Georgia runoffs: What a Democratic Senate means for Biden
It was understandably “overshadowed by the storming of the U.S. Capitol,” but “it’s hard to overstate the importance” of what happened the night before in Georgia, said Chris Cillizza in CNN.com. Democrats won both Senate runoff elections in that former Republican stronghold last week, securing unified control of government and ending Mitch McConnell’s reign as Senate majority leader. And they did so with two candidates who stand as harbingers of how much the country is changing. Rev. Raphael Warnock is only the second black senator ever elected from a former Confederate state. Jon Ossoff, meanwhile, will be the first Jewish senator from the South since the 19th century, and at 33 the youngest new senator since Joe Biden in 1972. Democrats should “profusely thank activist Stacey Abrams,” who led a tireless six-year effort to register Democratic voters in Georgia, said Jennifer Rubin in WashingtonPost.com, but President Trump also deserves credit. His shameful, post-defeat claims that America’s electoral system was fraudulent probably depressed Republican turnout and made “the difference between a GOP and Democratic Senate majority.” What sweet “cosmic justice.”
The wins give Democrats “an immediate expectations problem,” said Jennifer Haberkorn in the Los Angeles Times. With Congress and the White House now in Democratic hands, the party’s progressives will demand ambitious wish-list items, such as the Green New Deal and statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. But with a wafer-thin 10-seat majority in the House, and a 50-50 tie in the Senate—only Vice President Kamala Harris’ tie-breaking vote gives Democrats control—those plans “are likely moot.”
Still, the Georgia victories reshape the political landscape, said
Jonathan Chait in NYMag.com. Until last week, it seemed Biden’s greatest achievement would be “saving the country from a second Trump term.” Now, thanks to Georgia, “he can have a real presidency.” With Democratic control of the Senate, Biden can appoint Cabinet members, federal judges, and Supreme Court justices without obstruction. But the filibuster for legislation remains in effect, requiring 60 votes to overcome, so unless centrist Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia drops his opposition to scrapping it, passing actual laws will be much harder. But Biden may find willing partners in moderate GOP senators such as Mitt Romney and Lisa Murkowski, and Senate rules should let Democrats pass at least one “budget reconciliation” bill—a sweeping law that could deliver pandemic relief, shore up Obamacare, and raise taxes on the wealthy. Conservatives should be nervous, said the New York Post in an editorial. If there’s a single defection, “death, or retirement” in the GOP caucus, Democrats can “go radical despite Manchin.”
While Democrats look to the future, Republicans need a postmortem, said Eric Levitz in NYMag.com. In November, Ossoff received 2 percent fewer votes than GOP incumbent David Perdue, but he beat Perdue by 1 percent last week. What accounts for this 3-point swing? Was it mainly the fact that Trump himself wasn’t on the ballot, even though both Perdue and Loeffler ran as Trump loyalists? With Trump headed off to exile in disgrace, a GOP whose brand is “Trumpism without Trump” will be in big trouble. “Let Georgia be a lesson” for the GOP, said Kaylee McGhee White in WashingtonExaminer.com. Unless conservatives want to follow Trump into the political wilderness, it’s time to “start disentangling themselves from the anchor weighing them down.”