Democrats this week forced a federal government shutdown. Though their stated reason is to get an agreement on extending subsidies for the Obamacare exchanges, it’s clear that the party’s primary goal is to show its agitated base that it is “doing something” to resist Donald Trump. Democratic voters are deeply frustrated by how the President’s term has progressed so far and how their party has responded to it. The shutdown appears to be the most immediate way party leaders believe they can disrupt his agenda and, ideally, rally the public against him.

However, history shows that the party which initiates shutdowns rarely benefits from them or gets what it wants. Moreover, there is little evidence that Trump’s controversial actions over the summer related to immigration, free speech, lawfare, and general divisiveness have hurt him — or buoyed the Democrats.

New polling this week from the New York Times found that Trump’s approval rating currently sits at 43%, compared to 42% in the previous April survey. On several major issues, such as immigration, the economy, and trade, his approval rating was virtually unchanged. And despite the Democrats’ vocal pushback to Trump’s domestic troop deployments, he has a slight net-positive approval (+1%) on crime.

Meanwhile, Democrats’ own fortunes have not improved — quite the opposite. A recent Quinnipiac poll found the party’s favorability at just 30%, its lowest point since at least 2008. And trackers from RealClearPolitics show the Democrats with far lower standing (33.5% favorability) than either Republicans (40.8%) or Trump (44.2%). Simply put, even after a chaotic and polarizing summer, nothing has changed: Trump is no less popular, and Democrats are no more popular. So what ought the Left to do?

While Democrats’ concerns about Trump are understandable, they are stuck fighting previous battles. As election analyst Charlie Cook argued when the party threatened a shutdown back in the spring: “Deep down, it’s pretty clear that many Democrats still haven’t quite processed the outcome of the last election.” Yet the best way to gain real leverage over Trump is to win elections for Congress at next year’s midterms, and persuading voters must start now. To succeed there, they must maintain a monomaniacal focus on swing voters in districts and states which went for Trump last year.

The President’s biggest vulnerability is the economy. Though he was elected to tackle the cost-of-living crisis, prices have only gone up in response to his protectionism. And the public feels it. According to data from the polling guru Nate Silver, Trump’s net approval on the economy and trade are roughly 15-16 percentage points underwater, and on inflation it is subterranean at -33%. Voters may be reluctant to entrust Democrats to handle the issue after Joe Biden’s term, so candidates will need to develop cohesive plans that voters find credible. That’s easier said than done, but there’s clearly an opening here.

What’s more, Democrats must reckon with their past failures on immigration before offering a new way forward. It’s apparent that voters believe Trump has gone too far in some respects. The Times poll found his net approval on the issue at -6%. At the same time, they support some of his goals, such as deporting people living in the country illegally (+10%). If Democrats want Americans to take their criticisms of Trump’s policies seriously, they’ll need to demonstrate that they understand these frustrations and present a compelling vision that balances enforcement with humane policies — something past Democratic politicians understood well.

Finally, Democrats could benefit from rediscovering their patriotism, a starting point for defending American values they believe Trump is threatening. Gallup polling from this summer found that just 36% of Democrats were “extremely or very proud” to be an American, a record low this century. This mirrored other surveys showing that liberal Americans are likelier than others to feel “ashamed” of their country. Throughout his second term, Trump has exhibited hostility to core American values, including free speech and due process. Democrats may be able to capitalize on this, but only if the public believes their criticisms are rooted in love of country.

Democrats have a clear path to present themselves as the party of sanity and the sensible middle. That requires reining some of the less popular instincts of Left-wingers such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Zohran Mamdani. It also means keeping a disciplined focus on what matters to the average voter, not trying to tell voters what should matter to them. Those aggrieved at Trump’s actions in office will most likely back the Democrats, because it’s their only chance to check the President’s power. But it is swing voters who will ultimately decide whether the Democrats get that opportunity.

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Michael Baharaeen is chief political analyst at The Liberal Patriot substack.

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