Exclusive: Dems' tough medicine on Trump corruption
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A jarring message is coming for congressional Democrats this week: It may feel good to focus on allegations of corruption by President Trump, but that rhetoric has its limits.
Why it matters: Swing voters aren't biting at language that worked like a charm in prior elections, according to Impact Research focus groups in battleground states.
- 1️⃣ Swing voters are "more difficult to convince" on Trump corruption messages, said Tiffany Muller, the president of End Citizens United, an organization that says they're fighting corruption. "They've heard 'drain the swamp' before," she told Axios.
- 2️⃣ They agree that "threats to democracy" are bad news. But they disagree over what that means, watering down its effectiveness.
Zoom in: Trump isn't making it easy with his family's multibillion-dollar crypto deals or thanking Qatar on Monday for offering to give him an Air Force One replacement.
- But he still has some "inoculation" on corruption messaging thanks to DOGE and his longstanding anti-D.C. rhetoric, according to an Impact Research memo shared with Axios.
👀 The intrigue: Generic politicians are far more vulnerable to the corruption critiques than Trump or Elon Musk specifically, the focus groups suggest.
- But that's only if Democrats can put on a muscular anti-corruption demonstration. The focus group participants view Democrats as weak.
- Muller and Molly Murphy, the president of Impact Research, will be on the Hill this week to brief congressional Democrats and progressive allies on their findings.
- While a focus group is not a statistically significant sample like a poll, the responses show how some voters are thinking and talking about current events.
Zoom out: Populists on both parties' ideological extremes have already cracked the code, even when that means going after their own.
- The clearest example: Stock trading bans for lawmakers and their families, with bills attracting cosponsors that range from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) to MAGA firebrand Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.).
Among Democrats, the guidance comes as the party's traditional split between progressives and centrists is giving way to a divide between young and old, fighters and compromisers, those who understand the urgency of the moment and those who appear unaware.
- Some younger centrists, for instance, have found themselves pleading with older colleagues to be less complacent.
- But many in the party's older guard have refused to shift tactics, leading some lawmakers to openly bemoan their party establishment in ways that were once taboo.
