The 2022 midterms are still a little over a year away. However, as I travel across the country to states like North Carolina, it’s clear that Americans already have the midterms on their minds. After nine months of failed leadership and too many self-created crises to count, Americans are ready to put a check on the disaster that is Joe Biden’s presidency.
Nowhere have Biden’s failures been more apparent than when it comes to the one issue Americans are most concerned about: the economy. It’s no surprise Americans are worried about their economic future. Biden’s crippling “Build Back Broke” Agenda has squandered the economic recovery he inherited from President Trump and Republicans.
In September, the economy added fewer than half the number of jobs economists predicted, the second straight month in which jobs numbers came in lower than expected. Biden’s unconstitutional vaccine mandate only threatens to make things worse for old North State small businesses trying to climb out of the hole pandemic created and Democrat politicians like Governor Roy Cooper have only made worse. Cooper’s lockdowns have been a death knell for far too many small businesses throughout the Tar Heel State. Additionally, Cooper’s policies disincentivizing work are responsible for fueling a historic labor shortage that is preventing small businesses and their employees from thriving.
North Carolinians are also feeling the pinch of soaring prices on just about everything. Biden’s inflation is nothing more than a hidden tax that has driven real Americans’ real wages down. The average household now has to shell out an extra $175 a month just to keep up with skyrocketing prices that have risen to the highest level in 13 years and show no signs of slowing down. After arrogantly – and incorrectly – downplaying inflation as being merely “transitory,” the Biden White House now dismisses it as just a “high-class problem.” Try telling that to Americans struggling to afford their grocery bills or families facing the prospect of 54% higher home heating bills this winter.
In the face of skyrocketing prices, Biden is resorting to the same failed policies that created this inflation crisis in the first place. Biden wants to go on a reckless $3.5 trillion spending spree so he can make “fundamental changes” to the economy and usher in a new era of cradle-to-grave government. Democrat Senate candidates like Jeff Jackson, Cheri Beasley and Erica Smith would be nothing more than a rubber stamp for Biden’s radical agenda. For Biden, his socialist spending schemes are part of a vanity project he believes will secure his place in the pantheon of transformative presidents. But for everyday Americans, it means even lower wages and the largest tax hikes in decades.
Worst of all? The desperate Swamp-style semantic games Biden is playing to try to get his plan through. Biden claims because you are the one stuck paying for his plan that the real cost is zero. As he might say, that’s a bunch of malarkey. It’s an economically illiterate argument that would embarrass even an Econ 101 student, let alone the President of the United States.
It isn’t only the economy where Biden has shown he’s a man without a plan. Whether it was his disastrous Afghanistan exit or the raging humanitarian crisis he created at our southern border, it’s clear Biden isn’t up to the job. As Biden’s missteps add up, even Democrats are starting to worry – and with good reason.
Biden’s failing agenda and plummeting poll numbers are leaving his party increasingly fractured. That they can’t even come together on their priorities shows that Democrats are in complete disarray. Sensing a red wave forming, prominent Democrats, including here in North Carolina, are running for the hills and opting for retirement. And the recent string of Republican victories in state special elections – including flipping seats Democrats have held for decades – shows the energy is with our voters heading into the midterms.
Republicans are ready to get to work and return some commonsense thinking to Washington, D.C. I know that North Carolina is ready to deliver Biden and Democrats a reality check in the midterms next November by electing even more Republicans who will prioritize their interests and get our country back on track.
Tommy Hicks Jr. is the co-chairman of the Republican National Committee
