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The Democratic Party has reacted to its series of recent election losses by once again concluding that it needs a better economic message. As Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said Sunday, Democrats need a strong, bold, sharp-edged and common-sense economic agenda. The only disagreement within the party is about how sharp-edged and left-wing that agenda should be. But it is increasingly clear that the problem for Democrats has little to do with economics and much more to do with a cluster of issues they would rather not revisit about culture, social mores and national identity.

The Democratic economic agenda is broadly popular with the public. More people prefer the partys views to those of Republicans on taxes, poverty reduction, health care, government benefits, and even climate change and energy policy. In one recent poll, 3 in 4 supported raising the minimum wage to $9. Seventy-two percent wanted to provide pre-K to all 4-year-olds in poor families. Eight in 10 favored expanding food stamps. It is noteworthy that each of these proposals found support from a majority of Republicans.

The Democracy Fund commissioned a comprehensive study of voters in the 2016 presidential election, and one scholar, Lee Drutman, set out his first key finding: The primary conflict structuring the two parties involves questions of national identity, race, and morality. Focusing on the people who voted for President Barack Obama in 2012 and then Donald Trump in 2016, Drutman found that they were remarkably close to the Democratic Party on economic issues. But they were far to the right on their attitudes toward immigrants, blacks and Muslims, and much more likely to feel people like me are on the decline.

The Public Religion Research Institute and the Atlantic also conducted an important study to analyze the most powerful predictors of whether a white working-class American would vote for Trump. The top predictor was if someone identified as a Republican, a reminder that party loyalty is very strong. But after that, the two best predictors were fears of cultural displacement and support for deporting undocumented immigrants. Those who felt their economic conditions were poor or fair were actually slightly more likely to vote for Hillary Clinton.

Its worth considering how much the Democratic Party has changed over the past 25 years. Bill Clintons party was careful to come across as moderate on many social issues. It had a middle-of-the-road position on immigration and was cautiously progressive on subjects such as gay rights. The Democrats eventually moved boldly leftward in some of these areas, such as gay rights, out of an admirable sense of principle. On others, such as immigration, they did so largely to court a growing segment of Democratic voters, a process that Peter Beinart nicely explains in the most recent Atlantic issue. But in a broader sense, the Democratic Party moved left because it became a party dominated by urban, college-educated professionals, and its social and cultural views naturally mirrored this reality.

The partys defense of minorities and celebration of diversity are genuine and praiseworthy, but they have created great distance between itself and a wide swath of Middle America. This is a cultural gulf that cannot be bridged by advocating smarter policies on tax credits, retraining and early-childhood education. The Democrats need to talk about Americas national identity in a way that stresses the common elements that bind, not the particular ones that divide. Policies in these areas do matter. The party should take a position on immigration that is less absolutist and recognizes both the cultural and economic costs of large-scale immigration. On some of the issues surrounding sexual orientation, it can and should affirm its principles without compromise. But perhaps it is possible to show greater understanding for parts of the country that disagree. California recently enacted a travel ban that now prohibits state-funded travel to eight states with laws that in Californias view discriminate against LGBT people. Meanwhile, California has no problem paying for employees to travel to such havens of tolerance as China, Qatar and Russia.

The more I study this subject, the more I am convinced that people cast their vote mostly based on an emotional bond with a candidate, a sense that they get each other. Democrats have to recognize this. They should always stay true to their ideals, of course, but yet convey to a broad section of Americans rural, less-educated, older, whiter that they understand and respect their lives, their values and their worth. Its a much harder balancing act than one more push to raise the minimum wage. But this cultural realm is the crossroads of politics today.

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The Democrats' problem is not the economy, stupid - Washington Post

Things are getting so bad for the Republicans that theyre considering a last resort: bipartisanship.

Thats rightthe party that controls the White House, Senate and House might need some Democratic votes.

The immediate focus is the stalled Senate health care bill, which has a public approval rating of only 12 percent to 27 percent, depending on the poll. Nine GOP senators have expressed varying degrees of opposition to the bill. Conservatives dont like parts of it, moderates dont like parts of it, and even with President Trump cajoling lawmakers by phone and in person, the party cant seem to get to 50.

The New York Times says Mitch McConnell gave his senators a warning: Either Republicans come together, or he would have to work with Democrats to shore up the deteriorating health law.

Democrats are willing to negotiate, but their price is preserving most of ObamaCare with some changes. After seven years of Republican promises to repeal and replace the law, that sounds like a non-starterunless Trump and McConnell have no choice.

The larger problem is that the party that now runs Washington hasnt been able to push through a major piece of legislation. Theres been no progress on tax reform, which is tied in some ways to the tax reductions in the GOP health bill. Theres been no progress on an infrastructure program. Theres been no progress on constructing a border wall. And the GOP has to find the votes to approve a debt ceiling increase or face a government default.

Listen to the voices of Republican frustration, as reported by Politico:

Rep. Steve Womack: Wed better get our act together. Were better than this. Were not governing right now. Were stuck.

Rep. Tom Reed: The fact that were not getting to these issues health care, budget, tax reform is frustrating. We came here to move the needle.

The problem for Republicans is that they own these issues now. They are still trying to figure out how to be a governing party. The divisions within the party, and the gap between Trump and Republican lawmakers, has made each step agonizingly slow.

Gridlock in Washington can usually be blamed on the out-of-power party. And the Democrats have done their part to slow-walk just about everything, just as the GOP did during the Obama years.

But we are now faced with a Republican form of gridlock. And their success in 2018not to mention the presidents successwill rest on breaking it.

Howard Kurtz is a Fox News analyst and the host of "MediaBuzz" (Sundays 11 a.m.). He is the author of five books and is based in Washington. Follow him at @HowardKurtz. Click here for more information on Howard Kurtz.

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Could the Republicans rescue themselves by turning to ... Democrats? - Fox News

In the middle of the last century, Ringgold, Ga., was the town that expedited the formation of an institution that built the country in that era: namely, early marriage. At the time, you could get married at the age of 15 provided you had the consent of your parents or guardian and, thanks to Ringgolds 45-minute blood test, you could get married quickly.

Word got out rapidly, and this tiny little town just over the Tennessee state line became known as the marriage mecca of the Southeast and the mid-Atlantic. It fulfilled the hasty youthful heart expediently and enabled the young serviceman and his bride to get married before he shipped off to war.

Even the towns name sounded full of marital promise, notwithstanding it was named after a celebrated general rather than a wedding band.

Seventy years later, Stacey Evans, a Democratic representative from that town, hopes to ride todays trend in family life, single parenting, into the Georgia governors mansion.

She is doing so by chronicling her life story with photos and video clips of the 16 homes of her childhood, her living with a single mom and no father, and trying to avoid bill collectors or her mothers unsavory boyfriends. Once when I was 12 and we lived here, Evans narrates as a video clip of one home darts across the screen, I called the police while one of them was beating her.

The police said that they knew him and that he wouldnt do such a thing, so they didnt come, and so he kept beating her.

On always being one step ahead of a bill collector, Evans says: Living like that affects a child. You end up looking for something you can hold onto.

Welcome to the political race in Georgia that America is not paying attention to but should be.

Why?

Because the primary contest between Evans and a fellow Democrat, state House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, will have the biggest impact on the future of the national party. It reflects the battle within the national Democratic Partys ranks over where it goes from here.

Here in this case is the slinking around of Americas minority party with no message, no firepower, no aspirational missive and no plan for how to get out from under all of that.

Abrams comes from the partys urban school of thought, which is that campaigning is all about manpower.

Evans is running a campaign based on a story an important economic story that appeals to the white blue-collar voters Georgia Democrats lost to Donald Trump.

The question is: Will that story work? Or do Democrats merely need to turn out more of their urban and ethnic base?

They have been saying forever and a day that Georgia is the next state they intend to flip in their favor. They promised to do just that during the presidential election, and again in last weeks special election in the 6th Congressional District for an open House seat.

But it wasnt even close either time.

Its not that Democrats havent tried hard in Georgia. They tried to win the Senate race in 2014 with celebrated former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunns daughter, and she lost. They just tried with John Ossoff in the 6th District race, and he lost.

They have to start winning elections in Georgia eventually for Georgia to be a true battleground.

There will be a big question as to whats the best way to win. Is it to maximize turnout among African-Americans and transplants in the Atlanta area, or is it to claw back the rural blue-collar voters that Democrats ancestrally had when they used to win in the state? That is a serious existential question for Democratic operatives.

Both of these women are very strong candidates for governor.

Evans campaign is about the HOPE scholarship, a scholarship funded by the Georgia Lottery. Her powerful life story, portrayed so well in her campaign video, shows she was in a family cycle of poverty until the scholarship came along.

During Gov. Zell Millers days in the state capitol, he made Georgia the first state in the South to pass the lottery specifically for college scholarships. Anybody with a B average got one. And everybody else in the South since emulated that.

Evans is literally running right at the trailer park of rural Georgia. One issue with which such people still identify with the Democrats, for the most part, is public schools.

Abrams is a Yale Law School grad known for her fiery speeches, her national profile, a passion for mobilizing and energizing minority voters, and her prolificacy in penning numerous romance novels. Unfortunately for her, she voted to reduce HOPE scholarship funding.

In short, Evans has a message designed to appeal to rural, independent and conservative voters, and Abrams stands for a future in Georgia that is centered in urban Atlanta.

The truth is most Democrats in Washington think that the urban Atlanta model is most likely to succeed because of where the numbers are, which makes Republican strategists in Washington and Georgia happy.

It is the race that nobody is talking about and everyone should be talking about when it comes to the future of both the Democratic and Republican parties. With an exiting Republican governor who is not that popular and a lackluster Republican field in the state facing either an energized progressive or an energized blue-collar moderate, Democrats might finally catch that windmill theyve been chasing in the Peach State.

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Salena Zito column: The fate of the Democrats' future may lie in Georgia - Richmond.com

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June 29, 2017, 7:15 PM EDT

Deutsche Bank AG intensified its fight with Democrats over their requests for information related to loans to President Donald Trump, saying the German lender cannot legally turn over the documents.

In a letter on Thursday, lawyers for Deutsche Bank wrote that confidential financial information cannot be turned over to individual members of Congress -- but could potentially be turned over in response to a formal congressional committee request.

The information had been requested by five Democratic lawmakers, including Representative Maxine Waters of California, the top Democrat on the Financial Services Committee.

Earlier this year, the Democrats asked for its findings on two politically charged matters: banking on behalf of now-President Donald Trump, and trades from the banks Moscow operation that helped move some $10 billion out of Russia. They also asked for any internal review of Trumps business dealings with the bank, descriptions of which have surfaced in news reports.

The Thursday letter was part of back-and-forth correspondence with lawmakers over what can be turned over under the law.

We respectfully disagree with the suggestion that Deutsche Bank freely may reveal confidential financial information in response to requests from individual members of Congress, lawyers for the bank at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP wrote to the lawmakers.

Earlier: Deutsche Bank in Bind Over How to Modify $300 Million Trump Debt

In a letter earlier this month, the Democrats argued that federal laws forbidding the disclosure of client information to a government authority dont apply to Congress, since the legislative branch isnt an agency or department of the government.

That letter chided Deutsche Bank for refusing to acknowledge even the existence of the internal reports, which have been cited in the press. Waters and her fellow Democrats also contend that banking-secrecy laws, which are designed to protect client confidentiality, cant be used to hide potentially fraudulent conduct.

"This bank has lent hundreds of millions of dollars to Donald Trump and his family members, and reportedly conducted an internal review of whether their accounts had any ties to Russia," said Waters in a statement.

"Efforts by Trump, his family members and associates, and Deutsche Bank to avoid scrutiny only intensify our resolve to follow the Trump money trail," she said.

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Deutsche Bank Refuses Democrats' Request for Reports on Trump - Bloomberg

Delaware Democrats try to strong-arm GOP over budget impasse News & Observer Democratic lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to strong-arm Republicans late Thursday as an impasse over a budget for the fiscal year starting Saturday continued to escalate. Amid public criticism and partisan bickering over a decision by the Democratic ... and more »

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Delaware Democrats try to strong-arm GOP over budget impasse - News & Observer