The anti-corruption policies Democrats could enact today

No legislation needed

Our recent polling on anti-corruption measures revealed two important things.

The first is that there is an entire aspect of how voters perceive corruption that is missed by common anti-corruption proposals such as bans on stock trading.

The second is that measures to address this aspect of voters’ concerns could be implemented tomorrow. No legislation needed — candidates and elected officials could simply decide to implement these anti-corruption measures immediately.

Let’s start with the first point. When we talk about corruption, we tend to focus on politicians using their positions for financial gain. This behavior is obviously a hugely important aspect of corruption, and one that Trump is flaunting on an unprecedented scale.

But despite Trump being the most corrupt president ever, and despite a constant drumbeat of news stories highlighting this fact about him, voters see both parties as roughly equally corrupt.

Why? Our polling points to the answer: voters have a broader view of what constitutes corrupt behavior and current proposals are not capturing the full spectrum.

In addition to preventing politicians from using their position for financial gain, voters want politicians to be held to high standards of performance in office, and they demand much greater transparency about how they spend their time. Notably, measures that fall into these categories polled higher than a ban on stock trading (which is also popular):

There are two clear implications here. The first is that voters approach this issue as: I pay your salary and I want to know what you’re doing with your time. Just as a company asks its employees to fill out timesheets, voters expect politicians to do the same.

The second implication gets to why voters see both parties as equally corrupt.

We should just say it plainly: Under Biden, Democrats engaged in a high-profile cover-up of a president who was clearly in mental decline. It was obvious what was happening, and many Democrats insulted voters’ intelligence by asking them to ignore it. Our polling implies that voters understandably view Democrats’ cover-up of Biden’s decline as corrupt behavior and place it on par with politicians exploiting their position for financial gain.

Agree with it or not, that is an entirely reasonable view. Democrats left themselves extremely vulnerable here by committing the cover-up in the first place, and they remain vulnerable when they pretend it didn’t happen. On the one hand, the public sees Trump enriching himself; on the other, they see Democrats insulting their intelligence by continuing to pretend Biden was not in decline. This leads them to throw up their hands and say: a pox on both your houses, you’re both corrupt.

So what can be done to address this? The good news is that addressing voters’ desire to hold politicians to high standards of performance can be enacted right away., without legislation.

Here’s how. Members of Congress have substantial leeway to set the policies and practices that govern their offices. Starting today, members of Congress could:

• Release a timesheet at the end of every week, month, or quarter showing voters how they spent their time. Voters don’t seem to care if you do this ahead of time or after the fact (we asked the question both ways in our poll). What they want is an accounting of how you spent your time, not necessarily to know where you are going to be and when ahead of time.

• Create a public database of timesheets. Democrats could pledge to set up a chamber-wide database of this nature if they take back the majority, but there is nothing stopping members from doing it themselves in the meantime.

• Pledge to hold members accountable to high standards of performance. Congresswoman Marie Glusenkamp–Perez has been setting an example here.

• Commit to a minimum number of town halls per month or quarter. Voters rightfully believe that their elected representatives should be making themselves available to their constituents.

As a former Senate chief of staff, I know that every one of these measures can be implemented tomorrow as a matter of an individual office’s internal rules and policies. Meanwhile, candidates running for office can pledge to adhere to these practices if elected.

I’d also encourage members of Congress and their staff to get creative. This is one set of ideas – but the main thing here is to respond to voters’ clear desire to know how you’re spending your time, and to know that you are holding yourself accountable.

The final point I’d make here is that driving an anti-corruption message against Republicans will be a lot more effective if Democrats can show that they hold themselves to higher standards. In addition to being the right thing to do on the merits, transparency measures like these are exactly the kind of thing that will create such a contrast.

Democrats are rightfully preoccupied with Trump’s corruption, but they will be fighting with one hand tied behind their back until they address voters’ concerns with how the party has conducted itself over the past few years. Democrats can take immediate action to show voters they are different, and they should start now.