WHY THIS ELECTION IS A WIN FOR DEMOCRATS, AND WE, IN FACT, HAD A ‘BLUE WAVE’
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN LEVEL21 IN 2018
A Blue Wave has broken Republican control of Congress; In response, Democrats reclaimed the House of Representatives for the first time since 2010. Armed with subpoena power, Democrats are now in a position to put a necessary check on President Trump, holding him accountable to both the law and the Constitution.
Even though midterm races favored Democratic candidates, some major Democratic letdowns were. Beto O'Rourke is coming up short in the surprisingly competitive Texas Senate race, and Dan McCready, who was running against Mark Harris, one of the pioneers for the HB2 bill (which has since been repealed are just a couple. On the other hand, November sixth saw several historic firsts, including a record-breaking number of millennial candidates running for office nationwide.
The preliminary results reveal "the 2018 results intensify the 2016 cleavages."
Republicans did well with the following:
Rural voters
White Southerner voters
Uneducated voters
Democrats won among:
City-dwellers
Minorities
College-educated white suburbanites
The results clarify that American politics is polarized on identity, not class or ideology. Mass immigration and changes to the country's traditional racial hierarchy are two critical issues that will come up in the next two years. Many people are deeply hostile to ideas such as mass immigration & abolishing the prison system. Political science suggests that such divides exist between Americans living in different places and socializing with others. It reminds me of the famous psychology debate: Nature versus Nurture. I'm pretty sure politics isn't in our DNA, but some of the same questions apply: Does our environment affect how our opinions/values/morals beliefs form? Can these opinions/values/moral beliefs change over time if your environment changes?
Democrats did better with the following:
White women than white men.
College-educated whites than non-college-educated whites.
Republicans did far better with the following:
Whites of all different backgrounds there than they did anywhere else in the country.
CNN's exit poll shows Democrats winning 90 percent of black voters, 69 percent of Latino voters, and 77 percent of Asian voters. In addition, Democrats won big with minorities and educated whites.
Democrats obtained control of the House for the first time in eight years and will be able to offer a check on Trump and his Republican Party's legislative agenda and pursue their legislative initiatives. Politico noted that the Democratic party now has subpoena power over the Trump administration with its House majority. It could demand documents and information that Trump has declined to share before, like his tax returns. This could likely present challenges for Trump, who has characterized the midterm results as successful3.
Republicans have had control of Congress for the first two years of Trump's Presidency and have greatly benefited him. There are still two years left in Trump's Term, and things may happen in the next two years that can't be predicted, and the House will want to look into it; there is no end to what the Democrats could look into. As Vox noted, the party already has 50 subpoena requests it plans to pursue in January. Nancy Pelosi indicated that, with Democrats having the House majority, they would endeavor to pass legislation related to strengthening gun control measures, creating protections for young, undocumented immigrants, and reducing drug prices, among other things, as CNBC described.
Democrats have already indicated a desire to investigate things such as:
Trump's finances
Trump's administration's policies
Trump's cabinet and its actions.
Trump's Russia Connections and the Mueller Probe
Subpoenas can't change policy, but they can help provide transparency around crucial policy decisions for a functioning democracy. In addition, warrants help create political pressure that could push the government to change some of its actions, and Democrats could also wield that power to encourage people to vote against Trump and other Republicans in 2020.
The 2018 midterms have already brought a wave of historic wins:
Jared Polis is the first openly gay man elected US governor.
Lou Leon Guerrero is the First woman governor of Guam.
Share David and Deb Haaland became the first Native American women elected to Congress.
Ayanna Pressley and Jahana Hayes were elected as the first black women to represent Massachusetts and Connecticut, respectively, in Congress.
Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib became the first Muslim women elected to federal office.
This Midterm Election has selected the most diverse slate ever in American history. According to The New York Times data, 411 women, people of color, and LGBTQ folks ran this time. To that end, LGBTQ people and women of color were chosen more openly than ever before in this election.
