Make
no mistake: America has rejected Trumpism.
No
one seriously expected the Senate to flip, because Democrats had to defend 26
seats in that chamber, compared with only nine held by Republicans.
The
real battleground was the House, where Democrats had to achieve a net gain of
23 seats to get the 218 needed for a majority.
They
did.
Trump
wasn’t on the ballot but he made the election into a referendum on himself.
So
Americans turned against House Republicans, who should have acted as a check on
him but did nothing – in many cases magnifying his vileness.
The
nation has repudiated Trump, but do not believe for a moment that our national
nightmare is over.
The
Republican Party remains in control of the Senate.
Fox
News is still Trump’s propaganda ministry. (The line between Fox and Trump,
already blurred, vanished completely at his last pre-election rally when Fox
hosts Sean Hannity and Jeannine Pirro joined him on stage.)
The
American people will be subject to more of Trump’s lies and hate, as amplified
by Senate Republicans and Fox News.
Trump
can be expected to scapegoat House Democrats for anything that goes wrong.
American politics will almost certainly become even meaner, coarser, and
uglier. We will remain deeply and angrily divided.
Most
worrisome, America still won’t respond to real threats that continue to grow,
which Trump and his enablers have worsened – climate change; the suppression of
votes, and foreign intrusions into our elections; the most expensive and least
efficient healthcare system in the world; and, not least, widening inequalities
of income, wealth, and political power.
America
will eventually overcome and reverse Trumpism. The harder challenge will be to
reverse the reasons Trump and his Republican lapdogs gained power in the first
place.
Some
blame racism and nativism. But these toxins have poisoned America since the
founding of the Republic.
What’s
new has been the interaction between them and the long economic slide of tens
of millions of working Americans, most of them white and lacking college
degrees.
They
used to be the bedrock of the Democratic Party, many of them members of trade
unions whose strength in numbers gave them an increasing share of the gains
from economic growth.
Their
long economic slide has generated the kind of frustrations that demagogues
throughout history have twisted into rage at “them.”
Meanwhile, most economic gains have gone to the top 1
percent, whose wealth is now greater than the combined wealth of the bottom 90
percent – giving them enough political muscle to demand and get tax cuts, Wall
Street bailouts, corporate subsidies, and regulatory rollbacks. These in turn have
created even more wealth at the top.
All
were trends before Trump. Yet Democrats failed to reverse them, even though
Democrats occupied the White House most of these years (and during four of them
controlled both houses of Congress).
Trump
has worsened them by slashing taxes on the wealthy and corporations, whittling
back the Affordable Care Act, and loosening restrictions on Wall Street.
Jobs
may be back but they pay squat, especially compared with the rising costs of
housing, healthcare, and education. And they’re less secure than ever. One in
five is now held by a worker under contract without any unemployment insurance,
sick leave, or retirement savings.
Which
presumably is why Trump decided to focus the midterms on hate and fear rather
than the economy.
He
thereby created a large opening for Democrats aiming for 2020. They can become
the party of the bottom 90 percent by creating a multi-racial, multi-ethnic
coalition to wrest back control of our economy and democracy.
They
would focus on two big things: First, raise the purchasing power of the bottom
90 percent through stronger unions, a larger wage subsidy (starting with a
bigger Earned Income Tax Credit), and Medicare for All.
Second,
get big money out of politics through public financing of elections, full
disclosure of all sources of political funding, an end to the revolving door
between business and government.
Democrats
shouldn’t try moving to the “center.” The center no longer exists because most
Americans are no longer on the traditional “right” or “left.”
The
vast majority of Americans are now anti-establishment, and understandably so.
The
practical choice is either Trump’s authoritarian populism backed by the moneyed
interests, or a new democratic populism backed by the rest of us.
The
direction couldn’t be clearer. It should be the Democrat’s hour.
Robert B. Reich is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at
the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center
for Developing Economies. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton
administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective
cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fifteen books,
including the best sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of
Nations," and "Beyond Outrage," and, his most recent, "The
Common Good," which is available in bookstores now. He is also a founding
editor of the American Prospect magazine, chairman of Common Cause, a member of
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning
documentary, "Inequality For All." He's co-creator of the Netflix
original documentary "Saving Capitalism," which is streaming now.
