We don’t know yet what ‘Liberation Day’ holds, but its politics are likely to be tricky.
Obviously, we don’t know yet what “Liberation Day” holds, but its politics are likely to be tricky.
Sara Dorn in Forbes cites a recent (March 20-24) AP-NORC poll:
When asked about Trump’s handling of trade negotiations with other countries, 60% said they strongly or somewhat disapprove or lean towards disapproving, including 27% of Republicans, 68% of independents and 89% of Democrats.
A Fox news poll from a week or so earlier showed that 53 percent of voters thought tariffs hurt the economy. Only 28 percent believed they would help it. Sixty-nine percent thought they would increase prices of goods that they bought. Seven percent reckoned it would make them cheaper. According to a CBS news survey released on Sunday, 64 percent think that the president is not focusing enough on reducing prices.
It’s a human thing to confuse a solid victory with a sweeping mandate. But presidents need to carefully protect their image as competent leaders when pursuing their signature policies. Not even the current administration has learned to defy the laws of political gravity.
The truth is that the American public quickly forgets how it came to decide on this or that president. They are willing to allow presidents time to fix big problems — so long as those presidents communicate to them clearly what the plan is and what it will feel like to proceed through it. But most of all, they want the issue they reported caring about addressed, and addressed competently. The more that a president seems to be on an ideological crusade — whether Clinton before 1994, Bush before 2006, or Obama before 2010 — the more likely he is to be hammered for it.
Any economic policy is, if only by default, “ideological,” but a change of direction — and the Trump administration’s channeling of President McKinley is certainly that — will generally be seen as more ideological than sticking with the status quo. Overcoming the public’s suspicion of ideological crusades is tough. Persuading voters to give that crusade time to work can be tougher still: I suspect that people are less patient than Michael thinks, unless there are some signs of progress to cling to.
Mrs. Thatcher, an undeniably “ideological” candidate, became Britain’s prime minister in May 1979 after “the winter of discontent” (widespread strikes, renewed inflation, and relentlessly rising unemployment) had highlighted the depth of the country’s troubles. (Labour would probably have won had they gone to the polls the October before.) In a last service to their country, the unburied dead (gravediggers were among those who went on strike) made the case for TINA — “there is no alternative.” The effects of Thatcher’s medicine were much harsher than people expected. She seemed to be doomed, only to win by a landslide in 1983, due to victory in the Falklands War, a helpful schism on the Left and clear signs of a robustly recovering economy.
Ronald Reagan was able to pursue his “ideological” agenda thanks, above all, to the mess he inherited from Jimmy Carter. Once again, bitter medicine took its toll. The 1982 midterms were a setback for the GOP, despite an improving economy in the latter part of the year. But then the economy really took off, providing the perfect backdrop for Reagan’s formidable campaigning skills. A landslide ensued in 1984.
Four decades later, exhausted Argentine voters opted for Javier Milei, an ideologue if ever there was one. They were not necessarily enamored of his anarcho-capitalism (whatever that was), but everything else had failed and hyperinflation was just round the corner. It was time to dump the (failed) ruling party, time to reject the (failed) opposition, and time to roll the dice and make El Loco president. He offered an entirely new approach. What was there left to lose? Unlike Thatcher and Reagan, Milei has remained surprisingly popular through some very tough times. It has helped that he could quickly start pointing to a falling inflation rate, a sign, perhaps, that things might work out.
But Trump didn’t win the presidency of a wasteland. Yes, he was greatly helped by voter dissatisfaction with the economy, much of it attributable to bitter memories of an inflationary surge that had not yet quite died down. But unhappy as voters were with the economy, there’s little evidence that they thought it was in such bad shape that a massive brawl over trade was called for. To be sure, some polling data indicated that voters liked the idea of tariffs in the 10-20 percent range (and much more for China). This was consistent with an “America First” mindset, but it seemed to rest on the assumption that Americans would not be picking up the tab. The more recent polling mentioned above suggests that that assumption may be fading away.
And then there’s this (via ABC, November 14):
[A] February [2024] poll by YouGov for the Cato Institute (a libertarian think tank that supports free trade) suggested that support for tariffs dropped steeply if they would increase consumer prices or prompt retaliatory tariffs from other countries — both outcomes that economists have suggested are likely in response to Trump’s proposals.
If those economists are right (best guess, they are, and I’d throw in a rising recession risk, too) then the political path ahead will be rough going. After all, to win an election partly on the back of anger over higher prices, and then take steps that will almost certainly push them still higher may be novel, but is it wise?