Face of Nation : Among the tightknit circle of Obama alumni, the emails and texts started circulating quickly Wednesday night. The focus of Democratic candidates on the debate stage in Detroit may have been on former Vice President Joe Biden, but some of the charges hit squarely at the work he and others had been part of at the direction of President Barack Obama.
“What are they doing?” they asked one another. “This is stupid.” Their concern? That the increasingly combative debate among Democrats hoping to go toe-to-toe with President Donald Trump in 2020 has pushed the party into uncomfortable territory — and that Obama’s legacy could become collateral damage.
Those who served closest to the two-term former president express dismay at seeing his record picked apart by fellow Democrats at a time when they believe the focus should be squarely on the current occupant of the Oval Office. And they think it’s shortsighted since any Democratic nominee will need Obama’s help and support to win in 2020.
“I think it’s bad policy and bad politics and it’s really bad politics for the party collectively,” Matthew Miller, a former Obama Justice Department spokesperson said. “It would be smarter to talk about the accomplishments of the Obama administration and how you would build on them in the face of a complete attack on that legacy by Donald Trump, rather than to just criticize Obama and stop there.”
“It’s asinine,” Cornell Belcher, a Democratic strategist and former Obama pollster, said. “President Obama is the most popular figure in the Democratic Party, only surpassed by his wife, Michelle Obama. The idea that you’re going to gain ground by attacking elements of the policies of Barack Obama and his legacy is really, really bad strategy.”
The candidates’ critiques of certain aspects of the Obama record — particularly immigration — are in some ways an inevitable consequence of Biden’s strategy to tightly embrace his former running mate and position himself as their administration’s most ardent defender. It’s that critique that tends to most rile longtime Obama loyalists who see candidates desperate to distinguish themselves by making bold promises or score points at Obama’s expense.
“It’s not a long-term strategy — it’s not a strategy that sustains anyone,” one former Obama official said, requesting anonymity like others in discussing the internal party dynamics. “It’s great to have a strong moment on the debate stage but the debates are all leading to Iowa, and Iowa thinks they created Barack Obama, and he’s extremely popular with voters there. “
Another former official said this is a strategy largely being employed by those candidates struggling to break through. “Is there someone who feels like they have to be more sharply critical of Obama in order to stand out? I don’t think that person is likely to be the nominee,” the official said.
One person close to Obama expressed concern that the hand-wringing by Democrats about attacks on Obama policies might cause the candidates “to overcorrect and heap praise on him in the next debate.”
Former Attorney General Eric Holder has been perhaps the mostly public in admonishing Democratic candidates seeking to capitalize on any disappointments with the Obama record, tweeting about it twice in as many days.Obama was at times critical of his Democratic predecessors. As he ran on a platform of hope and change in 2008 against Hillary Clinton, he told one newspaper that President Bill Clinton had not “changed the trajectory of America” as much as President Ronald Reagan had done.
