There Will Be No Legislative Agenda for the Newly Minted Democratic House but That Doesn’t Mean They Don’t Have a Job To Do

By:  Lisa M. Hayes – Confluence Daily is your daily news source for women in the know.

I’m not going to say it’s bad – we’ll call it interesting. It’s interesting times indeed when the best we can hope for in politics is inching out of the pit of chaos to complete deadlock. However, welcome to the new air after the midterms. When the new year starts and the new members of the house or representatives take their seats, we will be at an unmovable state of political gridlock – and that’s way better than being on the Trump-driven-run-away train of insanity.

During the next few weeks, we are going to be in treacherous territory, because the new electeds have not started their new job and won’t until January. The lame duck Congress can do a lot of damage with the power they still rightfully have. However, once the new Congress takes their seats in January, there will be two teams on the field for the first time in two years. Trump will not be throwing passes to himself unchecked anymore.

And I’m hearing a lot of rumblings about what the legislative agenda of the House should be. What should they be working on when the first gavel falls?

Federal minimum wage increase?
Infrastructure?
Try to “save” healthcare??

All the pundits are doing what they do. They are talking about agendas, reconciliation, and rational progress towards the center though compromise. They are talking about whether or not Pelosi can stand toe to toe with Trump. Can she lead her party to some sort of successful agenda in this environment with her newly minted house majority?

No, she can’t and no one could. The Senate is not going to compromise on anything as long as Trump lives in the White House. The President is not even going to get on the field with the Democrats. We all know it.

There is no legislative agenda that can be fought and won in this environment. The new House of Representatives can and should only have one goal and it’s not a legislative agenda.

The only rational and working goal for the House must be, not just to stop the President, but to get rid of him – one way or the other.

I’m not naive. I know day one is not the day to start impeachment proceedings. I am aware that kind of reactionary flexing of pseudo-power would not be good for the country or even successful. I also know the House doesn’t have the firepower alone to successfully impeach and remove a sitting president. However, that doesn’t mean that getting rid of Trump isn’t the one and only priority of the new House majority.

The best thing that can happen to this nation is that Trump resigns. The House has the power to make walking away a very attractive option. Supeona power is just the first tool in the box they can leverage and every early indication out of the gate is that’s exactly what they plan to do. They can and should do that regardless of whatever happens to the Special Council probe. Mueller isn’t the only game in town anymore. It’s also exactly the job the voters who sent them there expect of them.

At some point, both sides of our electorate will have to find their way towards the “middle” and work together. I’m not suggesting the new House shouldn’t attempt to work with the Senate. They should. However, this group of Democrats that have been sent to the Hill needs to be prepared to go to war against the current sitting regime in the White House.

Democrats have reputation for playing nicer than they should. Republicans count on it. In the last four years, Republicans have re-written the book and redefined “fair play”. Dems need to study it and play by their rules until we’ve restored sanity in the White House.

My open plea to the Dems is that they choose leadership who is prepared to fight. My deepest request to the DNC is that they install a Chairperson who has four stars on a uniform and knows how to do one thing, at any cost, which is winning a war.

At any cost might sound overly-dramatic, unrealistic, or even unwise. However, just because we won the House doesn’t mean we’re aren’t still fighting to save our democracy.

For now, the voting is over. We’ve done our part. Now it’s their turn to do what we elected them to do – and it has nothing to do with impossibly non-productive conversations about wages, immigration, health care, or infrastructure. We hired them to save our democracy. We need to be prepared to support them in doing a lot of things that won’t look or feel like politics as usual.