I was going to post a comment to the thread of my previous post on this subject, but it started to get too unwieldy as a comment. I want to clarify a key point of my thinking on the Democrats’ shutdown strategy.
It all starts with this: I do not believe that there is any real chance for the Democrats to get what they want on healthcare. This is not a moment in which, this time, finally, the hostage-taking minority party is going to get what it wants. As such, this was never, in my mind, an opportunity to get the healthcare-related concession they are seeking; it was an opportunity to try and get the public to look at how the Trump administration has been usurping Congress’s authority and to highlight similar things.
Even that, by the way, is a Hail Mary in my mind.
Maybe I am forgetting something, and I would be happy to be corrected, but I cannot think of a time that the party that caused the shutdown was able to come anywhere near what they demanded, or even get what might be considered a major concession. There are, if I recall correctly, some occasional fig-leafs of concession, but nothing more.
That history, therefore, raises the question of what a shutdown is even useful for, and is the core of why I am not in favor of the tactic. I understand the logic that it gives the appearance of some kind of power to the minority. But the reality is, it always basically ends the same way, with the party that caused the shutdown to get little to nothing and to shoulder the blame, all the while losing some political capital as a result.
Put another way: those whose actions lead to the shutdown never get what they want and end up losing ground with the public.
As such, I would truly be shocked if the Democrats get real concessions on the healthcare issue.
That means that the only argument for really engaging this way is to try, with some degree of desperation, I would note, to get the public to look at the abnormal politics of the Trump administration.
And the reason I find the healthcare issue to be too mundane for this is that it is normal for Democrats to argue in favor of healthcare spending, and it is normal for Republicans to seek to cut it. But what the country needs is to understand how abnormal Trump is.
Further, I would note, the Republicans already cut healthcare expenditures, so in terms of a Democratic campaign issue, it already exists. The shutdown itself does not create that issue for the Dems to use; they already have it.
While this shutdown may draw more attention to those already existing cuts, the pain was coming no matter what, and, therefore, the ability of Democrats to campaign on it would have come about in due course.
So, my reasoning goes like this.
- There is no reasonable expectation that this shutdown will lead to the healthcare cuts being restored.
- Democrats already had those cuts as a campaign item.
- So, if you are going to engage in a shutdown, with a number of possible negatives being risked to include Trump using the shutdown to just close things he doesn’t like at a faster rate, you had better have some reason beyond normal-sounding politics as your more prominent message.
Schumer going on about bipartisanship and pointing to healthcare cuts doesn’t, in my mind, cut it.
This is a moment to get the public’s attention and try to get them to focus on Trump’s power grabs, not engage in political moves that could have time-traveled from a decade or two ago.
But please, for the sake of clarity, understand: the Dems will not be able to leverage the restoration of these cuts. If they do, it will be remarkable, and I will be happy to be wrong. At best, they may get a promise to hold a vote on something on the subject in the future (you know, in a Congress they don’t control, so we know how that will go).
So, the issue to me is not whether healthcare is important; it is. But in terms of outcomes, restoring the cuts is simply not on the table if history is any guide whatsoever (not to mention the current power dynamics in DC).
Really, I would rather the Dems go all-in and say they won’t cooperate, period, because of an easily recited list of grievances against the Trump administration and force the Reps to change the rules in the Senate so that the party owns all of this completely.
Indeed, I think one of the problems with our politics in general is that the public has a hard time knowing where to assign blame. A shutdown helps confuse the question of responsibility even further.
Pretending like this is about healthcare, as important as that is, isn’t going to work and makes all of this likely pointless, in my estimation.
If the reality proves me wrong, so be it, but does anyone really have any reasons (not feelings, reasons) why this time is going to be different?
I would conclude with two other points that drive my thinking.
- The hypothesis that there are enough GOP members of Congress to be fearful enough about their constituents rebelling over healthcare that they would buck leadership has already been tested and found wanting, as they all voted for the BBB.
- The current GOP is far more interested in tearing things down (e.g., firing, not spending appropriations, downsizing, etc.), so why would they let a shutdown leverage them in a way that would result in more spending?
In short, history shows this tactic doesn’t accomplish much and tends to damage the party that gets blamed. Right now, the Reps are willing to open the government, and the Dems aren’t, so I would like to see a more unique usage of this tactic that fits the times, and I am not seeing that.
