You would think that President Joe Biden would be a little more concerned that his Democratic majority is about to go up in a puff of smoke. If he is, he hasn’t shown it, as he continues to stick to stale talking points and Democratic myths about what voters respond to.
During his interview with Democratic mouthpiece Jimmy Kimmel, Biden begged voters to make the midterm elections about gun control. He also said that a potential Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade would cause a “minirevolution” and that voters are “going to vote these folks out of office.”
But gun control and abortion are not going to save Democrats. The party has tried to turn both into major issues for years with little success. Biden has failed to move the needle on gun control, constantly repeating tired lines about deer in Kevlar or how you couldn’t buy a cannon when the Second Amendment was written (even though you could). Abortion is an issue that brings Republicans to the polls, not Democrats, and it’s not clear who the Democratic Party’s abortion-on-demand stance will win over that it hasn’t already.
It is inflation that is occupying the minds of voters. Inflation has hit a 40-year high, with gas up 106.7% compared to the same time last year, and two-thirds of people expect it to get worse. Biden hasn’t had an answer on inflation, which is unsurprising, given that his reckless spending exacerbated the situation and he either denied that it was a problem or shifted blame at every opportunity.
The other issue dominating local elections is crime. The liberal bastion of San Francisco recalled District Attorney Chesa Boudin because of his soft-on-crime policies. Democrats across the country have failed to assuage concerns about crime in the major cities they run. According to the Washington Post, Republicans have an advantage of 12 percentage points on crime, and the issue is near the top of the list for voters in swing districts.
Biden is not terribly interested in those issues, though. Both he and the Democratic Party would prefer to retreat to the comfortable gun control and abortion talking points they pretend make a difference in elections. Biden can’t be bothered to address the issues that actually matter to voters because he can’t blame inflation or crime on Republicans. Better to drone on about a “women’s right to choose” or assault weapons while voters question their financial security or physical safety.
