In a few days, Americans will begin voting in the midterm elections. Control of the House and the Senate is up for grabs. Two years ago, Joe Biden and Donald Trump were locked in a similarly close battle for the White House. By that point, 2020 had already been extraordinarily eventful, even by the standards of presidential election years. The pandemic, the economic downturn, the protests following the murder of George Floyd — all appeared to herald political change. The moment seemed like a “plastic hour, ” a time that is ripe for national transformation because “an ossified social order suddenly turns pliable,” as George Packer wrote in the Atlantic then.
Politics
Perspective | A hard 2020 lesson for the midterms: Our politics are calcified – The Washington Post
Instead, Biden’s victory was narrow. The Democrats won slim majorities in the House and Senate. The Republican Party didn’t consider the election to be a repudiation and has yet to reject Trump as an election loser.
The plastic hour hasn’t come, and we seem no closer to political realignment today. American electoral politics doesn’t feel malleable. It seems set in stone.
Part of the reason is the well-known and long-standing trend in partisan polarization. Voters and leaders in the two major parties are not only more ideologically distant from each other but also more likely to describe each other in harsh terms. In the fall of 2020, 90 percent of Americans said there were important differences in what the parties stood for — the highest number recorded in almost 70 years of American National Election Study surveys.
But polarization is not the whole story. Something more is happening. Voters are increasingly tied to their political loyalties and values. They have become less likely to change their basic political evaluations or vote for the other party’s candidate. This is not just polarization but calcification. And just as it does in the body, calcification produces rigidity in our politics — even when dramatic events suggest the potential for big changes.
Calcification derives from more than long-term polarization. It is rooted in very recent divides between the parties on issues tied to racial, ethnic, national and religious identities. A key driver of these differences was Trump, whose hard-line positions on issues such as immigration led Democrats to shift to the left. For example, in the seven years since Trump’s presidential campaign began, there has been more partisan polarization on whether to increase immigration than there was in the prior two decades, according to Gallup polls.
Americans’ political priorities also feed calcification. The issues that Americans consider most important tend to exacerbate their differences, not mitigate them. During the 2020 campaign, the most salient issues to Republicans included opposing Trump’s impeachment, building a border wall and fighting reparations for slavery. Democrats’ priorities included impeaching Trump, opposing Trump’s restrictions on immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, and abortion rights.
By contrast, the issues on which there was more bipartisan consensus were less important to voters. For example, most Democrats and many Republicans are willing to raise taxes on the wealthy. In 2019 Nationscape surveys, 56 percent of Democrats and 33 percent of Republicans wanted to raise taxes on those making at least $250,000, with the rest opposed or unsure. But for both parties, tax policy was less important than abortion and immigration. This also helps explain why Trump could sign a tax bill that actually cut taxes on the wealthy without losing support from these Republicans. Within the GOP, identity politics appeared more important than economic populism.
Paradoxically, a calcified politics co-exists with frequent changes in who controls the government. This is because of the increasing parity in the two parties’ electoral strength. You can see partisan parity in the national electorate: By 2020, the Democratic advantage in party identification was the smallest in 70 years — just four percentage points. Partisan parity is visible in Congress as well, where the parties can expect to compete for control in most elections, producing what the political scientist Frances Lee has called “insecure majorities.” Right now, the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate certainly fit that description.
Calcified politics and partisan parity combine to produce a self-reinforcing cycle. When control of government is always within reach, there is less need for the losing party to adapt and recalibrate. And if it stays on the same path, voters have little reason to revise their political loyalties.
In our research on the 2020 election, we found evidence of calcified politics everywhere. Major events like the coronavirus pandemic and Floyd’s murder did not disrupt partisan alignments. Instead, those events were subsumed into the existing axis of partisan conflict. Trump’s push to reopen the country in April 2020 created partisan divisions on policies such as closing businesses and restricting travel. And after initially sympathetic comments about Floyd, Trump and other Republicans pivoted and attacked the racial-justice protests. Any “racial reckoning” that occurred was largely within the Democratic Party. When Floyd’s killer, Derek Chauvin, was convicted in April 2021, some conservative politicians and pundits attacked the trial, producing a historic gap between Republicans and Democrats in their views of the verdict.
Calcified politics was evident in the election’s outcome as well. To be sure, the changes between 2016 and 2020 were just enough to help Biden win. But those changes were small by historical standards. The average change in Democratic vote share in the states was just two points in absolute value, compared with 3.3 points between 2012 and 2016. At the county level, the average change between 2016 and 2020 was the smallest in consecutive presidential elections in at least 70 years, according to our analysis.
The same thing was true among individual voters. Drawing on surveys of the exact same voters in 2012, 2016 and 2020, we found more movement between 2012 and 2016 than between 2016 and 2020. For example, in 2016, 81 percent of those who voted for Barack Obama in 2012 reported voting for Hillary Clinton, 9 percent reported voting for Trump, and the rest reported not voting or voting for another candidate. Those 9 percent were the famous “Obama-Trump voters” who helped propel Trump to a slim electoral college victory. But in 2020, 95 percent of Clinton voters reported voting for Biden, and only 2 percent reported voting for Trump.
The greater stability between 2016 and 2020 flew in the face of speculation that Biden could somehow win back Obama-Trump voters. In fact, we found that 87 percent of Obama-Trump voters stuck with Trump. And most Romney-Clinton voters stuck with Biden. The swing voters of 2016 became loyal partisans in 2020.
Moreover, the election appeared to intensify the trends underlying calcification. There was continued partisan polarization: People saw Trump as more conservative than he was in 2016 and saw Biden as more liberal than Clinton. Democratic and Republican voters were further apart on a number of issues compared with 2016. And people’s views on key issues were more correlated with how they voted in 2020 than in 2016.
Polarization also helps explain a central puzzle of 2020 that remains relevant today: how Trump managed to increase his vote share among voters of color, especially Latino voters. After the election, there were various boutique explanations for specific groups: Biden was said to have lost votes among Cuban and Venezuelan Americans in Florida because they were concerned that the Democratic Party had become too “socialist”; for Mexican Americans in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, it was because they feared losing oil-industry jobs under a Democratic president who wanted to wean the country from fossil fuels.
But Biden lost votes among many kinds of Latino voters in many parts of the country, as well as among other voters of color. Polarization helps to explain that. We found that, compared with 2016, Trump gained support among conservatives in every major racial group, including Black and Latino voters. For Latinos in particular, these gains exceeded his losses among more liberal voters, leading to a small net change in his favor.
Those changes among Latinos were not enough to reelect Trump. But a shift of even a few percentage points can matter. This is the irony of calcified politics and partisan parity: Big events may produce only small changes, but small changes can have big consequences. Small changes were the difference between a Democratic or Republican president in 2020 and could be the difference between a Democratic or Republican majority in Congress after 2022.
The prospect of quickly regaining congressional majorities meant the GOP did little soul-searching after its loss of the White House. It refused any autopsy of the defeat, unlike after the 2012 election. In states where the party retained power, GOP leaders have pushed an ambitious conservative agenda, especially after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade. Meanwhile, Trump has persisted as a force within the party, with candidates courting his endorsement and mimicking his beliefs and style. And thus the cycle of partisan parity and calcification has continued.
The aftermath of the 2020 election also revealed an especially pernicious consequence of this cycle: It increases the incentive for people to countenance their own party’s undemocratic behavior in order to win an election. After his loss, Trump and his allies endorsed baseless claims and even illegal means to overturn that election. If Republicans embrace or appease such measures in future elections, then a national transformation will really be upon us — and our democracy will hang in the balance.
Canada called for “all parties” to de-escalate rising tensions in the Mideast following an apparent Israeli drone attack against Iran overnight.
G7 foreign ministers, including Canada’s, and the High Representative for the European Union released a public statement Friday morning. The statement condemned Iran’s “direct and unprecedented attack” on April 13, which saw Western allies intercept more than 100 bomb-carrying drones headed towards Israel, the G7 countries said.
Prior to the Iranian attack, a previous airstrike, widely blamed on Israel, destroyed Iran’s consulate in Syria, killing 12 people including two elite Iranian generals.
“I join my G7 colleagues in urging all parties to work to prevent further escalation,” wrote Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly in a post on X Friday.
More details to come.
Politics
Politics Briefing: Labour leader targets Poilievre, calls him 'anti-worker politician' – The Globe and Mail
Hello,
Pierre Poilievre is a fraud when it comes to empowering workers, says the president of Canada’s largest labour organization.
Bea Bruske, president of the Canadian Labour Congress, targeted the federal Conservative Leader in a speech in Ottawa today as members of the labour movement met to develop a strategic approach to the next federal election, scheduled for October, 2025.
“Whatever he claims today, Mr. Poilievre has a consistent 20-year record as an anti-worker politician,” said Bruske, whose congress represents more than three million workers.
She rhetorically asked whether the former federal cabinet minister has ever walked a picket line, or supported laws to strengthen workers’ voices.
“Mr. Poilievre sure is fighting hard to get himself power, but he’s never fought for worker power,” she said.
“We must do everything in our power to expose Pierre Poilievre as the fraud that he is.”
The Conservative Leader, whose party is running ahead of its rivals in public-opinion polls, has declared himself a champion of “the common people,” and been courting the working class as he works to build support.
Mr. Poilievre’s office today pushed back on the arguments against him.
Sebastian Skamski, media-operations director, said Mr. Poilievre, unlike other federal leaders, is connecting with workers.
In a statement, Skamski said NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has sold out working Canadians by co-operating with the federal Liberal government, whose policies have created challenges for Canadian workers with punishing taxes and inflation.
“Pierre Poilievre is the one listening and speaking to workers on shop floors and in union halls from coast to coast to coast,” said Mr. Skamski.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mr. Singh are scheduled to speak to the gathering today. Mr. Poilievre was not invited to speak.
Asked during a post-speech news conference about the Conservative Leader’s absence, Bruske said the gathering is focused on worker issues, and Poilievre’s record as an MP and in government shows he has voted against rights, benefits and wage increases for workers.
“We want to make inroads with politicians that will consistently stand up for workers, and consistently engage with us,” she said.
This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.
TODAY’S HEADLINES
Pierre Poilievre’s top adviser not yet contacted in Lobbying Commissioner probe: The federal Lobbying Commissioner has yet to be in touch with Jenni Byrne as the watchdog probes allegations of inappropriate lobbying by staff working both in Byrne’s firm and a second one operating out of her office.
Métis groups will trudge on toward self-government as bill faces another setback: Métis organizations in Ontario and Alberta say they’ll stay on the path toward self-government, despite the uncertain future of a contentious bill meant to do just that.
Liberals buck global trend in ‘doubling down’ on foreign aid, as sector urges G7 push: The federal government pledged in its budget this week to increase humanitarian aid by $150-million in the current fiscal year and $200-million the following year.
Former B.C. finance minister running for the federal Conservatives: Mike de Jong says he will look to represent the Conservatives in Abbotsford-South Langley, which is being created out of part of the Abbotsford riding now held by departing Tory MP Ed Fast.
Ottawa’s new EV tax credit raises hope of big new Honda investment: The proposed measure would provide companies with a 10-per-cent rebate on the costs of constructing new buildings to be used in the electric-vehicle supply chain. Story here.
Sophie Grégoire Trudeau embraces uncertainty in new memoir, Closer Together: “I’m a continuous, curious, emotional adventurer and explorer of life and relationships,” Grégoire Trudeau told The Globe and Mail during a recent interview. “I’ve always been curious and interested and fascinated by human contact.”
TODAY’S POLITICAL QUOTES
“Sometimes you’re in a situation. You just can’t win. You say one thing. You get one community upset. You say another. You get another community upset.” – Ontario Premier Doug Ford, at a news conference in Oakville today, commenting on the Ontario legislature Speaker banning the wearing in the House of the traditional keffiyeh scarf. Ford opposes the ban, but it was upheld after the news conference in the provincial legislature.
“No, I plan to be a candidate in the next election under Prime Minister Trudeau’s leadership. I’m very happy. I’m excited about that. I’m focused on the responsibilities he gave me. It’s a big job. I’m enjoying it and I’m optimistic that our team and the Prime Minister will make the case to Canadians as to why we should be re-elected.” – Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, before Question Period today, on whether he is interested in the federal Liberal leadership, and succeeding Justin Trudeau as prime minister.
THIS AND THAT
Today in the Commons: Projected Order of Business at the House of Commons, April. 18, accessible here.
Deputy Prime Minister’s Day: Private meetings in Burlington, Ont., then Chrystia Freeland toured a manufacturing facility, discussed the federal budget and took media questions. Freeland then travelled to Washington, D.C., for spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group. Freeland also attended a meeting of the Five Eyes Finance Ministers hosted by U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, and held a Canada-Ukraine working dinner on mobilizing Russian assets in support of Ukraine.
Ministers on the Road: Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly is on the Italian island of Capri for the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting. Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge, in the Quebec town of Farnham, made an economic announcement, then held a brief discussion with agricultural workers and took media questions. Privy Council President Harjit Sajjan made a federal budget announcement in the Ontario city of Welland. Families Minister Jenna Sudds made an economic announcement in the Ontario city of Belleville.
Commons Committee Highlights: Treasury Board President Anita Anand appeared before the public-accounts committee on the auditor-general’s report on the ArriveCan app, and Karen Hogan, Auditor-General of Canada, later appeared on government spending. Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Gary Anandasangaree appears before the status-of-women committee on the Red Dress Alert. Competition Bureau Commissioner Matthew Boswell and Yves Giroux, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, appeared before the finance committee on Bill C-59. Former Prince Edward Island premier Robert Ghiz, now the president and chief executive officer of the Canadian Telecommunications Association, is among the witnesses appearing before the human-resources committee on Bill C-58, An act to amend the Canada Labour Code. Caroline Maynard, Canada’s Information Commissioner, appears before the access-to-information committee on government spending. Michel Patenaude, chief inspector at the Sûreté du Québec, appeared before the public-safety committee on car thefts in Canada.
In Ottawa: Governor-General Mary Simon presented the Governor-General’s Literary Awards during a ceremony at Rideau Hall, and, in the evening, was scheduled to speak at the 2024 Indspire Awards to honour Indigenous professionals and youth.
PRIME MINISTER’S DAY
Justin Trudeau met with Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe at city hall. Sutcliffe later said it was the first time a sitting prime minister has visited city hall for a meeting with the mayor. Later, Trudeau delivered remarks to a Canada council meeting of the Canadian Labour Congress.
LEADERS
Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet held a media scrum at the House of Commons ahead of Question Period.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre attends a party fundraising event at a private residence in Mississauga.
Green Party Leader Elizabeth May attended the House of Commons.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, in Ottawa, met with Saskatchewan’s NDP Leader, Carla Beck, and, later, Ken Price, the chief of the K’ómoks First Nation,. In the afternoon, he delivered a speech to a Canadian Labour Congress Canadian council meeting.
THE DECIBEL
On today’s edition of The Globe and Mail podcast, Sanjay Ruparelia, an associate professor at Toronto Metropolitan University and Jarislowsky Democracy Chair, explains why India’s elections matter for democracy – and the balance of power for the rest of the world. The Decibel is here.
PUBLIC OPINION
Declining trust in federal and provincial governments: A new survey finds a growing proportion of Canadians do not trust the federal or provincial governments to make decisions on health care, climate change, the economy and immigration.
OPINION
On Haida Gwaii, an island of change for Indigenous land talks
“For more than a century, the Haida Nation has disputed the Crown’s dominion over the land, air and waters of Haida Gwaii, a lush archipelago roughly 150 kilometres off the coast of British Columbia. More than 20 years ago, the First Nation went to the Supreme Court of Canada with a lawsuit that says the islands belong to the Haida, part of a wider legal and political effort to resolve scores of land claims in the province. That case has been grinding toward a conclusion that the B.C. government was increasingly convinced would end in a Haida victory.” – The Globe and Mail Editorial Board.
The RCMP raid the home of ArriveCan contractor as Parliament scolds
“The last time someone was called before the bar of the House of Commons to answer MPs’ inquiries, it was to demand that a man named R.C. Miller explain how his company got government contracts to supply lights, burners and bristle brushes for lighthouses. That was 1913. On Wednesday, Kristian Firth, the managing partner of GCStrategies, one of the key contractors on the federal government’s ArriveCan app, was called to answer MPs’ queries. Inside the Commons, it felt like something from another century.” – Campbell Clark
First Nations peoples have lost confidence in Thunder Bay’s police force
“Thunder Bay has become ground zero for human-rights violations against Indigenous Peoples in Canada. Too many sudden and suspicious deaths of Indigenous Peoples have not been investigated properly. There have been too many reports on what is wrong with policing in the city – including ones by former chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Murray Sinclair and former Toronto Police board chair Alok Mukherjee, and another one called “Broken Trust,” in which the Office of the Independent Police Review Director said the Thunder Bay Police Service (TBPS) was guilty of “systemic racism” in 2018. – Tanya Talaga.
The failure of Canada’s health care system is a disgrace – and a deadly one
“What can be said about Canada’s health care system that hasn’t been said countless times over, as we watch more and more people suffer and die as they wait for baseline standards of care? Despite our delusions, we don’t have “world-class” health care, as our Prime Minister has said; we don’t even have universal health care. What we have is health care if you’re lucky, or well connected, or if you happen to have a heart attack on a day when your closest ER is merely overcapacity as usual, and not stuffed to the point of incapacitation.” – Robyn Urback.
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GOP strategist reacts to Trump’s ‘unconventional’ request
Donald Trump’s campaign is asking Republican candidates and committees using the former president’s name and likeness to fundraise to give at least 5% of what they raise to the campaign, according to a letter obtained by CNN. CNN’s Steve Contorno and Republican strategist Rina Shah weigh in.
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