weeknights on pbs.
Geoff: Democrats are crafting a
new message as they grapple with
how to position themselves in
November's midterm elections, in
which rising inflation and gas
prices remain the biggest
obstacles to keeping their
narrow majorities in the house
and senate.
President Biden has started
road-testing his new messaging
strategy, stressing that he
understands the economic pain
many Americans are experiencing,
while drawing a contrast with
the GOP and warning of
Republican extremism.
As president Biden focuses his
attention on Americans' anxiety
and anger over higher prices in
this midterm election year, his
message is a simple one -- he
insists he feels your pain.
Pres. Biden: I know you've got
to be frustrated.
I know.
I can taste it.
The vast majority of Americans
are hoping that government just
takes care of their problems and
they don't have to think about
it in detail at the kitchen
Geoff: And as he criticized
Republicans this past week for
blocking some of his economic
plans, the president used a new
phrase -- "Ultra-maga" -- to
brand part of the Republican
party as pro-trump extremists.
Pres. Biden: Americans have a
choice right now between two
paths, reflecting two very
different sets of values.
My plan attacks inflation and
grows the economy.
The other path is the ultra-maga
plan put forward by
congressional Republicans.
Geoff: Echoing what he said days
earlier, attacking a plan put
forward by Republican senator
Rick Scott to raise taxes on
tens of millions of middle-class
Americans.
Pres. Biden: Let me tell you
about this ultra-maga agenda.
It's extreme, as most Maga
things are.
It will actually raise taxes on
75 million American families,
over 95% of whom make less than
$100,000 a year.
Geoff: The new ultra-maga label
and underlying shift in
messaging, sources say, is the
result of polling and analysis
by democratic groups designed to
pinpoint the best approach in
trying to fend off Republican
gains in this midterm election
year.
By targeting so-called Maga
Republicans, Biden allows space
to reach out to moderate
Republicans, while casting the
trump-aligned GOP as a threat
not just to the economy but the
American way of life.
Pres. Biden: This Maga crowd is
really the most extreme
political organization that's
existed in American history, in
recent American history.
Geoff: For a closer look on
Democrats' shift in messaging,
I'm joined by anat
shenker-osirio.
She is founder of aso
communications, a Progressive
political consulting firm, and
host of the podcast, "Words to
win by."
It is great to have you with us.
As I understand it, the
ulta-maga label was the result
of a a six-month research
project by democratic-aligned
groups.
What do you make of it?
Anat: Well, two things.
The first is you want your
message to be your message, not
a commentary about what that
message is.
When we have discourse like this
conversation we are having right
now about the sausage making,
that eclipses the potency of the
sausage eating.
That aside, reality being what
it is, it is incredibly
important in your messaging to
first and foremost sees the
moral high ground and say what
you are for and second, to make
clear what your opposition is
and ascribe motivations to the
terrible things they do.
Whether we call them Maga
Republicans or trump
Republicans, I think it is smart
and strategic them a and our own
research backs that up.
Geoff: I've had a lot of
conversations with Democrats
about this very thing,
messaging.
One person told me, they said
Democrats are always at a
disadvantage because they have
to be focused on policy and
Democrats are expected to be
intellectually honest.
Republicans tend to message,
this person said, around fear
and the culture wars, which is
an easier way to excite the
base.
Does any Democrat have the
power, the capacity to formulate
a message that excites people?
Anat: I frequently tell my
colleagues, my clients, do not
take your policy out in public,
it is unseemly.
Your policy should not be your
message.
Your message should be about
what your policy delivers.
Whether or not Democrats have
the stomach to actually contrast
-- some Democrats do, and
clearly Biden is moving in that
direction.
One thing we see over and over
again, Republicans have no
trouble naming villains.
The name of their game is
scapegoating.
They pick some group to whom
they ascribe as "Other," that
could be welfare queens back in
the day, illegal immigrants,
more recently trans use, they
pick a group to escape -- a
scapegoat to divide and conquer.
They know they've got nothing to
offer so all they can do is have
us point our fingers in the
wrong direction.
With the other hand, they are
picking our pockets to hand the
wealth our work creates to
corporate donors.
With Republicans continuously
naming a villain, if we don't
name one and we simply rejoin
with we will work with those
people, bipartisanship!
By virtue of absence, the
villain continues to be whatever
group they scapegoated.
Geoff: Why doesn't the message
"Democrats deliver" work?
I talked to white house
officials, they are frustrated
by how little credit they
get for enacting a massive
economic stimulus and an
infrastructure package,
distributing covid vaccines to
-- vaccines, nominating and
confirming the black woman to
first the supreme court.
Why doesn't the president get
any credit for that in terms of
messaging?
Anat: In politics and life, it
is unwise to argue people out of
their feelings.
Regardless of what is actually
true in the world, the way
people feel right now about
their own economic situation is
that many Americans have, to put
it colloquially, more mouth than
check.
They have trouble making ends
meet and that is how they feel.
There is nothing we can say that
is stronger than that feeling or
stronger than the emotion of
looking at the bills and not
knowing how to cover them.
Rather than argue with people
out of their feelings, saying we
delivered for you, why are you
grateful, why do you love us
more?
Which is a recipe for backlash
and anger.
What we need to do is explain to
people both what our motivations
and intentions are, and what is
getting in the way.
In a message, what that sounds
like -- and this is not
copyedited -- but something like
no matter what we look like,
come from or do for a living,
most of us believe that people
who work for a living ought to
earn a living and we should have
the freedom to decide for
ourselves how we care for our
families and to pick leaders who
govern in our name.
But today, Maga Republicans,
trump Republicans, or go father,
an authoritarian faction, wants
to take away our freedom.
They point the finger for our
hard times at new immigrants or
black families or people
struggling to make ends meet
because they hope we will look
the other way while they hand
the wealth our work creates to
corporate donors.
But we know better and we choose
us.
Geoff: I have to jump in there