JEANNETTE, Pa. (AP) – When Joe Biden visited this corner of southwestern Pennsylvania in the last few weeks before the election, his goal was not to win, but to show the predominantly white working-class electorate that his party was at least willing to try.
“Many white working-class Democrats thought we forgot them,” said Biden after visiting a union training center during a visit to Westmoreland County in late September. “I have a feeling they were left behind.”
Democrats have offered tributes like this since President Franklin D. Roosevelt enacted the New Deal and cemented an alliance with working-class voters. This link was rooted in the notion that Democrats’ policies would improve the lives of workers.
But that relationship has been eroding constantly, with working-class voters now classifying Democrats as the party of cultural elites who speak to them and reject their values. This resentment has even led workers to vote against their apparent economic interests, as the Republican Party’s tax policy is often geared towards the wealthy and business.
Now Biden and his party hope that, with the passage of the $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus relief and economic stimulus bill – with benefits strongly targeted to middle and lower-income Americans – they will be able to win back at least a portion largest voter of the working class.
The president will fly on Tuesday to Delaware County, outside Philadelphia, to help promote the new aid.
Still, this proposition – which Republicans dismiss as a “liberal wish list” – will be tested in places like Westmoreland County. More than 400 kilometers to the west, the county was a Democratic stronghold until its industrial base dried up.
“This is the kind of issue that involves a little more meat and potatoes and that we should focus on in that area,” said Paul Adams, a former Democratic county official.
“Despite the fact that our sympathies may be with other issues,” said Adams, referring to greater efforts to combat racism and promote gay rights, “it is difficult to achieve traction with the local population.”
Democrats are betting on direct payments of $ 1,400 to most Americans under COVID-19 as a strong counterweight to these criticisms. The package also dramatically expands tax credits for families with children, increases unemployment benefits, reduces taxes on student loan debt, and decreases the costs of covering the Obama-era health law.
Ed Rendell, a former Democratic governor of Pennsylvania, said the legislation will not solve the party’s problems with working-class voters alone, but is “a good first mile ahead.”
“It is our responsibility to argue – what I believe has always been there to defend, we just did a (terrible) job – that we are the workers’ party,” said Rendell. “And the Republicans are using smoke and mirrors.”
According to some estimates, the law could reduce the country’s poverty rate by a third. This can have a huge impact on Westmoreland County, whose population under 65 receives more federal disability benefits than the national average and where less than a third of residents have a college degree, according to federal estimates.
The city of Jeannette used to boast of being the “Glass Capital of the World”, but almost all of these factories have already disappeared. A nearby Volkswagen plant was closed in 1988, eliminating 2,500 jobs.
But the strong economic incentives in the relief bill are clashing with structural support here for former President Donald Trump. Trump 2020 yard signs and beacons – often carefully preserved against winter snows – still line the banks of rugged roads, in addition to the heavy hulls of abandoned bottle factories. The Democratic county sheriff became a Republican last summer, saying his former party did not support law enforcement strongly enough during demonstrations that swept the country because of police brutality and racism.
Like Biden, Trump campaigned in Westmoreland County and won the county by almost 30 percentage points. But Biden got about 11,000 more votes here than Hillary Clinton in 2016. This is significant, given that Biden beat Pennsylvania by only about 80,500 votes.
Bill Bretz, chairman of the county Republican Party, said the new direct economic benefits were canceled out by other policies of the Biden government. This includes banning the Keystone XL pipeline, which has raised fears that Pennsylvania natural gas producers may face similar limits in the name of combating climate change.
“There are many people who are still registered Democrats, who still hold on to the democratic values of the working class,” said Bretz. “But their sensibilities are violated by the national Democratic platform.”
In fact, people like Mary Wilmes, who owns a gift shop at Greensburg County headquarters, don’t like to irritate customers with political talk. But she praised Biden and his work in promoting the stimulus. “He’s giving you the feeling that he cares about people,” she said.
“It’s not like before,” added Wilmes, “when what we had was, ‘It’s all about him.'”
The white working class helped drive Trump’s rise in 2016, but these voters have actually been gravitating to Republicans since 1992, according to a poll by Noam Lupu, a professor of political science at Vanderbilt University. Working-class African Americans remained firmly loyal to Democrats, but Trump saw his support among Latinos improve in 2020. This may indicate that a broader change in Democrats may be echoing among some Hispanics.
“I think that, for the Democratic Party, it is a difficult coalition to maintain: working class voters who are really focused on their economic interests, but at the same time, very progressive social positions for urban and educated voters,” said Lupu . “I think Biden has the opportunity to change the brand of the party a little bit.”
Working class generally denotes people without a college degree who have jobs with lower wages. It can also mean better-educated and better-paid middle-class people who don’t like to define themselves as rich or poor. Trump won 62% of white voters without a college degree in November, according to AP VoteCast, a national poll of the electorate.
During the campaign, Biden tried to contrast what he called the sensibilities of the working family in his hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania, with Trump’s Fifth Avenue, the values of a big city. Biden also promised to be “the most pro-union president you have ever seen”.
“Several working-class people have seen politics not working for their families, and sometimes it’s when Democrats are in charge and sometimes it’s when Republicans are in charge,” said Rick Levy, president of Texas AFL-CIO. “This creates an opening for demagogues who say, ‘I can fix it’.”
Some of the leading Republicans have begun to argue that their party is in fact the working class – mixing economic appeal with important social issues, such as promoting the right to arms and opposing abortion, in addition to emphasizing opposition to the cancellation of some Dr Seuss and abandon Potato Head’s “Sir.” So that the toy better promotes gender inclusion.
“We are a working-class party now,” tweeted Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley on election night. Hawley also offered legislation to raise the minimum wage to $ 15, which has long been a position for progressive Democrats.
Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, recently declared the Republican Party to be “the party of steel workers, construction workers, taxi drivers, police, firefighters and waitresses”. He proposed a $ 10,000 grant to help parents who live in areas where schools remain closed because of the virus to pay for education elsewhere.
Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Has endorsed a union organization campaign at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama, accusing the online giant’s leadership of waging a “cultural war against working class values”.
Levy said Democrats can now point to concrete provisions of the relief law, which he said also shows that the Republican Party “will never support the working class”.
But some say the stimulus package may prove to be empty in the long run.
“It’s a good thing now,” said Lucas Szekely, a 19-year-old community college student from Irwin, west of Jeannette, about receiving another stimulus test. “But you can’t keep doing this forever.”