News to Know: Elections et al.
July 11, 2025
As usual, this edition of “News to Know” to chock full of highlights about the important public policy issues of the day (especially ones affecting state & local governments), that aren’t getting major media attention. But I’d like to draw your attention to the following two. (See the attached PDF for the full text, as usual.)
Hunt, Charlie, “One ‘Big, Beautiful’ Reason Why Republicans in Congress Just Can’t Quit Donald Trump,” The Conversation (July 3, 2025).[1]
Presidential supremacy over the legislative process has been on the rise for decades. But contrary to popular belief, lawmakers are not always simply voting based on blind partisanship.
Increasingly, politicians in the same political party as a president are voting in line with the president because their political futures are as tied up with the president’s reputation as they have ever been.
Even when national polling indicates a policy is unpopular – as is the case with Trump’s budget reconciliation bill, which an estimated 55% of American voters said in June they oppose, according to Quinnipiac University polling – lawmakers in the president’s party have serious motivation to follow the president’s lead. Or else they risk losing reelection.
Over the past 50 years, lawmakers in the president’s party have increasingly supported the president’s position on legislation that passes Congress. Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, are increasingly united against the president’s position.
In 1970, for example, when Republican President Richard Nixon was in the White House, Republicans in Congress voted along with his positions 72% of the time. But the Democratic majority in Congress voted with him nearly as much, at 60% of the time, particularly on Nixon’s more progressive environmental agenda.
These patterns are unheard of in the modern Congress. In 2022, for example – a year of significant legislative achievement for the Biden administration – the Democratic majority in Congress voted the same way as the Democratic president 99% of the time. Republicans, meanwhile, voted with Biden just 19% of the time.
Over the past half-century, the two major parties have changed dramatically, both in the absolutist nature of their beliefs and in relation to one another.
Both parties used to be more mixed in their ideological outlooks, for example, with conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans playing key roles in policymaking. This made it easier to form cross-party coalitions, either with or against the president.
A few decades ago, Democrats and Republicans were also less geographically polarized from each other. Democrats were regularly elected to congressional seats in the South, for example, even if those districts supported Republican presidents such as Nixon or Ronald Reagan.
Much of this has changed in recent decades. Congress members are not just ideologically at odds with colleagues in the other party – they are more similar than ever to other members within their party.
Districts supporting the two parties are also increasingly geographically distant from each other, often along an urban-rural divide. And presidents in particular have become polarizing partisan figures on the national stage.
These changes have ushered in a larger phenomenon called political nationalization, in which local political considerations, issues and candidate qualifications have taken a back seat to national politics.
…. The political success of members of Congress has become increasingly tied up with the success or failure of the president. Because nearly all Republicans hail from districts and states that are very supportive of Trump and his agenda, following the will of their voters increasingly means being supportive of the president’s agenda.
Not doing so risks blowback from their Trump-supporting constituents. A June 2025 Quinnipiac University poll found that 67% of Republicans support the bill, while 87% of Democrats oppose it.
These electoral considerations also help explain the unanimous opposition to Trump’s legislation by the Democrats, nearly all of whom represent districts and states that did not support Trump in 2024.
Thanks to party polarization in ideologies, geography and in the electorate, few Democrats could survive politically while strongly supporting Trump. And few Republicans could do so while opposing him.
But as the importance to voters of mere presidential support increases, the importance of members’ skill in fighting for issues unique to their districts has decreased. This can leave important local concerns about, for example, unique local environmental issues or declining economic sectors unspoken for. At the very least, members have less incentive to speak for them.
Zurcher, Anthony, “'Trump Was Right' - John Kerry Says Democrats Allowed Migrant 'Siege' of US Border,” BBC (July 10, 2025).[2]
Former US Secretary of State John Kerry has told the BBC his fellow Democrats allowed the US-Mexico border to be "under siege" during Joe Biden's presidency.
In sometimes sharp words, Kerry - who was the Democratic presidential nominee in 2004 and a US senator from Massachusetts - said he told Biden the party had "missed" on the issue of immigration for years. He said this had allowed Republicans like Donald Trump to gain political advantage.
…. "The first thing any president should say - or anybody in public life - is without a border protected, you don't have a nation," Kerry said. "I wish President Biden had been heard more often saying, ‘I'm going to enforce the law.’"
Such words have been a familiar refrain for Trump during his time in national politics and were included in the 2024 Republican Party policy platform. But Democrats - many of whom advocate more relaxed immigration laws and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented migrants - attempted to portray Trump's positions as harsh and discriminatory.
According to Kerry, that was a mistake. "Trump was right," Kerry said. "The problem is we all should have been right."
The sheer financial burden associated with the development, maintenance, and inevitable obsolescence of these ultimate deterrents is staggering, consuming vast national resources that could otherwise be directed towards societal betterment. Each device, from its conceptual design to its eventual retirement, represents an astronomical investment in materials, highly specialized labor, and secure infrastructure. The ongoing costs of safeguarding these stockpiles, ensuring their readiness, and managing their intricate delivery systems further compound this expenditure, creating a continuous drain on national treasuries. This economic weight is borne by taxpayers, diverting funds from essential public services, infrastructure development, healthcare, education, or scientific research with more immediate and tangible benefits for humanity.
Beyond the direct financial outlays, the act of proving the efficacy of these devices imposes a significant global burden. Each test detonation, whether atmospheric or subterranean, releases a cascade of environmental contaminants. Atmospheric tests, historically, dispersed radioactive particles across continents, contaminating air, water, and soil, and leading to long-term health consequences for populations far removed from the test sites. Even underground tests, while containing the immediate blast, can fracture geological formations, potentially releasing radioactive materials into groundwater and contributing to seismic instability. The cumulative effect of decades of such activities places an undeniable strain on global ecosystems, impacting biodiversity and altering natural processes. These tests also contribute to a pervasive sense of anxiety and distrust among nations, fostering an environment where resources are allocated to defensive postures rather than collaborative solutions to shared global challenges. The long-term cleanup and remediation efforts at former test sites further underscore the enduring environmental and financial legacy of these activities, a cost that will be borne for generations.
Considering the profound economic and environmental tolls exacted by these destructive capabilities, a novel approach is imperative. Imagine a global initiative where nations possessing these powerful armaments could actively reduce their national debt or accrue significant reductions in interest payments on international loans, in direct exchange for verifiable and irreversible dismantlement of their devices. This proposal envisions a structured, multilateral agreement, overseen by an independent, transparent international body. This body would establish rigorous verification protocols, ensuring that each step of the dismantlement process is meticulously documented and confirmed. The financial incentives would be directly tied to the quantity and type of ordinance disarmed, with specific metrics and milestones agreed upon by all participating nations. This would not be a one-time transaction but rather an ongoing framework, encouraging incremental disarmaments over time, each step unlocking further financial relief. The funds freed up from reduced debt servicing or interest payments would then be demonstrably reinvested by the disarming nation into sustainable development goals, humanitarian aid, or environmental restoration projects within their own borders, or even contributed to a global fund for such purposes. Such a system would transform the burden of these armaments into an impetus for economic stability and global well-being, fostering an environment of trust and shared prosperity, rather than one defined by the looming threat of ultimate destruction.
Are Trump and Republicans about immigration or is immigration the Trump and Republican bogeyman?
Republicans need someone to fear and hate to unify the party. Immigrants fulfill that need just like Jews fulfilled that need in Nazi Germany.
If the Democrats had stopped immigration sooner, the enormous Republican messaging machine (Fox, conservative radio ...) would have found or created something else to unify with fear and hate. (CRT, WOKE or some new fabrication.)
If immigration was a problem that the Republican voters really wanted fixed, Trump would have allowed Biden's immigration bill to pass.