2020 was unique

There’s a fascinating question in a new Fox News poll that suggests the political dynamics at work in 2022 and 2024 will be far different from 2020. If that’s the case, it’s good news for Republicans.

Here’s the question: “If you could send just one of the following two messages to the federal government right now, would it be ‘lend me a hand,’ or would it be ‘leave me alone’?” Fox has asked the question in eight different polls since 2011, but 2020 stands out.

In most years, a majority of respondents told pollsters the message they would send to the federal government was “leave me alone.” In 2014, for example, 59 percent said “leave me alone.” In 2016, it was 54 percent. In 2012, it was 53 percent. At the same time, during those years, much smaller numbers of respondents — 32 percent, 39 percent and 37 percent, respectively -- said the message they would send the government would be “lend me a hand.”

In other words, majorities didn’t feel the need for an especially activist federal government. No, they weren’t saying they didn’t want existing government programs like Social Security or clean air standards. But they were saying they didn’t want broad new expansions of the government into everyday life.

That changed dramatically in August 2020, at the height of the COVID pandemic. At that time, a solid majority, 57 percent, said their message to the government was “lend me a hand.” Just 36 percent said “leave me alone.”

The reasons were obvious. The public wanted a vaccine. Those who were unemployed through no fault of their own needed money. The same for small business owners trying to survive. Of course they wanted the government to lend a hand.

But by the time of the new poll, in early August 2021, with the nation — even with the Delta variant — pulling out of the worst effects of the pandemic, the “lend me a hand” number had fallen to 44 percent. That, by the way, is precisely what it was in 2011, when the nation was pulling out of the Great Recession. Barring some unexpected calamity, the “lend me a hand” number will likely fall further.

So what does that mean? In the 2020 Democratic presidential primary contest, all the candidates, including “centrist” Joe Biden, proposed far-reaching, hugely expensive expansions of the federal government.

In that activist moment, Biden won the Democratic nomination and then the general election. But even with the slimmest margins of control, President Biden, under pressure from the progressive wing of his party, has pushed ahead with programs proposed during the worst days of the pandemic.

They have succeeded. First, Biden signed a $1.9 trillion “COVID relief” bill, passed on a partisan basis, that spent far more money than was needed. Recently, the Senate passed a $1.1 trillion bipartisan “infrastructure” bill that also spends far more money than is needed. And now the Senate is taking up a $3.5 trillion “human infrastructure” bill that incorporates many of the Democrats’ campaign promises for sky-high social spending.

Put it all together with the $1.9 trillion signed in March, and by the end of the year Democrats will likely have pushed through between $5 trillion and $6 trillion in new spending, by far surpassing spending levels on anything since World War II. And it was all because of their ability to take advantage of that brief “lend me a hand” moment in 2020.

But times are changing. If there’s no unforeseen crisis, voters are moving back to their more traditional hesitance when it comes to huge new spending proposals. In next year’s midterm elections, and in the presidential election in 2024, it’s likely the Democrats’ activist moment will have passed.