United States President Donald Trump on August 20 in Arlington, Va..
Photo: Tasos Katopodis - Pool Via Cnp/Zuma PressDemocrats nearly exhausted the flattering adjectives in Roget’s Thesaurus last week as they described the kind of man Joe Biden is. Republicans can respond this week by laying out the kind of country America could be, if voters entrust them with another four years of leadership.
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Democrats want to make the election a referendum on Donald Trump’s character, but it was striking that over four days last week they had precious little to say about their policies. They offered infomercials on gun violence, immigration, climate change and racial justice that appealed to the young and gentry left. But they offered little detail on how they’d help American workers.
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This opens the door to the GOP to educate voters about the Democratic plans and to offer an alternative economic platform with broader appeal. On the former, the openings are many: hostility to fossil fuels, much higher taxes, and vast new regulation and diktats on health care, energy, education, housing and finance.
But attacking the Biden agenda won’t be enough, especially since Mr. Trump will also want to make the election all about himself. Presidential second terms are notoriously poor. The last successful second term was Ronald Reagan’s, as the economic boom continued and his foreign-policy fortitude cracked the Soviet Union. Voters are right to be skeptical if all Mr. Trump does is offer voters a first-term highlight reel or impeachment grievances. He needs to give voters reasons to take a risk on him for another four years.
So far he hasn’t done so, and he hasn’t had an answer even when he’s been tossed softball questions. To one questioner he replied, “now I know everybody,” which as usual puts himself first. Voters want to know what Mr. Trump and the GOP are going to do for them.
The convention is their best, and probably last, chance to do so. It has to start with the coronavirus and the economy. Voters disapprove of Mr. Trump’s handling of the virus, and the election impact will depend on the course of the disease. But the convention can explain what his Administration has done on testing, PPE, and therapeutic and vaccine development.
Voters do give Mr. Trump the edge over Mr. Biden on the economy, meaning they don’t hold the pandemic recession against him. Before the pandemic the Trump policy mix of tax reform, deregulation and unleashing domestic energy production produced the best wage gains in two decades for the lowest-skilled Americans. Among black workers the jobless rate hit 5.4%, the lowest since that statistic started being kept in the 1970s. During the Obama-Biden years, that figure never fell below 7.5%.
Forestalling Mr. Biden’s $3 trillion to $4 trillion in tax increases is vital, but Mr. Trump could also promise action to spur growth. The temporary full expensing for business investments, passed as part of the 2017 tax cuts, will start phasing out in 2023. It should be made permanent, and don’t bet on Mr. Biden to do it.
Mr. Trump can also double down on deregulation. Democrats, including Mr. Biden, love grandiose talk of roads and bridges; Mr. Trump actually wants them to get built. In July the White House finished a rule to streamline the federal government’s out-of-control environmental reviews. It shouldn’t take 13 years to approve a 12-mile road. Democrats castigated the overhaul, and Mr. Biden would undo it.
Urban violence is a legitimate issue. But Mr. Trump can go beyond “law and order” to promote an opportunity agenda. That includes expanding school choice for K-12 and vocational education after high school. The opportunity zones in the 2017 tax reform are a chance to spread investment into depressed areas.
Republicans are destined to play defense on health care after failing to replace the Affordable Care Act. But Mr. Trump can tout his Administration’s incremental moves to expand choice and lower the cost of health insurance, and he can promise to do more to create a competitive market. He can also talk up the huge expansion of telemedicine in recent months and promise to continue it.
Mr. Trump will no doubt reprise his familiar populist themes on immigration, China and trade, pitched to blue-collar voters in the Rust Belt. But anyone voting on those issues is already for Mr. Trump. He’d be wiser to promise a second-term immigration compromise that would offer to legalize Dreamers and expand legal immigration in return for more border control. He needs to expand his support among Hispanics and suburban swing voters to erode Mr. Biden’s big lead.
Mr. Trump can’t win a character contest with Mr. Biden. But he might be able to win an election on who can best revive the post-pandemic economy and improve the lives of most Americans. The contrast will have to begin this week.
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