Democrats still appear to be arguing about what to emphasize on the campaign trail, weeks before the primary election season gets underway.
Some vulnerable Democrats want to talk about “kitchen table issues,” while others want to keep bringing up former President Donald Trump, fearing that if the issue is dropped, he and his allies are being “let off the hook,” according to the Washington Post. “Democrats … want to focus their campaigns on the bread-and-butter issues that appeal to swing voters, not Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election,” explains the news outlet.
The Post pointed to legislation that was introduced by vulnerable Senate Democrats — Sens. Mark Kelly (AZ), Catherine Cortez Masto (NV), Maggie Hassan (NH), and Raphael G. Warnock (GA) — to suspend the federal gas tax for the rest of this year, while the country is seeing a drastic rise in gas prices.
“That quartet represents the most endangered Senate Democrats and could decide the Senate majority next year: If all four win, Republicans probably have no path to getting the 51 seats. These Democrats say inflation is a big concern for their voters, not the former president,” the Post reported.
“Things like the price of gasoline, the price of ground beef or groceries or prescription drugs, especially if they’re a senior,” Kelly told the Post. “You know, they’re not looking back at an old — an election a year ago. They’re thinking about, ‘What affects my family?'”
“When I’m home and I talk to Nevadans, it’s the kitchen-table issues… Those are the top things,” said Cortez Masto.
The Post wrote that “some Democrats fear that this is letting the ex-president’s allies off the hook,” noting that some of the Democrats think “the liberal base and some swing voters in the suburbs need to hear a message that links GOP candidates to the attempts to overturn President Biden’s victory and future threats to elections.”
Stop Him Now, an anti-Trump super PAC, came out with a campaign ad that shows video clips of last year’s January 6 incident, followed by current Republican candidates shaking hands with Trump. The ad’s final image reads “Republicans in ’22 means Trump in ’24.”
Mandy Grunwald, a strategist who co-founded Stop Him Now, told the Post, “Our concern was that lane three — the Trump lane — was being abandoned.”
Additionally, Geoff Garin, who polled for the main Democratic presidential super PAC in 2012, said that Democrat candidates need to focus more on Trump.
“More important than Trump himself is what has happened to the Republican Party in the wake of Trump. This is a party that in many ways has become extreme and radicalized,” he told the Post.
However, a few months ago, former Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-VA) lost his reelection campaign, which focused on aligning his opponent — Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) — to Trump. His loss may be an example to other Democrats that solely campaigning against Trump and tying Republicans to him can backfire.
A CNN poll released on Friday showed that roughly an equal number of respondents wanted congressional candidates who oppose Trump and Biden.
Forty-four percent said they would prefer a candidate who opposes Trump, while 27 percent prefer a candidate who supports him. Similarly, 42 percent said they would prefer a candidate who opposes Biden, while 32 percent prefer one who supports him.
Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter.
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