National Public Radio has taken an in-depth look at covid mortality rates across the country, and has reached the dismaying conclusion that that there’s a direct correlation between political affiliation and one’s chances of dying in the coronavirus pandemic. This might not seem surprising given our general understanding that the Republican Party has a higher proportion of vaccine-resistant individuals than the Democrats, but the starkness of the numbers hit like a punch in the gut:
NPR looked at deaths per 100,000 people in roughly 3,000 counties across the U.S. from May 2021, the point at which vaccinations widely became available. People living in counties that went 60% or higher for Trump in November 2020 had 2.7 times the death rates of those that went for Biden. Counties with an even higher share of the vote for Trump saw higher COVID-19 mortality rates.
In October, the reddest tenth of the country saw death rates that were six times higher than the bluest tenth, according to Charles Gaba, an independent health care analyst who's been tracking partisanship trends during the pandemic and helped to review NPR's methodology. Those numbers have dropped slightly in recent weeks, Gaba says: "It's back down to around 5.5 times higher.
Death rates in Trump-supporting counties that are between 2.7 and 5.5 times higher than those of Biden-supporting counties constitute a disastrous and shocking disparity in health outcomes, and should strengthen Democratic resolve to go on the offensive against a GOP that continues to sabotage the national fight against the covid pandemic.
As I discussed a couple weeks ago, this prevailing Republican strategy is rendered even more unforgivable by the party’s simultaneous effort to blame Joe Biden for not getting the coronavirus under control. If this is not a clear example of a party having blood on its hands, I really don’t what is. Republican politicians are opposing commonsense health policies, and promoting fantasies like the efficacy of herd immunity in place of vaccinations, that have helped turned this pandemic into a literal culling of Republican voters. If the GOP is going to promote policies and fake science that result in mass death, then turn around and blame Joe Biden for the inevitable mass death, then this is a matter on which Joe Biden has not choice but to engage more strongly, both for the sake of bringing the pandemic to an end and for his own party’s political future.
Today, we have the latest indication that the GOP is only doubling down on its pro-covid polices, with The Washington Post reporting that, “Congressional Republicans are planning to ratchet up their attempts to repeal President Biden’s vaccine and testing mandates, seeking to unwind policies that the White House and top public health officials see as critical to combating the coronavirus.” In the next day, Republicans in the Senate, backed by one or two conservative Democrats, are expected to pass legislation aimed at blocked the Biden administration’s vaccine and testing mandate for large businesses. And this comes less than a week after GOP senators almost forced a government shutdown as part of their war on mandates.
Crucially, beyond the supremely important public health upside, escalating the rhetorical fight against GOP covid insanity offers two powerful political advantages. First, it could help drive a wedge between some Republican voters and their GOP representatives; after all, how often can you truthfully say in politics that a party's officials are pursuing policies that are killing off their voters in vast numbers? Joe Biden is the president of all Americans, and has a duty to protect citizens when their elected representatives are acting against their most basic interests, like life and health, even when those citizens didn’t vote for him. Second, it will help energize Democratic base voters by reminding them why they elected Joe Biden and a Democratic majority in the first place — to protect them from the depredations of right-wing extremists, who, among other things, refuse to embrace basic medical advice and long-standing precedent on how to battle a pandemic.