Throughout the month of July Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has sparred with the so-called ‘Squad’ of young, progressive first year congresswomen. These are socialist sensation Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, (D-New York), Somali immigrant Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), Palestinian American Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan) and the other one, Ayanna Pressley (D-Massachusetts). All members of the Squad are far-leftists, believe in racial and gender intersectionality and loath President Trump. But each member is unique.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (or AOC) is the most prominent member of the Squad and its unofficial spokesperson. She is a young go-getter who unseated 10-term House member and Pelosi confidant Joe Crowley. AOC is a member of Democratic Socialists of America. Even before taking office AOC has been trying to push Pelosi and the rest of the House to the left. Her Justice Democrats organization is actively courting challengers to run against Pelosi allies in the Democrat Party primaries next year. AOC talks and Tweets often but at 29 years old doesn’t really know much. Her tweets are filled with doom, gloom, and bombast. For AOC recently Tweeted, ‘Climate Change is here + we got a deadline: 12 years left to cut emissions in half.’ Not all members of the Squad as talkative as AOC.
Representative Ayanna Pressley is the quietest and least well-known member of the Squad. Her congressional seat Massachusetts’ 7th Congressional District covers much of Boston, a city once represented by famed House Speaker Tip O’Neill a pragmatic liberal renowned for making deals with President Reagan, and JFK, a tax-slashing Cold-Warrior. Being a member of the Squad, Ayanna Pressley doesn’t have much in common with Speaker O’Neill or President Kennedy or their Democrat party of working-class Americans. Pressley’s relative quiet and low profile speak well for her political future.
Like AOC Rashida Tlaib is a member of Democratic Socialists of America. Tlaib was an obscure House first-year until she was caught on camera cursing President Trump mere hours after being sworn into office in 2017. This is typical of her. In August of 2016 security removed the shouting and screaming Tlaib from a Trump rally in Michigan – when she was a member of the Michigan State House. Rashida Tlaib is merely a bomb thrower.
Ilhan Omar presents a special problem for Democrats. They made Omar the face of a new Democrat party, framing her election as the story of an immigrant Muslim woman fighting her way to the House of Representatives. But Omar has attacked Israel in anti-Semitic terms saying American support for the Jewish State is ‘all about the Benjamins’ and claiming Israel ‘has hypnotized the world.’ Most Americans see Israel as an underdog, friend, partner and ally with similar ideals and interests. Worse, Ilhan Omar comes off as smug and ungrateful. She routinely says America is racist and Islamophobic.
When Pelosi said the Squad is, ‘four people and that’s how many votes they got’ AOC accused the Speaker of ‘singling out’ women of color. Democrats routinely make racism charges against Republicans, not other Democrats. Later AOC announced she was graciously willing to meet with Pelosi about the Squad’s concerns. The long-awaited Democrat civil war between left and far left had begun.
Then on 14 July President Trump Tweeted about the Squad, ‘Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came[?]’ The Democrats pounced, saying Trump’s Tweet was racist, xenophobic, etc etc… When Trump jumped into the Democrat’s civil war many pundits said he made a huge mistake. Those pundits are wrong.
Donald Trump is a branding expert. He built Trump Tower in Midtown, Trump Place on the West Side, Trump Plaza and Casino and Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City. By the late 80’s Trump’s name was synonymous with big, gauche, nouveau riche opulence. In the 90’s Trump avoided foreclosure by convincing his creditors that without his name on those properties they would own worthless hulks. Trump was right. In the 2000’s Trump’s television show, The Apprentice, became one of the greatest reality television shows of all time and made his signature, ‘You’re fired,’ a household phrase.
Trump built a real-estate empire in a city with three local television stations, three newspapers and dozens of radio stations, saturating the front pages and airwaves with his name and face. He is a master media manipulator. So when Trump picked a fight with Pelosi’s Squad, he knew what he was doing.
The Squad is deeply unpopular with Americans. A CBS News poll conducted from 17-19 July shows all four members have horrible favorability ratings, AOC leads the group with a meagre 23%. A separate Democrat Party poll of white, working-class swing-state voters found that only 9% of those who had heard of Ilhan Omar viewed her favorably. These are the voters that gave Trump the Rust Belt in 2016 and the Democrats cannot win in 2020 without them. The Squad makes that job much harder for Democrats.
After Trump’s Tweets Pelosi defended the Squad and introduced a House resolution condemning Trump’s tweets as racist, xenophobic, and so on and so forth. The ensuing vote was a procedural disaster for the Democrats as Pelosi’s language was ruled out of order by the chair. Pelosi had hoped the resolution would split the House GOP, but both House and Senate leadership backed Trump, and only four Republicans voted yea. In the week after Trump’s Tweet and the House Resolution the president’s approval numbers actually improved by several points. With just a few tweets Trump made the Squad the most talked about and well-known Democrats in the country. He branded the Democrat Party the Trump way.
