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President Biden cited liberal icon Franklin Delano Roosevelt when he first addressed Congress last year, and outlined a political plan with an ambition the size of the New Deal: curbing climate change, reducing university costs and medicines, raise corporate taxes, subsidize child care and continue with tax cuts. for parents, among other initiatives.
Fourteen months later, despite unified Democratic control of the House, Senate and White House, none of this has been passed by law. At the same time, the conservative rebellion born in response to Roosevelt’s legacy achieved great public policy victories in the courts and states across the country.
This week’s Conservative Supreme Court victories over abortion and guns crowned a series of victories over a year on the right, especially in 23 states, including giants like Texas and Florida, where conservatives control all branches. of the elected government. Republicans have expanded school choice, reformed school curricula, restricted access to voting, reduced taxes, and launched a new wave of cultural warfare against gay, lesbian, and transgender Americans.
With the revocation of the court ruling on Friday Roe against Wade and the right to abortion and on Thursday by reducing restrictions on gun ownership, conservative activists have been hit by a wave of celebrations amid growing hopes of regaining the House and Senate this fall.
Hundreds gathered in front of the Supreme Court on Friday when the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v Wade was announced. (Video: Jorge Ribas, Hadley Green, Erin Patrick O’Connor / The Washington Post, Photo: Matt McClain / The Washington Post)
“They are not planted and harvested at the same time. And this has been a long process. The fruit of yesterday has long since arrived, “said Tony Perkins, chairman of the Christian Research Council, a Christian conservative group.” There were times when I didn’t even think we would get to this point. “
Meanwhile, the Liberals have become increasingly concerned that they will lose the opportunity to fully capitalize on control of both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, a unified power situation that only occurred after the 1992 and 2008 elections. Leaders of both parties expect a takeover of the House by Republicans in the midterm elections.
For the Conservative movement, liberal frustration is their own victory.
“I do not see what permanent structures the Democrats created in their first two years. Obamacare was a permanent structure, “said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, about Biden’s presidency.” They forgot, they didn’t focus on the fact that the New Deal was passed when they were almost 80. two percent majority in both houses. In 1964, after Goldwater lost, about 70 percent of the House and Senate were Democrats and you approved the Big Society. “
At the root of the Democratic struggles is the tenuous nature of Biden’s victory in the 2020 election cycle. Although he defeated President Donald Trump, Republicans nonetheless won a net gain of 14 seats in the House and reversed the New Hampshire state legislature. Republicans now control both the House and Senate in 30 states, compared to 17 states with democratic control, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The 50 senators who caucus with the Democrats have been fighting since Biden took office to unite around his agenda.
“With Biden, the slimest majority in the House only surpassed by the slimest majority in the Senate is a difficult playing field,” said Jim Kessler, a Democratic strategist for Third Way, on the disconnect between conservative success and frustration. liberal. “Republicans have had a 50-year plan to win the long game and Democrats have worked hard to win the next round.”
The Democrats ’lack of progress has led to petitions for action in the Senate over the coming months, before the midterm legislatures give Republicans a chance to shape Biden’s agenda. But a specific agenda, as negotiations continue with resilient senators like Joe Manchin III (DW.Va.), remains elusive.
“We can’t just say,‘ Woe is me. This is how world events will go, ‘said Ro Rohan (D-Calif.), A member of the Progressive Caucus of Congress. “We can be bolder. We can have more energy. We can do things that are out of the box. This is not the time for institutionalism or incrementalism.”
Biden’s political allies dispute the idea that the first months of his presidency were a political disappointment, pointing to frustrations similar to those dealt with by Republicans during the early years of Trump’s presidency, when Republicans had full control but they could not repeal Obamacare.
They focus on the ambitions he has achieved, including several executive actions, along with new bipartisan laws on infrastructure and arms security and the approval early last year of the U.S. bailout plan, which flooded states with funding. at the end of the pandemic and offered stimulus payments to most Americans.
“As the Conservatives celebrate partisan Supreme Court decisions that are completely out of step with the wishes and needs of the American people, I am clear that the Biden-Harris administration will continue to meet the president’s goals.” Danielle Melfi, executive director of Building Back Together, a nonprofit group that supports Biden’s agenda, said in a statement.
He described the president as “focused on the laser to better rebuild the pandemic, including initiating a historic economic recovery, making generational investments in communities across the country and restoring the global position of the United States.”
But this approach has done little to protect liberal activists fighting conservative efforts in states. Strategists for the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest advocacy group for gay, lesbian, and transgender Americans, have been fighting a wave of legislation to change the curriculum, to avoid classroom discussion about it. sexual orientation and prohibiting transgender men from competing in sports at the state level. .
“We have seen how these state legislatures are being blocked through these anti-LGBT bills, especially the anti-trans bills,” said Sarah Warbelow, legal director of the Human Rights Campaign. “The taste of the day has changed from year to year as conservatives try to figure out how to penalize the LGBT community.”
At the same time, despite Biden’s administrative action that has enshrined new protections for the LGBT community, efforts to pass the Equality Act, a top priority of the Biden administration that would enshrine new federal protections for gays and lesbians, have failed to move forward. in the U.S. Senate.
Teacher unions, a key part of the Democratic coalition, have also been fighting a wave of conservative legislation aimed at reducing what educators can teach in class and the curriculum they can use. They include new state laws that prevent teachers from talking about sexual orientation in younger courses and reduce the way race is taught.
“They are diverting public schools from their basic mission of educating children and they are just trying to create more anger,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. He said he expects the pendulum to swing back in the coming months as parents work to connect with teachers and more moderate leaders win school committee elections.
“The only topic we also need to be very clear about is, frankly, any conversation about sex issues in schools; it has to be age-appropriate, “he said.” Sensitive topics like race and gender should always be taught in an age-appropriate way. “
Even if Democrats exceed expectations this fall, there are few expectations that can do much to expand their elected power. Arizona and Georgia are the only states with Republican control of the legislature where the GOP runs a serious risk of losing gubernatorial elections in November. At the same time, Republicans have a way to gain trifect control of the governor’s mansions and legislatures in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
This will set another presidential election in 2024, where the country will once again be tightly divided. Even if Democrats win, they are likely to find themselves in a similar situation, with a conservative majority in the Supreme Court and Republican rule in many states. Democrats have been looking for new strategies to change the country’s political dynamics, including possible structural changes in the Supreme Court, an approach Biden has ruled out so far.
“My main criticism at the federal level with Biden was that he was too slow to use what he really controlled in the executive branch to explain what was wrong with the country and what he could do to fix it,” Jeff Hauser said. , a liberal activist with the Revolving Door Project, a group that oversees federal nominees. “By constantly acting as if we are one step away from returning to normalcy in American politics, Biden continues to downplay the crisis in that country.”