{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.kaine.senate.gov/tim-in-the-news/tim-kaine-bridge-builder", "Tim Kaine, bridge builder?", "2014-12-14", "2014", "2014-12", "Democrat", "House", "VA", "Tim Kaine", "K000384", "www.kaine.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "Tim Kaine, bridge builder?\t\r\n\t\t\t\t\r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                \r\n                    By:\u00a0\r\n                    Fred Hiatt\r\n                \r\n            \r\n            \r\n                \r\n                \r\n                \r\n            Sunday, December 14, 2014\r\n            \n\t\n\r\n            \r\n            With Elizabeth Warren following the Ted Cruz model last week, imploring the House faithful to defy their president even at risk of a government shutdown, you had to wonder: Is the Democratic Party heading for a schism that could rival the tea party-establishment battles on the Republican side?\r\nWarren has established herself as a leader of an anti-Wall Street, economic-populist left. Her side of the party is suspicious of international trade, big business and the economists and financiers who defined Clintonomics in the 1990s.\r\nThe party\u2019s more moderate branch, meanwhile, has been battered by electoral losses in red states, rhetorical attacks from the left for being corporate apologists or worse, and, most of all, the stagnation of middle-class incomes. The slowing of economic mobility seems to undermine the Clintonian premise that economic growth, rather than income redistribution, should be government\u2019s primary goal.\r\nIs there a way to bridge the divide as the party gears up for 2016? One Democrat wrestling with that question is Tim Kaine, Virginia\u2019s junior senator.\r\n\u201cTraditionally we\u2019ve had a spectrum of views in our party, but we haven\u2019t had wings,\u201d Kaine said during a visit to The Post last week. \u201cI\u2019m a little concerned that we might be moving toward wings.\u201d\r\n\r\nIf it is true that voters get the leaders they deserve, then Virginians are doing something right, because their Senate delegation of Mark Warner and Kaine is among the nation\u2019s most capable. At first glance the two also seem interchangeable: They are both pragmatic former Democratic governors who tried to work across the aisle in a purple state.\r\nBut whereas Warner has branded himself as defiantly bipartisan, or even nonpartisan, Kaine \u2014 an early Barack Obama supporter whose biography includes a stint as national party chair \u2014 has tried to stake out a clearer ideological position, and then prove that compromises can be achieved from there.\r\nAfter Warner\u2019s near-death experience last month, when Republican Ed Gillespie\u00a0almost unseated him, critics said Warner should have spent more time appealing to the base and less touting his willingness to work with Republicans.\r\n\u201cI would generally reject that,\u201d Kaine told me. \u201cVirginians want you to work across the aisle.\u201d But, he added, the best politics is \u201cto be affirmatively proud of who you are and what you are, and then work together.\u201d\r\nWhat would such an approach look like over the next two years? For Kaine, it has at least four elements. One is backing Hillary Clinton for president. He believes she can hold the party together even though she will take some grief from the left.\r\nA second entails a constructive model of opposition once Republicans take over the Senate next month.\r\n\u201cThirty-one of 46 of us have never been in the minority, and the only model of minority behavior we\u2019ve seen is \u2018we-want-him-to-fail\u2019 obstructionism,\u201d Kaine said. \u201cI think it would be better to draw a few really sharp contrasts than to fight on everything\u201d \u2014 better politically as well as for the Senate and the country.\r\n\r\nThird is to show seriousness about national security and foreign affairs. Kaine is one of three senators on both the Armed Services and Foreign Relations committees, and his leadership in writing and promoting\u00a0a new Authorization for Use of Military Force\u00a0in Iraq and Syria crosses ideological lines. The effort put him in opposition to Obama, who maintained until recently that he didn\u2019t need congressional authorization; it distinguished him from doves and isolationists, who would rather not get involved; but, with a provision barring the use of ground troops, it also put him to the left of the administration, which says it doesn\u2019t want to use troops but also opposes any such congressional restriction.\r\nMost important, Kaine says, the party must reject the demonization of the wealthy and the successful but come up with \u201ca credible income equality strategy\u00a0.\u2009.\u2009.\u00a0a human capital strategy\u00a0.\u2009.\u2009.\u00a0to make sure people can build a ladder of success.\u201d Career and technical education has been one of Kaine\u2019s signature issues in his first two years in the Senate.\r\nIn keeping with the non-demonization, Kaine was less alarmed than some in his party by the provision in the omnibus spending bill that increases the size of donations political parties can accept. Slipping the provision into a must-pass bill was \u201coutrageous,\u201d Kaine said, but reformers\u2019 focus should be on fighting \u201cdark money\u201d \u2014 the increasing influence of secret donations to independent groups. \u201cThat\u2019s the greatest corrupter of the system, more than whether a person can write a big check or even whether a corporation can write a big check.\u201d\r\nNone of this is academic for Kaine, whose term ends in 2019, meaning that \u2014 like Warner \u2014 he will be up for reelection in a non-presidential, low-turnout year, traditionally not an advantage for Democrats.\r\nUnless, of course, Hillary Clinton survives the primaries and has the sense to offer Kaine a spot on her ticket.\r\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.kaine.senate.gov/tim-in-the-news/tim-kaine-bridge-builder"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.886301139369607, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}