“A Boon To Their Chances Of Retaining Congress In November”: Democrats Use “Wall Street Reform” Success To Pivot Back To Offense After Infighting, Bad Obama Polls

Jul 17, 2010 6 Comments ›› Pat Dollard

The Hill:

After a week marred by party infighting, Democrats are trying to pivot back to offense after the final, delayed passage of their financial regulatory overhaul, which strategists touted as a boon to their chances of retaining Congress in November.

Democrats seized on Republican opposition to the Wall Street legislation as extreme, highlighting comments by GOP leader John Boehner (Ohio) that the bill should be repealed and that federal regulation across the economy should be curtailed.

Democrats were also buoyed by the first bit of good news out of the Gulf in months, as officials cheered the capping of the deepwater BP well that had been gushing since April. In the House, party leaders are moving forward on a package of legislation to respond to the disaster, aimed at ensuring BP pays the full cost and strengthening oversight to prevent future oil spills.

The sum total was a week that, for Democrats, ended significantly better than it began, when an off-message piece of political analysis by the White House press secretary sent House Democrats into a tizzy and prompted four days of intra-party recriminations.

The final passage of the financial bill came weeks, if not months, after party leaders had hoped, putting other pieces of the party’s summer agenda, like campaign finance and energy legislation, in jeopardy. But Democrats said the Wall Street legislation, perhaps more than any other they have passed, fit hand-in-glove with their political message of portraying Republicans as beholden to wealthy special interests while they side with “Main Street.”

“There is a clear, clear choice in November between folks who want to repeal and repeat the mistakes of the past … and those of us who are trying to chart a better course for this country,” White House senior adviser David Axelrod said on a Friday conference call aimed at promoting the financial reform.

The legislation, he said, provides “great currency” for Democrats to use in the fall campaigns.

While polls show that the public is not as familiar with the financial bill as with the hotly disputed healthcare law, overall support for greater Wall Street regulation is much stronger.

Republicans railed against the bill as an excessive expansion of federal power over the markets, and Boehner called for its repeal. He took his criticism a step further on Friday, suggesting a moratorium on “new federal regulations.”

“I think having a moratorium on new federal regulations is a great idea. It sends a wonderful signal to the private sector that they’re going to have some breathing room,” Boehner said.

Democrats responded immediately.

“The only thing more troubling than the Republican strategy to prevent progress on jobs and the economy is what they would actually do if they had the chance,” the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Rep. Chris Van Hollen, told The Hill, responding to Boehner’s repeal call. “And what the Republican leader is saying is he wants business as usual on Wall Street, and we know what the result of that was: It meant devastation on Main Street.”

The office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) also weighed in, writing a blog post in response to Boehner’s moratorium call that said the GOP leader had “put his mouth where the money is.”

As for the temporary cap placed on the BP oil well, Democrats reacted cautiously but took hope that the politically treacherous image of oil seeping endlessly into the Gulf could be behind them. President Obama proclaimed the milestone “good news” even as he warned that the cap was not a permanent solution.

Taken together, the developments clearly lifted spirits on Capitol Hill.

“We finished the week very strong,” one House leadership aide said. “Democrats showed they could take a punch. They got back up and moved forward.”