Everywhere and All at Once: A Path Forward for Democrats
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What did Governor J.B. Pritzker say in his speech?
OK, the first thing I want to tell you tonight is that Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker is going to join me live. And you may have seen the speech. You may have seen clips. But he gave quite a speech last night in New Hampshire. He attacked the Trump administration with some of what I would consider the most direct and clear language we've heard from any elected Democrat in a very long time. He also went after what he called do-nothing Democrats, which was a very interesting and important part of the conversation, what it means. He called for mass protests and for mass mobilization and basically for disruption. Now, if you haven't seen that speech, and you may not have, it happened on a Sunday, we want you to see that speech, and we're going to play a lot of it throughout the course of the next hour. And we're also going to talk to Governor Pritzker about it, including the do-nothing Democrats.
because I really do think it raises a lot of important questions about how Democrats should be approaching this moment. In the story, in my view, of what the opposition has done across these first 100 days of the Trump administration, and frankly, what they're going to do moving forward, is every bit as important to focus on as what the Trump administration has done and what they're going to do moving forward. And one of the things I've noticed is that the disagreement among Democrats about how to approach this moment actually isn't really an ideological one. I mean, yes, of course, there are debates and disagreements on big issues on the margins and even some bigger than the margins. Those are important, too.
But Democrats generally agree that taking a wrecking ball to the economy with a half-cocked trade war is a bad idea, as most people agree. Democrats agree that letting the world's richest man, you know who I'm talking about, and his band of weird interns rifle through the federal government and fire people who answer the phones at Social Security offices, people who track extreme weather events, people who research cancer, is a bad idea.
How are Democrats responding to Trump's administration?
Democrats agree that mistakenly shipping a legal resident to a notorious foreign prison is outrageous because it is. And deporting U.S. citizens as young as two years old is appalling because it is. Democrats agree that abusing your power to go after law firms and the media and universities is the stuff of tin pot dictators. They agree on that, all of that. So the values in that sense are all pretty aligned. But there are what I consider, for the most part, some healthy disagreements about how to respond to all of that, including what issues to focus on and elevate, what tactics should be used to stand up to the actions of the Trump administration. What's effective? I mean, there are some Democrats who appear to have chosen at this moment the age old strongly worded letter route.
He is using anti-Semitism, and it's appropriate to go after specific incidents of anti-Semitism, as a pretext to hurt these great universities. It's going to hurt every American. So we sent him a very strong letter just the other day asking eight very strong questions about why this isn't just a pretext. Well, you'll let us know if you get a response to that letter. I do want to say you said you hope that— I will. So Chuck Schumer sent a strongly worded letter to the administration about their attacks on Harvard with, by the way, eight strongly worded questions, apparently. Watch out, world. Sounds like it's going to change things. Now, in contrast, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz decided to actually go to Harvard University tonight for a conversation about the future of the Democratic Party and what Democrats should do to push back on the Trump administration. What tactics, what things, what policies can people be talking about? There's more contrast, too.
I mean, James Carville, as we all know, suggested that Democrats should essentially roll over and play dead and let the Trump administration implode. Others like Senator Bernie Sanders and AOC have had rallies with tens of thousands of people across red states. Others like Cory Booker have spoken on the Senate floor for 25 hours to rail against what this administration is doing to the country.
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Chapters
4 chaptersSpeakers
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