Opinion: US election shows that right- and left-wing performative populism has lost ground

An upheaval has shaken the US and other western democracies in recent years. People were outraged by established power, trust in institutions hit rock bottom, and populist fury grew right and left.

In the US, this manifested itself in the figure of Donald Trump. To his great credit, Trump has reinvented the Republican Party. He shattered the corporate shell of Reaganism and launched the party on a path to becoming a working-class, multiracial acronym.

Much to his discredit, Trump has wrapped this transition in prejudice, corruption and farcical gestures. It ushered in an era of performative politics — in which leaders emphasized phrases and gestures to get attention, at the expense of practical transformation.

The left had its own smaller version of performative populism. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has become a prominent figure thanks to her important contributions to Instagram. The Green New Deal was not a legislative package but a cotton candy confection created for the media. Slogans like “abolish ICE” (the immigration agency) and “defund the police” weren’t public policy, just catchphrases that sounded good to write on posters.

The political upheaval had its moment, but on the left, prominent Democrats sought to harness their energy while reining in the excesses that could render their party ineligible. In 2020, James Clyburn staked his political prestige on a moderate supporter of the establishment, Joe Biden.

This year, after progressives apparently cost Democrats the loss of several House seats with reckless speeches about socialism, moderate Democrat Representative Abigail Spanberger lashed out at the left and was one of the voices that helped bring the party back to the center of the world. debate on crime and other issues. Biden rejected the performance style of the populist moment and embraced some progressive ideas.

Performative populism began to lose ground. Twitter no longer holds the same fascination for the media as it did two years ago. There seem to have been fewer cancellations recently and less brainstorming, too.

At first I regarded the January 6 committee with skepticism, but now I recognize that it played an important cultural role. This committee forced the US to look into the abyss and see the nihilistic violence at the heart of Trumpian populism.

The 2022 election marked the moment when the US began to leave performance populism behind. While the results are biased, and while Trump acolytes can still help Republicans control Congress, this election has seen the emergence of an anti-Trump majority.

According to a national exit poll, nearly 60% of voters said they have a bad view of Trump. Nearly half of voters who said they “to some extent disapprove” of Biden as president voted Democrat — presumably because they didn’t want to vote for Trumpism. In a September Reuters and Ipsos poll, 58% said the Maga (“Make America Great Again”) movement threatens democratic foundations.

The single most important result of this election was the triumph of the normals. Practical leaders, defenders of the establishment, who don’t spend their time yelling angrily at you, have done well, both right and left: Governor Mike DeWine in Ohio, Governor-elect Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania. Pragmatic senators like John Thune in South Dakota and Ron Wyden in Oregon were victorious. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers said something that summed up the election: “The boring won.”

Americans are still deeply dissatisfied with the state of the country, but their theory of transformation seems to have begun to change. Less farcical media soap opera. Less existential threat politics. Let’s look for people who work and perform.

The electoral results that revealed a lot were at the level of the Secretaries of State. The America First Coalition of Secretaries of State includes candidates who rejected the 2020 election results and who, had they won on Tuesday (8), would have posed a threat to electoral integrity. Most of them either lost or seemed to be on their way to losing. Meanwhile, Brad Raffensberger, the Georgia secretary of state who resisted Trump’s bullying, won by a large margin.

Because the Democrats curbed their more extreme tendencies, while the Republicans did not, they attracted a lot of independent votes in a year that could have given the Republicans a sweeping victory. Regarding abortion and other issues, the centrist voter rule still holds. If you reach the place where moderate voters reside, you will win elections.

To be clear, I’m not saying that the fever has passed in the minds of those who are part of the Maga movement. I’m not saying that Maga’s Republicans won’t release a lot of crazy people at the next Congress. I am saying that voters have built a wall around this movement to ensure that it does not gain the power it has enjoyed in the past. I’m saying that voters have given the Republicans a clear order: Do what the Democrats did, counter their populist excesses.

I will leave you with two important truths. The first is that both parties are weak. The Democrats are weak because they have become the party of the highly educated elite. Republicans are weak because of Trump. Republican weakness is easier to root out. If the Republicans get rid of Trump, they could become the dominant party in the US. If they don’t, they will decay.

The second truth is that the battle to preserve the liberal world order is already well under way. While populist authoritarianism is still a powerful force around the world, from Kiev to Kalamazoo people rise up to push us towards a world where rules matter, practicality matters, stability and character are paramount. .

As Irving Kristol once wrote, the people of our democracy “are not exceptionally wise, but their experience tends to make them exceptionally sensible.”