Trump’s legal problems lead Republicans into midterms
Dems hope to gain leverage during election
WASHINGTON – Mounting legal problems confronting President Donald Trump and the GOP are rattling the political map nationwide, forcing Democratic and Republican candidates alike to rethink strategies just weeks before the midterm elections.
And the debate around impeachment – or as many Democrats prefer to frame it, the “culture of Republican corruption” in Washington – promises to dominate scores of congressional races.
“If you didn’t think the midterms were about impeachment, you certainly do now,” said Michael Caputo, who was a Trump campaign adviser. “The Republican chances of maintaining the House got dramatically slimmer.”
As if the convictions and guilty pleas of close Trump associates were not trouble enough, he said, the recent indictments of two Republican House members who were among the president’s earliest loyalists have created a full-blown political crisis for the GOP.
“I don’t know any credible Republican analyst who isn’t sounding the alarm,” Caputo said.
The convictions of Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen and former campaign manager Paul Manafort have Democratic strategists scrambling to capitalize, even in Trumpcountry districts where tearing down the president was until this week seen as a risky strategy.
“What the polling shows is it doesn’t matter if you are Republican, a Democrat or an independent, people don’t like corruption in Washington,” said Rep. Ted Lieu of California, a vice chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “There is a stunning amount of criminal activity in this administration . ... In any other era in America, we would be having immediate congressional hearings on potential campaign finance violations by the president of the United States. The fact that is not happening shows how out of touch the Republicans are with the American people and the actual facts of what is happening.”
But Democrats would be wise to proceed cautiously. They need only look back to the impeachment of one of their own, former President Bill Clinton, for a lesson on the dangers of overreach. Their challenge could be building a case around “corruption,” but avoiding talk of “impeachment” that could turn off crucial swing voters who are not itching for the president to be driven from office.
“Most Democrats in swing districts or red districts would probably do well to let the convictions speak for themselves,” said David Wasserman, who tracks House races for the Cook Political Report.