The latest political controversy involves Rep. Ilhan Omar tweeting and insinuating that American political support for Israel is driven by Jewish money and lobbying. Leaving aside her views for now, the general trend is striking: Social media is allowing individual politicians to further their own careers at the expense of their party's reputation. The result is that U.S. politics is quickly changing into a parade of celebrities.
Put yourself in Omar's shoes. You are a freshman representative in a group of 435. Most of your cohort will never receive national recognition, and as a Muslim woman, perhaps your hold on the seat is not entirely secure. You will probably never run for president, or even Senate, so your future is not tied very closely to that of the Democratic Party.
At some point you realize that if you tweet about Israel, you will get attention. You probably believe in what you are saying, and you think your opinions will contribute to the dialogue. But the tweets will also make you a national celebrity. That may help your future ability to get a book contract, hit the lecture circuit, or join a lobbying or non-profit firm.
Omar started tweeting about Israel and later tweeted a problematic remark about "Benjamins." People were offended and accused her of anti-Semitism, and she has since apologized. But don't be too distracted by the apology: She definitely got people talking about one of her preferred issues and raised her profile significantly. And she hasn't withdrawn her main point.
It is the Democratic Party that ends up looking bad. For one thing, most Americans are pro-Israel. Even if the tweets had been less controversial, the mere act of talking about Israel exposes more fissures in the Democratic coalition than among Republicans.
Or consider Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, arguably a genius on social media. She is attracting more attention than most (all?) of the Democratic presidential candidates, and now has over three million Twitter followers. She has been setting the Democratic agenda on both tax and environmental policy, and spurring a general sense among primary voters that the party ought to be moving further to the political left.
Is this all good for the Democratic Party? The positive spin would be that she is revitalizing debate in the party and giving it greater appeal to the young. The negative spin is that she is pushing the primary candidates too far to the left.
The true innovator in all of this is President Donald Trump. He used Twitter to help himself get elected, at the expense of the traditional view of what the Republican Party should be.
This trend will almost certainly continue and intensify. Most politicians do not have excellent social media skills, but many will try to get noticed and have an impact (or at least hire staff members who will). As more politicians up their game on social media, more of these attempts will hit home. Ocasio-Cortez will have competition. The influence and reach of political celebrities will grow stronger, and the parties will become weaker yet.
Editorial on 02/14/2019