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.
Gareth,
As Ruy (and many others) have pointed out, professionals have drastically shifted from being strongly Republican to Democratic. This shift has already had profound effects – for example, making urban districts very difficult for Republicans to win (the minorities and younger professionals tend to live in urban areas in higher percentages, while managers tend to reside in the suburbs). Managers (as distinct from professionals) remain strongly Republican. This distinction is also important in deciphering the North/South divide, as the larger Nothern urban areas tend to be more skewed towards professional services (law firms, financial institutions, advertising, media, healthcare) while most Southern cities’ economies are focused on managerially dominated firms (retail chains, travel, food industries and so on). Of course, there are many large exceptions to that.
According to the 2000 national exit poll, Gore carried African-Americans 90-9 with 1 percent for Nader. Gore also carried Asian Americans 55-41, with 3% for Nader and 1% for Buchanan. I don’t have a breakdown for students, but Gore carried voters aged 18-29 by a margin of 48-46, with 5% for Nader, and 1% for Buchanan.
I agree with Publius that most voters establish a partisan preference in their first few elections, and are very apt to remain with that party. It would be very encouraging, and strong evidence for the emergence of a clear Democratic national majority, if Kerry and Edwards can keep anything like the 58-37 margin among students they enjoy in the Harvard poll, and extend it over the next two presidential elections to the non-students in the 18-29 age group.
I don’t have data, but it seems to me that Reagan ran well among younger voters, and that they were Perot’s best group as well as Nader’s.
What was Bush’s approval rating among blacks in 2000?
I read that Kerry was writing his own speech for the convention, which would then be gone over by speechwriters.
Can you imagine if Bush wrote his own speech? {giggle}
Ruy: Single most important poll result I’ve seen so far this campaign (and apologies if you already noted it in your very long post which I haven’t quite made it through):
LA Times question: Among those voters (about 60%) who know enough about Kerry to evaluate him, he leads by 10 points. Among those voters who do not know enough, he trails by 12.
Bingo. That’s what’s weird about all the recent polling. To me, this is fabulous news, unless Kerry totally blows the convention (not very likely, based on the speech he gave at the send-off rally in Denver today, which I attended). He leads strongly among those who are clued in, and many of those currently choosing Bush don’t know enough about Kerry AND ADMIT IT.
The race is still on — to define John Kerry. And the man himself has the first best shot at it this week.
HEY! I’ve been paying taxes since I was 17! Bush being gone would be my wildest dream. All I can say is that in my upper-midwest college on the Minnesota/North Dakota border it runs about 55% Kerry, 40% Bush.
Ruy, why ignore Asians?
I believe they’re going to be the largest demo in 50 years or so (overtopping hispanics) and they are mostly republican aren’t they?
It’s a myth that people get more conservative with age. Just look at people over 65- that’s the best Democratic demographic! What in fact happens is that predispositions just get stronger with time. Basicially if you vote for the same party your 3 first presidential elections, you’re pretty much hooked for life. So the political environment during someone’s late teens through mid-twenties are decisive for future political loyalties.
BUt will African-Americans and GenX’ers decideit is important enough to go and vote?
Howdy Ruy!
do you (or any helpful commenters) have the numbers for Bush’s 2000 support among young voters?
Aren’t the young usually a good demographic for Democrats? And isn’t it usually a life-cycle, not cohort phenomenon? (In other words, don’t young college students become conservative professionals when they start paying income tax?)
Now the key is getting all those disaffected college students to actually vote!