As a conservative, I’m thrilled by the arrival of unified Republican government. But the politician I’m most grateful to in Washington today isn’t President Trump, House Speaker Paul Ryan or Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

It’s Chuck Schumer.

That’s because the Democratic Senate minority leader is doing more than anyone in our nation’s capital to ensure the passage of the most conservative health-care and tax reform possible — while working overtime to make sure that Democrats who voted for Trump in 2016 stay in the GOP fold in 2018 and beyond.

The biggest fear many conservatives had after the 2016 election was that Trump would be too quick to cut deals with the Democrats. He holds heterodox positions on everything from spending, foreign policy and entitlements to the minimum wage, trade and health care.

And he’s a dealmaker, not an ideologue. He would have loved nothing better than to cut deals with Schumer. Indeed, Trump reportedly called Schumer the morning after the election offering to do just that.

Instead of accepting Trump’s outstretched hand, Schumer’s Democrats are opposing virtually everything that Trump does. They are attempting to block not only his Cabinet nominees but also his sub-Cabinet appointments. And they have expressed zero interest in working with him on bipartisan legislation.

The battle cry of the Democratic Party is “Resist!”

This unrelenting resistance has pushed Trump to the right. Since Trump knows he can’t get Democratic votes for his health and tax plans, he doesn’t need to make concessions to the left. Conservatives criticizing the Trump-Ryan health-care plan as “ObamaCare lite” should consider how much worse it would be if Schumer had decided to sit down with Trump at the bargaining table.

This would have been smart policy and smart politics — allowing Schumer to sow divisions between Trump and the more conservative elements of the GOP caucus. But Democrats aren’t interested in bipartisanship. They want to destroy Trump. As a result, Schumer is passing up golden opportunities to win policy victories and divide Republicans — all in an effort to placate his Trump-deranged, far-left base.

Conservatives should be thrilled. Schumer is not only pushing Trump to the right but also helping Republicans consolidate and grow their congressional majorities — by further alienating once-reliably Democratic blue-collar voters who abandoned the party in the last election.

Last summer, Schumer dismissed these voters with the back of his hand, declaring that “for every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two, three moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.”

It didn’t work out that way. Democrats won Illinois but lost Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin and even Michigan. The Washington Post reports that of the nearly 700 counties that twice voted for Obama, “a stunning one-third flipped to support Trump” in 2016. That means there are millions of Obama voters out there who were sick of Democrats such as Schumer dismissing their concerns and decided they wanted to give Trump a chance.

Now they see Democrats responding to their decision by digging in their heels and resisting and obstructing everything Trump does.

The Democrats’ message to Middle America is: We don’t hear you.

There could be nothing better for the GOP — and nothing worse for the 10 Democratic senators up for reelection in 2018 in red states that voted for Trump. Republicans need to pick up only eight seats to win a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, in which case they won’t need Democrats for anything.

So thank you, Chuck Schumer! Let’s hope he continues to lead the resistance. Let’s hope he continues to block Trump’s agenda and forces vulnerable Senate Democrats to be Trump obstructionists. If Republicans don’t blow the opportunity, the result will be legislation that is more conservative — and expanded congressional majorities in 2018.

Special to The Washington Post