Will Dems unite to defend against Trump’s vile attack?

WASHINGTON >> Would Democrats rather beat each other than defeat Donald Trump? Have they forgotten opposition’s priority is to build a broad coalition for change?

Yes, the current fights among Democrats — in the House of Representatives and in the presidential campaign — are irresistible for us journalists. And many of Trump’s moral outrages are treated instead as campaign strategy. As in: Boy, all that cruelty at the border and his threat to ignore the law and add that citizenshipstatus question to the census fires up his base — he’s a genius. Trump has so debased the standards of our politics we stopped noticing how low we’ve sunk.

But Democrats’ primary mission now is precisely to highlight what Trump and his enablers in the Republican-led Senate are doing to our country. They can’t just blame the press for reporting tension among them. Progressives say moderates aren’t militant enough against Trump. Moderates say progressives are ignoring the middle-of-the-road voters that gave them their House majority to begin with.

But Democrats are united on many things, from seeing the shameful treatment of children in detention facilities as a violation of what America says it believes in, to how Trump’s environmental policies are a scandal, given the damage climate change is doing, and much more.

Perhaps a vile Trump tweet on Sunday will remind Democrats to battle him instead of each other. Without naming them, he attacked four first-term Democratic congresswomen — Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib — for standing up against his cruel border policies. Trump told the four progressives they should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.” It was despicable thing to say, and ill-informed, since all but Omar were born here.

The four have been fighting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, but she quickly defended them, assailing Trump’s “xenophobic comments” and declaring that his signature slogan “has always been about making America white again.”

Here’s hoping Trump’s malice forces Democrats to appreciate the stakes of this fight. The Democratic candidates for president need to challenge each other over genuine policy and philosophical differences. And because of Republican Party changes, the Democratic Party now ranges from former Republican moderates to democratic socialists. So there’s a lot to argue about.

But Democratic primary voters should decide: Who can create the unity necessary to beat Trump? Not just the most “moderate” candidate, but one who can also mobilize younger progressives into the electorate.

Pelosi faces a tough job unifying her wide-ranging caucus. House Democrats have sufficient power to do some things, but the Senate and White House blockades are causing frustration and spurring some of the public feuding.

House Democrats could take heart from recognizing the Trump administration is vulnerable. It was a grim triumph, but it’s good that Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta had to resign over his inexcusable handling of the Jeffrey Epstein case. And Trump did have to retreat on his politically motivated census question.

Pelosi’s colleagues should ask themselves: Who can play a long game?

It will be unforgivable if the opponents of a genuinely dangerous and immoral regime focus on inward-looking feuds when history’s demands upon them couldn’t be clearer.