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The
Democratic Party is in crisis as to what it will do to defend itself
as it is being surrounded by its Republican opponents. Its positions
are being overrun in public education, politics, and any priorities
pro-education proponents have proposed are being summarily dismissed.
Sadly, Democrats seem focused on intra-party infighting.
President
Biden’s Build
Back Better
bill is omitting programs to update and upgrade schools in
communities serving the most economically distressed communities
where COVID-19 is spiraling out of control. The programs for
universal school meals are under Republican assault even as food
insecurity is rapidly increasing among low-income students.
Teachers
are under increasing stress as Republican-aligned local parent and
anti-pandemic groups are storming school board meetings demanding the
abandonment or non-implementation of mitigation protocols—masking
and social distancing. Democrats are largely paying lip service to
these stark challenges and are off in an alternate political reality.
Efforts
to address the immigration status of Dreamers/DACA beneficiaries are
being sidelined at the Congressional level as Republican attacks on
all aspects of immigration are escalating. Democrats are devoting
their political energies to pitched battles over the $3.5 trillion
social safety net bill which they are waylaying internally.
House
Democratic progressives are wrestling with Democratic centrists when
everyone is aware that neither group has the votes to pass anything.
For now, Republicans are staying on the sidelines watching the
Democrats self-immolate. Although they are the minority party by
slim margins in the House and Senate, Republicans are operating as if
they have majority status.
School
choice is on a steady march to success in gaining more adherents and
state and federal government funding, and Democrats have taken their
eyes off the Congressional redistricting battles while Republicans
have the upper hand as they control most state legislatures.
Democrats have advanced no plan to fight back.
What
is most laughable about these matters is that the Democrats have
swiftly declining opportunities to maintain their Congressional
majorities, especially if they continue to alienate one of the most
loyal components of their political base, K-12 teachers who have long
been their loyal supporters and brought organization and money to the
races.
Teachers
have long been the linchpins in Democratic victories at the local,
state, and federal levels and are essential to turning out Democratic
base voters in close elections such as those which occurred in
Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, and Georgia in 2020. Given the
Republicans’ lockstep unity as we head into the 2022 midterms
and their continuing passage of voter suppression legislation at the
state level, they are on a glide path to taking control of the
federal government.
Some
of the questions are: Why are the Democrats so politically
disorganized at this critical juncture? Why are the House Democrats
pushing all their political chips (the bipartisan infrastructure bill
and the reconciliation bill) to the middle of the political table
when they do not have the votes among their Democratic Senate
colleagues?
While
Democrats fixate on these important issues, is there any room for
compromise as Republicans appear to be waiting for these Democratic
initiatives to fail so they can then blame Democrats for being unable
to deliver the political goods to their own voters. The Republican
plan is to use this defeat as a campaign strategy to depress
Democratic turnout during the midterms and propel themselves to
majority status.
The
Democrats need to fight back and advance multifaceted tactics if they
hope to retain power at the federal level and to expand power at the
state level. The question is: Will they fight for public education
or anything else? They appear to be stuck in place fighting each
other even as they have national opinion on their side.
As
Republicans have advanced a consistent message against Democratic
spending, starting with President Biden's Rescue
Act,
his signal political achievement to date which attempts to arrest the
COVID-19 pandemic and related social and economic challenges. Polls
have shown that this Act
and the proposed infrastructure and reconciliation bills have broad
support. Democrats need to leverage this reality.
Republican
field operatives acknowledge this as they are attacking Democrats at
the local level over their spending. This presents Democrats with a
bipartisan unifying opportunity to enhance their message and to push
back aggressively against their Republican opponents.
Moreover,
the most recent national Yahoo News/YouGov poll reveals that
Americans, by a 16 point margin, believe that they are better off
with Biden in charge of the pandemic than they would have been under
Trump. They also give Democrats higher marks on COVID-19 leadership
than they do Republicans, particularly in red states.
These
are critically important findings as Republicans intensify their
culture wars--forbidding teachers to teach about race in public
school classrooms, "born alive" bills to highlight
late-term abortion and overturn Roe
v. Wade,
and pandemic mitigation. Democrats need to counter these cultural
issues forcefully.
Fighting
for public education remains a potent Democratic issue if they choose
to use it as battering rams against Republican mendacity.
Funding
for free community college attendance is also an advocacy plus for
Democrats to use for a bipartisan focus and win over Republicans and
Independents. What is most important is that they need to fight for
something!
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