Dylan Brogan
Soglin blames Hillary Clinton for Trump's victory in Wisconsin.
Strange times are indeed upon us. The mayor of one of the most politically progressive cities in the country blames Democrats for abandoning the middle class. And he believes the newly elected Republican president — who is being roundly demonized by the left around the country — might just bring about economic prosperity.
“If [Donald Trump] is successful,” Madison Mayor Paul Soglin said at a press conference on Friday, “he’s going to end up walking in the shoes of Teddy Roosevelt.”
While no fan of Trump’s divisive rhetoric, Soglin expressed contempt for Hillary Clinton, saying the Democratic presidential nominee is responsible for President-elect Donald Trump’s upset victory in Wisconsin. Trump was the first Republican presidential candidate to win Wisconsin since Ronald Reagan’s landslide re-election in 1984. Soglin said Clinton violated two cardinal rules of politics: Don’t state one position in private and another in public. And never attack voters.
“The basket of deplorables remark was a total disaster. Donald Trump couldn’t have scripted it better for Hillary Clinton,” said Soglin. “No matter what you think of your political opponent, you do not attack and disparage your opponent’s supporters because in the process you paint a brush over a whole lot of people.”
Soglin also downplayed the importance of Trump’s divisive comments during the campaign, including his inflammatory “grab her by the pussy” comment from 2005, which was leaked to the media, and his line that some Mexican immigrants “are rapists.” Soglin said Trump’s misogyny and racism don’t tell the whole story.
“[The] folks voting for Donald Trump include women. They include African Americans. They include Latinos,” said Soglin, adding that everything in life is about balancing values. “If you are looking at the plight of your family and the economic condition and misery that you’ve experienced in the last 20 years, you are going to pick that economic condition as the most important value for you. It’s more important than any nasty thing [Trump] has said.”
The mayor said both major parties “pander to working Americans.” But neither party has offered “real programs or commitments” to help the middle class in 35 years.
“It’s the greatest fraud of our lifetime,” said Soglin. “For Republicans to do that to working people is a sham [but] it is something we are all prepared for. We know that their job is committed to the 1-percent … but for Democrats it is a true betrayal.”
Soglin argued that former Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle did his party no favors by embracing the Republican narrative on economic policies.
“The day [Doyle] made the commitment not to raise taxes, he abandoned the Democratic party. [In 2008], when the Democrats had the Assembly and Senate as well as the governor’s office, they didn’t do a damn thing and the people of this state knew it,” said Soglin, who supported Doyle during both his runs for governor. “That is extremely costly in terms of credibility with the public. And this election was about credibility.”
The mayor credited Trump with delivering an apolitical message that resonated with voters who have seen good-paying manufacturing jobs leave the state. How does Soglin sum up that message? “Kick the asses of everyone who lied to you over the years.”
“The voters heard one voice in this election. One voice that said, ‘I’m going to get even for you. [Get even with] the people that screwed you.’ And that was Donald Trump,” said Soglin. “This election, in terms of the perception of the people, had nothing to do with parties. It had to do with the perception of whether or not you were a change agent.”
There was another candidate in 2016 who was able to tap into the same vein that got Trump elected.
“The Democrats did have someone six months ago that was saying all of those populist messages and doing it in a fashion that was sensible,” says Soglin. “And not racist. And not exploitative. And that was Bernie Sanders.”
As to what he’d do to turn the economic tides for working Americans, Soglin said history has proven that public investment in infrastructure and in human capacity (like public education) produced “the greatest periods of economic growth in this country.”
“I don't know what is going to happen over the next three to six months. I know [Republicans and Trump] can agree on certain tax cuts,” says Soglin. “But are they going to agree on Donald Trump’s commitment to make America great again? You have to build. You have to invest.”
That's why Madison’s mayor is particularly interested in seeing how Republicans in Congress deal with Trump’s pledge to invest $1 trillion to rebuild highways, tunnels, bridges and airports.
“I just can’t see [House Speaker] Paul Ryan signing on to spending billions of dollars to fix this country. But Trump repeated it this week. He wants to fix the cities,” said Soglin. “He [might] take the Republican Party back to being a populist party… It could make Democrats irrelevant or it could make them very key players in putting together legislative majorities.”
