2017 poll results a warning for Trump, boost for Democrats
WASHINGTON : It was typical of US President Donald Trump to tweet about his November 2016 victory on Wednesday, a day after his party suffered a huge defeat in the just-concluded elections.
“Congratulations to all of the ”DEPLORABLES” and the millions of people who gave us a MASSIVE (304-227) Electoral College landslide victory!” he tweeted, possibly on his way to Beijing. But back in the US, Democrats declared the start of their comeback with the goal of reclaiming control of the Senate and the House of Representatives from Republicans.
“The door is certainly open for us,” said Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat in the House. She said she was reminded of similar victories in 2005 that led to Democrats taking the two chambers in 2006.
Democrats won an entire range of elections to governorships in Virginia and New Jersey, legislatures, municipal and judicial bodies, using an unprecedented demographic and cultural mix of candidates that were representative of the new America.
And, at the same time, they are so radically different from Trump’s coalition of angry, dispossessed and insecure white voters in parts of the country devastated by globalisation and those that live in imminent fear of it. He has promised them retributory succour from their present misery.
But the president has offered them no real plans, no rescue or rehabilitation or re-employment programme, other than the headline-grabbing withdrawal of the US from trade pacts such as the Trans-pacific Partnership, which might have helped them. But they will never know.