My 2024 Address to Trump World (& Harris World):
How What You Hear on FOX News & Elsewhere Misses the National Big Picture
Feel free to check the entire blog archives from “Political Pulse” & “Salzillo Report” on the 2024 primary cycle, rural outreach, redistricting litigation, base dynamics, campaign organization, the current media landscape, the issues at stake, Project 2025, Build Back Better, the progressive movement, the true story about former 2024 VP contender Gina Raimondo, and much more.
Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, do you feel there are two parallel political universes? Do you feel your counterparts on the other side are totally out of touch with the rest of the country? If you feel that way, I wouldn’t blame you.
Watch MSNBC & Fox News on the same day, and you’ll feel you were seeing two entirely different countries. But which one is the right one?
Well, let’s take it step-by-step. Is inflation real? It sure is, even as the rate of inflation falls to a new low of 2.9% from the 9.1% high. But you know what is not real? The idea that price gouging and greedflation are “a fantasy,” as pro-Trump commentators on the mainstream media are saying today.
How do we know this? Because the CEO of Kroger recently admitted his company raised prices beyond the rate of inflation, all while his company seeks a merger with Albertsons. This is a merger that Biden’s Federal Trade Commission currently (and rightfully) opposes. Take it from Krogers’ own guy. He’s the one who said it, not me. Sure inflation was low in 2020 when everyone was stuck at home. Of course gas prices were low when no one was traveling anywhere at any time. Hardly something to be proud of when it came at the toll of around 1,000,000 dead Americans.
Do we have a crime problem? Technically speaking, there has always been a crime problem since most societies are not crimeless. But, if you look at the last 4 years, crime is down, not up. Crime went up—ironically—during the Trump-Pence Administration. The post-George Floyd riots across the country in all cities & all states? Happened on Trump’s watch. Not Biden’s. Talk about crime? It is Trump who has the 91 indictments all across the country, was found guilty on 34 of them in NYC, & was also found liable for sexual harassment & business fraud.
Immigration is a problem. It has been a problem for at least 30 years. And—even if we could not get everything done—something could have been done about it if Trump did not call Capitol Hill Republicans pressuring them to tank their own border security compromise, which they reached with Capitol Hill Democrats & the Biden White House.
The state of education? No question we have a long way to go. I have seen it even at the local level. But which president led the school to shut down in the first place? Who had to do the nationwide lockdowns in March of 2020 because they had been in denial about the pandemic before then? If memory serves me right, President Biden wasn’t even in office yet.
Energy? The United States has been producing record amounts of oil & gas today, pumping up 13.5 million barrels a day. Yet at the same time, we are making record investments in renewable energy & other cleaner energy sources. More energy production today than even in the Obama & Trump presidencies. This is remarkable because fossil fuels are not replenishing naturally at the same rate we are extracting it today. Something we need to keep in mind not just for the climate crisis, but for long term energy independence with renewable sources.
Is our military weak? Not at all. Afghanistan was tough, like it was from the very beginning. It could’ve been handled in much better ways. It was a setback, the foundation of which was laid during the Trump Administration. But it is still the mightiest force around. It supports Ukraine in its own defense against Russia & Trump’s favorite dictator, Vladimir Putin. It has supported the defense of Israel in the midst of unprecedented attacks from Iran. Most importantly, it is led by a Commander-in-Chief who realizes that our alliances and our commitment to core values are our strengths, not our weaknesses. Also, for good measure, our NATO alliances are stronger and more united than ever thanks to President Biden.
Sure, a lot of problems have come up on the watch of President Biden & Vice President Harris. Reacting to the problems—much like firefighters or police officers—is nowhere near as sexy as avoiding them entirely. But is it their fault for the challenges we face, whether it’s the division, the domestic issues, or even the foreign conflicts?
It is because of Trump that much of the country (whatever the number is) believes Biden isn’t even the legitimate President. Some tried to violently overturn the 2020 election because of that belief. People like Donald Trump & JD Vance caused the division in this country, not Joe Biden or Kamala Harris. Trump left our economy in tatters with the country still in lockdown mode and in the middle of a historic recession, not Biden. Washington DC was plagued with increased security measures and political tensions the day Trump left Pennsylvania Avenue after January 6. For all the trouble, Biden-Harris, unlike Trump-Pence, is handling much of it well with very little room to spare.
Take these examples of what Biden and Harris have been up against. One, the courts have overturned precedent after precedent and important work the Biden White House has tried doing, like on student debt relief. And two, to paraphrase the one & only GOP Grim Reaper (a.k.a. Mitch “Kill the Bill” McConnell), Congressional Republicans pledged from day one to stop the Build Back Better Agenda. If given a chance, they will surely do the same to the Harris White House “Forward” Vision should they have their way in 2024.
Does Harris have a vision? Obviously yes. It’s one thing to not like her vision, or even the 2024 DNC platform. But she has laid out concrete plans like a middle class tax cut, tackling unlawful price gouging, concrete affordable housing goals, small business grants, family & child tax credits, fair taxation, an entire public safety apparatus, and other policy rollouts to come. And Trump? He doesn’t exactly bring policy chops to the table. Slogans like “Drill, Baby Drill,” and weird lectures on bacon, sharks, and Hannibal Lector hardly appear to be the substance undecided voters want, or need.
Trump also tries to downplay his more controversial comments about being a dictator on day 1. But wasn’t he the one who posted about suspending or “terminating” the Constitution? Didn’t he call for the military tribunals and the imprisonment of political opponents? We didn’t make him say that. And to Vance who says this is all merely a joke, what baloney. Or malarkey, I should say.
On that note, how can elections be stolen when you lose, and okay when you win? How was Trump’s election stolen when down ballot Republicans did just fine in 2020? Can’t have it both ways Don.
Finally, is Vice President Harris a flip-flopper?
Sure, some of our politics may have shifted, like on fracking. Or on going immediately to a single-payer healthcare system vs. pursuing other reforms President Joe Biden had campaigned on back in 2020.
Still, the idea that the Vice President is a self-serving flip-flopper is far from the reality. Vice President Harris has been pretty consistent on many issues, from all varieties of criminal justice policy, to marriage equality, workers’ rights, reproductive rights, and gun safety. All these were a central part of her record as San Francisco District Attorney & as California Attorney General.
Her record taking on predatory lenders, the big banks, for-profit colleges, the oil & gas industry, transnational drug cartels, and even social media companies at times is also very notable, and again, consistent. She has been steadfast in standing for working people against corporate power throughout her entire political career, whether in protecting the Affordable Care Act, or in preserving our environment and its natural resources.
Say what you will about whether you have a problem with some parts of her record, or the work she has done with President Biden on the Build Back Better Agenda. Regardless, make no mistake about it: more than not, VP Harris’s record has been by and large consistent to her 2024 presidential campaign. The values are indeed unwavering, even if the current approach is different from before.
Donald Trump, on the other hand? Trade is the only policy issue he has any sort of consistency on. Outside of that? Just look at his abortion flip-flop, trying to please all sides on the Florida ballot initiative because he knows his true agenda is much more unpopular. He may try to run away from his anti-abortion record, and then he may try to run back to it to get the evangelical vote, but it’s way too late for the leopard to change his spots.
He appointed the 3 Supreme Court justices who made the overturning of Roe v. Wade possible. If you are in Idaho, Utah, the Dakotas, Montana, Wyoming, Oklahoma, or elsewhere, remember why these states have abortion bans that have closed down reproductive care clinics entirely. The reason comes in one single name: Donald Trump.
That name is why women have less freedoms today than they did 50 years ago. That is why infant & maternal mortality rates have hit record highs since Dobbs. And if Trump wanted to protect IVFs, why didn’t he do it when he was President?
On guns, Trump promised reforms after shootings like those in Las Vegas & Parkland. But he did the bidding of the NRA when push came to shove. And he recently applauded his handpicked Supreme Court for overturning his administration’s own ban on bump stocks. No wonder gun violence is worse in states with Republican governors.
And finally, Project 2025. Trump spoke at the Heritage Foundation in 2022, praising its work to elect a conservative President in 2024. The purpose of that work is to help craft the agenda we all know and hate. Trump now tries to distance himself from it, pretending he doesn’t know a thing (is he really that oblivious? Or does he think we’re that stupid?).
It’s too late Donald. We know your former Administration staff—by the dozens—co-authored and wrote significant portions of the 900-page right-wing authoritarian manifesto. Your own VP pick JD Vance wrote the foreword to another book written by one of the Heritage Foundation leaders behind the far-right agenda. We know Russell Vought has your ear. We know he and his Project 2025 friends have said privately that they are not concerned with your public criticisms because even they know how unpopular it is.
Besides, we know your campaign platform, and the RNC platform too, incorporates similar rhetoric to that used by the Heritage Foundation. Project 2025 is your baby, Trump. We know it, and the American people won’t stand for it as more of the truth comes out. Indeed, we will also reject the Congressional Republicans who would be a rubber stamp for a 2nd Trump term & the Project 2025 playbook.
But again, who’s to say Trump has ever been consistent on anything? Even on party affiliation? He has gone from being a Clinton-loving Democrat (almost literally), to running for President on the Reform Party in 2000, to becoming a Republican. His party shifts have always been in his interests, not ours.
Unfortunately, many of us don’t hear from “the whole America.” We don’t hear all the stories of fentanyl overdoses and poverty & economic struggle in Rural America. Just as most people don’t hear the toll of far-right conspiracy theories like those from Q-Anon. We should, though. It is all part of the one America that we all live in.
We must talk through the noise. And here is one suggestion for the taking: do what Governor Tim Walz would do. Talk directly to voters on the other side. Whether in everyday conversations or in places like local media outlets, small town newspapers, FOX News, the National Review, or even CNBC. Get them to truly hear our side of the story.
That is the antidote to bridging the gap within our own Union.