Democrats Likely to Lose Congress in 2022 — Should They Stop Caring?

With President Biden’s approval rating headed downward and COVID-19 continuing to produce large numbers of cases across the country (including blue states), Democrats are in a tough spot heading into the upcoming election seasons. This year is worth mentioning, since Virginia, often an indicator of where the voters stand in the off-year, has its gubernatorial election as well.

Biden’s “mission accomplished” moment when he stood at the White House announcing a return to normalcy from the evils of COVID-19, only to reverse course weeks later, will likely haunt his party for a while to come. This was before the disastrous exit of Afghanistan, a situation that continues to deteriorate on a daily basis, started playing out on live TV every night.

Given all this, at least one veteran Democratic strategist writing in New York magazine says it’s time for Democrats to abandon hopes of retaining the House in 2022 and simply focus on the task of governing:

Every political party that achieves power in Washington has to make a central strategic decision early on: Does it want to focus on substantive accomplishments or on perpetuating its power? Democrats who hold a fragile trifecta right now need to make that choice very soon. . . .

They have no margin for error, even as progressives demand shooting the moon while centrists want to shrink, tone down, and maybe even defeat the larger and much more important of the two bills (the reconciliation package) in hopes of surviving their next election. . . .

What this means in terms of the current legislative choices being made by Democrats is they shouldn’t sacrifice too much to accommodate highly vulnerable House members who are probably going to lose anyway.

In other words, Kilgore argues, don’t let moderates set the agenda with some hope of winning in 2022 when the loss may already be baked into reality. The vulnerable Dems in swing districts will probably lose regardless of what Congress does or does not pass.

It would seem that taking a moderate tone might stem the losses, but in that case, what difference does it make if Democrats lose control anyway? Republicans are now inching close to even in polling of which party will win votes for congressional control next year:

What is your preference for the outcome of next year's congressional elections: a Congress controlled by Republicans or a Congress controlled by Democrats?

Democratic control 47%
Republican control 46%

(NBC News Poll, RV, 8/14-17/21)
more: https://t.co/l9hgFOS0NF

— PollingReport.com (@pollreport) August 22, 2021

Those numbers typically favor Democrats so for Republicans to be even or a few points ahead could spell catastrophe next year for Dem candidates in swing districts.

The House will be up for grabs in 2022 and Republicans can easily find ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. At the moment, it appears that most of the GOP leadership would prefer to remain quiet and let Democrats attack and bury each other over the Aghanistan departure and the destruction that will ensue for years to come.

Americans of all political persuasions were in favor of exiting the Afghan theatre, there’s no question this war had to end at some point or it turns into an endless occupation. No matter who ended it, the exit would be messy. The question is whether it had to be this messy and this chaotic from an administration that ran for office to put the adults back in charge.

Democrats may be well-served to write off 2022 and focus on passing their agenda, they may not get another shot for many election cycles depending on how badly they perform next year.