Hillary takes the reins of Democratic Party after Obama defeat

Make no mistake: while House Republicans also voted overwhelmingly against the president on a key trade bill Friday, it was his fellow Democrats who handed him the most stinging rebuke. Just 40 Democrats out of 188 voted with Obama. Nearly 80 percent of House Democrats, including Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, went against him.

A mere two of the 10 Democrats representing Obama’s home state of Illinois in the House actually voted with him Friday. The Congressional Black Caucus declined to bail him out.

Democrats didn’t trust Obama’s assurance that the trade assistance they were voting on would be sufficient to help workers displaced from their jobs by the agreement. “Unfortunately, the TAA proposal is really short for ‘taking away assistance,'” Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, complained. “It includes substantially less funding than the administration has said was essential to protect those who lose their jobs through expanded trade.”

Rep. Sander Levin, D-Mich., described the underlying agreement and trade promotion authority as “deeply flawed” on the House floor. Levin is no backbencher. He is the ranking Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee.

In a flashback of Obama’s testy exchanges with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., over the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), some congressional Democrats emerged from meeting with the president feeling “insulted.”

Liberal Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., told Politico that Obama “tried to guilt people and impugn their integrity.” The tactics the president has deployed in negotiating with Republicans weren’t any more effective with Democrats, who were mostly unmoved by Obama’s last-minute request for support.

Pelosi all but demanded a generous highway bill as a condition for letting TPP get enough Democratic votes to pass. This would be decried as “hostage-taking” if attempted by a Republican. Obama almost made the comparison himself, telling Democrats, “What I don’t want us to do is start becoming like the other party.”

Obama isn’t the first Democratic president to face a rebellion by the rank and file over a trade deal. Bill Clinton had to deal with many unhappy Democrats when he sought congressional approval for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). But he managed to get 40 percent of House Democrats and most Democratic senators to vote for it, alongside 66 percent of House Republicans and 80 of GOP senators.

Vox’s Ezra Klein protested that Democratic opposition to TPP has little to do with Obama. While granting there is genuine disagreement within the party over trade, it is actually routine for members of Congress to shield presidents of their own party from these kinds of setbacks.

There were congressional Democrats who had serious misgivings about provisions of the Affordable Care Act, and many more who were putting their seats at risk by voting for it, yet few would have dealt their president a loss on his most important legislative initiative.

Would Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, have called Obama sexist over the Stupak Amendment?

Now Obama struggles to get Democrats to grant him an authorization of force that would permit him to wage war against Islamic State terrorists beheading and brutalizing people in Iraq. He’s once again at the mercy of a Left-Right coalition unwilling to give him exactly what he wants.

As Obama sinks deeper into lame-duck status, Democrats are becoming less invested in his success. Without a competitive Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton is already settling into the role of titular head of the party. Fitting, since Obama holds the mantle she once thought was rightfully hers.

Who knows whether Hillary will ultimately do any better with her party’s left flank, having defied them on Iraq and her being first lady while her husband was defying them on everything from NAFTA to welfare reform, the latter a signature legislative accomplishment 85 percent of House Democrats voted against at the time.

But it’s her party and she’ll try if she wants to.