The Jobs Message in Michigan

Michigan is trouble for Trump. It is so bad even Breitbart is reporting it.

 Jobs. (It’s the economy, stupid.)

Breitbart Story, briefly

Breitbart covered the bad Michigan polls. Briefly. Then they demoted it to a tiny story and replaced it with one touting Trump wage growth. 

They are back on message, but it is a hard sell because the facts on the ground are grim.

General Motors is laying off people and closing factories in Michigan. There are help wanted signs all over the place in retail establishments and tourist places, but real family wage auto jobs in Michigan are leaving.

Same in Lordstown, Ohio, a major auto manufacturing town. A company that made seats for the Chevy Cruze just shut down. They offer re-training and they offer jobs to people who are willing to move out of state, but that doesn’t work for a lot of people.

The problem with the 2017 Tax Act is starting to make its effects known. Corporations are showing greater after tax income, but a lot of that is being used for stock buybacks. Stock buybacks benefit primarily people who own stocks. That isn’t trickle down. It is trickle up.

Overall, only 31% of Michigan voters say they would vote to re-elect Trump.  The Michigan poll showed 49% of Michigan voters would definitely not vote to re-elect Trump, versus 31% who said they would definitely vote to re-elect. Only 41% of self-described independent voters would vote to re-elect vs. 18% who would vote to re-elect.

Even his base is shrinking: only 67% of Republicans say they would vote to re-elect. 

Obama carried the upper Midwest twice. In 2008 it was because Republican George Bush was president and the economy was in free fall. Banks were closing, being revealed as insolvent. McCain semi-conceded that he was out of his element, announcing he was “suspending” his campaign to deal with the crisis. Meanwhile Obama seemed surefooted and confident, saying he could multitask.  Any Democrat could have won at that point especially one that seemed surefooted and confident.

The 2012 election was harder. There was a policy fork in the road dividing Obama and Mitt Romney. Mitt Romney said that the government shouldn’t save GM and Chrysler from its errors. Let them go bankrupt and reorganize. Obama got criticism from Republicans for saving them. But that was the Ohio message in 2012. Obama saved GM.

Voters noticed. Obama put the practical reality of jobs ahead of some ideology of unfettered market discipline.

There are two lessons here for Democrats. One is the straightforward one that the traditional manufacturing areas of the country are invested in their status quo economies, both the auto industry and the coal industry. Democrats have abandoned coal as an energy source—as surely they must to
preserve their policy integrity and environmental base—so they are doomed to lose West Virginia and Kentucky, and the Appalachians counties of Ohio and Pennsylvania. But they are not doomed to lose rustbelt auto manufacturing areas and those previously blue states of the Upper Midwest. 

Lesson number two is a risk and warning: Donald Trump understands lesson one. He talked a good game in 2016, and it worked, and he is back at it. He held press conferences with Carrier and Catapillar and he pretended to end NAFTA. He is talking American jobs, hire American. He said he has gotten tough on China and Mexico and he has ended an unfair and disastrous trade deficit. He has the show biz part of the Presidency job down pat.

But his policies aren't working well for Michigan.  Good auto jobs are leaving, and people notice. The trade deficit hit a trillion dollars, the greatest ever, and people are noticing. 

Brietbart and Trump: selling it.

Democrats can re-establish themselves at the jobs party, and it could be a point of favorable contrast with Trump. But Democrats may not do it. Their primary campaigns  work against it. The multiple candidates, differing by race, gender, ethnicity, are each trying to find a lane and a distinguishing position. Who is strongest and purest for Medicare for All? Who is strongest and purest on climate? Who suggests the best deal on college funding? Who is purest on campaign finance? Who has the best programs to make houses more affordable for young people?

Those issues have a job component.  

That is the winning message, especially in the states that tipped the electoral vote to Trump.

Joe Biden has flaws as a candidate, but he can win the nomination if he is the clearest spokesperson for jobs—especially if the progressive left candidates split the vote among themselves, divided over identity issues. Democrats would nominate a much stronger candidate than Biden if one of the candidates on the progressive left--e.g. Sanders, Warren, Harris—emphasized a jobs-first focus, and discussed the other issues as pathways to more jobs, especially jobs in the rustbelt.

If a progressive isn't the "jobs" candidate, then Biden will be it. Better for Democrats if it is a progressive.