It's Time for Class

The key to beating Trump’s distractions is by addressing the class divide head-on.

In the days following the assassination of UnitedHealth group CEO Brian Thompson, I was surprised to see conservative corners of the Internet joining leftwing online voices sounding curiously class-conscious in the way they viewed the crime. These people were decidedly not parroting Republican talking points about the dangers of vigilante justice; they were expressing genuine frustration with the healthcare system and admiration for the accused killer. That their hero came from a wealthy Baltimore family with every advantage in life seemed irrelevant. Just like Trump, it seemed, this abhorrent messenger of disaffected Americans was tapping into a powerful current of latent class resentment.

There is every indication that Trump 2.0 will exacerbate the trends driving Americans’ perceptions of a class divide. His tariffs will make Americans poorer and reduce competition among the corporations lobbying for them. Billionaires close to Trump will leech windfall profits from exemptions to them. His immigration crackdown will drive inflation at the grocery store while food companies reap record earnings. His budget-busting tax cuts will drive up interest rates on Americans’ credit cards, car loans, and mortgages, while CEOs will pay an even smaller share of their income in taxes than their employees.

Right-wing populists like Trump are adept at exploiting popular alienation to gain power. Said another way, they are good at politics. However, they have no real solutions for the vast majority of people who vote for them: they are bad at policy. When his mismanagement of the economy leads to trouble, Trump and his billionaire allies won't feel the pain their havoc creates. Instead they and other Republicans will try to distract ordinary Americans from their worsening financial prospects. 

They will try to bait Democrats into culture war battles like gender, race, and schools, that they think they have the advantage on. Consider Nancy Mace’s shameful and transparent attack on congresswoman-elect Sarah McBride’s right to use a bathroom corresponding to her gender in the Capitol. This isn't serious policy, it’s a dead cat strategy designed to divert Americans’ attention from real issues. 

In these moments under Trump 2.0, it will be incumbent upon Democrats to call Republicans out and speak directly to ordinary Americans: They are dangling divisive issues in front of your eyes because they don’t want you to look behind the curtain and see what they’re doing, they don’t want you to see them enriching their billionaire friends at your expense, creating a system for themselves and a system for you and me, all because they think you’re stupid and you’ll fall for it. (Just ask Ben Shapiro what happens when you take your own fans’ undying loyalty for granted.)

Trump used a similar tactic when he broke the fourth wall during the first 2016 Republican primary debates. He looked into the camera and declared that his opponents were bought and paid for by corporations, and that his wealth made him immune to that corrupting influence, and that he was the only candidate Republican voters could trust. His opponents accurately pointed out that he was a liar, adulterer, and charlatan. Voters shrugged and voted for him anyway. Just as with Brian Thompson’s alleged killer, the messenger’s moral failings don’t matter when he speaks to a deeper truth that resonates with fed-up Americans. People can accept a lot when they feel understood.

This “breaking of the fourth wall” with the ordinary American will be key to disrupting Republicans’ vise-like grip on the prevailing political narrative. Unlike Trump, we Democrats have actual ideas to back up our rhetoric. We believe in equality before the law and equality of opportunity. We seek to break down the class barriers that Trump and his enablers erect. 

The resonance of class-conscious messaging transcends partisan divides.