Tuesday, January 24, 2017

A Democratic Tea Party Playbook


Freshly energized protesters are taking to the streets, members of Congress are being confronted in their Districts by Constituents angry over Health Care, and Wealthy Donors are turning Fear into Action.

Eight years after Republicans united after a stinging Electoral defeat to oppose President Obama, Democrats are channeling an even deeper anxiety over President Trump, and a far shallower defeat, into a newfound burst of organizing.

Party Leaders, eyeing the huge protests last weekend and growing worries over the promised Repeal of the Affordable Care Act, are hoping to recreate the mass movement that sprang up in 2009 and swept Republicans to power in the House and in Governor’s races across the Country, a Tea Party equivalent from the Left.

And they are turning to the same Playbook that guided their Conservative counterparts in the aftermath of Obama’s Election:

- Creating or expanding a number of Groups outside the formal architecture of the Party.

- Focusing on often-overlooked State Legislative and Redistricting Campaigns.

- Bringing together frightened Fund-Raisers to Underwrite it all.

Recreating the conditions for a second lightning strike will be difficult. The kind of soaring unemployment that followed the worst recession since the Depression is not likely anytime soon, and with many House Districts Gerrymandered by Republicans and few Republican-held Senate seats open in 2018, the Political Terrain is more forbidding for Democrats now.

Only two Republican Senate Seats, Arizona and Nevada, are plausibly available to Democrats at the moment, while Democrats must defend 10 Seats in States won by Trump. The most hard-fought Campaigns may be the 38 Governor’s races that will take place over the next two years.

But in the fury at Trump and, specifically, the brewing anger over the Republican attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Democrats see passions on their side and the same potential for overreach that animated Conservative Voters in 2009 and 2010.

“You can see this health care thing just unraveling right in front of them,” said James Carville, the longtime Democratic Strategist, invoking the political maxim that “the mover on health care loses.” “To do something is to lose.”

The left begins with a Head Start: Trump is already far more unpopular than Obama was at the outset of his Presidency.

The looming question is whether Democrats can sustain the passion of their Contributors and Activists once the shock of Trump’s Inauguration wears off. The success of the post-Obama Democratic Party will be determined by whether the Progressives who are roused right now will open their checkbooks and show up at their Local Democratic Committees in the lead-up to the 2018 Midterm Elections.

Democrats must “rebuild from the grass roots up and go back to being competitive in state and local elections,” said Eric T. Schneiderman, New York’s Attorney General and a Democrat. “Even if Hillary Clinton had won, the Republicans still would be controlling 69 of 99 state legislative chambers and 33 governor’s mansions.”

The depth of the Party’s problems was a recurring theme as Donors, still in disbelief over Trump’s Election, gathered over Inauguration weekend at a Florida palm-tree-shaded golf resort to plot their comeback and tune out the transfer of power 1,000 miles to the north.

David Brock, the combative Democratic Organizer, brought together about 150 Contributors and Operatives for a three-day Conference that underscored the opportunity that Liberals have and the challenges they face in trying to create their answer to the Tea Party.

That the hard-charging Mr. Brock, polarizing even among Democrats and identified chiefly with Clinton, could summon a broad array of Progressives was an indication of the energy coursing through the left.

Strolling by the pool and talking about how to rebuild, in between presentations with titles like “What the Hell Just Happened?,” the Donors expressed a determination to fight back.

“There’s a real urgent energy,” said Susie Tompkins Buell, one of Clinton’s Top Fund-Raisers. “This is bigger than women’s rights, this is bigger than human rights, this is bigger than the environment. This is the future of the entire world.”

Brock said he would ask for $40 million this year for his constellation of Research and Advocacy Groups, increasing the individual budget of each.

A host of other Progressive Groups are broadening their ambitions, as well, including the Center for American Progress, a Research Group, and Priorities USA, which served as the Primary “super PAC” for Democratic Presidential Candidates in the last two Elections. Some Liberals who are part of the Democracy Alliance, a progressive Umbrella Group, are irritated that Brock staged the event, fearing that he is creating a Competitor to their Conferences.

Such jostling for Organizational Supremacy was also a feature of the Conservative landscape when the right formed its resistance to Obama.

But Democrats are already contending with Challenges that Republicans never fully confronted after 2008. There was something close to unanimity on the right in its opposition to Obama’s Agenda. The Affordable Care Act did not win one vote from a Congressional Republican. But Democrats are at odds over whether they should oppose Trump across the board or selectively work with him where they have Common Interests.

Putting his marker down in that debate, Brock told Donors that the “coming divide” in the Party would be “between those who resist and oppose and those who accommodate and appease.”

A debate over Trump’s first 100 days broke out at a Session, with Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago pressing for Accommodation at times and Ron Klain, a Veteran Democratic Operative, urging Total Opposition. “My attitude is, there will be things that in the interest of the country we’re going to work on, and things we’re not because it’s not in the best interest,” Emanuel said.

The Debate pointed to a more fundamental difference between the Political right and left, which could make Democratic unity more difficult: While Conservatives are glad to reap the Political Benefits from halting or undermining an expansion of Government, liberals are invested in a well-functioning State.

“You’re going to have a harder time getting Democrats to say, ‘We don’t want government to work,’” said Schneiderman, who was a Panelist at the Event.











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