Sen. Elizabeth Warren warned that Democrats could be headed toward “big losses” in the November midterm elections if the ruling party does not do more in the coming months to fulfill the promises it made to voters.
In an opinion piece published by The New York Times on Monday, the outspoken Massachusetts Democrat laid out the frustration and disappointment many Americans who voted for party members feel as President Joe Biden’s agenda stalls despite Democrats controlling the House, Senate and White House.
“Republican senators and broken institutions have blocked much of that promised progress. Now Republicans are betting that a stalled Biden agenda won’t give Democrats enough to run on in the midterm elections — and they might be right,” Warren wrote.
“Despite pandemic relief, infrastructure investments and the historic Supreme Court confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson, we promised more — and voters remember those promises,” she continued.
The 2020 presidential candidate outlined multiple priorities she said are both popular among voters and necessary to help Democrats deliver “meaningful change,” including passing a reconciliation bill that would make large corporations pay “their share to fund vital investments in combating climate change and lowering costs for families” — referring to provisions from Biden’s original “Build Back Better” spending bill. Warren also stressed that the president should exercise his executive power by canceling student debt and lowering prescription drug costs.
“To put it bluntly: if we fail to use the months remaining before the elections to deliver on more of our agenda, Democrats are headed toward big losses in the midterms,” the senator wrote.
Warren added that Americans have identified corruption in government as a top concern for years — an issue that stands in the way of tackling urgent issues like the climate crisis, income inequality and social injustice at the systemic level.
“To start cleaning up government, members of Congress and their spouses shouldn’t be allowed to own or trade individual stocks, which the vast majority of voters support banning, according to multiple polls,” Warren wrote. “Whether you’re a Republican senator or the Democratic speaker of the House, it is obvious to the American people that they should not be allowed to trade individual stocks and then vote on laws that affect those companies.”
In December, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said lawmakers should be allowed to trade stocks, despite a growing momentum from both parties to ban individual stock trading among members of Congress. An Insider investigation found that almost 60 members of Congress and over 180 senior congressional staffers failed to promptly disclose their trades in compliance with federal law — and that there have been several instances where lawmakers served on committees overseeing certain industries that those lawmakers had personally invested in.
A month later, the California Democrat warmed up to the idea, saying she was open to banning lawmakers from owning and trading individual stocks if there was enough of a Democratic consensus. She maintained, however, that she was personally “always in favor of trusting our members” to not engage in illegal activity.
“As the Senator would know from reading the news, the Speaker of the House supports such legislation and the Committee on House Administration has held a recent hearing and is developing legislation on this very topic,” Pelosi spokesperson Drew Hammill told HuffPost in a statement on Monday.
As reported by HuffPost in October, Democrats have largely been unable to fulfill Biden’s dream of an agenda comparable to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal due to an unwillingness to break from traditions like using the filibuster, citing parliamentarian opinions, weaponizing the debt ceiling and fear-mongering the deficit. Warren herself has been a loud proponent of eliminating the filibuster to pass urgent, necessary legislation on issues like voting rights.
“Like many Americans, I’m frustrated by our failure to get big things done – things that are both badly needed and very popular with all Americans,” she wrote. “While Republican politicians obstruct many efforts to improve people’s lives and many swear loyalty to the Big Lie, the urgency of the next election bears down on us.”
“Democrats cannot bow to the out-of-touch consultants who recommend we simply tout our accomplishments,” the senator continued. “Instead, Democrats need to deliver more of the president’s agenda — or else we will not be in the majority much longer.”