Ronald Brownstein
Brownstein, a two-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, is a senior editor at The Atlantic & a senior political analyst for CNN.
Last synced from Twitter 677d ago
The Democrats’ Age Divide Is Defining the 2020 Primary
Joe Biden’s edge with older voters is his greatest asset so far in the race.
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Ronald Brownstein
One of the crucial questions in the Democratic primary will be whether Joe Biden can sustain his big early advantage with older voters, @RonBrownstein writes
55h
Republican attacks on state voting-rights victories threaten our democracy
Republican state legislatures are determined to roll back hard-fought historic voting-rights victories and place entirely new roadblocks between citizens and their government.
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Ronald Brownstein
Important look @ renewed state GOP voter suppression drive: "Democracy has always been a battle...This feels...more like a new permanent state of war, w/one side willing to bust every norm in the service of installing an enduring form of minority rule."
4d
When It Comes to Republican Defectors, Current Crisis Is No Watergate
As history has shown with the Watergate and Iran-contra scandals, such investigations can gain legitimacy only when members of the president’s own party support them.
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Ronald Brownstein
Former GOP Sen: “He is basically thumbing his nose at Congress, saying I don’t recognize you. I am surprised there aren’t more defenders of the Constitution. If they are willing to submit that to the executive, then they have no business being in office.”
8d
America’s Biggest Newspaper 70 Years Ago Sounded a Lot Like Trump Today
The New York Daily News helped fashion a brand of right-wing populism that the president eventually rode to power.
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Ronald Brownstein
Terrific look by @matt_pressman at how Trump echoes the mid-20th century right-wing populism-isolationist, xenophobic, racist & anti-elite-that he grew up w/on the pages of the NY Daily News.
8d
Can Democrats Bend Their New Coalition Without Breaking It?
The voters who flipped the House aren’t uniformly on board with an ambitious progressive agenda.
As States Race to Limit Abortions, Alabama Goes Further, Seeking to Outlaw Most of Them
Alabama is advancing a bill to ban most abortions, though exceptions for rape, incest and serious threats to the mother’s health were being considered.
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Ronald Brownstein
“Alabama’s measure would effectively ban most abortions at every stage of pregnancy, from conception on, and would criminalize the procedure for doctors. A doctor could be charged with a felony, and face up to 99 years in prison”
11d
The Seven Ways Bill Barr Is Misleading the Public
The attorney general’s performance has been catastrophic.
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Ronald Brownstein
“As I read them, Barr’s public statements on the report reflect at least 7 different layers of substantive misrepresentation, layers which build on 1 another into a dramatic rewriting of the president’s conduct & of Mueller’s findings about the president”
17d
Biden Accelerates the Democratic Fight About the White Working Class
His candidacy is a proxy for the larger question of how the party can best rebuild a winning presidential majority.
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Ronald Brownstein
Joe Biden's candidacy is a proxy for a major question in the Democratic Party: Can it rebuild a winning presidential majority without white working-class voters? @RonBrownstein reports
17d
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Ronald Brownstein
Biden's critics on the left target parts of his long record, but more fundamentally many have rejected the idea that Dems should prioritize a nominee who can win back working-class whites vs 1 who can mobilize their new younger/nonwhite/college+ coalition.
17d
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Ronald Brownstein
Per new analysis of Census data by @ElectProject non-college whites fell to just 39% of all voters in 2018, down sharply from 43% in 2014. Does that mean Ds can stop worrying about them so much? Maybe not.
17d
Where Are the Socially Conservative Women in This Fight?
The American family needs defending and right now men are leading the charge.
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Ronald Brownstein
In terms of actual GOP voters this just isn’t true: “Dissenters from the feminist line are > likely to be motivated by a libertarian commitment 2 equal treatment of the sexes than a socially conservative commitment to gender roles as an affirmative good”
21d
The Mueller Report Could Alienate the Voters Republicans Need
The special counsel’s findings validate the concerns of anyone who feared how Donald Trump would wield presidential power.
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Ronald Brownstein
The #Muellerreport crystallizes two truths about Trump’s DC: He will accept no legal or moral restraints on his exercise of power and Republicans will not meaningfully restrain him no matter the provocation.
30d
Trump’s Message to Homeland Security Official: Close the Border Despite an Earlier Promise of a Delay
The conversation with Kevin McAleenan took place after Kirstjen Nielsen, then the homeland security secretary, refused to close the border, saying it would be illegal.
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Ronald Brownstein
“Ms. Nielsen had earlier refused to carry through with Mr. Trump’s desire to close the border, telling him it was illegal. But the president encouraged Mr. McAleenan to disregard Ms. Nielsen and enforce the move himself. “
36d
Trump’s Immigration Policies Unify White Republicans
As the GOP’s political power concentrates in less diverse areas, resistance to the president’s agenda keeps on shrinking.
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Ronald Brownstein
Is there still room in the GOP for voters or officials who oppose hardline resistance to #immigration or believe US must do more to achieve racial equality? Polls & Congressional votes show both those views are now marginalized in the party under Trump
38d
Cancel Kirstjen Nielsen
Her role in terrorizing children should make her a permanent pariah.
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Ronald Brownstein
“Nielsen should not be permitted to launder her reputation through a fellowship at Harvard, like Corey Lewandowski or Spicer did. She should not get to follow H.R. McMaster to Stanford. There are plenty of places that will hire a disgraced child-torturer”
41d
White House Obamacare reversal made over Cabinet objections
The heads of Trump's Justice Department and Health and Human Services Department opposed the unexpected switch in legal tactics.
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Ronald Brownstein
"Over lunch, the president tasked Republican lawmakers to come up with a new health care plan." Really? Trump's own budget already endorses replacing #ACA with Graham-Cassidy block grants. Suggests he hasn't read his own blueprint, no? politi.co/2FC1RHq via @politico
54d
The 2020 Health-Care Debate Won’t Just Be About Single Payer
President Trump remains as determined as ever to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
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Ronald Brownstein
The health care plan that will most affect the '20 presidential race has already been released- & it came from Trump, w/his renewed call in his budget 2 repeal the #ACA & block-grant #Medicaid, despite the voter backlash in 18 against his 1st try. My take
59d
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Ronald Brownstein
With Trump admin now seeking to invalidate the entire #ACA in court, it’s worth repeating: His undiminished desire to repeal the law will likely affect the 2020 election more than any Democratic healthcare proposal.
55d
No 2020 Democrat Has a Monopoly on Younger Voters
And only one seems like a shoo-in with the Baby Boomer crowd.
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Ronald Brownstein
Yes it's early, but polls in IA, NH & nationally have all consistently shown @SenSanders leading w/younger voters (while trailing Biden w/older ones). Which means Bernie is on a collision course with #Beto2020
66d
Trump Settles on His Reelection Message
“I’ll protect you” is the new “I alone can fix it.”
Democrats’ Two Roads to Beating Trump
The biggest battlegrounds in 2020 might require very different candidates.
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Ronald Brownstein
New @Gallup results show Trump is vulnerable for 2020 in both Rustbelt & Sunbelt states he won last time. But to seize that opportunity, Democrats face very different challenges in each region. Can one candidate meet both tests? My take.
80d
Republicans Sink Further Into Trump’s Cesspool
What they left out of their questioning of Michael Cohen says more about the degradation of my former party than anything they said.
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Ronald Brownstein
“In a sane world, the fact that the president’s former lawyer produced evidence that the president knowingly...committed a federal crime is something that even members of the president’s own party would find disquieting. But not today’s Republican Party.”
81d
How the Upper Middle Class Is Really Doing
Is it more similar to the top 1 percent or the working class?
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Ronald Brownstein
What do white collar voters want? “They want a pluralistic US that is engaged w/the world & embraces technology & future industries. What they don’t want is a backlash to diversity, a backlash to globalization, a backlash to technology.” @RoKhanna
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