Dems finally realize their messaging strategy is incomplete without a plan for mis- and disinformation
By Michael Jones
In the months and weeks leading up to the election, Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX) blitzed almost every battleground state in her role as a Harris campaign national co-chair, making the case that the vice president and congressional Democrats were the champions who could alleviate the affordability crises afflicting so many Americans and protect the nation from the worst of Donald Trump’s authoritarian impulses.
But what she encountered during her travels were former Democrats who were mad as hell at the Biden administration and the national party for leading the country into a recession, enabling a nationwide crime wave, and failing to provide the stimulus checks Trump delivered during his first term in office—some even told her they’d receive another check if Trump was reelected.
Escobar worked overtime to debunk these claims with the facts: The US pulled off the strongest post-pandemic recovery in the world by all macroeconomic indicators without triggering a recession. Murder, violent crime, and property crime were all down last year, with motor vehicle theft the only major offense of the seven tracked by the FBI to increase. And as for those stimmies, congressional Democrats passed the legislation that funded them while Trump delayed their distribution so the government could print his name on the checks. (For what it’s worth, millions of Americans received a second check when Joe Biden took office.)
While Escobar or none of the more than a dozen Democratic lawmakers, aides, and insiders I spoke to while reporting this column blamed misinformation or disinformation solely for the election results earlier this month, many walked away from the outcome clear-eyed about the fact that the left can no longer allow online information vacuums to be filled with right-wing bad actors if they want to compete in the new media environment. Democrats seem to have finally caught up to the reality that voters continue to replace traditional media organizations with news influencers, and tech companies don’t view it to be their responsibility to stem the proliferation of digital junk food on their social apps from spoiling the media diets of their users.
“There is a disinformation universe that is a threat, not just to the Democratic Party, not just for our next election, but it’s a threat to America. And we have to get in those spaces. We have to fight back and essentially fight for truth,” she told me at the US Capitol last week. “We’re not talking about disagreements in policy or nuance. We’re talking about mis- and disinformation. That is a much bigger question for us and while I’m not going to blame the election results on that, it was a huge factor. We’ve got to get into those universes where people are talking and spreading it and we’ve got to fight for truth.”
House Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar of California acknowledged that policymakers must consider how Americans receive their information in future election cycles.
“We make policy and then we have to talk about it. And we have to convince people that the policies we’re advocating for are good for that and good for their community members who we represent,” he said. “We do this job for a twin purpose: It is, one, to meet the needs of our constituents, and two, for the love of our country—those are the two objectives. Now, how we communicate that message is a key part of how we meet those two objectives.”
Aguilar, the number-three House Democrat, said his 18- and 15-year-old boys have encouraged him and Democratic members to communicate in different ways to reach younger and non-political Americans.
“I think that that’s incredibly fair and very thoughtful of them, of our two boys,” he said. “And so to the extent that we need to make some changes and communicate in different ways to reach different audiences, we absolutely need to be more open to that.”
Several Democrats, including Rep. Sara Jacobs, warned against throwing the baby out with the bath water until strategists have a chance to dig into the voter files, which won’t be fully available for months. Jacobs, whose district encompasses central and eastern portions of San Diego, California, and who became the youngest member of the state’s congressional delegation when she was elected in 2020, told me she believes it’s more of a medium problem than a message problem.
“But I think that it’s incumbent on us to do a lot of introspection to make sure that we are actually addressing the needs of the American people, and then making sure that they see that and that we’re rebuilding trust and faith in institutions and in government,” she said. “A big part of that is making sure we’re communicating with people where they are, which is where a lot of those things are percolating because we’re not there to be a countervailing force.”
Ayanna Pressley, who was reelected to a fourth term in Congress and represents most of the cities of Boston and Cambridge, said it’s tough for all members, whether in safe blue seats or competitive frontline districts because even if they have an effective message, it has to reach saturation.
“And that’s very challenging to do in a media market that’s bifurcated across so many platforms, mediums and compounded by a backdrop of mis- and disinformation.”
Pressley said she’s found success by treating her constituents as community members instead of just voters and organizing year-round, not just for an election, to ensure a constant two-way dialogue.
“Of course, you know those more conventional things like [telephone] town halls and coffee hours and things like that,” she said. “But also just meeting people where they are, having a space where people that are second- and third-shift workers [can participate]—if you’re going to do something that’s after work, then you have to provide child care and translation and a free meal. So those are some of the ways in which we get our message out there.”
It will take more than a few savvy members to compete with a far-right, well-funded media ecosystem and reconnect with the voters who defected from the party.
In Congress, this responsibility falls to Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI), who was reelected this week to lead the House Democrats’ policy and messaging arm, formally known as the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee.
Dingell told reporters that the DPCC has its work cut out as it empowers members to deliver a message that cuts through the noise and win back the gavels to break up the governing trifecta Republicans will enjoy for at least the next two years.
“We’ve got to ensure that the American people know that House Democrats are listening to them, that we understand their issues, and that we are the ones that are fighting for them, delivering for them, and are protecting them, that they’re getting the facts,” she said. “And we gotta help address the misinformation that’s out there to make sure that we’re reaching people [in] places we haven’t been.”
If the past couple of weeks are an indication of what to expect going forward, Democrats will adopt a more forceful posture against Republicans’ plan to misread the election results as an endorsement of the most extreme elements of Trumpism and a rebuke of a party that was punished by voters upset about the high cost of living.
And it will start from the top with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), who will be entrusted with leading the resistance from Capitol Hill.
“The question about this notion of some mandate to make massive far-right extreme policy changes? It doesn’t exist,” he told reporters this week. “And so in the new Congress, for anything to happen, it’s clear House Republicans cannot do it on their own.”
Now it’s up to Democrats to make sure voters see it this way too.
Michael Jones is an independent Capitol Hill correspondent and contributor for COURIER. He is the author of Once Upon a Hill, a newsletter about Congressional politics.
