Lame Duck Session Will Reveal Priorities for Both Parties
President Elect Joe Biden ran an unorthodox ‘duck and weave’ campaign to win the presidency. He successfully moved between the basement of his Delaware home and staged press events where he was careful not to answer questions and the media were careful not to ask questions.
The Biden-Harris ticket never came clean on its true positions on fracking, the Green New Deal, defunding the police, court packing, taxes, Medicare-for-All, and myriad other issues. The media gave the Democrats a ‘hall pass’ on vetting. Remember all that news coverage and investigative journalism over the Hunter Biden scandal? No, of course not because there was no thorough scrutiny of the Biden-Harris ticket from the mainstream media. On the contrary, the former vice president was protected, even promoted, by a propagandist media set on defeating Donald Trump.
Joe Biden might be the most familiar, yet least vetted candidate ever to win the Oval Office. According to a poll published by the Media Research Center, the media’s censorship of negative news about President Elect Joe Biden and positive stories about President Donald Trump smay have cost Trump the election.
However, now it is time to govern; albeit lame-duck style. The 116th Congress is back in session and how it proceeds — what legislation and priorities make it through the lame duck session — will tell the American people exactly where the parties stand. On additional COVID relief, the Democrats — led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer — are promoting an ideological agenda focused on bailouts for their cronies in poorly run blue states and cities. Republicans are focused on getting relief to families, working Americans, and small businesses being crushed by COVID-19 lockdowns. Negotiations are ongoing and the framework for a deal is fragile.
Republicans are pushing for another round of direct stimulus checks, but Democrats are demanding a ‘state and government bailout’ approach. Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) has argued that direct payments should be the cornerstone of any package, and Senate Majority Whip John Thune (R-SD) has indicated a bailout for state and local governments could preclude direct payments from a final legislative relief package.
The post-November Republican party is younger, more diverse, and working class. The GOP’s future is founded on a multi-generational, multi-ethnic, working-families coalition and populist ethos. In contrast, the new Democratic party is increasingly defined by identity politics, cancel culture, and the ‘Bigs’ — i.e., Big Government, Big Labor, Big-Tech, Big Media, Big Hollywood, Big Academia, and Big Business. This new party belongs to the likes of New York Democratic Socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, while the GOP is the party of small businesses and working families.
Recently, Josh Hammer offered clarity on the new reality of our political parties in the New York Post:
The reality, of course, is that today’s Democratic Party disproportionately represents the college-educated elite — purveyors of the addlebrained “woke” catechism, dispensers of New Green Deal, bottom-to-top redistributionist nonsense.
Meanwhile, it is the Republican Party that disproportionately represents a multiethnic, non-college-educated working class — the Rust Belt and Sun Belt “deplorables” of Hillary Clinton’s ire who, per Barack Obama, still cling desperately to their guns and religion.
The debate over the economic stimulus package is indicative of where the parties find themselves moving into 2021. The GOP is fighting for direct stimulus to American workers, and a group of Republican members are urging House and Senate leaders to include remedies for at-risk multiemployer pension plans in the forthcoming COVID relief legislation.
In a letter sent to Congressional colleagues, Representative Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and a number of House Republicans, including Reps. Tom Emmer (R-MN) and Anthony Gonzalez (R-OH), request a fix for multiemployer pensions at risk of insolvency. These pension plans are threatened by significant funding shortfalls, putting the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) on a fast path towards insolvency — a problem made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. The letter advocates for a solution that would save retirees from losing their pensions. Specifically, these Republican Members are requesting that a COVID-19 relief package include “a solution for multiemployer pensions at risk of insolvency.”
Even before the November Elections, Republican strategists Scott Reed and Matt Rhoades, wrote in RealClearPolitics, “Senate Republicans need to take the lead on an issue that impacts millions of retirees, businesses teetering on bankruptcy, and the economy as a whole. Right now, there is a crisis in the solvency of multi-employer pensions that fund the retirement of America’s truckers, retail employees, miners, manufacturers and service industry employees.” Unfortunately, like most important issues in Washington, D.C., the PBGC crisis was kicked down the road to the lame-duck. Now what was an ‘important’ policy challenge needing repair has become an ‘urgent’ crisis.
A COVID relief package that includes direct stimulus to working families while saving pension plans is good for working-class Americans. Helping American families and retirees is smart politics and good policy.
Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, however, by winning the largest share of non-white voters of any Republican since 1960 — most importantly working-class Latinos. Trump has turned the political landscape on its head. Republicans are the party of Main Street while the Democrats are the party of Wall Street.
Main Street needs stimulus relief and pension protection. The Republicans have precious little time to get it done in this Congress.
Jerry Rogers is the founder of Capitol Allies and the host of “The Jerry Rogers Show” on WBAL NewsRadio. Twitter: @JerryRogersShow.
