Former Party Committee Chairs: House Dems are in trouble
National Journal spoke to former NRCC and DCCC Chairs about the upcoming midterms.
Bottom line: House Democrats are in deep trouble.
In case you missed it…
How do you know a majority is in jeopardy?
National Journal
Kirk Bado
September 23, 2021
https://www.nationaljournal.com/s/715026/how-do-you-know-a-majority-is-in-jeopardy/
Democrats hoped that President Biden’s stabilizing governing would overcome the historical midterm difficulties that have plagued the party of first-term presidents. But eight months into the new administration, Biden is grappling with a still-raging pandemic, the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, and an ambitious domestic agenda limping through an intraparty battlefield in the House.
For some veteran campaign operatives, the current political environment bears a resemblance to previous precursors to power changing hands in the House over the last decade.
“I think it’s really hard to see Democrats holding the House in the midterms, and it’s going to be the same thing I went through, except you just change ‘R’ for’ D,’” said former Rep. Steve Stivers, the National Republican Congressional Committee chairman during the 2018 cycle, which saw Democrats gain a net total of 41 seats. “The question isn’t whether Democrats will be in the minority after the ’22 cycle, it’s how deep will their minority be?”
Midterms typically serve as a referendum on the party of the president. In late July, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Sean Patrick Maloney warned members in a closed-door meeting that if the midterms were held today, they would lose the House thanks to the darkening national environment. Stivers and other former campaign chairs and strategists who spoke with National Journal cited struggles with fundraising, candidate recruitment, and retirements as telltale signs of an imperiled majority.
Not-so-friendly territory
A little more than a year removed from the midterms, Biden’s approval is sitting at 46 percent, while 49 percent of Americans disapprove of his performance, according to FiveThirtyEight’s polling average. At similar times in both their first terms, then-Presidents Trump and Obama polled at 39 percent and 53 percent approval, respectively. Both lost dozens of seats in the midterms. Presidents with job-approval ratings below 50 percent have seen their party lose 37 House seats on average, according to a recent study from Gallup. Next year, Democrats can afford to lose only five to keep control of the House.
“We had a narrow majority and an unpopular president going into a midterm,” Stivers said of 2018. “Tradition is that if the president’s approval rating is below 50 percent, then his party will lose seats in the midterm.”
Democrats are optimistic that despite COVID-19 cases rising, voters will reward Biden for his attempts to return life to as close to pre-pandemic normal as possible, including his emphasis on vaccine distribution. To that end, the DCCC has begun to place the blame on Republicans for encouraging vaccine hesitancy. The question now is whether Democrats can successfully shift the blame in voters’ eyes.
“If Americans have the sense that the worst of the pandemic is behind them and the economy is rebounding, and President Biden makes the case that a Democratic Congress is essential to continue continuing those trends, then I believe Democrats can pick up seats in the House and Senate,” said Steve Israel, who was the chairman of DCCC in the Republican wave of 2010. “If things go south, obviously, there will be a more traditional midterm election where the president’s party loses seats.”
Off-season
The volume of congressional retirements and the fluctuation of campaign fundraising hauls are the tried-and-true tea leaves for measuring party enthusiasm. But the decennial redistricting cycle this year has complicated that calculus.
The current pace of House retirements is slightly behind the rate from this point in the 2018 cycle, when dozens of Republicans opted out of running for reelection when the political winds seemed to be turning against them. Congressional retirements are projected to pick up sharply in the next few months as states finalize redistricting plans. Once-safe representatives might call it a career rather than deal with a tougher than expected election, regardless of which party they think will wield the gavel in 2022.
While the pace has been slow this year, the quality of the House retirements could say more than the quantity at this stage. Two Democrats who represent districts that Trump carried have already announced plans not to run for reelection.
Complicating matters further, Democrats have struggled to recruit replacements across the map. The party lacks strong contenders for key opportunities in Florida, and only one of the 13 Democratic freshmen who lost last year has launched a rematch. Meanwhile, 11 of the 21 GOP candidates who came within 6 points of winning last year are running again, according to The Cook Political Report with Amy Walter. The party’s few offensive opportunities are dwindling even further thanks to proposed Republican-friendly congressional maps.
“Your candidate recruitment says a lot because you have to have somebody that’s better than the guy in the office now,” said Rep. Pete Sessions, the former NRCC chairman who delivered “a shellacking” to Obama and congressional Democrats in 2010.
Fundraising is a bright spot for the Democrats. The DCCC outraised the NRCC in August, and the 32 “Frontliners”—Democratic incumbents whom the DCCC views as vulnerable—raised an average of $722,000 and reported an average of $2.1 million in cash on hand, according to July fundraising reports.
Hail Mary pass
Outside of the typical campaign blocking and tackling of recruitment and fundraising, Democrats find themselves now between a rock and a hard place in terms of passing legislation. Negotiations have stalled in the House over the Biden administration’s domestic agenda, which they had hoped would be a powerful tool on the campaign trail next year.
“Failure is a disgrace, but success opens up a multitude of avenues for attacks from Republicans,” Rutgers University political science professor Ross Baker said.
Republican groups like the American Action Network are seizing on the minutiae of the Democrats’ massive $3.5 trillion reconciliation package in a campaign hammering vulnerable Democrats across the map. The PAC’s ads highlight the impact the budget would have on raising the global minimum tax, inflation, and the energy industry.
“[John] Boehner once said, ‘Don’t ever get in front of somebody who wants to commit suicide.’ I say they’re running to put that noose around their head by spending $3.5 trillion on reconciliation,” Sessions said.
Baker, who has studied Congress for more than 40 years, theorized that Democrats could be cramming because they realize they might not get another chance to legislate after the midterms.
“It’s a let’s-get-this-done-and-we’ll-live-with-the-consequences moment,” Baker said. “It’s a great leap into the unknown, and the hope is that it will be a landmark piece of legislation that will be durable. But some of the benefits will be felt very much in the future, and the results won’t be obvious for years.”
This approach is reminiscent of the 2010 cycle, when Democrats muscled through the Affordable Care Act, only to lose 63 seats thanks in part to Republican attacks on the health care law. It was not until the 2018 elections, when the ACA had become an entrenched—and popular—entitlement, that Democrats properly championed the legislation and flipped the House.
Democrats are hoping that health care will deliver them the majority again this year. They are expressing confidence that the recently passed abortion restrictions in Texas will galvanize suburban voters in the same manner that fueled their majority in 2018. But with more than a year until voters head to the polls, anything can happen.
“Whatever you think the issues are today, tomorrow, February, next year, check back in in August,” cautioned former Rep. Greg Walden, the NRCC chairman who maintained Republicans’ majority in 2014 and 2016. “That’s when something will pop up.”