When Congressional Democrats come to power in January 2027, there’s a long list of must-do items to be accomplished in the first several weeks. Reversing cuts to Medicaid, SNAP benefits, home heating aid, and other critical resources that help the most vulnerable survive is certainly a top priority. Curbing funding for ICE is another. So great were the damages to the country under Trump’s “reign of terror” these past 22 months, there are scores of other top priorities Democrats will have to define, rank and pursue.
One issue — corruption — is a headliner that can serve Democrats well.
“The midterms demonstrated that from every corner of the country and amongst every group of people—Democrats, Independents, and many Republicans—there is a deep and growing anger at the level of corruption in Washington,” said Neera Tanden, head of the Center for American Progress. The group, CAP, is pushing a proposal of reforms it hopes the new Democratic majority will pursue, including:
• A ban on trading individual stocks for all branches of government and requiring the use of blind trusts and approved index funds.
• Barring officeholders from launching or backing their own crypto products.
• Prohibiting all federal employees and contractors from participating in prediction markets.
• Curbing presidential self-enrichment with a 100 percent tax on any presidential income other than their government compensation, holdings in a blind trust, and regular real estate income from preexisting holdings.
• Allowing states and taxpayers to challenge potential corruption via the courts.
• Banning anyone worth more than $100 million from being a special government employee, unless they divest from all assets in the area they will be working.
• Prohibiting anyone with more than a 1 percent stake in an entity that has received more than $10 million in government contracts over a five-year period from working in a government position that oversees or regulates that industry.
CAP’s proposals also would make presidential pardons more transparent, including written certification of all people advocating for the pardons and any financial relationships between the pardon recipient and the president’s family, business or political network.
That those suggestions directly reflect Trump’s past two years in office is the point.
Nothing undermines trust in government more than the belief that elected officials illicitly benefit at the public trough while ordinary Americans struggle to stay afloat. Notably, a Gallup survey conducted in May-June 2026 found that 89% of Americans thought government corruption was widespread. That reflects a 10% jump over the previous year and is the highest level ever recorded in the U.S. It is also the highest level of perceived government corruption compared with other countries with advanced economies, according to the latest available data. Think of that: the worldview of the United States of America is that our political officials are the most corrupt of any western nation.
Shockingly, with this Trump administration, it is likely true. It’s a new low for the nation.
The political party that corrects that perception — and the Republican Party under Trump certainly won’t change its current course — will be rewarded with the voters’ trust not just in 2028, but for years to come if Democrats hold true.
On the other hand, if Republicans under Trump continue to deny their culpability, particularly in the face of two years of congressional investigations that will almost surely show otherwise, the MAGA-led Congress of the past two years will forever be tarred for allowing Trump to get away with such rampant corruption that it permanently soils the Republican brand. That Trump also betrayed our NATO allies, locked arms with Russia’s Putin, withdrew crucial American support of Ukraine, praised China’s Xing and looked the other way when espionage was apparent, illegally attacked civilians on fishing boats throughout the Caribbean, invaded Venezuela, launched a war in Iran (and lost!), and posted needless tariffs on friends and foe alike—along with a raft of domestic sins—all add up to the complete loser Trump has become.
The irony, for those Republicans who tied themselves so closely to Trump as the party’s savior, is rich.
–Angelo Lynn
