#BTColumn – Third time’s the charm

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by this author are their own and do not represent the official position of the Barbados Today.

by Dominic Hewitt and Arlington Kenneth

As America awaits the peaceful transition of presidential power, Bill Clinton now shares the allusion of ‘comeback kid’ with ‘folksy Joe.’

In his third bid, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., the 47th Vice President of the United States, prepares to become the 46th President. Not since 2000 has such drama unfolded around the White House. This is not as much a reference to the Supreme Court settling of Bush v. Gore, but to the cliffhanger of the Season One finale of “The West Wing.” The latter seems more apt as this most recent reality show is all over bar the shouting, literally.

While there are many notable outcomes of the election, one thing it emphatically wasn’t was the watershed moment that half of America, and much of the rest of the world, hoped for. It wasn’t a moment of redemption through the cathartic rejection of Trump and Trumpism. Although he was a polarizing figure within a penchant for xenophobia, racism, and misogyny, the closeness of the race and the fact that this time Trump garnered even more votes that Obama did in 2008, means you cannot write him off as an aberration.

Overall, the 2020 election bears a striking resemblance to the preceding one that took many by surprise. The anticipation that this would have been a decisively different election reflects the very human but very illogical triumph of hope over experience.

The rise of Trumpism and the ‘far right’ is America is symptomatic of a global phenomenon. The far right holds power in three of the five most populous countries in the world – Brazil, India, and the United States.

Their platform is a combination of a xenophobic form of nationalism ‘build the wall’, authoritarianism focused on law and order issues ‘lock her up’, and populism – a belief that elites are corrupt, ‘drain the swamp’.

Fuelled by economic anxiety -‘Make America Great Again’ – and populist media sources ‘not Fake News @CNN & MSDNC but great alternatives like @OANN and @FoxNews,’ the far right is dominant in countries like Britain, Hungary, the Philippines, Russia, and Turkey, whose voice is often centered on a charismatic leader. The triumph of Brexit and Boris Johnson is a case in point.

Trump’s repeated remarkable performance at the polls was driven by those many millions of voters who believe that the economy is the more important issue; more so than the coronavirus pandemic, racial inequality, law and order, or any other challenges facing the nation.

While Democrats held that the COVID-19 pandemic was the main issue, large numbers of white working-class voters, particularly in the rust belt and upper-Midwest states, disagreed. They voted for Trump again because they still felt ignored, their jobs vanishing and communities decimated, and they believe the Democrats no longer speak for them. Instructively, Trump won the support of 20 per cent of Black males and Latinos in South Florida.

While the COVID-19 pandemic clearly helped Biden, Trump’s formidability as a campaigner helped him turn it to his advantage. His brush with the virus seemed to invigorate him for a strong run in the final leg of the race.

Outrageously reckless and irresponsible in public health terms, his rallies were brilliant politically, conveying fallacious hope to millions wanting life to get back to normal. The visceral power of Trumpism means that it will endure regardless of whether Trump seeks re-election in 2024 or not. The cure
to America’s problems is varied and complex, and just as a vaccine won’t end COVID-19, Trump’s defeat shan’t bring about an end to Trumpism.

The Democratic establishment has to prove itself politically capable of meeting tomorrow’s challenges, particularly as the Biden presidency could be held hostage by a potentially hostile Senate and Supreme Court. Failure to win a Senate majority will block much needed reforms and allow Republicans to gerrymander further an already fatally compromised electoral system and, come midterms, tap into people’s disillusionment with what could be another Washington deadlock.

Having spent five decades trying to split the difference between the Democrats’ progressive and moderate camps, the President-elect will need to bridge the political chasm that Trumpism has created. He will need to win over many new converts to the Delaware Way, a consensus-building approach where politicians of both parties, as well as private business and interest groups, work together for the greater good.

Biden’s first test will be to unite the Democratic Party’s big tent. As the President-elect prepares his transition to the White House, Congressional Democrats are trying to comprehend their unexpected losses. Republicans secured a net gain of seats in the House, and Democrats have an uphill battle to take control of the Senate through the two Georgia runoffs in January.

“Something went wrong here across the entire political world,” said Rep. Cheri Bustos, D-Ill., the chair of the House Democrats Campaign Committee. She nearly lost her race. Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., was blunt about the results. “From a congressional standpoint, it was a failure… We have to commit to not saying the words ‘defund the police’ ever again… We have to not use the words ‘socialist’ or ‘socialism’ ever again.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi disputed Spanberger’s characterization of ‘failure’ noting that Democrats kept the House. “We did not win every battle, but we did win the war.”

However, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., seminal to Biden’s comeback, warned that rhetoric could cost them their last remaining shot at the Senate majority. “We have to focus on Georgia for the next several weeks,” he said, and if Democrats “are going to run on Medicare for All, defund the police, socialized medicine, we’re not going to win.”

While appreciating the view of moderates it is important to realise that, inspired by Bernie Sanders, young people voted overwhelmingly Democratic.

If there were a 50-50 Senate split, Vice President Kamala Harris’s honeymoon as the first female President of the Senate would be short-lived. She will need to employ all her consensus-building skills to support Chuck Schumer, as majority leader, to broker deals with Mitch McConnell. Democrats would also need to ensure buy-in from potential rogue Democrats like Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema and win over outlying Republicans such as Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski.

Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable – the art of the next best. Americans proved that democracy is alive and working and that the peoples’ voices count; that they are not statistical models but active agents of hope and change.

In this regard, we need to recognise that George Floyd’s death was pivotal as the Black Lives Matter movement and Black Americans played a crucial role in the election outcome.

The Democratic Party’s nomination of the first Black woman for national office was neither unrecognised nor unrewarded. Black women were Biden’s most loyal bloc with 91 per cent support. They were also on the front lines of the election, working to ensure that all eligible voters had their voices heard. None was more instrumental than Stacey Abrams. If there’s one person singularly responsible, it is her. She literally wrote the playbook for Democrats in the state – The Strategy and Path to Victory in 2020.

Going forward Democrats must replicate the Abrams playbook, possibly giving her a secretaryship. They must also ensure they understand and are responsive to the diversity within the Black and Latino communities. The Trump campaign successfully micro-targeted different groups of Latino voters in South Florida.

Noteworthy also was that Mississippi voters sent a message to the world that they are moving forward. A new Mississippi flag flies over the State Capitol after a majority of voters approved the design that has a magnolia encircled by stars and the phrase “In God We Trust.” In June, Mississippi legislators retired the 126-year-old state flag, the last to include the Confederate battle emblem, a visual reminder of Mississippi’s racist history.

The US electorate returned the first transgender state senator and its first Black gay congressman – but also its first lawmaker to have openly supported the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory. Sarah McBride’s victory in Delaware makes her the highest-ranking Trans official. When she addressed Democrats in 2016, McBride became the first Trans person to speak at a major political convention.

Democrat Ritchie Torres, 32, a New York City councillor, will be the first Afro-Latino gay member of the US Congress after comfortably capturing New York’s 15th district. Mondaire Jones, the Black gay congressman for New York’s 17th district, follows Torres into the House. All four members of the progressive “Squad” of Democratic congresswomen of colour – Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib – were comfortably re-elected.

In a democracy, individuals not only enjoy the ultimate power but also carry the ultimate responsibility. Let’s hope that in moving forward Americans hold to E Pluribus Unum and bury the political hatchet, seeking common ground to shape and advance the ‘land of the free.’ Oh Happy Day!

Dominic Hewitt is passionate about politics and aspires to be a political commentator. London-based, he is pursuing graduate and professional studies in law. Arlington Kenneth is trained in political sociology.