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Happy Tuesday morning.

It is Election Day in America. So let the finger-pointing begin!

With Democratic losses expected in the House and possibly the Senate, Washington is about to kick off a sacred rite of the post-election season – deciding who to blame for the party’s misfortunes.

We’re going to talk this morning about who’s getting tagged and why. This is, of course, based on the assumption that Democrats lose. We had conversations with a number of Democrats across the party over the last week to discuss the potential fallout.

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President Joe Biden: Whether the White House likes it or not, Biden will be the face of this defeat. Just like Barack Obama in 2010 and Bill Clinton in 1994. Biden embraced a decidedly progressive agenda once in the Oval Office, endorsing trillions of dollars in new spending in the most aggressive effort to expand government since the Great Society. Not just the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, but the American Family and American Jobs Plan, which came in at a staggering $4 trillion-plus when proposed. The $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure law. A student loan debt forgiveness plan that will total over $400 billion.

Should the White House have been more cautious on inflation, which Biden and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen downplayed as “temporary” and “transitory” in mid-2021? High inflation and economic fears are the top issues for voters, and the effects of soaring prices will be felt for years to come.

The White House never came up with any plan to deal with the unprecedented wave of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border, or an effective message to counter GOP attacks. The disastrous U.S. pullout from Afghanistan damaged Biden’s approval ratings, and record-high gas prices crushed them.

Biden was hired by the American people to return things to normal after the joint chaos of the Trump era and the Covid-19 pandemic. Normal hasn’t happened, and it may never. Biden has had a solid record of legislative success, and the White House has pushed that message. But that hasn’t sunk in for voters. Will that change in 2023? Can it?

On that note: Obama called his party’s 2010 defeat a “shellacking.” George W. Bush called the Republicans’ 2006 election a “thumpin’.” The White House wouldn’t commit to Biden holding the traditional post-election news conference. The president will leave for a trip to Egypt, Cambodia and Indonesia Thursday evening.

Speaking of Obama, many Democrats have complained to us that the party’s best messenger was nowhere to be found until the last few weeks. Had Obama been out there earlier driving the party’s message, could that have changed things?

→	The Democratic Party: There’s a widespread recognition that Democrats set expectations too high coming into the 117th Congress. Trying to appease the left, they made the American Rescue Plan too large, possibly helping jump-start the inflationary cycle the country finds itself in.

Democrats spent this entire Congress fighting with each other – the left versus the moderates, the House versus the Senate, the Senate versus the White House – and struggled to present a cohesive, unified vision. We covered this in-depth last week.

Many in the party hoped running on abortion rights in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision and as a counter to Republican extremism post-Jan. 6 would give them an edge this cycle. But economic concerns carried the day for voters.

Democrats passed several major pieces of legislation with one of the slimmest congressional majorities in recent history. But they could never figure out how to talk about their victories in a way that resonated with the public.

The American Rescue Plan may have helped the country pull out of the Covid malaise it was in, yet voters don’t know enough about how it impacted them. The bipartisan infrastructure bill, while wildly popular, has yet to take hold around the country. Only a quarter of voters knew it had even become law in a poll released this summer. The bipartisan CHIPS legislation will create lots of jobs, although it hasn’t had a significant impact yet. And the key provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act are years from taking effect. Not to mention the fact that just two Democratic candidates have even run ads directly mentioning the bill, as we wrote last week.

In and around the leadership, Democrats acknowledge that the flood of migrants at the southern border combined with the “defund-the-police” rhetoric, crime and inflation made Americans feel insecure and unsafe.

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Speaker Nancy Pelosi: You must say this about Pelosi – she wears her strategy on her sleeve. Pelosi is a firm believer in using the majority she was given instead of trying to preserve it for the future. An honest assessment of her legislative prowess during this Congress would lead anyone to believe that Pelosi got as much done as possible.

The criticism of Pelosi will be that she went for broke at the expense of her moderates. But that’s a lazy criticism, considering many of her moderates voted for what she proposed.

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DCCC Chair Sean Patrick Maloney: Depending on the scale of Tuesday’s losses, SPM could come in for a big part of the blame here, fairly or not. Maloney angered many in his party by announcing he was going to run in the district represented by Rep. Mondaire Jones prior to the redistricting process. Jones ended up losing in a primary in New York City, far from his political base.

Republicans have poured millions into the district in an effort to knock off SPM, forcing Democrats – including the campaign arm – to spend big to defend the seat. Several Democrats, particularly Frontliners, have privately complained about the party having to spend to save Maloney.

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Progressives: They complained Democrats didn’t go big enough when they had the chance – on ARP, infrastructure or the Inflation Reduction Act. Ask many on the party’s left flank and they’ll say too many Democrats are afraid to embrace the big, bold policies that voters crave and more concerned with Republican attacks than anything else. Yet this is also true – a Democratic defeat today could set their cause back years.

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Moderates: For moderates, their progressive colleagues were more concerned with party purity and picked fights at every turn. Not just over the major pieces of legislation – although they fought there too. House moderates maintain progressives refused to even allow them small wins on the floor, particularly when it came to immigration or crime and safety. These were victories mods said they desperately needed to fend off Republican attacks in their districts. Now the whole party will be in the minority.

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Media: The one thing that will probably unite Democrats is blaming the media if the party suffers major losses tonight. The media holds Democrats to a different, often higher, standard than Republicans, they say. The media is too focused on intra-party Democratic fights and not a potentially crumbling U.S. democracy, they add.

What they’re saying:

→	Biden was asked last night if Democrats could keep the House. Here’s what he said: “I think it’s going to be tough but I think we can. I think we’ll win the Senate. I think the House is tougher.”

→	Pelosi to CNN’s Anderson Cooper:

– John Bresnahan, Heather Caygle and Jake Sherman

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