On today’s show: David Weigel of Semafor joins to talk about the various responses to the Trump administration from Democrats and those forming an early opposition to his moves. Plus, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer changes his position and backs the GOP’s funding bill, Trump’s effort to ban birthright citizenship makes it to the Supreme Court, and Donatella Versace steps down. Today’s episode was hosted by Shumita Basu.
Chapter 1: Who are the key Democrats forming resistance to Trump?
Good morning. It's Friday, March 14th. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today. On today's show, politicians on the left are testing out different resistance messages against Trump. Senator Chuck Schumer gets on board with Republicans' funding bill. And a giant of the fashion industry steps away.
Let's start with a pulse check on Democratic Party leadership and opposition to President Trump seven weeks into the new administration. In the flurry of early actions by Trump, Democratic voices were largely sidelined by a barrage of daily headlines.
Chapter 2: How are Democrats positioning themselves against Trump?
But in the past few weeks and days, we've seen a number of Democrats and at least one independent step forward and position themselves as messengers for voters who are feeling disillusioned with Trump. For more on what the opposition looks like and how it's taking shape,
I called up Dave Weigel, national political reporter at Semaphore, and I asked him if it feels like the Democratic response to Trump is only starting to gel in the past few days.
It does. Yes, Democrats came together a bit more over the last week, but their fate was not entirely in their hands. They've had a message really since they lost the election. I'd say right before they were a little more muddled on the role of Elon Musk and the idea that Trump is going to hand the country over to billionaires and cut things you love to give tax cuts to the rich.
They actually have been saying that for months and months and months. But did it click? until recently. I don't really think it did. And we've seen polling this week from CNN that shows while Trump's more popular on immigration policy than ever, this is the lowest approval he's had on the economy. And that's good for Democrats.
So it sounds like you're saying message is consistent. Circumstances have changed, which has made the message more effective.
Yes, but it's by people who sometimes disagree with each other. I don't think, for example, James Carville and Bernie Sanders think they agree with each other that much. But the Carville case, which he made in The New York Times, is that Democrats should play dead, should not try to work with Trump or take credit for anything over the next couple of years.
Right. Kind of let Republicans squabble it out.
Yeah, the Sanders view articulated in his rallies is that there is a looting going on by the billionaire class, by the oligarchy. Democrats should oppose that and people should come out and vote against it in 2026.
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Chapter 3: What is Bernie Sanders' message to voters?
Well, so let's actually stay with Bernie Sanders for a moment and talk a little bit about him. I mean, he's been holding these major rallies, pulling significant crowds. Most of his appearances have been in swing districts represented by Republicans. What is his message to voters and how is it resonating?
It's the speech he's been giving for decades, which is that the billionaires and the oligarchs are manipulating everybody to get their taxes cut, to get government contracts, to benefit at the expense of everybody else.
So we are here to say loudly and clearly that in our great nation, we will not accept oligarchy.
What Democrats expect, Sanders certainly, is these doge cuts are inefficient. They're going to lead to some pain that affects people. And they need, as Democrats or as independents who work with Democrats, to say, if you're angry at the call time for Social Security, that's Trump. If you're angry about not getting health care, that's Trump. If you're angry about prices, that's Trump.
They're pinning everything to him. on economics, which they're all pretty happy doing. It's just they don't sound happy because they're not winning right now. They think it might take them a long time to win.
Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, tell me, though, is Sanders' message resonating with people? Obviously, he's drawing huge crowds, but what does it all mean? What's the effect that he's having?
It definitely has inspired Democrats. There was a little bit of embarrassment, I would say, from Democratic politicians because they lost the election. Their base was very demotivated. But the Sanders message is, let's ignore all that. This is about economics. And if you get to a situation where people associate Doge with things being broken and not working, boom, that's the election.
Then you can say, hey, we're the Democratic Party. We're the party that want to fix this stuff. It's hard right now because there is a lot of work to do to rehabilitate what they stand for. And they believe, I'd say led by Sanders fairly, that starts with saying this idea that the billionaires are going to come in and cut waste and you're all going to benefit is crazy.
Come back to us and we'll give you something better when you get tired of that.
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Chapter 4: How is Gavin Newsom engaging with conservative figures?
Well, they do agree with Sanders that the people have left the Democratic coalition over the sense that they are not working for them. And they are not quite sure what to do about the tension. The chair about Slotkin was anger that she said, you know, that she praised basically Ronald Reagan.
President Trump loves to say peace through strength. That's actually a line he stole from Ronald Reagan. But let me tell you, after the spectacle that just took place in the Oval Office last week, Reagan must be rolling in his grave. We all want an end to the war in Ukraine, but Reagan understood that true strength required America to combine our military and economic might with moral clarity.
And you saw people on the left saying, if you're saying Reagan was good in any way, you don't understand what's going on. But she is trying to just turn the clock back as badly as Democrats were doing under Ronald Reagan. They still were doing much better with working class voters. They still were the party of labor unions, the party of trade protectionism, the party of good wages for hard work.
And they lost that. And so how do you how do you restore that without selling out all the other people in your coalition? That's what she's trying to do. But it is in a different tone. And just the way Democrats have been talking in the last, I'd say, year, you could see Democrats moving away from not just identity politics, but the idea that it was good if America's identity was changing.
It was a little bit less white working class. And Slotkin's speech was one of a couple of examples, I think, of suddenly not doing that.
Are there any other Democrats you're watching right now who seem to also be emerging as people who can rally the opposition with a particularly strong message? I'm thinking of people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Tim Walz has been speaking out. Pete Buttigieg. Who has had something effective to share right now?
Well, everyone, you mentioned the Democratic governors who we all expect to be running soon, like J.B. Pritzker, Wes Moore, Gretchen Whitmer. They've made a couple of big stands against what Trump is doing. But I think it's interesting what they're not emphasizing quite as much. They are letting the attorneys general speak. lead on suing the administration over federal job cuts, firings.
The administration is trying to shut down congressionally created agencies. They're kind of letting them do that. They're letting the congressional party do that. The governors are focused more on this economic message that I was talking about. There are some Democrats who say
You need to comprehensively challenge the way this administration is using its power to deport people, to arrest people, to silence people. And there are some Democrats saying, that's great. That's not how we win. We're going to focus on economics instead. The left of the party is getting more invested in these issues.
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