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NovOn November 6, 2018, the new round of mid-term elections in the United States was settled. After a lapse of eight years, the Democratic majority controlled the House of Representatives once again, and the Republican Party successfully maintained and expanded the majority advantage in the Senate.
This is basically in line with the general expectations of the pre-election, and fully demonstrates that this election is basically in line with the overall characteristics and the historical law of public opinion.
Trump became a "lame" president
In the House of Representatives, the Democratic and Republican parties basically staged a war of their own stable basics.
For the Democratic Party, "all politics is identity", that is, the "identity" card effectively raises the voter turnout rate of women, ethnic minorities and other vulnerable groups, and achieves a reversal in certain constituencies.
For the Republican Party, the key to save the election is obviously to maintain the voter turnout of the moderate group within the party that is dissatisfied with the Trump administration, but until now, this effort has not been successful. In the Senate elections that had caused the Democratic Party to face greater uncertainty, the Republican Party’s current state of Indiana and North Dakota was the first time the Democratic Party’s incumbent sought re-election. Moreover, the two states have also shown a conservative tendency in the political situation in recent years, so it is not unexpected.
In any case, the mid-term elections in 2018 meant that after the first Republican president took office in 1952, a unified government that controlled the two houses has ended. Washington politics will step into a new phase of the so-called "separate government."
For Trump, "lame" became the institutional dilemma he had to face.
The White House may face another "closed crisis"
Regarding the prediction of "lame", it is natural to start with domestic policies. According to the general view, under the boycott of Congressional Democrats, Trump’s domestic policy agenda of “unsuccessful” for the first two years of his term will be difficult.
In fact, the embarrassment caused by this "separate government" is likely to fall faster and even inevitably to Trump and the Republican Party. In FY 2019, there is still no formal full-year appropriation, and the current provisional appropriation will expire on December 8 this year. The Democrats who have become the majority of the next House of Representatives will naturally reluctantly pass the full fiscal year grants, and at most will only continue and extend the final decision to the 116th Congress, where they are able to exert the power. And how to eliminate the mines that may trigger the "closed crisis" at any time is undoubtedly a problem.
In addition, on March 1, 2019, the expiration of the new round of federal debt ceiling will certainly become the battlefield of the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party will definitely maximize the use of the priority enjoyed by the House of Representatives in the field of “pocket rights” and its derivative policies.
The trouble with domestic policy, the essential result is that there is no legislative output, or to repeat the so-called "crisis" which has its limitation, this situation does not necessarily mean Trump's absolute dilemma.
On the one hand, although Trump and the Republican agenda will be difficult to move, the Democratic Party will not be able to advance its agenda.
On the other hand, Trump's offensive still lies in his insistence on the public agenda as president, especially the "social media president." In this sense, Trump's recent seemingly "whimsically" throwing out the signal of abolishing "born citizenship" actually blew the horn to assemble the conservatives.
Whether it is possible to land is at the second place. By setting up some agendas that are directly connected to the conservatives, and launching a wave of movement and going straight to the 2020 election, it may be the transcendental layout of Trump’s “solutions” in the next two years. .
"Lame" President Trump may make a fuss about foreign policy
Another mainstream pre-judgment about “lame” may be “loss inside and compensation outside”. There is no progress in domestic policy, and foreign policy issues need to be made some achievements in order to win the 2020 general election.
Will this logic really happen? If you make historical comparisons, that is, look at how the president who lost the House of Representatives in the first term of the midterm elections made a choice, the recent precedent is actually Obama after the Democrats lost the majority of the House of Representatives in 2010.
In the face of the 112th Congress of the Republican Party, the Obama made three major events in 2011: March 19 launching the "Operation Odyssey Dawn" against Libya, May 2nd killing Bin Laden, and December 18th declaring the Iraq War Conclusion.
Among the three things, at least the last two have a positive impact on Obama’s polls, which basically offset the negative impact caused by the debt crisis in that year, thus allowing Obama to advance into a big suspense with a poll that is not too negative.
From this experience, Trump is also likely to cater to the domestic audience with solo dance on the international stage. When he chooses foreign policy issues that can add extra points, he is estimated to meet two criteria: one must respond to the basic disk and the key disk (blue-collar middle and lower class); one is to have short-term effects, and avoid dragging feet.
In this sense, the Middle East does not seem to be a good choice, and trade issues, peninsula affairs, and even US-Russian relations are more likely to become the focus of big fuss. Even if the Democratic Party wants to win the 2020 election, it must attract the key players of the blue-collar, and then the possibility of launching a "strong competition" with the White House on the trade protection policy will not be too small.
The 2020 election will be staged
In addition, an invisible manifestation of "squatting" is that the status of the only "big man" in the American political drama is likely to be shared.
The end of the midterm elections is the beginning of the general election. This statement has become more and more reasonable with the predecessor of the election cycle in recent years. Different from the two open election cycles of 2008 or 2016, or a general election with incumbents seeking re-election in 2012 was presumably opened on March 3, 2011, when Gingrich announced his candidacy.
Therefore, within a few months after this midterm election, it is highly probable that the challengers will come out from the Democratic camp. Whether it is Elizabeth Warren, or Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, or even Joseph Biden, these people will not only "take the headlines" with Trump, but will also launch various competition with Trump.
The situation of "competition" will aggravate Trump's sense of crisis for 2020. At that time, the US president with the world to run with him may make people even more eye-popping.
The Democrats who regained the House of Representatives also have troubles.
Trump, who holds the national steering wheel, "smashed his feet" and the Democratic Party who sit back to the co-pilot also had his own troubles.
On the one hand, the reorganization of different factions within the Democratic Party has been unobstructed in the 2016 general election. Now, after mastering certain powers, it will inevitably break out again.
Under this blue tent, the 78-year-old Pelosi and the 29-year-old Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are inevitably inconsistent, not to mention leadership and collaboration. The adjustment of the leadership of the Democratic Party will also involve the choice of the route for the next two years. whether it will deal with Trump tit-for-tat or present a plan which will play to the key disk in a far-sighted way, the Democratic Party faces a huge test of ecology and philosophy that may not be able to cope with.
On the other hand, if the US economic indicators cannot be maintained in a good state in the next two years, even worse, Trump would have been unable to make more domestic performance in the next two years, the Democrats who occupy the majority of the House of Representatives has to clean up the mess. At least in the 2020 campaign mobilization framework, Trump will blame all the problems at that time on the Democratic Party's drag and boycott.
From this point of view, even the seemingly embarrassing "squat" is actually only the return of American politics to the historical norm. However, it is undeniable that the party’s struggle for polarization and the fierce fight between government and Congress have long become the habitual drama of this historical normal.
(The author is the research fellow of NADS and associate professor of the School of International Relations.)
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