Political punditry, at its worst, treats politics as mere sport, spouting off predictions of upcoming games.
At its best, punditry helps us understand how politics works, how coalitions form, how parties evolve, how history repeats, and how change happens.
Nevertheless, trying to discern what today’s political developments mean for tomorrow is fraught. Inevitably, predictions can fall short.
We pundits need not be shunned for making mistakes. But we should learn from our mistakes. All pundits should take stock at the end of the year and see what they got right and wrong.
Having written about politics for over 20 years, I’ve mostly learned not to go further with predictions than I can; gut opinion is not enough to make firm declarations of what’s to come. So, I’m pleased to report that when reviewing my work in 2023, I found few errors of consequence. Here are three big things I got right and one that didn’t quite hit the target.
✔️ Ron DeSantis Should Have Taken a Pass on 2024
In April, I argued that “If [Florida Governor Ron] DeSantis is not willing to take the fight to Trump, for fear of alienating his voters, then he should follow that logic to its inevitable conclusion. The best way to not alienate Trump voters is not to run against Trump.” DeSantis did not take this advice and appears to be headed to a humiliating defeat in Iowa, a quick exit from the presidential primaries, and a diminished political future.
Of course, we need not shed tears because one proto-authoritarian could not eclipse another. The bigger question explored in my April piece was “whether the GOP is Trump’s GOP,” or was it possible for Trump’s support to be driven down with blunt attacks from fellow Republicans. Unfortunately, the latter theory wasn’t much tested except for Chris Christie’s anomalous effort.
Without any coordinated operation among Republicans to dislodge the frontrunner, Trump’s support among Republican primary voters, in national poll averages, has risen over the year, now clearing 60 percent. Yes, Nikki Haley’s numbers have risen substantially in New Hampshire, where independents and old-school Yankee moderates can dilute the conservative nature of the Republican primary electorate. Yet Trump has not reciprocally declined, remaining in the mid-40s all year. (In the modern presidential primary era, no New Hampshire candidate has reached 40 percent support and lost except for Ronald Reagan in 1976 and Bill Bradley in 2000, both two-person races.)
✔️ Kevin McCarthy Did Want a Debt Limit Deal
As early as February, I argued that the new Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, despite his right-wing background and unruly House Republican Conference, was ready to negotiate in good faith and avert a debt limit crisis.
This view was not premised on any assumption of decency on the part of McCarthy but on political incentives and budgetary realities. As I wrote at the time, contrary to conventional wisdom, “the debt limit is not a valuable hostage, easily tradable for a tidy ransom. The debt limit is more like a hand grenade; you don’t want it in your hand when it explodes.”
While President Joe Biden was a little slow to begin negotiations in earnest, he did recognize McCarthy as somebody he could do business with, and an agreement was reached with time to spare before the limit was breached.
After this episode, congressional Democrats didn’t adjust their assessment of McCarthy. Months later, after McCarthy engineered passage of a stopgap bill to keep the government in the new fiscal year, House Democrats joined a small splinter group of far-right Republicans to strip McCarthy of the gavel. Instead of sidelining the far-right renegades, who were agitating for a government shutdown, Democrats allowed them to exercise a veto over who gets to be Speaker.
House Democrats didn’t see anything distinguishing McCarthy from the far-right Republicans. Here’s where quality punditry could have made a difference. Professional politicians can get trapped in echo chambers, where opponents get caricatured, and black-and-white analyses drown out exploration of the political grays.
I wrote in October that our new Speaker, Mike Johnson, was not an upgrade, “but squint and you’ll see glimmers of hope.” Since Johnson did vote for the debt limit deal and reportedly was prepared to allow a Ukraine funding bill to reach the House floor, maybe Johnson would be tough enough to ignore Trump and the extremists, keep the government open, and stand with Ukraine. We won’t have definitive answers for a few more weeks or months.
✔️ Democrats Did Need an Immigration Strategy
In the wake of an unprecedented influx of asylum-seekers, I wrote in January, “Democrats Need an Immigration Strategy Before They Turn On Each Other.” At that point, the strain on municipal governments in big, blue cities, heavily abetted by Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s systematic busing of migrants to points north, was already causing intra-party strife. The problem has only gotten worse.
The Democratic Party still lacks a consensus on how to be welcoming to immigrants while also imposing order at the border. Now, to get Ukraine funding through Congress, Biden will have to make concessions to Republicans on border policy (partly at the insistence of Speaker Mike Johnson), risking further stress on the Democratic coalition.
Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas did try to craft an innovative policy solution: increasing the use of “humanitarian parole” to admit migrants from Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Haiti; creating more opportunities to apply for asylum before crossing the border; and deporting border-crossers who don’t apply for asylum first.
X But Biden’s Border Plan Didn’t Work Quite as Well as Advertised
In May, I praised the plan for successfully slashing the number of southern border crossings by 50 percent. In June, I noted the drop reached 70 percent. This celebration of mine, however, was premature, as the numbers escalated after June.
The use of humanitarian parole helped meet the unprecedented demand from Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Haiti, but in recent months, migrants from farther and farther away—China and Africa in particular—proved overwhelming. Many cities are still facing difficulties finding shelter for new arrivals (though our tight labor market can use fresh workers, making it far more desirable to find as many beds as possible rather than shutting down the border to new arrivals completely.)
The new pressures on our creaky immigration system don’t make Biden’s approach wrong; it can still be scaled up and refined. But Biden was always stretching the limits of executive power and still faces litigation from the left and the right. He needs a properly funded legislative solution.
If a bipartisan deal can be struck in the new year, a faction of Democrats will surely revolt since no intra-party consensus on dealing with this complicated problem was settled in advance. However, as I recently argued, Republicans are not of one mind either. In all likelihood, Donald Trump and his acolytes will reject partial victories on the border policy and any linkage to Ukraine funding, as it upsets their “America First” worldview, which argues aiding Ukrainian security takes away from American security.
Which party will be the most divided heading into the 2024 election remains to be seen. That’s a pundit take for another day.
