The National Populism That Never Was

Some overdue introspection.

When have either sugar-coating or silent sycophancy ever provoked growth? 

The past three years have brought an infusion of new intellectual energy into the American conservative movement. After the ascendance of Donald Trump, voices both old and new (but predominantly online) began issuing condemnation after condemnation of the American conservative movement’s record. When many were asking, confused, how Trump could become President, this ragtag group of wordsmiths and wonks asked another question: how couldn’t he have become President?

Gone, they said, were the days of “impotent Reaganism” and rearguard action. Gone, they said, were the days of stultifying libertarianism and leaders numb to the pain of America’s forgotten cross-sections. In conferences, they derided the fetishization of our one-trick pony: tax cuts. In writings, they exalted industrial policy, as both a means of soft power competition with a civilizational foe and a vehicle for the revival of American communities and American ambition.

One could see a faint glimmer of hope in their Twitter threads and passionate treatises. A hope that American conservatism wouldn't just settle for being the perpetual opposition, but would seek something richer. Something constructive. Post-partisan, even. Who wouldn’t be enthralled by such prospects? Juxtapose the modern conception of American conservatism with the illustrious careers of titans like Eisenhower, Roosevelt, and Clay, conservatives in the classical, paternalistic sense, and you, too, would find yourself railing against this “dead consensus.” 

That’s why it came as such a shock that, in the aftermath of the passage of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Framework, the group most visibly unnerved by Republican defection in support of the bill weren’t libertarians, nor moderate pragmatists, and not even the hardline partisans...but the national populists--the ones calling for a radical departure from the status quo. Why would the faction of the American Right most amenable to state power and state spending be so perturbed by Republicans defecting in support of precisely that? So perturbed that they’d join a chorus of voices (consisting primarily of those for whom state power and state spending are an anathema) calling for the likes of Nicole Malliotakis and Don Bacon, doctrinaire conservatives, to be unseated.

One recurring criticism—and perhaps the one most consistent with the ethos preached by these firebrands—is that the infrastructure bill contains too little...infrastructure. That’s fair. If one of the primary insights of your political movement is that lackluster public investment is responsible for American decline, what does the BIF look like to you? Yet another perennial display of “historic” investment that will do a grand sum total of nothing. The roads will remain unpaved. New sinecures will arise. Bureaucrats will feast on the lucre. And our decline will continue unabated. But, now, with a trillion dollar paint job. How historic!

Less sophisticated critics claim that less than 15% of the bill is allocated towards infrastructure. A claim that is trivially refuted by...reading even a summary of the bill (remind me: $550bn in new infrastructure spending is what percentage of $1.2tn?). Oh, and BIF and BBB? Not the same bill. But, for all of their inaccuracies, at least the concerns of these naysayers are directionally oriented towards more. More construction. More investment. A more vigorous vision for state action. Or in other words, the ideals that national populists have all but made their brand. 

Alas, a cursory scroll through mediums where chatter exists will quickly reveal that these voices belong to a minority. What angers this nascent movement isn’t insufficiency. And it certainly isn’t pork. What makes their blood boil is what has always made our conservative blood boil: excessive spending and partisan betrayal. This should naturally raise an eyebrow for those who’ve been reading carefully. Isn’t fiscal conservatism precisely what this movement—our movement—credits with conservative impotence and American ruin? Isn’t dutiful servility to the Republican Party (and to insular Washington, more broadly) the hallmark of the “establishment politics” salt-of-the-earth populists decry? To the untrained eye, the line separating the New Right from the predecessors they now disparage is now blurred, at best, and nonexistent, at worst.

To be fair, those who characterize the package as unnecessarily wasteful may have merit. Simply put, building in America is expensive (and often a slog). When it comes to the expenses required for high-speed rail construction, we rank sixth globally. Raw material commodity prices are higher in America than elsewhere. And the electrification of the Caltrain still remains incomplete (with service delayed until 2024, and the cost of the project more than quintupling). In a counterfactual world, the BIF isn’t nearly as expensive. But these cost reductions don’t come without trade-offs. We don’t trim these inflated figures without gutting organized labor, whose bargaining power allows for higher (if socially efficient) wages and labor costs, at the expense of our blue-collar bonafides. We don’t contain expenses without removing statutory advantages for American shippers, like the Jones Act, and import protections, like Section 232 steel tariffs, that make everything from the raw materials themselves to their transport more expensive than a competitive equilibrium. Now, nothing stops us from endorsing both of these measures. We could do them. And forfeit any claim to being protectionist, populist or attuned to the needs of forgotten Americans in the process.

So which is it? Fiscal responsibility or the very priorities that characterize our movement? That once characterized Trump’s insurgency. If your opposition to the BIF is rooted in budgetary concerns, that’s defensible. There’s a long tradition of balking at deficits in the Republican Party. A tradition that I do recall a certain heterodox political movement dismissing as the bane of substantive conservative governance (hint: that movement is ours). If we didn’t want to spurn the very elements that forged our movement, we could always target the vetocracy, which often protracts even the most trivial of projects. Ending the routine sacrifice of public works to stakeholder discretion and NIMBYist obstruction would undoubtedly yield savings. But...some conservatives oppose the BIF for removing analogous roadblocks in housing markets. Which is it?

Assess their objections and you’ll quickly find the very essence of their opposition irreconcilable with their political project. Populist nationalism and fiscal conservatism, like oil and water, don’t mix. Contradictions like these force us to confront uncomfortable yet necessary questions. Is our rhetoric knee-deep? Are our aims guided by fleeting expedience? Is our movement...a farce?

Fiscal conservatism isn’t all. Some national populists have fixed their targets on the act of defection itself. Now this is a criticism that I find most baffling. For all intents and purposes, we are a political outgroup. Our ilk aren’t represented in Washington in any meaningful numbers. This isn't just me being pedantic. This is one of the literal theses of national populism--that the incumbents have failed, that the party is wretched, and that we owe them nothing. And it’s not just us. This was also one of the most attractive (and arguably most successful) pitches of the Trump campaign. That he wasn’t a Republican, but an outsider, who wouldn’t even pledge to support the eventual nominee, party be damned. Trump was a wrecking ball who broke with the other 17 candidates on everything ranging from immigration to infrastructure to procedure. Who did he owe his allegiances to? The American People. The American Dream. The bygone American Past. The Republican Party was but a vehicle to be commandeered. An afterthought. And he had no qualms with regularly bucking his party’s leadership--doing so even at the conclusion of his presidency with little political capital to be gained.

Why, then, are his alleged heirs aggrieved by insufficient deference to this same leadership class and this same vehicle? It’s almost as if we’ve forgotten that our own policy heterodoxy, if it’s to be more than just claptrap, will at times put us in opposition to the party and lead us to caucus with, yes, Democrats. Some say we should wait until we’re in the majority to claim this decisive victory. The likelihood of a Republican Majority prioritizing infrastructure notwithstanding, tell the rural hospital patient that the win tally of your party is more important than middle-mile internet access. Tell the Americans suffering from inflation that they should be content with relatively unproductive ports inadequately suited for higher demand (Republican concerns, no?).

This reminds me: in nearly every instance where one of our political priorities has become a focal point of Senate deliberation, our ilk have seemingly been missing. First with Mitt Romney and his peerlessly generous Family Security Act. And then Todd Young and the Endless Frontiers Act, a bill that would resuscitate R&D in America, create tech clusters in underserved regions (where our base lives and works!) and counter China’s ascendance. Time and time again, the voices partaking in economic heterodoxy, acting on our priorities--adequate support for families, re-industrialization, and the like--are the moderates. Not the knife-fighters. Not the theatrical MAGA diehards. The pragmatic “squishes” (as they’re derisively labelled). And the same was true Friday night, when congressmen like Brian Fitzpatrick and Jeff Van Drew, not their ostensibly populist (and nationalist) peers, made the passage of the first comprehensive infrastructure package in decades inevitable. Perhaps blue-collar conservatism doesn’t run through the ex-Tea Party pundit class, but representatives in districts where the Building and Constructions Trades Unions reigns supreme and American decline is most sorely felt. Where allegiance to people comes before allegiance to party.

Admittedly, the title of this piece is harsh. It’s been at most 3 years since the movement has begun to take shape and, as is the case with any young movement, we’re in the wilderness. It’s in our infancy that we’ll figure out our identity and become more comfortable with our message. But it’s also in our infancy that candid assessments of our failures (and missteps) are sorely needed. I make these criticisms, harsh as they may be, because our potential is unbounded. As many of my peers say, “the hour is late.” The country that we love, the heritage that we cherish, the communities that plead for deliverance...their survival depends on us. Do we have the conviction to act on the prescriptions we offer? Or, when the moment calls for us, will we revert to the bromides of yesteryear? There have been many tests of how committed we are to our vision (or if we even have one). And, to date, we’ve failed most of them. But if the stakes are as high as we say, failure should never and can never be an option. 

National populism, national conservatism, post-liberalism--whatever you call it--can fundamentally revive the America that now only exists in the hearts and memories of a declining few. But only if we, its stewards, act. Will we collectively resolve to do what’s been promised? Or be the movement that never was?