Maybe …
She has a doctorate from Pat Robertsons’ Regent University, by the way.
Here’s her fellow Georgian:
President Joe Biden and his team are hoping to spend the spring and summer months drawing sharp distinctions with Republicans, one in particular. They still plan to push forth revived pieces of stalled agenda. But they’re also eagerly awaiting potentially explosive findings from the Jan. 6 select committee and hope those discoveries can inflame a battle brewing within the GOP over former Trump’s legacy and power.
Biden, who has tried to pivot back toward domestic matters while also tending to the war in Ukraine, gave a hint of the upcoming strategy on his recent West Coast swing, in which he blasted the GOP for falling under the control of far-right extremists.
“This ain’t your father’s Republican Party,” said Biden, who declared it “the MAGA party now” and that Republicans now “are afraid to act correctly, because they know they’ll be primaried” if they don’t toe the line set by Trump and his acolytes.
Lot’s of anonymous complaints about how the White House failed to offer a straight forward message, the DNC isn’t doing its job, the usual. And they note that Biden’s numbers are low (but apparently are improving) and inflation, gas prices, yadda, yadda, yadda.
But:
But the White House has renewed hope that it could change the conversation.
Biden aides have been delighted to watch growing division within the GOP, as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has fended off bitterness within the ranks after a series of revelations about his critical words for Trump and right-wing caucus members after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Additionally, there is growing hope that the House committee investigating the insurrection may produce damaging findings against Trump and other key Republicans. The committee plans to begin holding prime-time hearings this June.
Biden advisers have also tried to game out this week the possibility of one particular October surprise. Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter raised the chance that Trump could be reinstated to the social media platform, where he had more than 80 million followers before being banned in the wake of the Jan. 6 riot. Musk has said he would allow Trump to return, and while the ex-president has claimed he doesn’t want back on, the White House does not believe him.
The consensus among Biden aides about Trump’s possible return: it could cut both ways. While the former president would eat up an extraordinary amount of political oxygen, it’s also possible that he would push the Big Lie or feud with fellow Republicans and damage the GOP’s otherwise strong chances of regaining at least one house of Congress. The more the election becomes about Trump, the better the Democrats’ chances become, many in Biden’s orbit believe.
Some Democrats feel the White House has been too reactive to crises and unwilling to go on the offense. For his part, the president has been reluctant to bash Republicans often, still believing that bipartisan deals can be made. But he has ramped up the attacks of late, including on Thursday when he laced into National Republican Senatorial Committee chair Rick Scott’s tax plan for hurting the middle class and small businesses.
“He grew up in the Senate when there was some bipartisanship, he was hoping to bring that same approach to the White House,” said Adrienne Elrod, a senior aide on Biden’s transition team and aide to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. “But the unfortunate reality is that this is not a bipartisan world anymore. The only way we are going to be able to make our case as Democrats and sell our agenda is to draw contrasts with Republicans and show the country how awful they are.”
The White House also was heartened by a development across the Atlantic that strong campaign contrasts could compel voters to reward incumbent parties — even if they’re not enamored with the job those parties are doing.
After carefully watching French President Emmanuel Macron’s reelection over far-right candidate Marie Le Pen, the White House will aim to more directly place the Republican Party in Trump’s shadow. Macron’s surprisingly comfortable victory was not just hailed vital to keeping Europe intact but it also was treated as positive reinforcement for Biden’s own domestic future, according to two senior officials not authorized to speak publicly about private deliberations.
May I just offer my own words here:
Axios’ report:
Democrats are starting to fight back against the bludgeoning they’ve taken since the Republicans seized on socially charged issues to help win this fall’s midterms.
Recent research has shown the barrage of “culture war” messaging — on everything from critical race theory to bashing LGBTQ communities — is working, and Democrats now realize they can’t ignore it any longer. They want to make 2022 a referendum on MAGA nation and its agenda.
President Biden himself got more aggressive while traveling to Ohio last Wednesday to honor 2022’s Teacher of the Year: a history instructor who teaches courses about oppression and Black history.
“Today, there are too many politicians trying to score political points trying to ban books — even math books. I mean, did you ever think … that when you’d be teaching, you’d be worrying about book burnings and banning books? All because it doesn’t fit somebody’s political agenda,” the president said.
“We ought to stop making them a target of the culture wars.”
The American Federation of Teachers — along with 214 other parent groups, student groups, and unions — is also placing ads in more than a dozen newspapers, including the New York Times, across 13 key states this week to coincide with Teacher Appreciation Week, Axios has learned.
“We’re saying we are grateful, your work matters and you need support to help our kids recover — not attacks from political extremists who make your job harder,” AFT president Randi Weingarten told Axios.
Fox News has talked about what’s being taught in schools over 1,000 times since January 2021, per the Washington Post.
Democrats have often shied away from the emotional appeal of such issues — even with abortion rights — frequently dismissing Republican attacks as unworthy of a response.
No longer.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) told Axios: “There’s a lot of us that are extremely frustrated with Republicans for doing this but also want our colleagues to be comfortable enough to stand up and defend our values rather than running to some other message or running away from it.”
“I think that’s starting to happen,” said Jayapal, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) said: “It is very clear that the other side is going to continue to sort of fear-monger as a way to drum up support. For some [voters] that works, but I think pushing back works too.”
Until last week, Democrats felt they didn’t have a clear, firebrand example for how to successfully push back on these attacks — even though the party’s leaders control the White House and both chambers of Congress.
Now, they believe they have at least one: little-known Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow.
The lawmaker from a blue-collar state gave a now-viral floor speech in Lansing rebuking a Republican colleague for labeling her a “groomer” over her support of LGBTQ kids’ rights.
Every Democratic House member interviewed by Axios amid this reporting independently mentioned McMorrow and the backbone and passion she displayed.
Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) compared the virality of the speech to that of Barack Obama’s speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, telling Axios it was the “perfect call-out to the attacks on what McMorrow dubbed ‘marginalized people.'”
Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), a candidate for the U.S. Senate, said: “I think you absolutely need to have that kind of tone, that kind of attitude on these issues. These guys are punching down. … I think you’ve got to hit back. You’ve got to hit back hard.”
I know Tim Ryan’s brand is to call out the Republicans on the floor. But it’s still telling that he’s a moderate politician who has to appeal to the “working class” salt-o-the-earth voters in Ohio and he’s not insisting that they have to talk about kitchen able issues. He must believe that negative partisanship can work there.
McMorrow herself told MSNBC last week: “I hope that there are a lot more people like me, who see what I did and say, ‘We have to stand up and fight back.’ Because this strategy is not going away.”
With inflation sweeping the nation, the war in Ukraine dominating headlines and slow-moving legislation in Congress, some Democrats feel like they’re in limbo.
Biden’s poor approval ratings have made them want to go on the offensive, but rather than talk about what they’ve done, they’re increasingly targeting the GOP for siding with Donald Trump and backing his rhetoric.
Rahna Epting, executive director of MoveOn, told Axios: “It’s very clear to me this needs to be a referendum on today’s Republican Party, which has embraced [Make America Great Again].”
“It’s about all of us versus MAGA. I’m not just talking about Trump, but the disease within the GOP that has taken over,” Epting continued.
Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), chairman of the Democratic National Campaign Committee, warned of the Republicans’ “alarmingly potent” tactics in February.
Maloney, a member of the LGBTQ community, told Axios that Republicans have become “openly homophobic and hateful in some of their rhetoric, and we don’t need to be shy at all.”
Axios then helps Republicans spread their lies, of course::
“Democrats are pushing defund the police, irreversible transition surgery for minors, critical race theory and taxpayer-funded abortion,” said Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), chair of the conservative Republican Study Committee.
“Americans overwhelmingly reject this insanity. That’s why, so far, their policies have been far more aggressive than their public-messaging. The more upfront and honest Democrats are about their radical and anti-American cultural agenda, the better.”
Whatever. I say “bring it.” Here’s a little bit of evidence that the Republicans may have overreached — if Democrats make clear what they are doing:
Math textbooks axed for their treatment of race; a viral Twitter account directing ire at LGBTQ teachers; a state law forbidding classroom discussion of sexual identity in younger grades; a board book for babies targeted as “pornographic.” Lately it seems there’s a new controversy erupting every day over how race, gender or history are tackled in public school classrooms.
But for most parents, these concerns seem to be far from top of mind. That’s according to a new national poll by NPR and Ipsos. By wide margins – and regardless of their political affiliation – parents express satisfaction with their children’s schools and what is being taught in them.
A bipartisan majority of U.S. adults oppose laws that go after companies for their political positions and the politicians who support them, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll found, indicating efforts by Florida lawmakers and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to target Disney for the company’s opposition Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law, are likely broadly unpopular—including even among many Republicans.
Republican candidates are falling all over themselves to see who can be the most aggressive culture warrior in the race. In order to win their primaries they are having to sign on to the craziest wingnut ideas in order to win over the Trump cult.
It’s an uphill climb for Democrats but the doom and gloom of the last couple of months is uncalled for. There is a huge opening if they will just walk through it.
By the way:
Let’s hope they follow through. It’s our only hope.