Democrats Need to Take Back America’s Story from Trumpier Republicans

Trump has defined the prevailing political narrative; Democrats need to change that

Democrats have allowed Donald Trump to define the United States, and today the entire world is paying the price. Others are complicit, including Republicans, some in the media and an increasing number of businesses and other institutions. It is the Democrats, though, who have had the spotlight and the platforms. They have failed.

Trump was allowed to define his first four years in office as an economic juggernaut. In fact, when he left office in 2021, the economy was in tatters. Some 3 million jobs were lost during his first term, the worst record since Herbert Hoover. The economy grew at a dismal average annual rate of little more than 1%.

Trump advocates say the president can’t be held accountable for the economic collapse during the pandemic. That’s nonsense. Trump ignored warnings from the outgoing Obama Administration and even from his own team that pandemic readiness should be a priority. Trump’s mismanagement can be traced directly to not having a national action plan or a store of needed supplies when the pandemic hit. Presidents don’t get a pass on crises; crises define many presidencies. No president, other than Trump, is judged on best three-of-four years.

Democrats, though, let Trump’s narrative become reality throughout President Biden’s four years. Instead of touting the benefits of long overdue investments in infrastructure and technology, including record job creation and strong wage increases, Democrats defended something called “Bidenomics,” seemed oblivious to the struggles of working families and kept calling out Trump as a threat to democracy when too many Americans felt threatened by both the tangible and illusory impacts of rising grocery prices, immigration and the erosion of traditional values.

Today, the prevailing public opinion has been shaped by Trump. He justifies tariffs by claiming the U.S. is a manufacturing wasteland. In fact, it is the world’s second largest manufacturing country; its output is more than twice that of the third-place country.

How about energy? Trump promises to unleash oil and gas producers to make the U.S. energy independent. That’s great, but we have been there a long time. The U.S. in Biden’s term became the largest producer of energy, including sustainable energy, in the world.

That bloated federal government that Trump claims to be cutting? So far, the spending reductions mostly are overstated if not flat-out wrong. Sure, there is waste and fraud and it should be rooted out and eliminated. Trump and Republicans, though, are doing more to add to deficits, undermine critical programs, including Social Security and veterans’ health care, than they are to making government more effective.

Democrats need to stop treating Trump as if he is an anomaly in an otherwise normal political party. Republicans aren’t Making America Great Again so stop calling them MAGA.They are making America Trumpier - a philosophy that celebrates the rich at the expense of the poor, that rejects shared values and common decency and seeks to emulate the world’s autocrats.

Trump is the Republican Party, Republicans are Donald Trump. Don’t pretend that an occasional show of backbone by one or two Republicans is a sign of Trump’s grip weakening. It’s not. This is the Republican economy and they have given the power to Trump to run it into the ground.

How can Democrats change the narrative?

Start advertising right now. Yes, it’s expensive, but Democrats in Wisconsin and elsewhere have shown they can raise the money. There will be blowback. Political advertising is annoying and will turn off some people, but it’s the best way to break through the clutter of a media environment dominated by Trump. Show real people - farmers, the elderly, Main Street businesses, veterans and others - who are suffering because of Republican policies. Make the pain real, compelling and Trumpier Republican. Cut through the clutter created by propaganda and noise and create a new, more honest narrative of America.

Advertising needs a message and Democrats need an agenda. They need a simple, understandable set of policies that address the immediate challenge and put people first. Some suggestions:

Support tax cuts for working families, but oppose the Trumpier Republican tax bill. What’s the difference? The 2017 tax bill and the proposed 2025 extension encourage corporate profits to be spent on stock buybacks and dividends, not on research and job creation. Look at the fossil fuel industry. In a moment of candor following the 2017 tax bill, the U.S. Oil and Gas Association justified using profits for stock buybacks and dividends by saying, “At some point companies may run out of opportunities with growth potential to justify deploying profits.” Well, okay, but if if the industry has run out of development opportunities, why does it need so many tax subsidies? How about using some profits to reduce prices at the pump?

Democrats should be the party of economic innovation. A Trumpier America uses tariffs that will only serve to increase consumer costs by thousands of dollars. Tariffs don’t create well-paying manufacturing jobs. America should be the manufacturer of tomorrow, creating innovations in technology, health care, energy and other fields that truly put America first. You know what that takes? Investments in research and education, exactly the spending Trump and his chainsaw partner Elon Musk are eliminating from the federal budget. Does anyone really think the U.S. is going to create sustainable jobs by producing more low-value widgets when our competitors are creating high-quality, low-cost electric vehicles, to cite one example?

Trump’s tariffs are his admission that he doesn’t think American workers are smart enough to compete with the world. Democrats should be the voice of disagreement.

Democrats also need to be the party of more efficient and effective government. There are too many barriers to development and job creation. The U.S. can streamline regulations without compromising the environment, worker safety or other important values. One place to start is housing. Any developer knows how to build high-quality, safe homes at lower costs by getting rid of unnecessary red tape. Democrats should trust the talent and skill of American workers and the integrity and ingenuity of home builders and other developers.

Certainly, Democratic lawmakers need to hold Republicans accountable in Congress and in the courts. They need to safeguard rights Trump is eroding in the states where they have influence. Democrats are a minority party in the states, but they aren’t insignificant. Twenty-three of the nation’s governors and 22 of the attorneys general are Democrats. Democrats have a majority in 38 of the nation’s legislative chambers. Individual Americans, Democrats, independents and disaffected Republicans, need to make their voices heard, calling their elected representatives, letting the institutions caving to Trump know their actions aren’t supported and sharing their opinions with their families and networks.

All these actions will be far more effective if they are under a common umbrella, a shared story of a country coming apart at the seams, but one still built on hope. Democrats can lead in mending the fabric of our society, but they first must show that Trumpier Republicans have created a world that exists only for the very wealthy and well-connected. Democrats need to tell the real story.