Democrats contend they are running on their record before November’s midterm elections. But, with a problematic economy, the FBI search and seizure at former President Donald Trump‘s Mar-a-Lago home and office could help them frame the cycle as a series of contrast contests rather than a referendum on the country under President Joe Biden-led unified Democratic control.
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The Mar-a-Lago raid, along with Trump and the Republican response to it, has made it harder for the GOP to persist with the pressure the party has been putting on Biden and Democrats regarding the issues that have driven the president’s job approval ratings down, according to strategist Doug Heye.
“Trump’s ability to seize headlines — good or bad — distract [from] Republican efforts to campaign on the things they should be campaigning on — inflation, rising crime, the border, and so on,” Heye told the Washington Examiner. “There’s less oxygen for them.”
That coincides with the muddying of Republican criticism of Democrats for being “soft on crime” after Attorney General Merrick Garland confirmed he personally approved the Justice Department applying for a probable cause search warrant on the FBI’s behalf as it investigates Trump and his associates’ handling of classified material and whether that posed a national security risk.
“Those Republicans now attacking law enforcement in the name of Trump have taken the salient issue of Democrats who want to defund the police and either neutralized it or turned it on its head,” said Heye, a former Republican National Committee spokesman. “It’s dangerous for the country and willful political malpractice.”
Ari Fleischer, a White House press secretary for former President George W. Bush, attributed the distraction to the Justice Department, not Trump, regardless of reports the 45th president received a subpoena for the material in June before this week’s raid.
“This definitely makes Trump a bigger issue again, at least for now, but that’s because DOJ chose to act this close to an election,” he said. “Now, if Trump declares his candidacy prior to November, he will turn the election into a choice instead of a referendum, and that would be a mistake.”
Other Republicans cite early polling that indicates some in the party are rallying around Trump, despite a recent dip in support. Morning Consult found last month that 53% of GOP voters and GOP-leaning independents would back Trump if the 2024 presidential primary were today. That number increased by 4 percentage points in a survey released this week after the raid. Trump’s closest rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, earned 17% of the vote, a decrease from 23% in July.
The Morning Consult Friday poll was published as Biden’s average approval hovers around 40%, according to FiveThirtyEight and RealClearPolitics. FiveThirtyEight has updated its predictions to reflect a 61% chance of Democrats holding on to the Senate and Republicans’ 79% chance of recapturing the House, while the GOP only has a 0.1 point advantage on RealClearPolitics‘ generic congressional ballot average.
Heye disagreed: “Politically, you’d still rather be in the GOP’s position than the Democrats’, but that’s not the slam dunk it was just a few weeks ago.”
National security-focused Republicans, such as House Intelligence Committee ranking member Mike Turner (R-OH) and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), a former FBI agent, softened their Justice Department and FBI scrutiny after reports law enforcement took nuclear-related material from Mar-a-Lago. A Chinese national was deported last year after serving eight months in prison following her 2019 arrest at the Palm Beach, Florida, resort with five cellphone SIM cards, a hard drive, nine USB thumb drives, and an electronic signals detection device.
But House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY) repeated Friday morning the raid was another example of governmental overreach and politically motivated, comparing it to the Hillary Clinton and Hunter Biden investigations.
“Republicans are fired up because Democrats are using their unchecked power of government to target conservatives,” a GOP source said. “This transcends Trump and will backfire on Democrats.”
The unsealing of the Mar-a-Lago search warrant and property receipt, which Trump could have disclosed after the raid but had a federal judge disseminate them following Garland and the former president’s legal team not objecting to their circulation, came two hours before House Democrats passed Biden’s climate and healthcare spending bill Friday afternoon. The bill, though drastically reduced from his roughly $2 trillion original proposal, has been pitched as a major legislative victory for the incumbent.
The unsealing additionally falls on the fifth anniversary of the Charlottesville, Virginia, white supremacist terrorist car attack that killed counter-Unite the Right protester Heather Heyer. Biden describes the incident as the reason he launched his third presidential bid in 2019.
A Democratic aide argues his party has been “making a contrast every single day” and “for a long time,” referring to its portrayal of Republicans as “extremists” and “ultra-MAGA,” particularly after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
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“Voters are seeing a lot of wins, but I would not say that any of this news is overshadowing the agenda,” he said of Trump. “We can do both.”
