Gas and grocery prices are expected to be a big issue for voters in the upcoming midterms. With that in mind, President Donald Trump's advisor Jared Kushner (pictured above) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries recently met to talk about things like housing, immigration, and the cost of living.
According to The New York Times, the meeting was an unusual instance of a top Democrat and a Trump confidant coming together to discuss potential areas of agreement, and it has drawn scrutiny from the Democrats, who are favored to retake control of the House from Republicans in a few weeks.
Some conservatives might argue that the outreach shows the White House and Democrats expect a tight battle or a potential flip of the House, forcing both sides to game out a split government.
The immediate backlash Jeffries faced from his own party's progressive wing could indicate a vulnerability that distracts Democrats from a unified midterm message, and some may frame the discussion as an implicit admission by Democrats that Trump's populist economic concerns resonate broadly, pulling the opposition toward the administration's turf.
However, Auron MacIntyre of Blaze Media does not foresee a lot of cooperation coming between the Republicans and the Democrats.
"The possibilities of that seem pretty low," he said on American Family Radio this week. "The Republicans can't even cooperate with themselves to pass something like the SAVE Act while they still have time, so, the idea that they're going to broker some kind of large legislative goals — even if there would be some level of overlap or agreement with the Democratic Party — seems very unlikely."
He thinks the far more likely scenario is that the GOP is expecting to lose the House, which means they are going to need to do their best to figure out how to function in that environment.
Meanwhile, MacIntyre sees the Democrats as a threat to the U.S.
"They have made it very clear that they are more than happy to use lawfare to go after the president himself, different members of the administration," he notes. "These people will literally do anything to stop Donald Trump from moving forward with his agenda. It would be unsurprising that they're gearing up a whole slate of different ways to inhibit the Trump administration from articles of impeachment to different investigations."
This private meeting was not the first time the Trump administration has reached out to Democrats. At the Congressional Ball last December, President Trump told lawmakers from both parties that they should work together on national goals. A few weeks later, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer visited the White House to discuss economic policy and affordability with the administration.
