Framing the Midterm Issues
Framing the Midterm Issues
Talking points for the issues at the top of voters' minds in the midterm elections.
We’re into the final stretch of the midterm elections. Even the most hawkish campaign advisors recommend switching to all positive messaging at this point. Our best bet is to proceed by talking about what we believe, not just about what we will do for people, but why it is “the right thing to do.”
Framing the Issues
We tend to give voters a laundry list of policies that we either have delivered or will deliver. We need less “what” and more “why.” Let’s talk about why those things matter to people’s lives and why we believe those things are worth fighting for.
The short narratives and phrases below provide a view of the top issues from our moral perspective, what we believe is right or wrong.
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The Cost of Living
Freedom is a powerful value in American culture because it is a powerful metaphor. We have to describe the feeling of constriction caused by economic conditions and the feeling of relief caused by the actions we are taking to improve them. It’s all about that “breathing room.”
SAY THIS:
President Biden always says that people should be paid enough to raise a family on “with a little breathing room.”
Democrats believe that people should be free from the economic anxiety and distress caused by rising costs of living.
President Biden is fighting for your freedom at work: your right to have a say and negotiate for higher wages. He is the most pro-working-people president in decades.
Democrats believe that we should all be able to afford the things we need in order to take care of our families, like child care, health care, housing and elder care. We all have the right to retire with dignity and security.
Democrats believe that we have the right to live our lives free of illness and pain, regardless of where we work or what we earn. That’s why we made health care available to millions more people and why we’re fighting to lower everybody’s costs. Democrats recently passed laws to free people from the burden of high prescription drug prices.
Inflation is squeezing American families. Between the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, supplies are low and demand is high. President Biden is doing everything he can to lower inflation by increasing production and freeing up bottlenecks in our supply chain, so that supply can keep up with demand.
The Inflation Reduction Act will help ease the pressure on our economy by increasing manufacturing in America, lowering costs of energy, health care and prescription drugs, and reducing the deficit by making the top 1% pay their fair share.
The Power of Money and Public Corruption
Recent polling showed that the terms “corporate monopolies” and the “top 1%” elicited strong negative feelings by huge majorities in both parties. What they agree on is that the wealthy wield disproportionate power over our political system.
SAY THIS:
Thanks to strong action by the Biden administration, many American people got a raise or even a new job, but before they ever got any “breathing room” they got squeezed by out-of-control corporate greed.
A little inflation would be normal in this situation, but due to corporate monopolies, industries like oil companies, meat packers and shipping companies are taking advantage of the crises and jacking up their prices. They are raking in record breaking profits.
Democrats tried to crack down on price gouging and crisis profiteering by the gas industry, but Republicans stood in our way. We stood up to the pharmaceutical industry to lower drug prices. Not one Republican voted with us.
Democrats believe in serving the public interest, not private interests. That’s why they stand up to corporate monopolies on behalf of the American people.
Joe Biden is the first president in decades to actually increase anti-trust enforcement to stand up to corporate monopolies and restore real competition to some of our critical industries.
Use “private interests” to contrast with the “public interest.” To most people, the term “special interests” now means constituency or identity groups, not business interests.
We are the Party of Law and Safety.
Conservative message strategy on crime is about creating false choices: that being for one thing automatically means that we are against something else.
SAY THIS:
[Answer to any question about supporting the police.] That’s a false choice. It’s not the police versus the people. It’s the police and the people versus crime.
We need police to keep people safe and our neighborhoods free of crime. The best way to fight crime is to build a real partnership with the community. Police can’t treat the people they serve like the enemy. In order to fight crime, we have to rebuild that trust and accountability between police and the communities they serve.
There is no place in our society for weapons of mass murder. We believe in freedom from gun violence. You should be free to go about your life, go to the grocery store or to church, or send your kids to schools, without fear of gun violence from either mass shooters or drive by shooters.
We believe in equality before the law. That means everyone, from petty criminals to former presidents, should be held accountable for their actions AND have their constitutional rights protected.
We will continue to fight to improve our criminal justice system until every single person, regardless of race or gender or wealth or social status is treated equally and fairly by law enforcement and in our courts.
More on this topic coming soon!
Global Warming
SAY THIS:
Our climate is messed up and teetering on the brink of collapse. We can either stand up and face this challenge like responsible adults, or we can chicken out and run away.
The Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act is the most important action ever taken to get our climate back in balance, but we have to do a lot more, including building transmission lines and increasing battery storage, to support the transition to cleaner and cheaper energy for all.
You see all this dangerous weather we’re having? It’s all from global warming. We royally screwed up, and large parts of this country and world will become uninhabitable, sooner rather than later. The earth will be fine without us, but if we want to keep living here, we had better save the only human habitat we’ve got.
Read more about framing global warming at The Climate Challenge is Now: How Words Work and How to Fix the Weather.
Immigration
SAY THIS:
We need real bipartisan solutions to our broken immigration system, but for ten years, Republicans have refused to come to the table. They would rather have a crisis they can use to pull political stunts than actually solve the problems.
Meanwhile, people come here seeking asylum from political persecution and violence or to find a better life for their families, just like our grandparents and great grandparents did. Instead of demonizing them and using them to divide us, we need to give them the compassion and support they deserve.
What makes America exceptional is that we are made up of people from all over the world who came here and created something special together. That’s why we lead the world in creativity and innovation.
Immigrants are a benefit to our society both culturally and economically. We just need to fix the process so that it works for everyone.
Freedom and Bodily Sovereignty
SAY THIS:
We do not use people’s bodies against their will, not even to save another person’s life. This debate is actually about the right to control your own body in accordance with your own beliefs.
Americans believe in freedom. The right to have sole authority over your own body is the first and most essential condition of being a free person.
We do not question men’s rights to absolute bodily sovereignty. Without it, women can be neither free nor equal in our society. There is no way to get around that.
For government to force women to remain pregnant and go through labor against their will is a massive violation of their most fundamental human right (and may be a violation of the Constitution’s ban on involuntary servitude.)
Laws that ban abortion are also a violation of people’s right to act in accordance with their own religious beliefs. Opposition to abortion is a religious belief held by some, but not all, of the religions practiced in our pluralistic and free society.
Don’t use the term forced birth. The word birth causes us to involuntarily visualize an actual baby being born. Forced labor means something else entirely. I recommend forced or involuntary pregnancy, compulsory, mandatory or government enforced pregnancy, or my favorite, involuntary medical servitude.
Read more about framing reproductive rights at How to Reframe the Abortion Debate, Part One: the Good Frames and How to Reframe the Abortion Debate, Part Two: the Bad Frames
Voting is Freedom, and the War in Ukraine
It’s not about the “integrity” of our elections. There will always be accidental votes and paperwork errors. It’s about the “legitimacy” of our elections: how well they represent the will of the people.
SAY THIS:
We believe in democracy. Voting is what makes us free. The right to govern ourselves is what makes this a free country. The right to live under the government of their own choosing is what the people of Ukraine are fighting for.
If you force people to vote at the point of a gun, like the Russians did in Ukraine, that election is not legitimate, because it does not represent the true will of the people.
If you make it so that too many people are unable to vote, that election is not legitimate, because it does not represent the true will of the people.
Nobody should have to overcome barriers in order to vote. Every citizen should have an equal right to vote and to have their vote counted.
Read more about framing voting and democracy at Reframing the Threat to Democracy and Jan 6th, Freedom and Self-Government.
Public Education
The school privatization movement has been dying to get their hands on public school budgets for decades. How do we fight back? By reminding people why we need public schools in the first place.
SAY THIS:
We believe in public schools, because public schools give our children the freedom to become whoever they want to be.
Our children can’t become free and functional adults unless they know all of the options that are available to them in life and are prepared to succeed in whichever option they choose. Public schools give us all that freedom, regardless of who we are, where we came from or our ability to pay.
Public schools give us the shared body of knowledge we need so our society can function. We live together in a society. Public schools give us a shared understanding of how that society works and of our role in it: our obligation to each other and what it means to be a good citizen.
We trust teachers. We trust people to teach and develop curriculum who have spent a lifetime studying how to help kids learn. We take all parents beliefs into account, not just those who complain the loudest.
We believe in teaching the truth about the history of the United States. We are a great country because we learn from the past and keep getting better.
No child should ever be made to feel that there is something wrong with them because of who they (or their parents) are. Every single child should be respected and welcomed. We want our children to grow up physically and emotionally healthy. End of story.
Read more about framing public education at Can Public Schools Save America? and Teacher Surveillance: How to Culture War.
Hang in there.
I know we are all pretty stressed out. We know what’s at stake in the upcoming election. The only way I can get out of bed every day and move forward is to visualize this election as just one part of a long-term project to fix what has gone wrong with our society.
Our success this year, in 2024 and beyond, depends on our ability to connect emotionally with the majority of the people in this country, including a broad collection of persuadable voters. We have to react less and lead more. We have to help people visualize better ways to live, to govern ourselves and to interact in the world, and we have to help people understand the connection between political participation and making that better world a reality.
Meanwhile, we just have to do our best. But please, take care of yourself while you do it!
Thanks, as always, for reading. I hope you are able to use this in your work and your activism.
I look forward to your feedback and ideas!
Warmest regards,
Antonia
Thank you for reading Reframing America! This is a reader-supported publication.
To receive new posts by email please consider becoming a subscriber. All content is free, but some people choose to become paying subscribers to support this important mission!