BY DOMINICK DICARLO | STAFF WRITER
Republicans should not sit back and relax now that the midterm elections are over. While it is true that the Republicans managed to pick up seats in the United States Senate, the Democrats took back the House of Representatives and gained almost 40 seats. Nancy Pelosi is almost guaranteed to become the next Speaker of the House, barring any legitimate challenge from other members of the Democratic caucus.
There are some talking heads on the right that are claiming the Democrats gaining almost 40 House seats is not a blue wave. These folks will continuously reference that in 2010, Republicans overwhelmingly took back the House, successfully gaining over 60 seats. Democrats may not have gained as many seats as Republicans did in 2010, and Republicans may have been able to actually improve their footing in the Senate, but the concerns from the midterms should be of grave concern to the Republicans.
Democrats managed to take control of dozens of suburban districts that were previously held by Republican lawmakers. Take Orange County, California as an example of this sort of thing. Orange County is a typical Republican-leaning suburban district, even though it is in blue California, the Democrats swept all seven seats in this district. This should be an immediate red flag to anyone on the right. Whether or not the President is popular in districts like Orange County does not matter. Republicans have to be effective in these districts in order to win elections moving forward. As of right now, Republican candidates are ineffective in these places.
Republican candidates got destroyed in suburban districts across the country. Democrats made gains in seats that were once believed to be reliably red. This should concern Republicans who are eyeing the 2020 elections. The President is not going to win states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan without Republicans figuring out how to take back the suburbs. The coalition that President Trump built-in 2016, was due in part because of hatred for Hillary Clinton. President Trump and the Republicans need to work hard to show those same voters that their actions under this Democratic Congress will be worth their vote in 2020. This should not be a very difficult thing to carry out. Democrats managed to win this year on a message lacking any real substantive policy goals. If Republicans realize this in 2020, and work to push their agenda, they will hopefully convince these suburban voters to re-elect the President and elect enough Republicans to retake the House.
Democrats have some soul-searching to do moving forward as well, and they have to do it fast, or else it could mess up their agenda moving into the next Congress. They ran on a message of resistance and it was enough to get their hands on the reins of power. They are now going to have to govern in some way, though it will be difficult to pass anything now that we have divided government.
It’s going to be interesting to watch what happens inside the Democratic party moving forward. There are two wings of the party that have formed and are seemingly at odds with each other. The more progressive, younger wing of the party is looking to have more power within the Democratic coalition, while the old guard, including Minority Leader and soon to be Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, are trying to keep control of the party by any means necessary. What we have seen over the past few years is a splintering Democratic party. We are watching an electorate move increasingly to the left, while at the same time the party leadership is resisting any efforts to change how they operate. The leadership also does not want to relinquish power to the younger generation of Democrats, who as I just mentioned, are increasingly more progressive than earlier generations.
Whichever party realizes that the key to 2020 is suburban voters will be in an excellent position to make huge gains in the 2020 elections. Republicans would be smart to begin putting in more effort in these areas, especially in typically blue states that President Trump won in 2016, such as Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. If Democrats can get past their infighting and get their act together, they will pose a real challenge to the GOP agenda in 2020.
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