The reaction among Democrats to Donald Trump’s return to power has been significantly more subdued than what we saw in 2016 after the mogul’s first shocking electoral win. The old-school “resistance” is dead, and it’s not clear what will replace it. But Democratic elected officials are developing new strategies for dealing with the new realities in Washington. Here are five distinct approaches that have emerged, even before Trump’s second administration has begun.
Some Democrats are so thoroughly impressed by the current power of the MAGA movement they are choosing to surrender to it in significant respects. The prime example is Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, the onetime fiery populist politician who is now becoming conspicuous in his desire to admit his party’s weaknesses and snuggle up to the new regime. The freshman and one-time ally of Bernie Sanders has been drifting away from the left wing of his party for a good while, particularly via his vocally unconditional backing for Israel during its war in Gaza. But now he’s making news regularly for taking steps in Trump’s direction.
Quite a few Democrats publicly expressed dismay over Joe Biden’s pardon of his son Hunter, but Fetterman distinguished himself by calling for a corresponding pardon for Trump over his hush-money conviction in New York. Similarly, many Democrats have discussed ways to reach out to the voters they have lost to Trump. Fetterman’s approach was to join Trump’s Truth Social platform, which is a fever swamp for the president-elect’s most passionate supporters. Various Democrats are cautiously circling Elon Musk, Trump’s new best friend and potential slayer of the civil-service system and the New Deal–Great Society legacy of federal programs. But Fetterman seems to want to become Musk’s buddy, too, exchanging compliments with him in a sort of weird courtship. Fetterman has also gone out of his way to exhibit openness to support for Trump’s controversial Cabinet nominees even as nearly every other Senate Democrat takes the tack of forcing Republicans to take a stand on people like Pete Hegseth before weighing in themselves.
It’s probably germane to Fetterman’s conduct that he will be up for reelection in 2028, a presidential-election year in a state Trump carried on November 5. Or maybe he’s just burnishing his credentials as the maverick who blew up the Senate dress code.
Other Democrats are being much more selectively friendly to Trump, searching for “common ground” on issues where they believe he will be cross-pressured by his wealthy backers and more conventional Republicans. Like Fetterman, these Democrats — including Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren — tend to come from the progressive wing of the party and have longed chafed at the centrist economic policies advanced by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and, to some extent, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. They’ve talked about strategically encouraging Trump’s “populist” impulses on such issues as credit-card interest and big-tech regulation, partly as a matter of forcing the new president and his congressional allies to put up or shut up.
So the idea is to push off a discredited Democratic Establishment, at least on economic issues, and either accomplish things for working-class voters in alliance with Trump or prove the hollowness of his “populism.”
Colorado governor Jared Solis has offered a similar strategy of selective cooperation by praising the potential agenda of Trump HHS secretary nominee, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., as helpfully “shaking up” the medical and scientific Establishment.
At the other end of the spectrum, some centrist Democrats are pushing off what they perceive as a discredited progressive ascendancy in the party, especially on culture-war issues and immigration. The most outspoken of them showed up at last week’s annual meeting of the avowedly nonpartisan No Labels organization, which was otherwise dominated by Republicans seeking to demonstrate a bit of independence from the next administration. These include vocal critics of the 2024 Democratic message like House members Jared Golden, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Ritchie Torres, and Seth Moulton, along with wannabe 2025 New Jersey gubernatorial candidate Josh Gottheimer (his Virginia counterpart, Abigail Spanberger, wasn’t at the No Labels confab but is similarly positioned ideologically).
From a strategic point of view, these militant centrists appear to envision a 2028 presidential campaign that will take back the voters Biden won in 2020 and Harris lost this year.
We’re beginning to see the emergence of a faction of Democrats that is willing to cut policy or legislative deals with Team Trump in order to protect some vulnerable constituencies from MAGA wrath. This is particularly visible on the immigration front; some congressional Democrats are talking about cutting a deal to support some of Trump’s agenda in exchange for continued protection from deportation of DREAMers. Politico reports:
“The prize that many Democrats would like to secure is protecting Dreamers — Americans who came with their families to the U.S. at a young age and have since been protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program created by President Barack Obama in 2012.
“Trump himself expressed an openness to ‘do something about the Dreamers’ in a recent ‘Meet the Press’ interview. But he would almost certainly want significant policy concessions in return, including border security measures and changes to asylum law that Democrats have historically resisted.”
On a broader front, the New York Times has found significant support among Democratic governors to selectively cooperate with the new administration’s “mass deportation” plans in exchange for concessions:
“In interviews, 11 Democratic governors, governors-elect and candidates for the office often expressed defiance toward Mr. Trump’s expected immigration crackdown — but were also strikingly willing to highlight areas of potential cooperation.
“Several balanced messages of compassion for struggling migrants with a tough-on-crime tone. They said that they were willing to work with the Trump administration to deport people who had been convicted of serious crimes and that they wanted stricter border control, even as they vowed to defend migrant families and those fleeing violence in their home countries, as well as businesses that rely on immigrant labor.”
While the Democrats planning strategic cooperation with Trump are getting a lot of attention, it’s clear the bulk of elected officials and activists are more quietly waiting for the initial fallout from the new regime to develop while planning ahead for a Democratic comeback. This is particularly true among the House Democratic leadership, which hopes to exploit the extremely narrow Republican majority in the chamber (which will be exacerbated by vacancies for several months until Trump appointees can be replaced in special elections) on must-pass House votes going forward, while looking ahead with a plan to aggressively contest marginal Republican-held seats in the 2026 midterms. Historical precedents indicate very high odds that Democrats can flip the House in 2026, bringing a relatively quick end to any Republican legislative steamrolling on Trump’s behalf and signaling good vibes for 2028.
Well, barring an Al Quaida sideshow, then Kerry has it pretty much sown up..
However, I tend to think that even if the Bin Ladin clan staged an event, the Kerry crew still has a hope. I personally believe that desparate times, require desparate action and as such, any event by Al Quaida should drive the DEMs into stating in no uncertain terms that the ability of Al Quaida to successfully stage an event 2 -3 years after Bush was given a mandate to secure the nation, is living proof of his inability to get the job done. As such, he is leaving all of america and he people vulnerable and open to further humiliation, global embarrasment, open fear and general suffering.
This is the tact that would have to be used in order the right side up the cart. Any other apporach would be too weak and would lead to a Bush victory. The DEMS need to prepare for this eventuality and dont put it past the GOP to latch onto such an event for political gains.
> He can’t
> count on the economy because its heading down
> hill at a rapid rate.
Well, at *best*, the record will be mixed — but I think Kerry already has enough fuel to keep the economic fire burning through Nov. 2 even if “Shrub” gets lucky from now on. There is supposedly an old rule saying an incumbent needs half a year of good news on the economy to convince voters they’ve turned the corner. I don’t think a temporary upswing in new jobs created this fall will do the trick — particularly since fuel prices are expected to remain high for the rest of the year.
> He cant count on being a war president because
> that was is yet to produce results.
Maybe the Afghani elections will turn out to be smashing success, but I would not exactly count on that either. As you say, Iraq will remain bad for the foreseeable future.
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I think the Administration’s best bet might be in the “lost and found” category. Found! WMD evidence, at last. Found! bin Laden and Al-Zarqawi(sp). The latter isn’t such a big stretch, but even Saddam’s capture didn’t cause a lasting bounce.
> It seems to me that his only hope is to smear
> kerry to the ground and role him in the dirt,
Won’t work… Kerry/Edwards and their base (which is angry as hell, as am I) have made a conscious effort to put on a positive face. Their message is patriotic, positive in tone and generally upbeat — the 527s are doing the Dems’ dirty work for Kerry. It will be pretty hard for “Shrub” and “Right Wing Dick” to launch a smearing campaign after the Boston convention. Incumbent presidents have rarely done that at such a late stage in the campaign.
> along with getting his rank and file to rally
> around the waggon and get every possible
> republican and wannabe republicans to vote.
Probably their best bet, I agree about that. However, this means pandering to the extreme religious right at every opportunity. Doesn’t seem like a workable strategy as Kerry/Edwards are working very hard at wooing centrist voters abandoned by the GOP!
> ofcourse, miraculous PR and advertising is
> always there and the GOPs would use it…
No. Emotional spin about Willie Horton, gay marriage, flag burning, liberal flip-flopping etc. work only if the playing field is essentially level and if the GOP candidate has no negative baggage from the past. This is why the Bushes won in 1988 and 2000. Kerry would have been toast if he had tried to run as well. But 2004 is different since most voters really are only interested in the incumbent president’s track record. And that track record looks pretty bad right now, in so many areas.
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Apart from Kerry self-destructing in the debates, there is one major wild-card though. Al Qaeda might want to keep its “useful idiot” good-enemy American president in power, by staging another major attack killing thousands of Americans. Unless it turns out the Administration really screwed up homeland defense before 9/11 pt.II (a distinct possibility, alas), it’s bound to deflect negative attention away from “Shrub”. Don’t forget he *was* quite effective as a cheerleader in late 2001, when his approval ratings were in the 80-90% range (a boost of 40-50%). It could conceivably happen again — especially since Kerry would have little choice but to suspect campaigning and voice his unconditional support of the Admininstration’s policies.
MARCU$
I hope someone with status will get the courage really soon to declare that Bush’s terror announements are 80 percent politricks and 20 percent concern about American safety.
Someone mentioned that if Al Quaida pulls off an event before the elections that it will play directly into Bush’s hand and the country will rally behind him. Personally I tend to agree with that but only if the DEMS allow it to be this way.
Actually, well marketed and laced with good PR, any event of such a nature can be billed as a catastrophic failure of Bush to secure the country after 2 – 3 years of skirting and politicising the issue.
Truth be told, it would be the absolute truth because he had the time and pretty much the budgets to get the job done. So, if this event does happen, I hope that the opposition, who ever they are, is ready to clad the media with this kind of message on every front.
And by the way…. it is possible that not every event of a negative nature in the world might not be the Bin Ladin clan? Is it possible that there are other terrorist groups not linked to Bin Ladin? Is it possible that there are terrorist groups deep with in the US who are ready and waiting to do just as much devasatation as the purported Al Quaida before Nov 2?
Why do we blame every single event on Al Quaida? The reasons why I ask is because no one seems to be doing the research to refute the GOPs constant claims on the subject and the worse fear of all is that this two eyed approach to Al Quaida certainly leaves room for other groups to creep up on our blind side and do just as much damage.
Sometimes I wonder how much free PR Al Quaida gets from this administration and the world… Sometimes I think that these guys have gone pretty dormand and are hibernating… but then some event pops up and its Al Quaida again. hmmm..
If these events are truly always the Bin Ladin clan, then they are super organised and much more sophisticated than any army in the entire universe and then it makes me wonder why spend so many trillions on US military power and these guys are carrying out warfare on donkeys and motor bikes. Strange.. but we find out exactly whats going on here.. it doesnt make sense to me.
cheers
Leslie, Leslie…. you sound nervous. If you are this nervous now, can you imagine the butterflies on elections night? LOL.. LOL…
There comes a point when you simply have to let go and let the system do its work. Before that time, you can make sure to mobilise people in the area who are willing to ensure that the right systems are in place. Beyond that, there is not much more that can be done and you will have to sit quietly and wait for the results.
I would like to think that the DEMs have people on the inside looking after these issues. If they dont, then you have plenty reason for concern as this current admin doesnt allow for much trust.
Start talking to the powers that be, in the party.
Cheers
I’d feel a whole lot better if Florida (and some other states) weren’t using electronic voting machines without paper trails. It wouldn’t be so bad if Jebbie wasn’t the governor there and if the executives of the companies that count the electronic votes weren’t best buddies with Dubya et familia. I hate to sound like I don’t trust the Bushes; it’s just that I don’t trust the Bushes.
The more desperate things become for the Republican Party, the more nervous I get. Karl Rove and his band of meany men are ruthless, and I don’t even want to think what they have up their sleeves for October.
I agree that it’s way, way, beyond Bush’s control by now. He’s a passenger.
The only conceivable way he could win would be an event which causes people to abandon reason and react emotionally. But it’s getting late even for that. Once people have made up their mind against him, a catastrophic event would be less likely to cause a change in their thinking than it would have in 2001, when all but the most partisan voters were keeping an open mind about him, and everybody knew he’d be President for three more years no matter what.
I think that time has run out for Bush. I am sure that he was banking on a much better economical report at this time so the he could have a somewhat solid platform on which to launch his economical policies at the convention. Unfortunately, nothing of the sort happened and now he has to find something on which to run his campaign.
He cannot run it on his record because it has nothing within it by which he can stand. He cant count on the economy because its heading down hill at a rapid rate.
He cant count on being a war president because that was is yet to produce results.
It seems to me that his only hope is to smear kerry to the ground and role him in the dirt, along with getting his rank and file to rally around the waggon and get every possible republican and wannabe republicans to vote.
Beyond this, his days are numbered… The whitehouse is Kerry’s to lose and not Bush’s to win. He has already lost it, so kerry now needs to do what he needs to, to collect the keys.
I am pretty sure that his time has run out. I cant think of any possible report that can show the economy in some radical upswing, I cant think of anythiing that can be done to suddenly create peace in Iraq, I cant think of anything that can change his foreign policy instantly, I cant think of anything that can retract those fleeting truths which he has been laying on the american people in the past two years, I cant think of anything that cause his to get his first elected term in the whitehouse…
ofcourse, miraculous PR and advertising is always there and the GOPs would use it… and I am sure they are about to unleash it..
Cheers
I am particularly encouraged by the way the dreaded “outside events” have gone so far in August. Remember: this month will belong to “Shrub”. He will get lots of media coverage once the GOP convention starts in late August. Kerry won’t get as many good opportunities to make his case e.g. due to the Olympics. So the Republicans are planning a big media blitz. But the first week of this month has been dominated by unexpectedly bad news about the economy, and additional violence in Iraq. This is deadly stuff, since it re-focuses voter attention on this Administration’s track record in 2000-04 while rendering Kerry’s negative “intangibles” (=aloof French-lookin’ Taxachusetts aristocrat out of sync with All-American values etc.) increasingly irrelevant.
Time is running out for “Shrub”. He is the incumbent trying to defend his 1st term achievements. He cannot change the subject to Kerry’s shortcomings as a candidate, unless he has good news to report about the economy or the War on Terror. Right now it seems he needs to place his bets on Pakistan managing to catch bin Laden shortly before Nov.2.
MARCU$