The Democrat who won in Trump country

Summary

Today, Explained: The Democrat Who Won in Trump Country

Episode Release Date: November 25, 2024 | Hosts: Sean Rameswaram & Noel King

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Introduction: Breaking the Mold in Trump Country

In a political landscape often dominated by stark party lines, Marie Glusenkamp Perez, a Democrat, has emerged as a notable figure by securing a victory in a traditionally Republican stronghold. Representing Washington's 3rd District, Perez's win challenges the prevailing narrative that Democrats primarily appeal to the affluent and the impoverished, risking alienation of the working class.

Noel King introduces the episode by highlighting the broader criticism faced by Democrats in 2024: "The rap on the Democrats in 2024 was that they only spoke to the very rich and the very poor." (00:01) However, Perez's success story counters this claim, demonstrating that Democrats can resonate even in "Trump country."

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Background: Perez's Roots in a Rural Community

Marie Glusenkamp Perez's connection to her constituents is deeply rooted in her rural upbringing. Before her political career, she and her husband operated an auto repair shop and a machine shop in Skamania County, Washington—a region characterized by its low population density and reliance on essential services.

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "We live in rural communities. We are not the devil. We are your neighbors." (00:15)

Her firsthand experience with the challenges of rural life—such as limited internet access and reliance on wells for water—shapes her pragmatic approach to governance.

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "We get our Internet from a radio tower. We get our water from a well." (00:33)

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A Bipartisan Approach: Crossing the Aisle

In her inaugural term, Perez made headlines by frequently voting with Republicans to better serve her rural and working-class constituents. This approach, while effective in her district, has stirred controversy within the Democratic Party.

Noel King: "Gluesenkamp Perez... horrified some Democrats along the way." (00:42)

Despite facing backlash, Perez remained steadfast in her commitment to pragmatic solutions over partisan loyalty. Her decision to oppose President Biden's student debt relief plan exemplifies her focus on local priorities over national party agendas.

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "I am not here to play partisan football. I'm here because I see and value what we have and I know it's worth fighting for." (02:14)

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Navigating Partisanship: The Challenge of Minority Status

With Democrats holding the minority in both the House and the Senate, the episode delves into the strategies and historical precedents that minority parties can leverage to effect change. Sarah Binder, a political science professor at GWU and a Brookings fellow, provides insightful analysis on how minority parties can both block undesirable legislation and find avenues for bipartisan cooperation.

Historical Context: Binder references past instances where minority parties have successfully influenced major policy decisions, such as:

• George W. Bush Era: Democrats in the minority threatened filibusters to block the privatization of Social Security, aiming to protect senior citizens' interests.

  Sarah Binder: "They threatened a filibuster... to raise the stakes." (17:04)

• Affordable Care Act Opposition: Democrats thwarted Republican attempts to repeal Obamacare by mobilizing public support and highlighting the potential loss of health insurance for vulnerable populations.

  Binder: "They made sure the public was very aware that it was the Trump administration... trying to take away their health care rights." (24:21)

Current Strategies: In the current political climate, Binder emphasizes the importance of minority parties engaging in both obstruction and collaboration to push forward their agendas.

Sarah Binder: "Unified party control of government does not last very long. On average, unified party control basically lasts two years..." (26:08)

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Representative Perez's Legislative Initiatives

Perez's legislative efforts focus on addressing the unique needs of her rural district. One notable bill she introduced ensures the "positive right to serve fresh fruits and vegetables" in daycare facilities receiving federal funds, aiming to simplify regulations that currently hinder local businesses.

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "I've introduced a bill that creates a positive right to serve fresh fruits and vegetables." (09:13)

This initiative reflects her broader commitment to supporting trades and practical skills over purely academic pursuits, advocating for "good jobs that don't require a college degree."

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "We don't want academic intelligence to be the thing that we should be supporting. We want good jobs..." (04:16)

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The Evolution of Partisanship in Congress

The episode explores the shifting dynamics of partisanship within Congress, noting a trend towards more "reflexive partisanship" where loyalty to the party often overrides bipartisan cooperation. Binder contrasts this with historical periods when both parties had internal factions (e.g., liberal Republicans or conservative Democrats), allowing for more nuanced legislative processes.

Sarah Binder: "Today's partisanship... it's really almost team play. Right. Your team is against it... That's reflexive partisanship." (20:16)

She underscores the rarity of such deep partisan divides in the past, suggesting that today’s political environment presents unique challenges for effective governance.

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Conclusion: Navigating a Divided Congress

As Democrats brace for a prolonged minority status, Perez exemplifies a pragmatic approach to governance—prioritizing local needs and seeking bipartisan solutions. The episode concludes by highlighting the importance of minority parties remaining proactive and adaptable in their strategies to influence legislation and represent their constituents effectively.

Marie Glusenkamp Perez: "I just continue to be myself and reflect my community and just work hard to knit our community back together." (11:10)

With insights from Sarah Binder, Today, Explained offers a comprehensive look at how Democrats like Perez can navigate and potentially thrive in a challenging political landscape dominated by heightened partisanship and minority status.

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Key Takeaways:

• Marie Glusenkamp Perez's Victory: Illustrates the potential for Democrats to win in traditionally Republican areas by focusing on local, pragmatic issues.
• Bipartisan Strategies: Emphasizes the importance of crossing party lines to address constituency needs, even amidst intra-party criticism.
• Historical Parallels: Highlights past instances where minority parties influenced major policy decisions, offering lessons for the present.
• Evolving Partisanship: Discusses the shift towards more rigid party loyalty, posing challenges for bipartisan cooperation.
• Legislative Initiatives: Showcases Perez's efforts to support trades and simplify regulations, aligning with her community's values.

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For more detailed discussions and insights, listen to the full episode of "Today, Explained" on Vox's Podcast Network.

Transcript

[Noel King]

The rap on the Democrats in 2024 was that they only spoke to the very rich and the very poor.

[Sarah Binder]

So they lost the working class.

[Noel King]

But not all of them lost. Marie Gluson Camperez did not just win, she won. In Trump country, Democrats work in the.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Trades like we live in rural communities. We are not the devil. We are your neighbors. Before being elected, I ran an auto repair at a machine shop with my husband and we live in unincorporated Skamania county and and our son is three years old now.

[Noel King]

Skamania county in Washington state has a national forest and a population of about 12,000 people.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

We get our Internet from a radio tower. We get our water from a well.

[Noel King]

In her first term, Gluesenkamp Perez crossed the aisle to vote with Republicans on behalf of her rural and working class constituents. And she horrified some Democrats along the way. Her plans to get things done despite a Republican majority in Congress. Coming up on TODAY explained.

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[Noel King]

Last week I went to Capitol Hill to talk to Representative Marie Gluson Camperez, who represents Washington's third District. This is a swing district. It was held by a Republican for 12 years before she won in 2022. And this time around, Donald Trump backed her opponent, Joe Kent. So I asked her, why do you think you won?

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Well, yeah, I think what we want in Southwest Washington is to see our priorities and our culture reflected in Washington, D.C. we don't want a national agenda or a culture from somewh else imported and replacing our community, our values, our priorities. And so just a real focus on what my community needs, what our values are, who we are. The district went for Trump by seven points in 16. And this time we were able to point to my record and say, I am not here to play partisan football. I'm here because I see and value what we have and I know it's worth fighting for. You know on the student loan forgiveness, I looked at the data. My district only holds 3% of the federally issued debt. This was a regressive tax policy. If you support progressive tax strategies, you should do that consistently, not just when there's, you know, party favors. And, you know, I had people protest our auto shop.

[Sarah Binder]

Just to clarify for listeners who may not know, you voted against president in Biden's student debt relief. People looked at you and said, a Democrat.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Oh, yeah. So they were really aggressive on our online reviews. We take real pride in the quality of work we do and had that take. People were just bombing it who'd never been customers. But hearing from my community, like, yeah, we don't want the trades to be considered as an afterthought. We don't want to be second fiddle and really challenging the idea that academic intelligence is the thing that we should be supporting. We want good jobs that don't require a college degree. We want honors level shop class and junior high. You know, those are the things that reflect our values and our priorities. And so that's how I vote.

[Sarah Binder]

The thing about national office, and I think this is where the pushback comes in, is when you vote, when you're in national office and you vote, you vote on something that affects everybody in the country. So not many people in your district ended up in a lot of college debt, but all across the United States, many, many, many young people did. You're in national office. You don't just vote for this little corner of Washington because your vote as one of 435, it affects the whole country.

[Noel King]

How do you respond to that?

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Well, my job is to represent my community, you know, the people that live where I live. And that's my role. And I think the way that you arrive at good policy is by having everyone show up at the table with the unique perspectives of their community and loyalty there. And that is how you end up with better policy in the end. Like, you don't get good legislation without having people who are driving trucks and changing diapers and turning wrenches at the table. Not as an afterthought, but in the inception of the legislation, Whether you support.

[Sarah Binder]

Donald Trump or are a critic of his, one thing that you can say he successfully did is he turned local issues national. Right. Springfield, Ohio, was struggling with an influx of immigrants. There is no reason that somebody in Maine or Florida or Texas should have cared at all about Springfield, Ohio. That was a local issue. Donald Trump took that local issue, made it a national issue. Some analysts say that is what helped him win.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

I Think, let me think about that. Like, people want to be heard. I had a lot of people, colleagues, whatever, saying, like, how do we get people to understand that the economy is actually great? Like, what do we need to say?

[Sarah Binder]

This was the Democratic line.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

You don't, you don't. Okay, don't do that. People are putting their groceries on a credit card. You know, it's like you go to Albertsons or whatever, your grocery store and you feel like you're in a game of chicken with the CEO. And so don't gaslight people hear them when they are telling nobody cares about your spreadsheets. You know, And I think that is the loyalty that needs to guide any progress getting back to a place where we are finding the non political ways of conveying our values. You know, like, I think, you know, people that can, like get their Honda Civic to 500k miles, like, that's cool. And when those people are regarded as, you know, like the vanguard of environmentalism, like, I think that's, that's, that's progress. Like, that is how you grow the field of people who feel real. Like, that is how you build a coalition that can actually pass useful legislation.

[Sarah Binder]

The person who gets their Honda Civic to 500,000 miles, as you said, is not usually identified as like, wow, that person's a great environmentalist.

[Noel King]

It's like, oh, that person is broke. Right. And that's why they've run their car.

[Sarah Binder]

At a half a million miles.

[Noel King]

Good for them. But do you think there's a kind.

[Sarah Binder]

Of snobbery within the Democratic Party where maybe the heroes that the party is choosing are the wrong heroes?

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Well, what I've seen being here is that, I mean, it feels like Everybody is under 40 and has like at least 2 degrees. And, you know, that's not what the country looks like. That's not what the value system of merit is everywhere.

[Sarah Binder]

Do you mean over 40 and has.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

2 degrees under 40? Okay, you feel like, you feel like.

[Sarah Binder]

Washington Congress is young.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Oh, I mean like all of the, like, staff and lobbyists and, you know. Yeah, the people who are, you know, often writing legislation.

[Sarah Binder]

Gotcha. Okay, keep going.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Sorry, I was talking to a constituent. She, she works in childcare. She told me she is not legally allowed to peel a banana or an orange. That is considered food prep. They are not a licensed food prep facility. So they can open a bag of chips, can't peel a banana. And I went round and round and round for like four months. I had my office talking to local regulators and licensors and elected officials and they kept saying, she's dumb. She doesn't understand the rules.

[Sarah Binder]

Does she understand the rules?

[Noel King]

Yes. Okay.

[Sarah Binder]

Yes. Okay.

[Noel King]

Keep going.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Their licenser said they would need six more sinks before they were legally allowed to be engaged in food prep. And I don't think this is a small thing. Like, I have a toddler. I know how durable food preferences are.

[Sarah Binder]

So are toddlers.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Yeah, Sorry. And like, having regard and respect and agency and having people who are actually doing the work at the core of the legislative process. So I've introduced a bill that creates a positive right to serve fresh fruits and vegetables. It says, like, if your state's taking federal dollars for childcare, you will not infringe on the right to serve fresh fruits and vegetables. And, like, this is the long work of building strong local agriculture and national health.

[Sarah Binder]

It is also, if we're being honest, in a tradition that more closely hues to what Republicans think. You're pointing to overregulation, and you're saying, this is ridiculous. And I can imagine Democrats saying, but what about listeria? Every time you turn on the news these days, there is listeria in something. There's E. Coli in something. You're going to give it to the kids. How do you square the party that you're in and the historical positions that it's taken on things like regulation?

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

I don't know if it's, like, necessarily partisan as much as, like, parents know that food preferences in children are very durable, you know, and so my experience as a young mom is what's driving that, not, like a partisan agenda. But I think that this is absolutely one of the reasons that there's one licensed daycare facility in my entire county. Think about the overhead of, like, installing six cents somewhere, you know, so what are the ways that we can find structural reforms to build health, to build access, to provide quality care?

[Sarah Binder]

I think there's a conception that being the minority party in the House, the Senate, and not holding the presidency means you cannot get anything done. Certainly you don't seem like somebody who wants to spend two years just spinning your wheels. What's the plan?

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

No, I mean, I. Right. Like, I miss my family. You know, I better be productive if I'm not going to be with them. And I'm on a plane, like, every three days. I'm not doing that to just sit here and reflexively disagree. It's as much as possible getting ahead of, you know, when a bill is dropped and figuring out, like, what are the parts here that my community agrees with. How could I make this more reflective of our values. You know, the fuller picture of a situation, like frequently just being from a rural community means that, you know, that has not been considered by whatever committee staff drafted the bill. So getting our perspective, our values, our priorities baked in and then working on amendments afterwards. But you know, I mean, elections have consequences. So, you know, I think it's important to hear what people are saying and with curiosity and figure out like what are the shared parts we agree on. I don't know what bills will come to the floor, but you know, I mean, I just continue to be myself and reflect my community and just work hard to knit our community back together.

[Sarah Binder]

Representative Marie Glusenkamp Perez, Washington State's 3rd district thank you so much for taking the time. We appreciate it.

[Marie Glusenkamp Perez]

Thank you so much.

[Noel King]

Coming up so you're the minority in Congress. How to get things done Anyway.

[Sarah Binder]

Support.

[Noel King]

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[Noel King]

I'm Noel King with Sarah Binder. She teaches political science at gwu. She's a fellow at Brookings. All right, Sarah, for the next two years, Democrats will be the minority in the House and the Senate. They will try to get things done anyway. Are there moments in the past where you can look back and say, dang, the minority really pulled that off?

[Sarah Binder]

George W. Bush in 2005, beginning of his second term, he and his administration is proposing to privatize Social Security, give.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Younger workers the option of putting a portion of their payroll taxes into a voluntary personal retirement account.

[Sarah Binder]

You are responsible for the investments of your Social Security, Right? You take on the risk. And Democrats, so it was a Republican majority, Democrats in the minority in the Senate. They basically threatened a filibuster. They said, if you do this, we're going to go ballistic.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Today as we are here on the floor of the House, House Democrats are offering a motion that will give members of Congress a chance to say exactly where they stand on the president's proposal on privatization. Our motion says we're going to get.

[Sarah Binder]

The senior citizens on our side. We're going to defeat you, not by voting things down, but by raising the stakes. Right? Getting the public, getting their attention, getting them off the sidelines so that they are going to come to fight it as well.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Over 300 town hall meetings have taken place or shortly will be, and we're now going on to the next phase of them.

[Sarah Binder]

We were the Affordable Care act under Trump in 2018 at that election. Right. The minority party Democrats in the House didn't really have a lot of power, but they could attract attention. They could say, trump wants to take away your health insurance for your children under 26. Trump wants to take away the protection for preexisting health conditions.

[Noel King]

We all have reasons to fix our health care system, but Republicans in Congress keep voting to repeal Obamacare instead of.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Fixing it to take away health care from people with preexisting conditions. He is just dead wrong, and that ain't going to happen.

[Noel King]

If seniors had to pay another $6,400 a year for health care, how would they manage?

[Sarah Binder]

Eat less, raise the stakes, get attention. The minority can do that. And that's often their key to power.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Right?

[Sarah Binder]

Force the majority to make concessions or even sometimes to back down. Today's Senate, you need 60 votes to cut off debate. Most majorities don't have 60 votes. Right. The new incoming one is probably at 53. So if they can't get Democrats to vote with them to cut off debate, the Senate goes nowhere.

[Noel King]

In politics in 2024, a lot of the analysis that we're seeing about the Democrats losing the presidency, the House and the Senate, suggests that Republicans are going to go ham and roll over their colleagues, get done what they want to get done. It's almost. Some of the analysis almost suggests that it's, like, kind of punitive. You guys lost, and so we are going to trample right over you. Was it always this way?

[Sarah Binder]

Well, over congressional history, we've. In American history, we've had periods of very high partisanship and very low partisanship. Sometimes it just means, like, the conservatives are on one side of the aisle and liberals are on the other side of the party aisle, and they have core disagreements about the role of government. But today's partisanship, it's really almost. It's just. It's team play. Right. Your team is against it. So my team's gonna be for this bill. Right? You can switch positions. Oh, your party used to be against it, but now you're for it, and so we're gonna be against it. Like reflexive partisanship. You're for it, I'm against it. That is seems. Seems a bit newer than we've seen before.

[Noel King]

Okay, so in the first half of the show we talked to a young congresswoman who kind of made her name by crossing over the aisle. She's a Democrat and voting with Republicans. And the think pieces that have been written about her suggest that, oh my God, she's a traitor. How could she do this? I think what I hear you saying is once upon a time, it wasn't that way. It hasn't always been that way.

[Sarah Binder]

We have periods of time where within the Democratic Party there were conservatives and there were liberals. We've had periods of time in the past where we had, in the Republican Party, conservatives and liberals, right? We don't even, we don't even have the term anymore liberal Republicans. But we had them. We would usually put this period roughly mid late 1940s and then petering out by the 1980s into the early 1990s. Who are the liberal Republicans? Senator Jacob Javits from New York.

[Unnamed Speaker]

In our country, we don't tolerate police by terror, taking the law into their own hands.

[Sarah Binder]

He was a Republican, right? Senator Durenberger, a liberal Republican from the state of Minnesota. Four years ago you elected me to.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Represent you in the United States Senate. I promised to stay in touch with.

[Sarah Binder]

You, that I'd represent your views and.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Above all that I'd be myself.

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In his later years, Duerenberger criticized what he called his Republican Party's hard swing to the right. And he endorsed Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden for president.

[Sarah Binder]

And on the same token, we've had conservative Democrats, right? Even in the 1940s and 50s, we would say, right, segregationist Democrats, conservatives in the Democratic Party.

[Unnamed Speaker]

These damnable proposals he has recommended under the guise of so called civil rights. And I'll tell you, the American people from one side or the other had a head better wake up and oppose such a program.

[Sarah Binder]

Today's parties just don't look like that. But we do see these bipartisan pairs. I think it's important to like get below the surface of where most of the spotlight is. You do see not on big major bills, right? A bipartisan pair is not going to reform and fix Social Security, right? But a bipartisan pair might deal with a special problem in an agricultural office. Loans aren't going through, subsidies aren't working. So there is room for bipartisanship. But oftentimes there are a lot of incentives not to work with the other team.

[Noel King]

We've talked about how people at times have crossed party lines, teamed up on things. There does seem to be another way that the minority party can get things done, and that is to not get things done to hold Things up to whatever extent they can. And I think in 2024, a lot of people are wondering, oh, will they try it this time? Can you tell us what it looks like when that happens?

[Sarah Binder]

Sure. So probably the most famous or infamous of these efforts by minorities and at times minority parties, but minority groups to block majorities, especially in the Senate, was the efforts by Southerners to block action on protecting civil rights, anti lynching laws, anti poll tax laws. The minority party, or at that time, really a minority coalition filibustering in the Senate to block forward action on major civil rights measures.

[Unnamed Speaker]

We're going to give this fight against bureaucratic tyranny and totalitarianism everything we have.

[Sarah Binder]

In a period of unified party control, minority parties have been better suited toward blocking things, or maybe sometimes we might say moderating majority agendas. The most recent clear version of that was Trump in 2017. Republican House, Republican Senate. Republicans in the house had voted 60 times in the past decade to repeal the Affordable Care Act. It was top, top priority. And technically it was blocked because Senator John McCain, a Republican, broke from his.

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Party, prompting an audible gasp in the chamber.

[Sarah Binder]

But keep in mind, what did the Democrats do? They made sure the public was very aware that it was the Trump administration and Trump trying to take away their health care rights.

[Unnamed Speaker]

Nobody knew that health care could be so complicated.

[Sarah Binder]

So that's how minority parties can try to make a difference here, by blocking things is just elevating and getting the audience out of the bleachers and onto the field to try to block the majority. However, there were a number of big issues tackled that Democrats were part of. Renegotiating and redoing. Nafta, the trade agreement with Mexico and Canada. House Democrats, led by speaker Pelosi in 2019, played a big role. Opioids addiction, that was bipartisan. Sanctions on Russia, that was bipartisan. So Democrats did not sit out the first Trump administration. They found some common ground, particularly with the Senate, not necessarily initially with President Trump, but tried to use it to move those priorities closer to their own. The challenge here for the Democrats this go round and for future minority parties is it's hard to break through the public's attention, I think in part because many partisans are in their own news bubbles. Right. And so let's say the Trump administration administration decides it wants to cut spending on healthcare for the poor. Is that going to be shown on Fox News? I don't know. Right. And so the Democrats have to figure out who they want to get off the sidelines. And so it's a challenge. I think to find ways to reach different generations and how to break through these media silos that often people are stuck in. This is how I think about it. Unified party control of government does not last very long. On average, unified party control basically lasts two years, two, three years. So majorities like to overreach and voters often make them pay the price.

[Noel King]

Sarah Binder of George Washington University and Brookings Today's Team Victoria Chamberlain, Peter Balan Rosen, Amina El Saadi, Patrick Boyd Andrea, Kristen's daughter and me, Noel King.

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[Unnamed Speaker]

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