florida with the seat of retiring
Republic Ileana Ros-Lehtinen their top priority. Other Republican targets include Carlos Curbelo, Mario
Diaz-Balart and Brian Mast. A three-seat switch would give Democrats majority control of the Florida
delegation.
A big plus for Democrats is that the party controlling the White House has lost an average of 30 House
seats and four Senate seats in the past 21 midterm elections. If the Democrats can achieve the average
midterm gains, they will take control of both houses.
President Barack Obama and the Democrats lost 63 House seats in 2010, with most of the losses
attributed to the passage of Obamacare. Obama and the Dems lost 13 more seats in the 2014 midterm.
The loss of 76 seats in the two Obama midterms gave Republicans their current 241 to 194 advantage.
President George W. Bush gained 8 seats in the 2002 midterm, becoming only the second president in
the past 21 midterms to gain seats. The gain was attributed to public support for the president in the
aftermath of 911. In the 2006 midterm, Bush and the Republicans lost 30 seats.
President Bill Clinton lost 54 seats in 1994 due to a reaction to his failed attempt to pass health care.
Four years later, Clinton became the only other president in the past 21 midterms to gain seats.
Democrats picked up five seats in 1998, a reaction to the Republican overreach in their attempt to
impeach the president.
The largest midterm loss in the past 21 midterms occurred in the 1922 midterm of President Warren
Harding. The Republicans lost 77 seats.
Midterms clearly are bad news for the party controlling the White House, which means Republicans
will confront a major obstacle in 2018. In addition, Trumps low approval rate, 34 percent, is
historically low for an incoming president.
Not only is President Donald Trump unpopular, but so is his major legislative priority, the American
Health Care Act. The public has strongly opposed the Republican plan with 55 percent strongly opposing
the plan in a recent Kaiser Family Foundation poll.
It is worth remembering that two of the largest midterm losses were related to health care. Clinton and
the Democrats lost 54 seats when his health care plan failed, and Obama and the Democrats lost 63
seats when health care was approved. Will a similar fate confront Trump and the Republicans in 2018?
Republicans point to the fact that they are five-for-five in winning special congressional elections since
Trump became president. But, special elections have been poor indicators of electoral success in
midterm elections.
Democrats should not be over-optimistic even though almost all political factors favor them. Likewise,
Republicans should not be optimistic because of their success in special elections.
If Democrats fail to win political control in the 2018 midterm elections, look for Democrats to thoroughly
out their leaders, especially in the House, and replace them with younger, more articulate leaders for
the party. The current House leaders have an average age in the mid-70s.
It is past time for new faces and new leadership.
Voters are showing signs of voting for Democrats again --- unpopular education
policies are factoring into their evaluations
Moffitt 6/20 Susan Moffitt, Director of the A. Alfred Taubman Center for American Politics and
Policy and Associate Professor of Political Science and International and Public Affairs, 2017 ("Poll:
Trumps support declining in swing districts, gaining in Republican strongholds," Brown University News,
Available online at https://news.brown.edu/articles/2017/06/taubmanjune, Accessed 7/17/2017)
A new survey by Browns Taubman Center for American Politics and Policy also finds low confidence in
Congress, widespread support for healthcare for all.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] A new poll conducted by the Taubman Center for American
Politics and Policy at Brown Universitys Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs reveals
evidence of voters in swing districts moving away from President Donald Trump and Congressional
Republicans, while support for the president and GOP in Republican strongholds remains steady.
A deeper analysis into five distinct locales across the country suggests areas that swung from Obama to
Trump appear to be moving back into the blue column, while traditionally Republican strongholds are
solidifying behind the President, said Susan Moffitt, incoming director of the Taubman Center.
The poll, conducted June 10-15, was fielded by RABA Research, a bipartisan polling firm, in collaboration
with Brown University, and is a follow-up to an April survey.
Like the spring poll, the new survey focused on five distinct geographies with different recent voting
patterns including two areas that voted for Obama in 2012 but for Trump in 2016. The five areas
include working class suburbs in Rhode Island, wealthy suburbs in Colorado, rural areas in Iowa, diverse
rural areas in North and South Carolina and upper middle class exurbs in Pennsylvania.
Results underscore that President Trump is losing support in locales like the working-class suburb of
Kent County, Rhode Island, that switched from the Democratic to the Republican column in the
November 2016 election. In Kent County, those responding that President Trump is doing an excellent
job fell from 30 percent to 23 percent.
But the president is gaining support in places that traditionally vote Republican, like rural Midwestern
Iowa, where those responding that President Trump is doing an excellent job rose from 25 percent to
29 percent.
Even more striking are the numbers showing dissatisfaction with Congress, Moffitt said.
Fewer than one in five respondents across all five locales polled said they have confidence in Congress
to act in the best interest of the country. Everywhere but in the rural Midwestern sample in Iowa,
support for a GOP Congressional candidate on a generic ballot has fallen.
In the places that switched from Obama to Trump, net support for a generic Republican relative to a
Democrat slipped six percentage points in Kent County, Rhode Island, and 11 percentage points in the
North Carolina and South Carolina sample. The generic Democrat relative to the generic Republican also
gained five percentage points in the middle-class exurb outside Philadelphia which polled for Romney
and then 2016 Democratic president candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The June poll also questioned voters on healthcare, climate change, education funding, Trumps
immigration executive order, or travel ban, and attitudes about alleged Trump ties to Russia.
Among these, one area of broad agreement is healthcare.
The poll shows a strong majority of Americans everywhere believe that the nation has a moral
responsibility to provide healthcare to all Americans. But there is less consensus about how that health
care should be provided.
Americans seem to share the view that the nation has a responsibility to provide healthcare, a striking
change when you consider the heated debates around healthcare during Obamas first term. But
partisan divides continue to play a strong role in influencing voter opinion, Moffitt added.
Voters are increasingly opposed to proposals to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA), but they are
powerfully influenced by whether the existing health care law is referred to as the ACA or by its
nickname, Obamacare.
While a plurality of Iowan voters responding to the Taubman Centers April poll supported getting rid of
the ACA, a plurality in June now opposes the same proposal.
But when the phrase Affordable Care Act is switched out for Obamacare, support for repeal grows
often dramatically. While only 36 percent of these Iowa voters support getting rid of the Affordable
Care Act, 54 percent support getting rid of Obamacare.
On the question of whether the president has ties to Russia that threaten Americas interests,
respondents from areas that switched from red to blue, like Chester County, Pennsylvania or blue to
red, like diverse rural areas in North and South Carolina, between 2012 and 2016 answered that the
narrative had gained credibility in the last two months, while respondents in reliably Democratic or
reliably Republican areas were either convinced or unconvinced, respectively.
The poll also found broad consensus on questions relevant to education and climate change.
School voucherswhich the survey described as proposals to give parents taxpayer money to help pay
for their childrens private and perhaps religious school are unpopular everywhereeven places that
voted for President Trump.
And a plurality of voters in every type of community responded that they believe that humans are
causing climate change.
Despite the partisan divides that shape political discourse, certain issues pierce red and blue bubbles
and reveal common ground among Americans, Moffitt said.
Uniqueness Dems Momentum
Dems have momentum now theyre peeling off GOP voters, but only if
their message is clear
Yglesias 6/21 Matthew Yglesias, Fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, 2017 ("The
overall message of 2017 special elections is that Republicans are in trouble," Vox, Available online at
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/6/21/15846464/republicans-are-in-trouble)
Rank-and-file Democrats are, reasonably, disappointed with a loss in what seemed to be a winnable
special election in Georgia. Even my colleague Andrew Prokop warns that Democrats shouldnt
sugarcoat the result, which is bad news for the party.
But step back from the specifics of the race and look at all four special elections in red districts held
since Donald Trumps election, and a more optimistic story emerges. Democrats have successfully
transferred Hillary Clintons gains in well-educated districts to their down-ballot candidates, even while
succeeding in making up some of the ground she lost in white working-class ones.
The Democratic Partys leaders seem to have believed they could improve on her margins in a place like
the Georgia Sixth District while being unreasonably pessimistic about the partys chances in situations
like the South Carolina and Kansas races. That speaks somewhat poorly of their judgment and strategic
acumen, but the underlying reality revealed by the four elections taken as a whole is actually more
bullish for Democrats than the one the partys leaders thought they were in. If the basic pattern holds
up with Democrats pocketing Clintons gains and the GOP not consolidating Trumps they are
well positioned for the future.
The switcheroo
The 2016 presidential election featured a substantial reworking of the underlying demographic map of
American politics. Clinton did about 10 percentage points better with white college graduates than
Barack Obama had done four years before, offset by doing about 14 percentage points worse among
whites without college degrees. Since college graduates vote at a higher rate than non-graduates, this is
a decent swap in popular vote terms but was deadly to Democratic fortunes in the Electoral College.
An important question going forward was how much that vote swapping would stick. And the answer of
the special elections thus far seems to be fairly optimistic for Democrats. We see in the Georgia race
that Democrats have successfully transferred Clintons gains with white college graduates into down-
ballot races. But we see in the other three races that Democrats have partially made up ground in white
working-class areas where Clinton underperformed. That wasnt good enough to win any of the four
seats that have been on the ballot, but those were all seats the GOP won comfortably in 2016.
Democrats are overperforming everywhere
David Wasserman of the Cook Political Report has a table comparing the results of each election to the
districts Partisan Voting Index, essentially a synthetic measure of where each district would be expected
to land in the case of a national 50-50 race.
As you can see, Democrats are doing better than expected across the board. Thats what you would
expect with Donald Trump being unpopular, and Democrats did especially well in Kansas, where the
Republican governor is also unpopular.
Cook Political Report
In the wake of the Georgia outcome, there is a lot of grousing about moral victories and Democrats
have to win somewhere, but this is fundamentally misguided.
These are all races for open seats that Trump deliberately created by appointing incumbent House
Republicans to his Cabinet. He didnt create any vacancies in swing states. Its true, obviously, that to
win a House majority, Democrats need to win somewhere. And the way to do it would be to generate a
national swing of 4 or 5 points that nets them lots of seats that have a 2- or 3- or 4-point pro-GOP lean
(due to gerrymandering, Democrats need to win Republican-leaning states) rather than an 8- or 15-point
one.
How Democrats misread the trends
What is true is that these results show the partys leadership having misread the larger electoral trends
somewhat. The Georgia race was for a seat that Republicans have traditionally won overwhelmingly but
that Trump only carried narrowly. The Montana race was in a district where down-ballot Democrats
have often succeeded but Trump was dominant. The South Carolina race was for a seat that Democrats
actually held until the 2010 midterms but where Trump did very well.
The calculation behind the all in on Ossoff theory was that these trends would continue and Atlantas
northern suburbs would go from R-leaning to D-leaning, while Montana and the South Carolina seat
would continue to slip out of grasp.
The results show that neither of these things seems to be true. Ossoff did about as well as Hillary
Clinton, which means he did better than any House Democrat in forever, but he didnt improve on her
performance. But Democrats in places where Trump was very strong have managed to improve on her
results. This actually paints a fairly positive portrait of Democrats overall fortunes. The party seems to
be consolidating Clintons gains with white college graduates to a much greater extent than the GOP is
consolidating Trumps gains with non-college whites.
Mentally setting the baseline as the results of the Trump-Clinton election seems to have led Democrats
to overrate their odds in Georgia and underrate their odds everywhere else. Based on the Cook PVI,
which takes a longer view of the situation, their odds were really no better in Georgia than in South
Carolina but their overall performance is very strong.
The Panera Democrats plan had fatal flaws anyway
Democrats would feel better today if their baselining theory had been correct. Winning Georgia
narrowly even while losing South Carolina in a landslide would have been perceived as a huge blow
to the GOP and a rebuke of the Trump agenda.
But an electoral strategy based on accentuating the demographic trends unleashed by the 2016 election
former Hillary Clinton spokesperson Brian Fallons Panera Democrats was fatally flawed in a
number of ways.
For starters, these demographic trends are exactly how Clinton wound up losing the Electoral College
despite a healthy popular vote lead in the first place. And the state-based math is even more punitive in
the Senate. California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Illinois all have below-average white populations,
which means that the vast majority of states have above-average ones. Even in the best-educated
states, most white voters dont have college degrees.
Simply put, there is no possible route toward a Democratic Senate majority that doesnt involve a
stronger-than-Clinton performance with white voters who dont have college degrees. Democrats dont
need a majority of those voters, but they do need to do better than Clinton did, because no number of
Latinos in San Antonio or college graduates in the Dallas suburbs can make up for the Senate seats in the
Midwest and the Plains.
Consequently, the actual outcome of these special elections showing that Democrats are not doomed
to Clinton-level performances in white working-class areas is good news for the party. And while
Republicans are rightly happy to have held on in Georgia, they should consider it sobering that they
didnt manage to win back the white college graduates that Trump lost there.
Republicans are on thin ice but have fundamental strengths
All of which is to say that the fundamental political conditions in the United States continue to be
unfavorable for Republicans. Donald Trumps approval rating is bad, and the generic congressional ballot
favors Democrats. Incumbent parties almost always lose seats in midterm elections, and there is
absolutely nothing about the current state of public opinion to in any way suggest that 2018 will be an
exception.
But Republicans also have considerable strengths. The shape of House Districts means that even if a few
more people vote for Democratic House candidates, the GOP can easily maintain its majority. To win,
the Democrats need a lot more votes than the Republicans. To do that, Democrats need to appeal to
some right-of-center voters without watering down their message so much that they annoy and
demobilize their base. Its objectively difficult to pull off, especially in the face of whats likely to be an
entrenched Republican advantage in outside spending and a more ideologically coherent message.
All that said, the basic message of these special elections is entirely consistent with a polling outlook
that looks bad for the GOP. Trump pulled many new voters into the GOP coalition, but many of them
are willing to drift back to the Democrats at least with Trump not on the ballot. But he also repulsed
many traditional Republican voters, and they dont seem to be coming back home.
Uniqueness GOP Agenda Unpopular Now
Democrats have leverage now current GOP agenda items are hugely unpopular
Kane 7/8 Paul Kane, The Washington Post's senior congressional correspondent and columnist, July
8th ("Republicans thought they could force 2018 Democrats to cut deals, but Trump keeps sliding in
polls," The Washington Post, Available online at
https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/republicans-thought-they-could-force-2018-democrats-
to-cut-deals-but-trump-keeps-sliding-in-polls/2017/07/08/283ea444-6350-11e7-a4f7-
af34fc1d9d39_story.html?utm_term=.bfc2e930b09a, Accessed 7/10/2017)
Senate Republicans began this year thinking that they had leverage over some Democrats, particularly
the 10 up for reelection next year in states that President Trump won in the fall.
Those Democrats, some GOP strategists believed, would want to work with the president to appeal to
enough Trump voters to win their states in November 2018.
That didnt happen. Instead, Trumps standing has slipped in many of these states. The president has
faced legislative gridlock and a deepening investigation of his campaigns connections to Russia. His
focus, in public appearances and on social media, has regularly drifted away from the policy agenda on
Capitol Hill.
Thats left Senate Democrats feeling stronger than they expected to be eight months after their highly
disappointing showing in 2016, which left them in the minority and heading into 2018 defending 25
seats compared with Republicans eight.
If Trump had spent his first six months increasing or even maintaining his popularity in these states, he
might have struck enough political fear in these 2018 Democrats to compel them to support some of his
initiatives.
During a luncheon in his home state of Kentucky on July 6, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-
Ky.) said the private health insurance market is imploding and that delaying the health care
replacement doesn't work. (Reuters)
Thats looking more and more like the sort of negotiation that will happen only if Democrats can
command a good deal in return.
McConnell says GOP must shore up ACA insurance markets if Senate bill dies
The dynamic is sure to test Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in the months ahead,
particularly if Republicans fail to muster the votes solely from their side of the aisle to repeal chunks of
the Affordable Care Act. McConnell has warned that such an outcome will force him to work with
Democrats to shore up imploding insurance markets.
No action is not an alternative, McConnell said Thursday while in Kentucky.
Beyond the health-care fight, McConnell has also made clear that there are many other agenda items
that will require the traditional 60-vote threshold to choke off filibusters, meaning he needs at least
eight Democrats to move legislation such as annual government funding bills and an increase in the
governments borrowing authority.
But the bargaining table is different now.
Take Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), whose state delivered a critical victory for Trump, the first by a GOP
presidential nominee since 1984.
A staunch liberal, Baldwin began the year expecting her 2018 reelection bid to be a 50-50 prospect. Her
state had voted Republican three straight times for governor and in two of the past three Senate races.
Trump has used the presidential bully pulpit to focus on the Badger State, making three trips there since
November. But his visits have done little to boost his standing.
Just 41 percent of Wisconsin voters approved of Trumps job performance in late June, while 51 percent
disapproved, according to a poll by Marquette Law School.
On basic popularity, Trump is easily the most disliked politician among Wisconsin voters, with 54
percent holding an unfavorable view of him and 40 percent a favorable one.
Baldwins image is not great, but it is far better in Wisconsins eyes than Trump: 38 percent have a
favorable view and 38 percent unfavorable.
Its the same in Michigan and Pennsylvania, both states Trump narrowly won. In Michigan, just 35
percent of voters approved of his job performance in a late May poll conducted by EPIC-MRA, with 61
percent disapproving. In Pennsylvania, 37 percent supported his job performance while 49 percent did
not, according to a May poll by Franklin & Marshall College.
The good news for Trump is that his image in Pennsylvania improved a little from earlier in the year. The
bad news is that his image in Michigan got a bit worse. The really bad news is that Trumps image is
battered enough that neither Sens. Robert P. Casey Jr. (D-Pa.) nor Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) are
feeling much pressure to work with Trump in the run-up to their 2018 reelection bids, unless its on their
terms on a critical issue for their state.
For senators who hail from states where he is completely underwater, there is no political reason to
work with him unless its on an issue where they have something to gain, said Matthew Miller, a
former aide to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
Infrastructure was Trumps shot at a bipartisan deal, but he left Democrats waiting by the phone
Its not just Trump who is unpopular; so is his partys health-care proposal.
Late last month, two liberal super PACs, Priorities USA Action and Senate Majority PAC, released a poll
of the 10 states Trump won where Democrats face reelection next year. It showed that 60 percent of
voters in those key battlegrounds want the Senate to start over on a health-care plan, while only 25
percent support its passage.
The super PACs did not release Trump-specific data, but several sources familiar with the poll said that
the Democratic groups also privately tested the presidents standing with voters in those 10 states. Only
in the most conservative of those states, such as West Virginia and North Dakota, did Trump have a net
positive approval rating, but even there his approval was only a handful of points higher than his
disapproval.
Trump won West Virginia and North Dakota by 42 and 36 points, respectively. Under normal political
circumstances, Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) should be trying at every
turn to work with Trump much as Southern Democrats supported Ronald Reagans early agenda
when the Republican icon swept that region in 1980.
After initial meetings with Trump during the transition, during which their names were floated as
potential Cabinet members, Manchin and Heitkamp have kept a respectful distance from the president
on most issues. Unless Trump can regain his strong popularity in these conservative states, the two are
unlikely to feel the pressure to support the president, particularly when hes pushing very
conservative agenda items.
You have to demonstrate that you respect the office and are willing to work with him, but hold firm to
your principles on core issues, Miller said, describing Manchin and Heitkamps approach.
During the spring negotiations over 2017 government funding, Democrats held firm against most of
Trumps priorities, including money for a Mexican border wall. Republicans got very few conservative
wins.
If Trump isnt careful, this dynamic might start repeating itself for the foreseeable future.
Democrats have leverage over GOP policy now lack of public credibility
Harwood 17 John Harwood, American journalist who is the chief Washington Correspondent for
CNBC, May 25th ("Democrats feel their influence rising as Trump and GOP-led Congress struggle," CNBC,
Available online at http://www.cnbc.com/2017/05/25/democrats-feel-their-influence-rising-as-trump-
and-gop-led-congress-struggle.html, Accessed 7/10/2017)
Beyond the blur of daily events, an unexpected shift is slowly coming into focus: the struggles of all-
Republican governance have handed Democrats growing leverage over how policy gets shaped.
Eroding Republican strength has long since dashed initial hopes for enacting a new health-care plan to
replace Obamacare by Easter and a new tax system by August. But four months into Donald Trump's
presidency, his party faces growing skepticism that it can resolve major issues, which in turn would force
concessions to Democrats in return for votes.
Consider the breadth of GOP problems:
President Trump and his associates face FBI and congressional investigations into their interactions with
Russia. Trump is hiring outside counsel, and aides are preparing a White House "war room" to cope with
the storm. Major Republican reforms on issues such as taxes or health care require strong, focused
leadership from a Republican president.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the House-passed health bill would leave 23 million
fewer people with coverage, and destabilize insurance markets in areas serving 1 in 6 Americans. Just 20
percent of the public supports it, a new Quinnipiac University national poll shows. Senate Republicans
are meeting privately to craft a more politically viable approach, but haven't produced one yet.
The White House has opposed a critical piece of the House GOP tax plan, but neither the White House
nor the Senate has produced a plan of its own yet. On Thursday, Trump Cabinet officials Steve Mnuchin
and Mick Mulvaney gave contradictory accounts of the administration's intentions. Moreover,
congressional rules prohibit Republican majorities from enacting tax reform under the expedited
procedures until they complete action on health reform using those same procedures and pass a new
budget.
Trump's budget proposal, which contains priority shifts that would require Democratic backing in any
event, has been declared dead on arrival by fellow Republicans. Internal splits over the extent and
targeting of spending cuts threaten their ability to reach consensus not only on the budget, but also on
an increase in the federal debt ceiling that the Treasury says it needs within a few months in order to
avoid default. The House Freedom Caucus announced Wednesday it will not support an increase until its
austerity demands are met, bolstering the likelihood that the White House and GOP leaders will be
forced to obtain Democratic support.
These and other setbacks have diminished Trump's already-low political standing and rattled Republican
confidence about holding their House majority in 2018 midterm elections. His approval rating in the
Quinnipiac poll was 37 percent; only 28 percent strongly approve of the president, while 49 percent
strongly disapprove, foreshadowing a 2018 gap in Republican and Democratic voter enthusiasm. For the
same reason, the Democratic candidate in Georgia's special House election next month has a chance to
win what the Republican candidate's pollster calls "a close race that shouldn't be."
Those stumbles give House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and her Senate counterpart Charles
Schumer greater ability to influence policy in Washington that anyone expected as Trump took office.
The principal question is where they can bring that influence to bear.
Steve Bell, a longtime Senate budget aide now at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said the GOP's
simultaneous predicament on the debt limit and health care could produce a Senate compromise with
Democrats on both. On health care, that would mean legislation closer to Obamacare-repair than
Obamacare-replace.
Spokesmen for GOP House and Senate leaders dismissed that possibility as fanciful. But not all
Republican lawmakers do.
"A bipartisan health bill is a possible outcome, though no one in leadership wants to admit it," said Rep.
Charlie Dent, a Pennsylvania Republican.
GOP splits give Democrats an opening to influence other initiatives, too. Veteran Republican
communications aide Kevin Madden, who now advises businesses at Hamilton Place Strategies, said that
could mean tax reform that gives more to the middle class and less to the wealthy, and an infrastructure
plan relying more on cash outlays and less on tax credits.
"The business community has always recognized that the major issues are going to require some level
of Democratic buy-in," Madden said. That expectation, he added, "has become more pronounced."
One indication of heightened pressure on Republicans came with Wednesday night's bizarre incident in
the special House election in Montana, where the Democratic candidate has been surprisingly
competitive in a GOP-friendly state. Law enforcement authorities charged Republican candidate Greg
Gianforte with assaulting a reporter after the reporter pressed him to comment on the House GOP
health bill.
Uniqueness Trump Support Low
The plan flips the script --- Democrats are capitalizing on Trump now terrible budgets
for the working class especially in the context of education
Rubin 17 staff at The Washington Post, March 16th (Jennifer, How Democrats can capitalize on
Trumps betrayal of his base, The Washington Post, https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-
turn/wp/2017/03/16/how-democrats-can-capitalize-on-trumps-betrayal-of-his-
base/?utm_term=.d992c9b1c257)
President Trump ran as a different kind of Republican, putting together a collection of evangelical
Christian, rural and working-class voters who felt betrayed by government. He was the outsider,
agitating for an agenda that did not promote corporate profits at the expense of workers and vowing,
for example, to leave entitlements alone. His vision was nativist, nationalist, protectionist and
paternalistic. Big government for the little guy, in other words.
His two biggest initiatives so far health-care reform and his budget tell a vastly different story.
This is old-style right-wing politics on steroids. Transfer wealth to the rich via Medicaid cuts for the poor
and tax breaks to the rich. Deploy health spending accounts, where 70 percent of money comes from
those making more than $100,000.
The budget is even less generous to Trumps base. The Post noted that the listed of abolished programs
included the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which disburses more than $3 billion
annually to help heat homes in the winter. It also proposed abolishing the Community Development
Block Grant program, which provides roughly $3 billion for targeted projects related to affordable
housing, community development and homelessness programs, among other things.
President Donald Trump has proposed halting funding for rural clean water initiatives and reducing
county-level staff, for a 21 percent drop in discretionary spending at the Department of Agriculture
(USDA), according to a White House budget document.
The $4.7 billion in cuts would leave USDA with a budget of $17.9 billion after cutting some statistical and
rural business services and encouraging private sector conservation planning. Farm groups warned that
farmers and rural communities could suffer. The budget proposal would save $498 million by eliminating
a rural water and wastewater loan and grant program that helps fund clean water and sewer systems in
communities with fewer than 10,000 people. Other areas targeted for cuts include staffing at county-
level USDA service centers.
If you are an industrial worker, you might be concerned about a 21 percent cut in the Labor Department,
which will impact worker safety and training programs.
As one might expect, the AFL-CIO issued a blistering statement from its president, Richard Trumka:
Working people in states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin didnt vote for a budget that
slashes workforce training and fails to invest in our nations infrastructure. President Trumps
proposed budget attempts to balance the budget on the backs of working families. The $54 billion cut to
programs that benefit working families is dangerous and destructive. Huge cuts to the departments of
Labor, Education and Transportation will make workplaces less safe, put more children at risk and make
improving our failing infrastructure much more difficult. The administration can and should do better.
The budget abandons the futureslashing investments in workers, communities, young people,
protecting our environment and building democracy. There are major cuts in job training, education,
health programs, the environment, the arts and foreign aid. Research programs in science and medicine
are slashed. Sixty-two government programs/agencies are slated for elimination.
The budget, like the health-care plan, strikes at the heart of Trumps campaign promises, which did not
envision a libertarian evisceration of government. Trump leaves the details to others, but the details
undermine his appeal to working-class voters, his core support. Either he never meant to be a different
kind of Republican or his team has used his rhetorical routine to mask a budget that is less populist than
any other in the modern era. Democrats would be wise to start analyzing the budgets real-world impact
quantifying cuts to each state and to programs that serve people making, say, less than $75,000.
What expenses are shifting onto the backs of working-class and middle-class people? What protections
are eliminated? This is not going to match up with the beneficent image Trump tried to cultivate.
Trump hired a right-wing Cabinet, so its no surprise a right-wing budget and health-care plan emerged.
Democrats would do well to focus on the clash between Trump, protector-of-the-little-guy, and Trump,
friend-of-the-rich-and-powerful. The former was simply a sales pitch for the campaign; the reality should
be a rude awakening for all those new GOP voters who might be amenable to a true populist
economic message from the other party.
Democrats can win the midterms, but they need anti-Trump leverage giving him
legitimacy usurps that
Kilgore 17 Ed Kilgore, Managing Editor of The Democratic Strategist, an online forum, and a Senior
Fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute, April 2nd ("Heres What Democrats Need to Do to Take
Congress in 2018," Daily Intelligencer, Available online at
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/04/what-democrats-need-to-do-to-take-congress-in-
2018.html, Accessed 7/9/2017)
Democrats emerged from the 2016 election confused, depressed, and virtually powerless. But it hasnt
taken long for them to regain their psychological mojo, aided as they have been by a combination of
fear, anger, and Donald Trumps inept first few months in office. The resistance started at the
grassroots, taking visible form in protests at events held by Republican members of Congress in their
home districts. After the GOPs initial plan to repeal Obamacare was scrapped in March, the excitement
spread to Washington, D.C. When Florida senator Bill Nelson, a mild-mannered centrist, announced he
would filibuster the Supreme Court nomination of Neil Gorsuch, it was clear that Democrats had found a
new spirit of unity and defiance.
The expected postelection struggle for the soul of the Democratic Party has now been replaced by
optimism that the party might actually make a comeback in the next election. Theres a storm thats
going to hit Republicans in 2018, Representative Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat, told the New York
Times. The only question is if it is going to be Category 2 or Category 5.
Thanks to a highly adverse Senate landscape in 2018 Democrats must defend 25 seats, ten in states
carried by Trump the House offers the best opportunity to disrupt the GOPs congressional
stranglehold. Democrats will need 24 seats to win a majority there 23 if Jon Ossoff wins his special
election in Georgia later this month. In February, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee
announced it was putting full-time organizers on the ground in 20 GOP districts as part of a midterm
strategy it calls March Into 18. The plan will attempt to channel the resistance into election
campaigns especially in the 23 House districts represented by Republicans that Trump lost to Clinton
in 2016.
Will Anti-Trump Fury Help Flip the Electoral Map for Democrats?
House Republicans will not give up their majority easily. The GOP continues to benefit from district maps
aggressively gerrymandered after it picked up six governorships and 20 state legislative chambers in
2010. In 2012, the first cycle after the redistricting, the GOP won 234 House seats despite actually losing
the national popular vote. In states like Florida, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, GOP House
delegations continue to be far larger than the partys statewide popular vote would suggest. Aside from
defending its own seats (the National Republican Congressional Committees Patriot Program is
dumping money into the races of ten Republican incumbents it perceives as vulnerable), the GOP will go
on the offensive against ten House Democrats who represent districts carried by Trump. Another
presumed advantage for Republicans is in turnout patterns: Young and minority voters rarely participate
proportionately in non-presidential elections; the whiter voters who have been trending bright red do.
But precisely because the Trump presidency is not normal, Democrats have reason to believe
Republicans wont benefit from their normal advantages. Trumps brand of conservatism, if thats what
it is, has turned off many college-educated white voters, who tend to turn out in midterms. That may
pose a particular problem for suburban moderate Republicans, like Peter Roskam, who represents
suburbs west of Chicago, and Erik Paulsen, whose district on the outskirts of Minneapolis went for
Clinton over Trump by nine points.
Democratic base enthusiasm is becoming a tangible asset. Grassroots volunteer activity is up sharply, as
reflected in the 2,000 canvassers working for Ossoff in Georgias Sixth District special election.
Democratic fund-raising expectations were initially low after the 2016 results, when some large donors
openly questioned their return on investment and demanded an autopsy of what went wrong. But
there has been an astonishing upsurge in small contributions to Democratic and progressive causes,
much of it online. Initial candidate recruitment for tough races is also looking good, especially among
women newly mobilized for public service by the global marches of January.
The Democrats also have one trend on their side: Midterm elections are mostly referenda on the
occupant of the White House. Barring exceptional luck or exceptionally good conditions, almost all
presidents lose popularity by the midterms. Of the last 20 midterms, the presidents party lost House
seats in 18 (the exceptions were in 1998 and 2002, when presidents Clinton and George W. Bush,
respectively, had unusually high job-approval ratings).
Trumps approval ratings are famously low for a new president, and if they continue to lag, Republicans
are going to lose House seats in 2018. In 2006, the same George W. Bush whose party did so well in
2002 lost 30 House seats and control of the chamber after he limped into the midterms with a job-
approval rating of 37 percent, roughly where Trump is today.
The steady trend toward straight-ticket voting means it will be difficult for House Republicans to
separate themselves from an unpopular president. But its too early to tell just how much the taint of
Trump will spread or if it will be enough for Democrats to win a majority. The possibility that
enthusiasm, unity, a more favorable mix of voters, and Trumps misdeeds could produce a turnout
revolution for Democrats will get early tests this year in Georgias special congressional election and the
off-year state elections in New Jersey and Virginia.
The March Cook Political Report race ratings list only 23 highly competitive seats, and 12 of them are
held by Republicans. Cook shows 25 districts as likely Republican. Democrats will need to flip a
number of the long shots to get to their magic number. But there is certainly a recent precedent for
that. At this point in 2009, Cook showed only 23 House seats held by Democrats as being vulnerable.
By Election Day in 2010, that number had swollen to 101, and the GOP made a net gain of 63, with 52
Democratic incumbents losing. Tsunami elections like those Democrats are hoping for in 2018 often
build slowly. But across the country anti-Trump activists believe they can see big waves gathering. We
may hear their distant thunder very soon. Ed Kilgore
Democrats in red-leaning states are willing to cooperate with Trump social services
are the determining factor
Brownstein 7/6 Ronald Brownstein, national political correspondent and columnist for the "Los
Angeles Times," He has been named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of both the 1996 and
2004 presidential elections, 2017 ("Will the 'Trump 10' Pay a Price in 2018?," Atlantic,
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/will-the-trump-10-pay-a-price-in-2018/532710/)
Apparently, no one has informed Bob Casey and Claire McCaskill that they should be running scared.
Casey and McCaskill are among the 10 Democratic senators facing reelection next year in states that
President Trump carried in 2016, often by commanding margins. After that performance, many in both
parties assumed they would be the Senate Democrats most vulnerable to White House pressure. During
the transition, almost all of the Trump 10 declared their willingness to cooperate with the new
president. There are probably a number of areas where we can work with him, Casey told MSNBC
shortly after Trump narrowly carried his home state of Pennsylvania.
It is an understatement to say the relationship between the president and the Trump 10 hasnt worked
out that way. In recent interviews, both McCaskill and Casey made clear the White House has done
almost nothing to solicit their input or enlist their support. I will be optimistic and hope that moment
comes, but not yet, Missouris McCaskill told me.
Instead of being tugged toward Trump, both Casey and McCaskill have been propelled toward resolute
resistance of his agenda. In that, they are the rule, not the exception, for the Trump 10. The group also
includes Ohios Sherrod Brown, Floridas Bill Nelson, Wisconsins Tammy Baldwin, and Michigans
Debbie Stabenow in swing states that tilted toward Trump; and Montanas Jon Tester, North Dakotas
Heidi Heitkamp, Indianas Joe Donnelly, and West Virginias Joe Manchin in more conservative states
where the president romped.
Their opposition took root early in Trumps tenure. None of the 10 backed confirmation for Betsy
DeVos as education secretary. Just Manchin, Heitkamp, and Donnelly voted to confirm Supreme Court
Justice Neil Gorsuch. And, more recently, all 10 have signaled opposition to the evolving Senate
Republican legislation to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
This pattern of resistance has forced Senate Republicans to try to squeeze more of their agenda into the
reconciliation process, which requires fewer votes to pass legislation. Its also framing what could be the
pivotal question in next years Senate midterm elections: Will these Democrats pay a price for
consistently opposing Trump in states that voted for him only last year?
They had better hope the king is dead, said Pennsylvania-based GOP consultant John Brabender, and
that a year from now Donald Trump isnt being seen, on the core issues he promised to these [voters],
that he has delivered.
So far, though, both Casey and McCaskillalong with their colleagueshave been emboldened to
oppose Trump precisely because they believe his agenda hasnt met those voters needs. McCaskill
said she respects Trump voters and their choice to pull the pin on this grenade [to] see if we can
upset the status quo. But she argued that Trumps agenda would deliver a gut punch to [the] rural
Missouri communities where he ran bestthanks to a health-care plan that would raise premiums for
older and small-town consumers; proposals to shift federal funding from public to private schools
through vouchers; and an infrastructure plan centered on promoting private investment and adding toll
roads, both of which are more likely to benefit urban areas.
Casey pointed to similar risks in the congressional GOP proposals to severely cut Medicaid, which he said
could destabilize both the physical and economic health of rural Pennsylvania. (In over half of
Pennsylvanias rural counties, he pointedly noted, the local hospital is either the largest or second-
largest employer.) Add in the toll-focused infrastructure plan and proposed reductions in community-
development grants and home-heating assistance for low-income seniors, Casey said, and I dont think
thats what people in his base thought they were getting in their communities.
Just as striking as the substance of the Trump 10s criticism is its style. No one has ever used the word
firebrand to describe Casey, a soft-spoken former state auditor with a centrist pedigree. (Hes one of
the last prominent Democrats to oppose legal abortion.) Yet, since Trumps victory, Caseys defining
image came when he rushed, still in formal white tie, from a Philadelphia Orchestra ball to join an
airport protest against the presidents first travel ban in January.
Links / Internal Links
Link Public Education
Millennials dont support Trump now but fixing school education would help win their
support--studies prove its a major issue for them
McGrane 16 Victoria McGrane, a national political correspondent for the Boston Globes
Washington DC bureau. She joined the Globe in May 2016. She has covered policy and politics from the
nations capital since 2006, including six years as a reporter with The Wall Street Journal, covering
banking policy, the roll out of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial regulation law, the Federal Reserve, and
economics. 8/20/16, Is Donald Trump alienating young Republicans?,
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2016/08/20/gop-critics-say-donald-trump-alienating-new-
generation-republicans/E1sTMY1MWWXQ81u48DI9CL/story.html, SR)
The 33-year-old communications professional worked for the Treasury Department under George W.
Bush. He believes in free trade, less government involvement in the economy, and a strong foreign
policy.
But the rise of Donald Trump and the Republican Partys embrace of the real estate mogul have driven
DeSouza away from the GOP.
I would say at this point I am a man without a party, said DeSouza, who plans to vote for Democratic
presidential nominee Hillary Clinton this fall though hes not joining the Democratic Party. I hold certain
values that I deem to be conservative, but the party where it is now, I dont even know where it is. Its
some reactionary force to generational trends that are so against what I find to be important in terms of
values and policy positions.
Trump is losing millennials in droves, recent polls show, and some party leaders are deeply worried that
trend has dangerous implications for the partys future beyond the 2016 election.
Clinton has an almost three-to-one advantage over Trump among younger Americans in the latest
polling. The former reality TV star could lose the youth vote by the largest margin in modern political
history if the current trend persists.
For many millennials eligible to vote in their first presidential election, Trump is their introduction to the
Republican Party and to presidential politics.
In interviews with the Globe, some right-leaning millennials said they were turned off by what they saw
as his bullying style and divisive comments toward women, Muslims, and others. Some of his central
policy positions, they said, such as building a wall between Mexico and the United States to keep out
illegal immigrants, are disturbing or preposterous. They said they dont think he has the character or
temperament to be president.
I dont really take any of Donald Trumps policies seriously, said Miguel Undurraga, a member of the
Harvard Republican Club, What I take more seriously is the kind of person who makes those
comments.
The risk for the Republican Party is that Trump, and all that young voters dont like about him, becomes
inextricably linked with the image of the party in millennial minds.
The country that Donald Trump talks about is not in any way in line with the experiences of young
voters right now. They dont see the world the way he sees it at all, said Tim Miller, a top adviser to Jeb
Bushs primary campaign and outspoken Trump critic. That disconnect is so stark that it is turning them
viscerally away from him in particular and also the party, and thats a problem.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Trump greeted the crowd Saturday as he arrived to speak at a rally in Fredericksburg, Va.
The millennial generation, loosely defined as Americans born between 1980 and 2000, is a key prize for
both major parties. More than 69 million members of this generation are of voting age, making them a
potential voting bloc almost as large as that of the baby boom generation, according to the Pew
Research Center, although they have so far consistently turned out to vote in lower numbers than older
voters.
Their views and votes will only matter more in the years ahead: In April, their total numbers surpassed
those of the baby boomers to become the largest living generation.
And an awful lot of them seem to hate Donald Trump.
Clinton is thrashing Trump 56 percent to 20 percent among Americans under 35, according to a USA
Today/Rock the Vote poll released last week.
Clinton has her own millennial concerns. Her Democratic primary rival, Bernie Sanders, crushed her
among younger voters by a 78-to-21 average, according to exit poll data compiled by Tufts Universitys
Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.
Polls suggest that many of these young Sanders followers are inching their way toward embracing
Clinton but not necessarily with the same enthusiasm.
For Republicans looking beyond the top of the ticket, and beyond 2016, the numbers in the USA Today
poll are more troubling: Half of those surveyed said they identified with or leaned toward the
Democratic Party, while just 20 percent identified with or leaned toward the GOP.
Veteran GOP strategist Barry Bennett rejected the notion that Trump was somehow hurting the
Republican Party among younger voters. The truth is, they turn out in abysmally small numbers, he
said of millennials, in keeping with young voters of previous generations.
When they get older, they will vote in higher numbers, but by then their attitudes will have changed
drastically and they will be more conservative, he predicted.
Many millennials are angry at the government because they cant find jobs and feel as though their slice
of the American Dream is slipping away; that provides an opening to Trump to win over some of them
if he focuses his message, Bennett said. He can speak to that.
But others in the party are very worried.
His campaign paints the picture of all Republicans being misogynists and racists, and obviously that isnt
true, but when youre young and youre an undecided voter trying to align with a party, Donald Trump
as the face of the Republican Party isnt very beneficial, said Sapna Rampersaud, 19, a member of the
Harvard Republican Club, which publicly declared it was not supporting Trump earlier this month, the
first time in its over 125-year history the group hasnt backed the partys standard-bearer.
Rampersaud says she will probably vote for one of the third-party candidates but is still a Republican.
Fellow club member Undurraga, on the other hand, changed his California voter registration to no
preference the day after Trump effectively clinched the nomination so he could vote for Clinton in his
states primary, and he plans to vote again for her this fall. The 20-year-old considered taking a job doing
Latino outreach for the Clinton campaign in Ohio, but ultimately decided against it because hed have to
take off a semester of school. He said he will volunteer once hes back on campus in the fall.
She is more stable, she has the experience, and whats most important for me, in an era where
Washington is just so plagued by partisan gridlock, we need somebody with big tent policies and the
ability to compromise, said Undurraga.
Trump spoke to supporters Friday in Dimondale, Mich.
Forces within the GOP are trying to help the party respond to its millennial problem. In June, the
College Republican National Committee published a report, based on polling and focus groups with
Americans aged 18 to 29, that concluded young voters dont believe Republicans care
about many of the issues that matter most to them. Their top issues included
fixing troubled schools, promoting clean energy, reducing the national debt, and addressing
poverty.
The report was part dire warning, part game plan for how to win over the millennial generation. That
playbook included having Republican candidates show themselves as empathetic, pursuing policies that
demonstrate the GOP cares about people from all walks of life a value that emerged as paramount
among the millennials surveyed.
The authors also said their research indicated millennials are attracted to market-based solutions to
problems, a core Republican belief but one that the party needs to communicate better to younger
voters. Candidates should cast their policy approach as modern and innovative, after the fashion of
Uber, and cast the other side as an old, yellow taxi-cab company, the report said.
Though Trump was not mentioned by name, the implication about his candidacy was clear.
DeVoss education policy will sink GOP now --- plan rescues them from that narrative
Klein and Grim 17 Rebecca Klein, education reporter for HuffPost, Ryan Grim, the Washington
bureau chief of HuffPost, February 7th ("OK, Betsy DeVos Is Now Education Secretary, But The Fight Over
Her Agenda Has Just Begun," HuffPost, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/betsy-devos-education-
agenda_us_589a3611e4b040613139f992)
WASHINGTON Betsy DeVos was confirmed on Tuesday, by a razor-thin margin, after an extraordinary
outpouring of opposition. That means she will serve as the secretary of education.
When it comes to implementing her agenda for public education, however, the battles have only
started.
Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who backed DeVos and is a major proponent of the voucher movement, told
reporters after Tuesdays vote that there isnt much she can do on her own. Over 90 percent of funding
for schools comes from state and local resources, he noted, so the federal government controls only a
small slice of education spending.
DeVos has long championed voucher programs that allow kids to attend private schools using taxpayer
money, even though those schools are often religious. Her new boss, President Donald Trump, has made
the expansion of voucher programs his signature education plan, proposing to repurpose $20 billion in
existing federal funds to help subsidize students going to private schools.
Asked what DeVos confirmation means for that $20 billion proposal, Scott said not much. It means it
still has to get through Congress, he said. The secretary of education cannot unilaterally make any
decisions on her own. She needs to be empowered by Congress, and the fact of the matter is that were
going to need eight Democrats, according to the current means of the Senate, in order to get anything
done. Thats going to be very difficult.
DeVos needed only 50 votes to get confirmed, but any legislation will need 60 votes to overcome a
Democratic filibuster in the Senate. After calls opposing her nomination flooded into Senate offices,
lawmakers are well aware that pushing forward on the DeVos agenda will trigger a similar uprising,
one that members of Congress would rather avoid heading into midterm elections.
Link Legislative Win
The threshold for the link is low Trump needs any bipartisan victory
Cook and Dawsey 7/19 Nancy Cook and Josh Dawsey, White House reporters for POLITICO, 2017
("Tax reform becomes a must-win issue for the White House," POLITICO, Available online at
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/19/tax-reform-becomes-must-win-for-trump-240691,
Accessed 7/21/2017)
With President Donald Trumps effort to undo Obamacare derailed by opposition from Republican
senators, the White House has turned its attention to its next big shot at a big win: tax reform.
The long-held GOP goal of re-engineering the U.S. tax system has now become a political imperative for
the Trump administration, which has yet to deliver any major legislative victories despite Republican
control of the White House and both houses of Congress.
They know they could really use a win, said Larry Kudlow, an informal economic adviser to the Trump
campaign, who met with Trump last week. The president, from the get-go, has been much more
comfortable with tax cuts than health care.
Donors and influential Republicans are particularly eager to see tax reform completed before the 2018
midterms both for their own bottom lines and because it will be harder for Republicans to hold on to
Congress without policy accomplishments, White House advisers and outside supporters fear.
If Republicans fail to repeal or at least substantially roll back Obamacare, it raises the stakes
dramatically to pass into law a big, bold tax-reform plan, said Tim Phillips, who leads Americans for
Prosperity, the political group backed by the Koch brothers.
On the political side, the biggest problem that Republicans could face in 2018 is not a partisan battle.
It's a sense of incompetence and inability to govern that will be most painful, said Josh Holmes, a
longtime McConnell adviser and former chief of staff.
Unless they can figure out how to reverse this quickly, you can see where this cascades into more
issues past health care, Holmes added.
But consensus on the political value of achieving tax reform ahead of the 2018 midterm elections does
not equal agreement on the policy details and that could bedevil Trumps next big policy push, just as
the health care effort was undermined by insurmountable differences between moderates and
conservatives in the Republican Caucus.
Trumps lack of capital gives Dems leverage to make gains in the midterms --- he has
to find a way to create the perception that he is a deal maker
Graham 7/18 David A. Graham, Staff Writer at The Atlantic, 2017 ("It's (Still) Never Trump's Fault,"
Atlantic, Available online at https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/07/its-still-never-
trumps-fault/534066/, Accessed 7/21/2017)
Not that the president was ready to accept any blame. Just as he did after the Houses first attempt at
repeal failed in March, Trump blamed Democrats:
This makes no more sense than it did in March. Democrats are a minority in the Senate, and both the
repeal-and-replace and the clean-repeal plans failed because the Republican caucus couldnt unify. The
Democrats were never a factor in the debate. Thats not surprising: Why would any Democrat work to
repeal the partys signature policy achievement of the last decade in order to replace it with a plan that
would leave tens of millions of people uninsured and increase premiums for many? The broadside
against Dems came only about 10 hours after promising that they would work together to replace
Obamacareand an a hour and a half before Trump called for the Senate to invoke the nuclear option
and totally eliminate the filibuster.
Meanwhile, Trump wants credit for almost not failing. Essentially, the vote would have been pretty
close toif you look at it48-4. That's a pretty impressive vote by any standard, the president said at
the White House on Tuesday, referring to the basic standard of reaching a bare majority of votes
required for all legislation as impressive, a bravura act of bar-lowering. (Indeed, most bills these days
require 60 votes, and it was only thanks to the reconciliation process that this bill needed only 50.)
Trump has the answer: He needs voters to send him a supermajority in the Senate:
The bad news for Trump is that presidents typically lose seats in Congress during their first midterm
election. That rule holds even for presidents who are not as historically unpopular as Trump is (a
situation his failure to deliver repeal is unlikely to help); some forecasters believe 2018 could produce a
Democratic wave.
The president has one more idea. Let Obamacare fail, he said Tuesday. It will be a lot easier. And I
think were probably in that position where well just let Obamacare fail. Were not going to own it. Im
not going to own it. I can tell you, the Republicans are not going to own it.
Perhaps he is right, but it wouldnt be surprising if he were wrong. Given unified control of the House,
Senate, White House, and Supreme Court, as well as several failed attempts at repeal, the Republican
Party will have a hard time convincing voters it doesnt own the bill. (Dont ask me, though. Ask Donald
Trump, who in September 2013 tweeted, NO GAMES! HOUSE @GOP MUST DEFUND OBAMACARE! IF
THEY DONT, THEN THEY OWN IT!)
Although the collapse of the Senate bill echoes the March collapse of the Houses health-care bill
closely, Trump doesnt seem to have learned much from it. Perhaps the successful resuscitation of the
House bill convinced the White House that the hands-off strategy worked well. The demise of the
Senate bill shows, just as President Obama before him learned, that there are dangers in deference.
One notable difference this time was that no one expected Trump to contribute meaningfully to passing
the bill. As the climax of the House bill neared in March, members of the House leadership team took to
talking about Trump as the ultimate closer. There was no such talk from Senate leaders this time
around.
As I wrote when the bill collapsed, Trump seemed to be overestimating his ability to bounce back from
defeat. The president didnt bring policy experience, or governing know-how, to Washington. What he
brought was a reputation as an effective dealmaker. Once squandered, that reputation is difficult to
reclaim, and his irrelevance to the Senate repeal-and-replace effort demonstrates that. One can
understand, given Trumps shaky salesmanship so far, why congressional Republicans would be
reluctant to let Obamacare collapse and trust that Trump would successfully pin that on Democrats.
In the business world, Trump could quietly walk away from a deal, even if it meant taking a loss of
millions of dollars. In New York real-estate, a few big losses were survivable, even if it meant lighting
money on fire. Politics doesnt work that way.
It is possible that McConnell, whose reputation for wiliness is bruised but not broken by the health-care
collapse, will find some way to revive repeal, but Trumps failures of marketing, strategy, and tactics on
Obamacare repeal are the equivalent to lighting political capital on fire. If that was unwise in March,
its foolhardy now, when Trumps position is, thanks to the Russia matter, weaker than ever.
Six months into his presidency, the president has squandered his reputation as a dealmaker and spent
away whatever political capital he had at the start of his presidency. Even worse, he has no major
legislation to show for it.
Link Cooperation with GOP
Dems can take the midterms increased turnout is the critical variable
Cohn 4/5 Nate Cohn, writer for the New York Times, 2017 ("Democrats Are Bad at Midterm Turnout.
That Seems Ready to Change.," New York Times, Available online at
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/05/upshot/democrats-are-bad-at-midterm-turnout-that-seems-
ready-to-change.html, Accessed 7/21/2017)
Donald J. Trumps low approval ratings and the palpable enthusiasm of progressives nationwide have
Democrats dreaming of a big win in next years midterm elections. But to pull that off, theyll need to
overcome one of their biggest challenges of the last decade: low turnout in off-year contests.
The Democratic turnout in those elections has been extremely weak worse than many public analysts
have suggested. Democrats have depended on young and nonwhite voters, two groups that produce
low turnout in midterm contests. Nationwide, Republicans were more than 20 percent likelier to vote
than Democrats (defined by party vote history and registration) in 2010 and 2014, according to an
Upshot analysis of voter file data from the company L2.
But there are early signs this could be changing. If it does in 2018, it will be consistent with a longer-term
trend in which the party out of power benefits in midterm elections, seemingly from a stronger
turnout.
Democrats have fared well in recent special elections, and they have turned out in strong numbers in
the four contests where complete turnout numbers are now available: a relatively uncompetitive special
election in Iowas 45th State Senate district in December, two January contests in Virginia, and
Delawares 10th State Senate district race in February.
In Delaware, the turnout for Democrats and the unaffiliated matched 2014 levels, while Republican
turnout was five percentage points lower. In the end, the partisan composition of the electorate was
about the same as in 2016, and Democrats won the race. (For a special election in a state senate race,
simply matching previous turnout levels is an impressive feat.)
In Iowa, Democratic turnout was far higher than Republican turnout, improving the Democratic share of
the electorate by 14 points since the last midterm election. The turnout data is harder to interpret in
Virginia, where voters do not register with a party. But Republican primary voters outnumbered
Democratic primary voters by a somewhat smaller number in both contests than they did in the 2014
elections.
The trend toward higher Democratic turnout appears to be continuing in the April 18 special election for
Georgias Sixth Congressional District, where early voting has recently gotten underway. So far, the
partys turnout is running about twice as high as it did at this point in 2014, while Republican turnout is
about half what it was.
It would be unfair to judge Republican voters too harshly for their low turnout at this stage they are
trying to decide among 11 candidates. (I wouldnt have voted yet, either.) But the higher Democratic
turnout is striking, and if it holds it suggests that the Democratic candidate Jon Ossoff will benefit from
stronger party turnout than in the past.
A few elections arent enough to prove that turnout is really shifting. But there are other signs of higher
Democratic enthusiasm, like the millions who marched and protested a day after Mr. Trumps
inauguration, or the abundant fund-raising for Mr. Ossoff.
Parties out of power have long tended to do very well in midterm elections. It has been less clear why
maybe because of turnout, or because voters swing across parties to check the president.
If its because of turnout, the Democratic midterm turnout problem might just solve itself with a
Republican in the White House. If its not because of turnout, Democrats might be disadvantaged by an
unfavorable electorate, even in the sort of election theyre supposed to win.
The available evidence is limited, but it suggests that the party out of power enjoys stronger turnout
than the party holding the White House. The best evidence comes from Iowa, which has voter turnout
data by party registration going back to 1980. It tells a fairly consistent story: Democrats usually have
worse turnout in midterm elections, but the Republican edge is greatest when Democrats hold the
presidency. The Democratic turnout disadvantage is smaller or basically nonexistent when
Republicans hold the White House.
On average, Republican turnout has been just 6 percent higher than Democratic turnout in midterm
elections when Republicans have held the White House, like in 1982, 1986, 1990, 2002 and 2006.
Republican turnout has been 17 percent higher than Democratic turnout in midterm elections when
Democrats have held the presidency like in 1994, 1998, 2010 and 2014. The same pattern shows up in
the lower-quality data available elsewhere.
Its far too early to say whether Democrats can return to the relative parity they enjoyed in the Bush and
Reagan years, especially since the Democratic coalition is younger and more diverse than it was then.
But the history of midterm turnout, the recent special elections, the protests, the donations and the
early vote all seem consistent with the same story: The Democrats might be fixing their midterm
turnout problem.
Impact Investigations / Democracy /
Investigations
2nc Impeachment Impact
Trump causes extinction nuclear war, climate change, disease, and prolif
Baum 16 Seth, is executive director of the Global Catastrophic Risk Institute, a nonprofit think tank
that Baum co-founded in 2011. Baums research focuses on risk, ethics, and policy questions about
major threats to human civilization, including nuclear war, global warming, and emerging technologies,
December 9th ("What Trump means for global catastrophic risk," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists,
Available online at http://thebulletin.org/what-trump-means-global-catastrophic-risk10266, MSCOTT)
In 1987, Donald Trump said he had an aggressive plan for the United States to partner with the Soviet Union on nuclear non-proliferation. He was motivated by, among other things, an
encounter with Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafis former pilot, who convinced him that at least some world leaders are too unstable to ever be trusted with nuclear weapons. Now, 30 years
Trumpfollowing a presidential campaign marked by impulsive, combative behaviorseems poised to
later,
become one of those unstable world leaders. Global catastrophic risks are those that threaten the
survival of human civilization. Of all the implications a Trump presidency has for global catastrophic
riskand there are manythe prospect of him ordering the launch of the massive US nuclear arsenal is by far
the most worrisome. In the United States, the president has sole authority to launch atomic weapons. As Bruce Blair
recently argued in Politico, Trumps tendency toward erratic behavior, combined with a mix of difficult geopolitical
challenges ahead, mean the probability of a nuclear launch order will be unusually high. If Trump orders an
unwarranted launch, then the only thing that could stop it would be disobedience by launch personnelthough even this might not suffice, since the president could
simply replace them. Such disobedience has precedent, most notably in Vasili Arkhipov, the Soviet submarine officer who refused to authorize a nuclear launch during the
Cuban Missile Crisis; Stanislav Petrov, the Soviet officer who refused to relay a warning (which turned out to be a false alarm) of incoming US missiles; and James Schlesinger, the US defense
secretary under President Richard Nixon, who reportedly told Pentagon aides to check with him first if Nixon began talking about launching nuclear weapons. Both Arkhipov and Petrov are
now celebrated as heroes for saving the world. Perhaps Schlesinger should be too, though his story has been questioned. US personnel involved in nuclear weapons operations should take
the only
note of these tales and reflect on how they might act in a nuclear crisis. Risks and opportunities abroad. Aside from planning to either persuade or disobey the president,
way to avoid nuclear war is to try to avoid the sorts of crises that can prompt nuclear launch. China and
Russia, which both have large arsenals of long-range nuclear weapons and tense relationships with the
United States, are the primary candidates for a nuclear conflagration with Washington. Already, Trump has increased
tensions with China by taking a phone call from Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen. China-Taiwan relations are very fragile, and this sort of
disruption could lead to a war that would drag in the United States. Meanwhile, Trumps presidency could create some interesting
opportunities to improve US relations with Russia. The United States has long been too dismissive of Moscows very legitimate
security concerns regarding NATO expansion, missile defense, and other encroachments. In stark defiance of US
political convention, Trump speaks fondly of Russian President Vladimir Putin, an authoritarian leader, and expresses little interest in supporting NATO
allies. The authoritarianism is a problem, but Trumps unconventional friendliness nonetheless offers a valuable opportunity to rethink US-Russia relations for the better. On the other
hand, conciliatory overtures toward Russia could backfire. Without US pressure, Russia could become aggressive, perhaps invading the Baltic
states. Russia might gamble that NATO wouldnt fight back, but if it was wrong, such an invasion could
lead to nuclear war. Additionally, Trumps pro-Russia stance could mean that Putin would no longer be
able to use anti-Americanism to shore up domestic support, which could lead to a dangerous political
crisis. If Putin fears a loss of power, he could turn to more aggressive military action in hopes of bolstering his
support. And if he were to lose power, particularly in a coup, there is no telling what would happen to one of the worlds two largest
nuclear arsenals. The best approach for the United States is to rethink Russia-US relations while avoiding the sorts of military and political crises that could escalate to nuclear
war. The war at home. Trump has been accused many times of authoritarian tendencies, not least due to his praise for Putin. He
also frequently defies democratic norms and institutions, for instance by encouraging violence against
opposition protesters during his presidential campaign, and now via his business holdings, which create a real prospect he may violate the
Constitutions rule against accepting foreign bribes. Already, there are signs that Trump is profiting from his newfound political position, for example with an end to project delays on a Trump
Tower in Buenos Aires. The US Constitution explicitly forbids the president from receiving foreign gifts, known as emoluments. What if, under President Trump, the US government itself
becomes authoritarian? Such an outcome might seem unfathomable, and to be sure, achieving authoritarian control would not be as easy for Trump as starting a nuclear war. It would require
government officials are
compliance from a much larger portion of government personnel and the publiccompliance that cannot be taken for granted. Already,
discussing how best to resist illegal and unethical moves from the inside, and citizens are circulating
expert advice on how to thwart creeping authoritarianism. But the president-elect will take office at a time in which support for democracy
may be declining in the United States and other Western countries, as measured by survey data. And polling shows that his supporters were more likely to have authoritarian inclinations than
supporters of other Republican or Democratic primary candidates. Moreover, his supporters cheered some of his clearly authoritarian suggestions, like creating a registry for Muslims and
An authoritarian US government would be
implying that through force of his own personality, he would achieve results where normal elected officials fail.
a devastating force. In theory, dictatorships can be benevolent, but throughout history, they have been responsible for
some of the largest human tragedies, with tens of millions dying due to their own governments in the
Stalinist Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Maoist China. Thanks to the miracles of modern technology, an
authoritarian United States could wield overwhelming military and intelligence capabilities to even
more disastrous effect. Return to an old world order. Trump has suggested he might pull the United States back from
the post-World War II international order it helped build and appears to favor a pre-World War II isolationist mercantilism that would have the United
States look out for its unenlightened self-interest and nothing more. This would mean retreating from alliances and attempts to promote democracy abroad, and an embrace of economic
Such a retreat from globalization would have important implications for catastrophic risk.
protectionism at home.
The post-World War II international system has proved remarkably stable and peaceful. Returning to
the pre-World War II system risks putting the world on course for another major war, this time with
deadlier weapons. International cooperation is also essential for addressing global issues like climate
change, infectious disease outbreaks, arms control, and the safe management of emerging technologies.
On the other hand, the globalized economy can be fragile. Shocks in one place can cascade around the world, and a bad enough shock could collapse the whole system, leaving behind few
complete rejection of
communities that are able to support themselves. Globalization can also bring dangerous concentrations of wealth and power. Nevertheless,
globalization would be a dangerous mistake. Playing with climate dangers. Climate change will not wipe
out human populations as quickly as a nuclear bomb would, but it is wreaking slow-motion havoc that
could ultimately be just as devastating. Trump has been all over the map on the subject, variously supporting action to reduce emissions and calling global
warming a hoax. On December 5th he met with environmental activist and former vice president Al Gore, giving some cause for hope, but later the same week said he would appoint
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, who denies the science of climate change, to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. Trumps energy plan calls for energy independence with
If his energy policy puts more greenhouse gas into the
development of both fossil fuels and renewables, as well as less environmental regulation.
atmosphereas it may by increasing fossil fuel consumptionit will increase global catastrophic risk. For
all global catastrophic risks, it is important to remember that the US president is hardly the only important actor. Trumps election shifts the landscape of risks and opportunities, but does not
change the fact that each of us can help keep humanity safe. His election also offers an important reminder that outlier events sometimes happen. Just because election-winning politicians
have been of a particular mold in the past, doesnt mean the same kind of leaders will continue to win. Likewise, just because we have avoided global catastrophe so far doesnt mean we will
continue to do so.
Investigations Failing Now
Dodd Frank repeal destroys the economy removes supervision and consumer
database
Lazarus 17 David Lazarus, American business and consumer columnist for the Los Angeles Times,
April 18th ("Revised GOP bill would destroy the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau," La Times,
Available online at http://www.latimes.com/business/lazarus/la-fi-lazarus-gop-at-war-with-consumers-
20170418-story.html, Accessed 7/16/2017)
In his first draft of the CHOICE Act, introduced last year, Hensarling proposed replacing the CFPBs
independent director with a more easily influenced bipartisan committee. His new version calls instead
for a single director removable at will by the president.
Under current rules, the bureaus director is appointed for a five-year term and can be ousted only for
cause, which is defined as inefficiency, neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.
Hensarlings bill also would allow for the CFPB deputy director to be appointed and removed by the
president. At present, that job is filled by the director. Both these changes would ensure that the
president has full control over the agency.
Gone would be the bureaus authority to monitor the day-to-day activities of financial firms. CHOICE
Act 2.0 stipulates that the CFPB would be an enforcement agency only, without supervision
functions.
What that means is the bureau would be stripped of its current supervisory role, which allows it to
audit firms practices and access internal documents. As an enforcement agency only, its authority
would be limited to cracking down on corporate malfeasance only after it comes to light.
Kind of like a judge being demoted to a security guard.
Moreover, the bureau no longer would be able to go after corporate practices it deems unfair, deceptive
or abusive, such as a payday lender with unusually onerous terms. Hensarlings bill, incredibly, specifies
that the CFPB would have no such authority of any kind.
And because the delicate feelings of companies are so easily bruised by criticism, Hensarlings revised
bill would completely do away with the bureaus database of consumer complaints, which contains
more than 700,000 searchable listings.
The first version of his bill throttled the effectiveness of the database by requiring that all complaints be
verified before being posted online. The new version simply says no consumer complaints can be
publicly aired. So there.
Clearly, none of these changes represent improvements, at least for consumers. Every one of them
either weakens the CFPB politically or reduces its ability to effectively prevent financial firms from
preying on customers.
In fact, Hensarling would give the bureau a whole new name: the Consumer Financial Opportunity
Agency, which tellingly eliminates protection from the equation.
Sarah Rozier, a spokeswoman for the Financial Services Committee, said in a statement that Hensarling
plans to reintroduce his amended bill by the end of the month.
Our plan, which will be released in the next few weeks, is a bold and visionary plan that protects
consumers by holding Wall Street and Washington accountable, ends bailouts and unleashes Americas
economic potential, she said.
Im not sure how Americas economic potential has been shackled by a consumer agency thats
overseen a revamping of mortgage rules, proposed new regulations for payday lenders and held dozens
of firms accountable for fiscal misdeeds. The bureau says it has recovered about $12 billion for
consumers since 2011.
Marcus Stanley, policy director for the advocacy group Americans for Financial Reform, said Hensarlings
revised bill makes regulators even weaker than they were before the financial crisis.
If this bill passes, he told me, it would turn the CFPB into an ineffective agency.
Score that a big win for financial firms after years of filling Hensarlings pockets with money.
You get what you pay for.
Dodd Frank is key to the economy CFPB oversight prevents massive recessions
Zonta et al 17 Gregg Gelzinis, Michela Zonta, Joe Valenti, and Sarah Edelman, March 27th ("The
Importance of Dodd-Frank, in 6 Charts," Center for American Progress, Available online at
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/news/2017/03/27/429256/importance-dodd-
frank-6-charts/, Accessed 7/16/2017)
Introduction
This week, the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and House Financial
Services Committee both hold hearings on topics that involve the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and
Consumer Protection Act. Dodd-Frank, as the act is commonly known, was passed in direct response to
clear and unmistakable lessons learned during the 2007-2008 financial crisis. Thanks to Dodd-Frank,
today the nations financial system is more stable and consumers are better protected from toxic
financial products than before the financial crisis. However, in what can only be described as a fit of
historical amnesia, some Republican members in Congress want to roll back Dodd-Franks vital financial
stability and consumer protections. Below, we offer six charts that demonstrate the need for, and
positive effect of, financial reform.
The financial crisis destroyed jobs and middle-class wealth
The 2007-2008 financial crisis, caused by the build-up of consumer abuses and unchecked financial
sector risk, precipitated the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression. Workers lost
their jobs, millions of people lost their homes, and families saw their wealth vanish. It is against this
backdrop that Dodd-Frank was passed. The act aimed to establish a safer marketplace for consumers
and bolster the financial stability of the U.S. economy. Since the end of the financial crisis, and Dodd-
Franks passage, the U.S. economy has steadily recovered, although the scars of the Great Recession
certainly remain.
The Great Recession has had a profound impact on the U.S. economy. Between 2007 and 2009, 8.6
million jobs were lost, resulting in a sharp increase in unemployment rates. In 2010, the average
unemployment rate was more than double that reported in 2007: 9.6 percent versus 4.6 percent. The
U.S. economy has added millions of jobs since the economy bottomed out in 2009; today, the
unemployment rate stands at 4.7 percent.
Furthermore, nearly 8 million families have lost their homes since 2007 due to foreclosures. The
foreclosure crisis was largely the result of the unscrupulous practices by under-regulated mortgage
lenders who sold predatory mortgage products to any investors who would take them in the private
label security market. In the meantime, the market share of traditionally safer mortgages, such as those
purchased by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and those insured by the government, shrunk. This directly
refutes the claim that the mortgage crisis was driven by Fannie and Freddie.
Home equity represents the main resource for wealth accumulation. Therefore, the losses suffered
during the foreclosure crisis are likely to impact American families for generations. Researchers
forecast that the typical white family will have 31 percent fewer assets by 2031 than they would were it
not for the Great Recession. Typical black families, on the other hand, are likely to experience a 40
percent cut to their total wealth.
Financial reform: enhancing financial stability and consumer protection
The financial crisis made clear that consumers were not adequately protected from the dangers of toxic
financial products. Dodd-Frank sought to fix this problem by creating the Consumer Financial Protection
Bureau, or CFPB, a first-of-its-kind agency designed to protect consumers in the financial marketplace.
Since its inception, the bureau has been an unmitigated success. For every $1 of funding, the CFPB has
returned approximately $5 to victims of financial wrongdoing; to date, it has returned nearly $12 billion
to 29 million wronged Americans.
Consumers have also benefited from decreases in high-cost mortgages. Dodd-Frank created standards
for safe mortgages and established the CFPB as a new cop on the beat to make sure Americas families
arent stripped of their wealth again by predatory companies. High-cost mortgages, as a share of total
mortgages, have declined significantly since the financial crisis.
Financial reform in the credit card market has protected consumers without increasing costs or
constraining access. According to the Federal Reserve, total revolving creditmoney that consumers
can borrow and repay at their discretion, such as credit cards and lines of creditapproached $1 trillion
at the end of 2016, showing a return to pre-crisis levels. Meanwhile, the costs of credit have decreased.
The average interest rate on credit cards was 12.4 percent at the end of 2016consistent with the rate
when the CFPB opened its doors in 2011 and down from 13.3 percent when the Credit CARD Act of 2009
was signed into law to address abusive credit card practices. Personal loan rates, too, fell by more than 1
percentage point over the same period. The CFPB estimates that, between 2011 and 2014, reforms
under the CARD Act lowered the total cost to creditinterest and fees combinedby nearly 2
percentage points for borrowers, resulting in credit card holders saving $16 billion.
Dodd-Frank also increased capital requirements and other banking standards to protect the financial
stability of the U.S. economy. In the lead-up to the financial crisis, the financial sector was highly
leveraged and undercapitalized. This meant that, when losses piled up in the sector, banks did not have
sufficient equity capital to bear those losses and either experienced devastating bankruptcies or were
bailed out by the government.
While advocates of Wall Street deregulation argue that lending has been negatively impacted by these
vital financial stability enhancements, the data prove otherwise. Dodd-Frank increased banks loss-
absorbing cushions of equity capital and added other regulatory enhancements, such as strengthened
liquidity rules and stress tests. Advocates for lower capital requirements argue that increased capital
leads to less lending. Several different studies show this is not the casebetter capitalized banks lend
more over an economic cycle. It shouldnt be a surprise then that Dodd-Frank did not hurt lending; look
at Figure 5banks have significantly increased overall lending and business lending since the bills
passage. Credit card loans, auto loans, and mortgage lending have all also increased since Dodd-Franks
passage.
Community bank health
Community banks are a key piece to a vibrant and healthy economy. They provide lending to small,
local businesses and have built strong relationships with their hometown customers. The claim that
community banks are suffering under the burdens of Dodd-Frank has been a familiar refrain trumpeted
by many as a reason to roll back financial reform. But since the end of the financial crisis and the
passage of Dodd-Frank, community banks have increased their lending and profitability. In the past 12
months, community bank loan balances grew more (9.4 percent) than loan balances at noncommunity
banks (6.5 percent). Furthermore, an FDIC study found that the core return on assets for community
banks has remained stable since 1985; net income for community banks in the third quarter of 2016 was
up 12.9 percent from the third quarter of 2015.
Dodd Frank is key to protect investors, the environment, and excessive risk-taking
prevents economic collapse
GA 17 Green America, nonprofit membership organization based in the United States that promotes
ethical consumerism, June 8th ("The Financial CHOICE Act Is the Wrong Choice," Green America,
Available online at https://blog.greenamerica.org/2017/06/13/the-financial-choice-act-is-the-wrong-
choice/, Accessed 7/16/2017)
From rejection of the Paris Climate Accords to rejection of financial safeguards that were put in place
following the 2008 financial crisis, US policies are increasingly a threat to people and the planet.
On June 8, 2017, the House of Representatives voted along party lines, 233-186, to roll back vital
financial protections in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. These
protections are needed to:
Protect millions of Americans, through the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, from
financial ruin due to abusive, fraudulent, and deceptive financial products and services;
Safeguard our economy from excessive Wall Street risk-taking especially as taxpayers are
expected to bail out banks that fail;
Allow average investors not only the very largest to bring issues of concern before
corporate management and other investors using the shareholder resolution process.
The vote on the Financial CHOICE Act of 2017, HR 10, was clearly a choice to further enrich and
empower the wealthiest at the expense of the publics well-being. It is a poor choice for the long-term
economic health of our country.
Green America mobilized our members to oppose the bill which represents a major set-back to the
green economy we work to build. Key protections under attack by Republicans were put in place
following the 2008 financial crisis in order to prevent the recurrence of that economic nightmare for our
nation. The Dodd-Frank provisions have certainly helped our nation and need to be further
strengthened, not repealed. The Dodd-Frank protections have limited excessive speculation by the
mega-banks; reigned-in unscrupulous mortgage lenders; and tackled problems with payday lenders that
purposefully trap people in debt.
A number of Republicans have cast their opposition to the Dodd-Frank reforms as being hurtful to small
banks. But rather than work constructively to make any needed changes, they seek to dismantle the
protections for all of us except Wall Street. Interestingly, Republicans are not interested in revisiting,
let alone dismantling, regulations that they have promoted that hurt small banks. Why not revisit
money-laundering and Patriot Act provisions that small banks struggle with?
Another problem with the Financial CHOICE Act is its goal of taking away the power of all but the largest
investors. The shareholder engagement process with corporate management, in place through the
Securities & Exchange Commission, has served our nation well since 1934. The number of shareholder
resolutions filed on social and environmental issues has grown over the years, thanks to engagement by
concerned investors. They force Corporate America to confront its impacts on human rights, worker
rights, climate change, environmental issues, the advancement of women and minorities, corporate
political spending and lobbying, and many other issues. Republicans would limit the shareholder
resolution process to a handful of the very largest investors. And no surprise they have not been the
ones to champion social, environmental, and corporate governance improvements at companies.
Members of Congress who supported this wrong Choice Act are giving megabanks and predatory
lenders the green light to financially exploit hard-working Americans, further expanding the chasm
between the rich and the majority. Green America advises the Senate to defeat this short-sighted bill
based on Wall Street greed, not a green economy for all of us. All Green Americans should contact their
Senators to urge them to uphold and strengthen the Dodd-Frank financial protections; support the
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; and maintain the current shareholder resolution process to hold
companies accountable on their social, environmental, and corporate governance impact.
Impact EU Economy
The plan allows Democrats to find an issue to inspire its voters to turn out
Phillips 7/18 Steve Phillips, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, 2017 ("Democrats
Are Trying to Win the 2018 Midterms in All the Wrong Ways," Nation, Available online at
https://www.thenation.com/article/democrats-are-trying-to-win-the-2018-midterms-in-all-the-wrong-
ways/, Accessed 7/19/2017)
It is quite possible that Democrats are going to spend nearly $1 billion trying to solve a problem that
doesnt exist. By buying into a myth about why they lost in 2016, they are ignoring the underlying math
about what really happenedmisspending huge amounts of money, while setting themselves up to lose
again in the critical contests to come.
Many progressive politicians and pundits have bought into the notion that millions of people who had
voted for Barack Obama in 2012 defected from the Democrats and voted for Donald Trump in 2016. The
strategic premise flowing from this conclusionthat the Democrats can prevail in the congressional
and presidential races to come by winning those voters backis influencing how tens of millions of
dollars are being spent and will continue to shape the spending of hundreds of millions of dollars in the
midterm elections next year. But as my colleagues at Democracy in Color and I point out in the new
report Return of the Majority Progress Report: Another Billion Dollar Blunder?, the premise driving
this strategy is ill-founded and incorrect.
The popularity and persistence of the myth was encapsulated in a recent New York Times column by
Thomas Edsall, The Democratic Party Is in Worse Shape Than You Thought. Edsall devoted
considerable attention to Obama-to-Trump voters and cited estimates based on exit polls in which
voters were asked whom theyd voted for in 2012 and 2016. That polling quantified the ranks of said
voters as ranging from 6.7 million to 9.2 million people. The viewpoint has been popularized to the point
where it is now accepted as fact and drives major Democratic decisions such as where to hold the
Senate Democratic caucus retreat (West Virginia), to whom to feature in the response to the State of
the Union (white people in a Kentucky diner), to how to spend $19 million in advertising in the Georgia
special election (targeting Republicans rather than rallying Democrats). The primary problem with this
approach is that the math underlying the myth is perplexing, at best, and just flat wrong at worst.
The inaccurate arithmetic is most evident when looking at what happened in Wisconsin, one of the
three narrowly decided states that led to Clintons losing the Electoral College despite prevailing handily
in the national popular vote. The conclusion that large numbers of Obama voters switched their
allegiance to the Republican is undercut by the fact that Trump got fewer votes in Wisconsin than Mitt
Romney did four years earlier. If Trump got a big infusion of previously Democratic votes, why did the
Republican vote total go down? But look even more closely, at county-level data. In the 23 counties that
flipped from Democratic in 2012 to Republican in 2016, the data show that it is likely that there were
just as many Obama-to-third-party voters as there were Obama-to-Trump voters (an increase of 23,117
third-party votes, as compared with 20,662 additional Republican votes in those counties). And the
biggest problem in Wisconsin was the fact that 60,000 fewer people voted in heavily black Milwaukee,
contributing to Clintons losing the state by 23,000 votes.
The myth also lacks mathematical support in a state like Florida, where there was an actual surge for
Trump, with him picking up 450,000 more voters than Romney received. That increase, however, didnt
come from disaffected Democrats. Clinton got more votes in 2016 than Obama did in 2012. What
happened in Florida is that large numbers of whites who sat out 2012 rallied to Trumps racial-solidarity
appeals and came out in significantly larger numbers.
While the data from Wisconsin and Florida undermine the myth about what happened in specific
strategic states, the aggregate data throw the entire premise into question. The most inconvenient fact
for the proponents of the Obama-to-Trump migration theory is that Clinton got very nearly the same
number of votes as Obama did nationally. Itd be like being told someone has taken 10 percent of the
money out of your bank account, but when you check your balance it shows you have the exact same
amount of money. If 10 percent of the funds went away, where did the 10 percent come from to backfill
the account?
The other problematic point for the 7 million-lost-votes figure is that Trumps total vote number
increased only by 2 million over what Romney secured in 2012. If there are 7 million Obama-to-Trump
voters, why didnt Trumps vote total increase by 7 million? Its conceivable that a ton of Romney voters
defected from Trump and were replaced by Obama-to-Trump voters, but there has been precious little
analysis of that possibility. The focus for most Democrats begins and ends with wooing the Obama-to-
Trump voter.
The numbers that arent in dispute are the figures for black voters and Stein voters. Recently released
Census data shows that African-American voter turnout dropped precipitously, falling below the rate of
the 2004 election. In Pennsylvania, according to national exit-poll data, the black turnout dropped by
137,000 people, and Clinton lost by 44,000 votes. In Michigan, the problem was Obama-to-Stein voters,
with Stein getting 30,000 more voters than she did in 2012, and the Democrats losing the state by just
11,000 votes.
Certainly some voters did defect from Obama to Trump, and, conversely, some Romney voters moved to
either Clinton or Johnson, complicating the calculations all around. Digging into data is important, but,
unfortunately, thats not where Democratic leaders are focusing their analytical attention. Rather than
accurately assess the numbers, they have let the myth take on the status of legend, and tens of millions
of dollars are being allocated based on faulty data.
Perhaps the most pernicious part of the myth is that it reinforces the absolutely incorrect mind-set that
progressives are in the minority in America. Democrats won the popular voteand not by a little, with
Clintons 3 million vote margin surpassing the largest figure ever recorded by someone who didnt win
the Electoral College. In the critical states that enabled the Electoral College lossMichigan, Wisconsin,
Pennsylvania, and Floridathe progressive vote splintered, allowing Trump to slip through with less
than a majority of the votes in each of those states.
This minority mindset leads to timid tactics and tepid politics that are no match for the audacity of the
rights racist, xenophobic assault on multiracial America that is occurring every day. Fear of alienating
the unicorn of the white swing voter mutes Democratic responses when the only proper response to
what is happening in America is unapologetically fighting back by every means availablepushing for
impeachment, conducting sit-ins to block the buses deporting people, and issuing full-throated
denunciations of a judicial system that sanctions the police murders of unarmed black people. As
Obamas successful elections showed, Democrats win only when their voters are inspired to turn out in
large numbers, and a bold, courageous, hopeful platform is essential to generating voter enthusiasm.
In order to carry ourselves with the confidence to act with that kind of decisiveness requires the
conviction that we are in fact the majority of people in America. If we look at math and not myths, we
can straighten our backs, raise our voices, and do what is necessary to bring about the return of the
majority in America.
No Link No Concession
Progressives have refused everything that Trump has doneits not necessarily
because of his policies but because of him
Davidson 17 John Davidson, a senior correspondent at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in
the Wall Street Journal, National Review, Texas Monthly, First Things, the Claremont Review of Books,
The LA Review of Books, February 1st (Why Are Progressives So Angry? Trump Defeated Their
Messiah, The Federalist, Available online at http://thefederalist.com/2017/02/01/why-are-
progressives-so-angry-trump-defeated-their-messiah/, SR)
The consternation and outrage weve seen in response to President Trumps executive order on
immigration has little to do with the policy as such. Restricting immigration from certain countries is
nothing new; President Obama did it, as did presidents Bush, Clinton, H.W. Bush, and Reagan.
Rather, it has everything to do with the elevation of progressive politics to the status of a religiona
dogmatic and intolerant religion, whose practitioners are now experiencing a crisis of faith.
Forget the executive order itself. Progressives have reacted with moral indignation and hysteria to
everything Trump has done since taking office. His inauguration was enough to bring out hundreds of
thousands of protesters across the country. In the 12 days since then, we have witnessed yet more
demonstrations, boycotts, calls for resistance, comparisons to the Holocaust, media witch-hunts, the
politicization of everything from Hollywood awards shows to professional sports, and real tears from
New York Sen.Chuck Schumer.
One is hard-pressed to think of something Trump could do that would not elicit howls of outrage from
the Left. On Tuesday, Senate Democrats boycotted confirmation hearings for Steven Mnuchins
nomination to serve as treasury secretary and Rep. Tom Prices nomination to be secretary of Health
and Human Services, while continuing to try to block the confirmation of Betsy DeVos for education
secretary and Sen. Jeff Session for attorney general. Even before Trump announced his Supreme Court
pick on Tuesday night, Democrats had already announced they would filibuster the nomination, no
matter who it was.
The obstinacy of Senate Democrats reflects the mood of their progressive base, whose panicked anger is
the natural reaction of those for whom politics has become an article of faith. Progressives, as the terms
implies, believe society must always be progressing toward something better. Always forward, never
backwards. After eight years of Obama, they believed progressive politics in America would forever be
on an upward trajectory.
Trump shook that faith. But his election also unmasked the degree to which progressivism as a political
project is based not on science or rationality, or even sound policy, but on faith in the power of
government to ameliorate and eventually perfect society. All the protests and denunciations of Trump
serve not just as an outlet for progressives despair, but the chance to signal their moral virtue through
collective outrage and moral preeningsomething that wasnt really possible under Obama, at least
not to this degree.
Impact
No Impeachment
Pence is way worse than Trump legislative experience really screws democracy and
enables agenda passage
Dolack 5-26-17 (Pete Dolack writes the Systemic Disorder and has been an activist with several groups
- Why Pence Might be Even Worse Than Trump - https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/05/26/why-
pence-might-be-even-worse-than-trump/)
The thought of Donald Trumps monstrous ego being swiftly turned out of office because of his
incompetence and corruption cant help but give us a warm feeling of schadenfreude. Yet contemplating
his possible impeachment gives full meaning to the idea of being careful of what you wish. The
complicating factor here is that an impeachment and removal from office would elevate Christian
fundamentalist Mike Pence to the presidency. That would be truly a horrifying development. Not only
because Vice President Pence is more of a true believer in the extreme Right agenda than is President
Trump but as an experienced legislator and governor, hed likely be far more effective in steering bills
through Congress. With some of the most ideological Republicans in control of all three branches of
government, and given that the Democratic Party has shown no sign whatsoever of learning from last
years electoral debacle, hoping for relief from traditional politics seems even more hopeless than it is
ordinarily. What to do? Even the ongoing campaign to Refuse Fascism by driving out the
Trump/Pence regime has a controversial element to it. Although appropriately aimed at both while
targeting the system that could elevate such horrors to the apex of political power, this sort of campaign
spreads confusion by equating what is a particularly nasty manifestation of capitalist formal democracy
with full fascism.