Alex Wagner

Violence is very inherent to the Trump administration, but because it's affecting those people and not this person, you can call for civility while being remarkably uncivil and explicitly violent.

How do you think they think of that disconnect?

Well, I think it's interesting that you talk about this in the context of the government shutdown, because I was having a conversation with Dan Pfeiffer yesterday on Pod Save America, and...

he was saying the Democrats are doing the worst, part of their strategy is so flawed, which is to say, we're not at fault for this government shutdown.

In fact, they should own it and say, we had to shut the government down because of what this administration is trying to do to Americans.

We were left with no resort because we care about the health and welfare of our citizens, and we can't fund a government that is actively trying to strip them of their rights,

strip them of access to healthcare.

So this is a principled fight.

It's actually, in some ways, I wonder if that more adheres to your notion of why civility doesn't work and it's time for uncivil tactics, like shutting down the government in the name of principle.

I mean, does that square or am I overthinking it?

Well, the government is shut down.

I mean, in fairness, they did, Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer didn't play ball and we are in a government shutdown, right?

The question is what happens next?

And I think to your point,

it's unclear why they did it, right?

They haven't been saying explicitly why they did it.

There is a conversation happening about healthcare and its affordability, and I think that's inherently in service of democratic goals, but there's no ownership of the fight.

And what I'm hearing from you is like, own the fight because the times demand battle.

Not murderous battles, but new tactics and new strategies.

Well, you write in the article, I keep wondering when we will reach a cultural breaking point, when finally the Trump administration will go far enough to shove us out of the comforts of our day-to-day lives.