President Biden needs reelection of a Democratic House and expansion of the Democratic Senate in 2022 to fulfil his agenda. He can accomplish that by changing the election dynamics just as President Harry Truman did in 1948, famously besting the pollsters and pundits by inveighing against do-nothing congressional Republicans.
That strategy will enable Biden to craft a favorable 2022 election terrain, dramatizing for voters the values that distinguish Democrats.
Embattled Truman
The Democrats lost both the House of Representatives and Senate in the 1946 midterm election, with Republicans refusing thereafter to support more than a handful of Truman’s initiatives. Over the next two years, he faced greater challenges than Biden today – obstructionist Republicans in control of Congress, soaring postwar inflation (above 20% in 1947), a deeply divided Democratic Party including white supremacist Dixiecrats and a united Republican Party led by the popular Wendell Willkie. Truman’s approval polling was a dismal 36% in the months preceding the 1948 general election.
Truman responded to this daunting environment with a variety of popular proposals, including economic issues (a higher minimum wage, stronger collective bargaining rights), national health insurance, and confronting the Soviet Union. Once the Dixiecrats split off in 1948 following Truman’s integration of the military, he also began emphasizing civil rights. Truman was playing from a weak hand, but he exploited the paltry legislative record of the Republicans, labeling them a do-nothing Party.
True, Biden faces a more favorable picture, with inflation likely to diminish, notable legislative successes, and the stark contrast with 2020 of his stunning jobs rebound in 2021 with the COVID economy increasingly reopening. On COVID-19, for instance, he arrived to find a White House in chaos with bare medicine cabinets, no plans for vaccinations, and promoting bizarre, murderous advice while demonizing medical experts.
The Democrats lost both the House of Representatives and Senate in the 1946 midterm election, with Republicans refusing thereafter to support more than a handful of Truman’s initiatives. Over the next two years, he faced greater challenges than Biden today – obstructionist Republicans in control of Congress, soaring postwar inflation (above 20% in 1947), a deeply divided Democratic Party including white supremacist Dixiecrats and a united Republican Party led by the popular Wendell Willkie. Truman’s approval polling was a dismal 36% in the months preceding the 1948 general election.
Truman responded to this daunting environment with a variety of popular proposals, including economic issues (a higher minimum wage, stronger collective bargaining rights), national health insurance, and confronting the Soviet Union. Once the Dixiecrats split off in 1948 following Truman’s integration of the military, he also began emphasizing civil rights. Truman was playing from a weak hand, but he exploited the paltry legislative record of the Republicans, labeling them a do-nothing Party.
True, Biden faces a more favorable picture, with inflation likely to diminish, notable legislative successes, and the stark contrast with 2020 of his stunning jobs rebound in 2021 with the COVID economy increasingly reopening. On COVID-19, for instance, he arrived to find a White House in chaos with bare medicine cabinets, no plans for vaccinations, and promoting bizarre, murderous advice while demonizing medical experts.
Yet, popular components of Biden’s agenda remain stalled by Senate Republicans (and a few Democrats), including voting rights protections and a child tax credit that Columbia University experts found reduced American child poverty by a remarkably 45%. (Another study affirmed that modest cash support – $333 monthly – enable parents to enrich infant cognitive development, which is why child support is common in Western Europe, with the U.S. and Turkey abysmal outliers.)
En bloc Senate Republican opposition provides the opening for Biden to campaign against (say) the Do-Nothing Republicans, Trump Republicans or the Party of No. After all, many of the same concerns separating the political parties in 1948 that Truman emphasized still resonate today. Moreover, the Republicans are stunningly vulnerable. Their record – including inability even to craft a Party platform in 2020 – is an empty vessel. And Republican senate leader Mitch McConnell is deeply unpopular, with a favorability rating at 15% (and recall his cynical political determination to make Barack Obama a one-term president).
Biden’s 2022 Election Protocol
- Promptly conclude negotiating with narcissistic Democratic senators and enact elements of Build Back Better and voting rights protections they support. Support bipartisan legislation also supported by Republicans, perhaps including upgrading the Election Counting Act. Perfect should not be the enemy of the good.
- Senate Republicans are on record opposing improved minimum wages. They should be required to also vote on other individual elements of the Biden agenda – including Medicare drug pricing caps, paid family leave, a child tax credit, expanding the child care infrastructure (and capping family outlays at 7%), labor law upgrades including eliminating the independent contractor scam, free community college tuition, eliminate some college debt, Obamacare expansion through Medicaid and the like.
- Require Senate Republicans to vote on specific voter protection upgrades including a national election-day holiday, Sunday voting, same day registration, election administration upgrades, automatic voter registration and the like.
- Counter critique of Biden’s inflation record by requiring Senate Republicans to cast votes on policies to stem inflation. Policy options include expanded supply chain support, antitrust investigations and regulation of de facto cartels, including the meat and poultry industry, big tech, and ocean shippers.
- Rebut the unfunded-spending critique with full funding for these Senate proposals by closing loopholes and restoring higher tax rates on the wealthiest Americans, on corporations and by capturing hidden income sequestered abroad.
- Use the presidential bully pulpit to challenge Republican senators, which can be complemented by Department of Justice interventions against iniquitous Republican state-level voter suppression initiatives and by other executive actions like expanding overtime pay eligibility.
- There are other potential issues that should be considered. For instance, 68% of independents favor electing presidents by popular vote – and the Democrats alone by amending the Elections Count Act can neuter the constitutionally-mandated Electoral College to accomplish that.
The 2022 Mid-Term Election
Campaigning against do-nothing Republicans will highlight the differing policy goals of the two Parties. Polarized politics and naysayers aside, like Truman before him, Biden is enviably positioned to draw that comparison. Fingering obstructionist Senate Republicans will clarify for swing voters the choice they face this November.