Here’s how Charlie Cook is looking at the Democrats’ prospects for winning control of the House of Representatives next year:
A big question is whether Trump voters will behave like Barack Obama voters. In 2008, a lot of fresh new voters came online to elect Obama, but in 2010, when his name was not on the ballot, they stayed home. When he was up for reelection in 2012, they turned up at the polls again, then didn’t show up in 2014. No one needs to be reminded that Democrats had good years in 2008 and 2012, and horrific years in 2010 and 2014. Will the Trump voters who turned out in 2016 do so again when he’s not on the ballot?
It would be easy to exaggerate how much Barack Obama’s success against Hillary Clinton represented a blow to the party’s Establishment. In truth, loyalties among party bigwigs and power players was fairly evenly split. Obama excited new people but, unlike Trump, most of those new people weren’t motivated by outright hostility or opposition to the party as it existed. I don’t want to underplay the discontent, either. As a founding member of the left-wing blogosphere, I know how important it was to tap into the growing unhappiness with the feckless opposition to early years of the Younger Bush’s presidency.
Still, Obama didn’t campaign like Trump, mocking the intelligence, courage, and stamina of his opponents in the primaries, or breaking left and right with his party’s orthodoxy. If the Democrats had difficulty turning out voters when Obama’s name wasn’t on the ballot, I imagine the average Trump voter will be much less inclined to turn out to vote for backbenchers in a party they’ve come to despise. As I discussed a lot recently, many Trump voters are folks who voted for Obama once if not twice. They made a bet on Trump, not necessarily the Republican Party.
This problem could become more pronounced if Trump’s approval numbers remain low and Republican candidates are trapped between getting some separation from him and holding onto his most ardent supporters. Or, if Trump blames his failures on his own party, as seems likely in many instances, or if Trump concludes that he must move to the middle to get traction on infrastructure or tax reform, these things could expose fissions within the GOP and lead to internal bickering and apathy that sink Republican loyalty and turnout.
It’s not hard to envision some combination of these factors leading to a good midterm election for the Democrats. But we should not forget that Obama won reelection. The Democrats need a plan that will work when Trump’s name is on the ballot, and if they don’t have that they may see a repeat of what the Republicans experienced, which is good midterm year results and catastrophic presidential year results.
First, while I may be one of the few that think this way, I still don’t think Trump will still be President in 2020 and not because he’s been impeached either. But, leaving that aside, from the standpoint of issues, Trumpcare, the tax “reform” for billionaires, the likely stagnating economy and downturn in jobs and continued disfunctionality in the Executive branch all ought to mean a discouraged and apathetic GOP voter base. But GOP voters are not the same as Democratic voters. They will continual to vote against their own self-interest, especially in rural and exurban districts because of racism, hatred of “elites”, sexism and intense dislike of Democrats. I can readily imagine some Trump voting independents and ex-Obama Democrats sitting the election out and so a few marginal seats might go away but I’m not convinced there will be a wave election in 2018.
Trump’s name won’t appear on a ballot ever again. It may not appear on a prison roster, but he won’t survive his term.
it’s as Fladem pointed out a while back, health care, or Trumpcare. MT is tying the special election candidate to Trumpcare. and who is running for “no one dies” Labrador’s seat in ID? vs him for gov?
Hey Boo, have you had time to game out what the clearance plan is to get this through the Senate and how likely the mushy middle of the GOP blocking votes are to do something drastic (block granting Medicare)?
Because, if this is likely then all bets are off as I never though they would actually follow through on this insanity.
That depends very much on whether there are opposition candidates to vote for and how attractive those opposition candidates are.
Capturing Congress with a plan of committee use and legislative agenda would be helpful, but only if the agenda serves ordinary Americans.