The real lessons from Election Day

The media, pundits and politicians have all fundamentally misread the meaning of Election Day 2017. Conventional wisdom has been to look at the Democratic triumphs in key races in New Jersey and Virginia within the context of partisanship and politics, and through this lens, the elections have been widely interpreted as a repudiation of President Trump and the Republicans.

But the elections were much more than just a reaction against Trump. Rather, it represented a fundamental backlash against establishment figures and institutions on both sides of the aisle who are widely perceived to be failing the American people. The political and media misinterpretation of what happened on Nov. 7 is evident in comments by NBC News political editor Mark Murray, who stated, “I think this election showed that how Donald Trump defied gravity in 2016, well, gravity still exists,” and by Washington Post columnist Jonathan Capehart who referred to Nov. 7 as “the first sign of correction” following the 2016 election of Trump.

{mosads}To be sure, these interpretations may be partially true, but they are incomplete and do not nearly capture the whole story. Indeed, the tendency in the media and by talking heads to interpret the election as purely a repudiation of Trump is another example of an out of out touch political class fundamentally misreading what the public wants. Put simply, this year’s elections were about trust, or more specifically, the erosion of trust in our institutions. Continuing anger at the establishment, the belief that those in positions of responsibility are not looking out for our needs and loss of trust in our institutions were the key forces driving the election results.

This is not the first time this has happened. The anti-establishment rage that we are seeing today has been simmering for some time. Indeed, it was front and center during the 2016 election, where it played a leading role in the election of Trump. In that election, Hillary Clinton represented the establishment. She represented the “corruption” which people of both parties as well as those who don’t consider themselves party members feel. Trump, by contrast, “polled as one of the most authentic candidates in the election” according to the New York Times. Reviled as he was by the liberal elites, in the eyes of his supporters, he was the outsider, a person who could not be bought and who would shake up the system that had failed them for too long. True or not, voters in traditionally blue states decided to give him a chance.

In many ways, the 2017 election was much the mirror image of the 2016 election, when the momentum was clearly on the side of the Republicans who had been out of the White House for eight years. Today, Trump is no longer an outsider. He is the establishment. The same public who elected him to shake things up is deeply frustrated with him and a Republican-led Congress who cannot seem to get anything done.

Importantly, the loss of trust in our institutions is not a liberal or conservative phenomenon, nor is it a matter of Democrat versus Republican. Right now just 28 percent of Americans are satisfied with the way the nation is being governed, and according to Gallup, “the federal government has the least positive image of any business or industry sector measured, Congress engenders the lowest confidence of any institution that Gallup tests, and Americans rate the honesty and ethics of members of Congress as the lowest among 22 professions in Gallup’s most recent update.”

Last year, Gallup reported that trust in the mass media among Americans has plunged from 76 percent in the 1970s to 32 percent today overall, and just 14 percent amongst Republicans, with trust down across all age groups. Meanwhile, the two major parties are diminishing in power, relevance and inclusion. Neither is operating under a coherent governing agenda, and both have been largely co-opted by polarizing factions on the extreme right and left, who have embraced intransigence over pragmatism, civility and compromise.

Within this vacuum of leadership, the United States appears to be in the early days of a reconfiguration of our political structure. While it remains to be seen how our political institutions will evolve, what the future roles of our two major parties may be, and what coalitions and interest groups will unite, what is clear is that in the absence of civility, our institutions will continue to deteriorate, our economy will face unnecessary difficulties, and the U.S. position in the world will continue to diminish. If America is to protect its future as a nation and as an organization of individuals, we must start by rebuilding trust among people and with their institutions.

Douglas E. Schoen served as a pollster for President Clinton. Elliot Stein is chairman of Senturion Forecasting, a predictive modeling firm.