The Chuck ToddCast
Democrats Need Some Soul Searching + Jake Sherman On The Capitol Hill Chaos
Thu, 3 Apr 2025
On episode 2 of the brand-new Chuck Toddcast, Chuck is joined by Jake Sherman, founder of Punchbowl News and one of the most well-connected reporters on Capitol Hill.But first, Chuck reflects on the results of the special elections in Florida and the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, which showed that the base of the out-of-power party is fired up. He explains why this suggests voters are more inclined to vote against a party rather than for one. He also discusses why the party in question is in desperate need of soul-searching and possible realignment to build a winning coalition.Then, Jake Sherman joins the conversation to discuss the latest from D.C. They begin by examining Speaker Mike Johnson’s decision to send the House home for the week after a dispute over proxy voting for members of Congress—and why Johnson’s power is tied directly to President Donald Trump. They also explore the revenge-driven mindset that has shaped decision-making on Capitol Hill and the lack of Republican pushback against Trump’s sweeping tariffs.They dive into how the dynamics of the current Congress differ from those of years past and why some Republicans might view their loss in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race through rose-colored glasses—thanks in part to Elon Musk.They wrap up by discussing whether Democrats could see a shake-up in leadership and the timeline for passing a tax cut and a debt ceiling extension.Finally, Chuck wraps up with a listener question in the “Ask Chuck” segment by giving his take on whether the debate around a Trump third term was a smokescreen to knock “Signalgate” out of the news cycle.Timeline:0:00 Introduction2:00 Voters are telling us what they DON’T like5:00 Democrats need to do some soul searching9:45 Democrats can’t just be “anti-Trump”11:17 Jake Sherman joins the show15:50 Mike Johnson sends the house home20:30 Is Johnson powerless without Trump?23:10 Revenge is the mindset of Republicans25:50 Any appetite in Congress to take back authority from the executive branch?28:15 Will economic downturn/tariffs scare elected Republicans31:20 Lack of experience in Trump’s cabinet38:00 Could we see a deluge of Republican retirements from Congress41:25 Members of Congress are different now43:28 Republicans secretly happy they can blame Elon Musk for the Wisconsin loss?46:28 Would Chuck Schumer win a leadership vote in the Senate?49:05 Timeline for passing tax cuts/debt ceiling extension?56:05 Ask Chuck: Was the “Trump third term” debate a smokescreen to knock “Signalgate” out of the news”(Timestamps may vary based on advertisements)
Chapter 1: What do the recent elections tell us about voter sentiment?
You really get to find out what, you know, what's your team made of. And I think now we got a temperature check and we found out a few things that are that really haven't changed. Right. Number one is we still have the shotgun Trump voters, as I mentioned yesterday, when Trump's not on the ballot. There is clearly a five to 10 point disadvantage for any Republican running.
Democrats are a bit more fired up right now. Frankly, I think there was a little bit of a question. How fired up would the party be? There's been a lot of disillusionment. You've seen these town halls have gotten people fired up, but you've also seen Democrats get cranky at other Democrats because they don't think that they're fighting hard enough.
I think there was some concern in some Democrats I talked to that maybe some would sit on their hands. Well, you didn't have that. So you clearly were starting to see in some ways... A similar pattern takes shape that we saw, frankly, when the first in 2017 during the first Trump turn.
Chapter 2: Why do Democrats need to do some soul searching?
And you saw it really in 2021 going in to Biden's one term there that the pattern of the party out of power suddenly looks more appealing because. What we're really in is an era of voters telling us what they don't like. We've now had three straight presidential elections where voters have voted against. They've told us they voted who they didn't want.
They didn't want Hillary Clinton as president, so Donald Trump became president. They didn't want a second Donald Trump term, so Joe Biden became president. They didn't want a Kamala Harris slash Biden second term, so we ended up with Donald Trump. And how do you know that that's the case? Because look how quickly... Trump's approval rating fell. It fell even faster than Biden's.
And what's instructive, I think, right, about all of them is that Trump won, Biden won, and Trump too, is that in all cases, they started with a little bit of a honeymoon, not a great one, but somewhere in the 50% mark. And it's almost like the first crisis dipped them and they never recovered.
Trump really never recovered from from sort of the initial sort of chaos of the first 90 days of administration, the travel ban, the in and out, all the different fired members, you know, firing James Comey, the launch of the special counsel probe. Right. So there was all this chaos and it sort of kept his approval ratings in the mid 40s with Joe Biden.
He sort of hung in there until the Afghanistan withdrawal debacle. He dipped below 45, never recovered. Right. I frankly assume that Donald Trump doesn't get over 45 for the rest of his presidency. Now, if it happens, I'm going to assume it's some outside event that we don't know about that essentially rally where the country does the rally around the flag.
That's to me the only way you would see his numbers go up because he almost seems intent on rallying. creating such a disruptive presidency that it's almost inevitable that that you're going to you're going to have this negativity. The question I have for the for the Democrats is this. Are they ready to truly sort of have the fight to figure out who they are?
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Chapter 3: What challenges does Speaker Mike Johnson face?
I think the Democrats have to be careful here. You know, they have one the one advantage they go and there's a there's a majority coalition in this country that doesn't like Trump ism. or Trump himself. They don't like his philosophy in the economy. They don't like his philosophy in foreign policy. They don't like his philosophy and certainly don't like his character, et cetera.
But the problem for the Democrats is there's a slice of these anti-Trump folks or folks that are not comfortable with Trump who don't trust the Democratic Party, who view the Democratic Party as too far to the left, who view the Democratic Party as too out of touch. Maybe they're uncomfortable with their economic policies. They're uncomfortable with their cultural thing.
So the Democrats have to figure out, can they develop a message that figures out how to talk to the, say, 55% who will get comfortable enough to say, okay, we trust you to govern.
And I think the question is gonna be, is it gonna be as simple as the party having the same debate that they had in 1988 after they lost that and you had the rise of Bill Clinton who was sort of a pro-business Democrat who sort of beat back Jesse Jackson at the time, who was sort of the leader of the more liberal wing of the party. Is it something like that? If it is, and it's pretty simple, okay.
And then you start to look out for sort of governors who start to find that space. You see Rahm Emanuel, who's not a former governor, but a former mayor of Chicago. He's trying to sort of sit in that pro-business space. In fact, he just took a job with a private equity firm. I don't think that...
You know, 10 years ago, that would have been seen as a decision somebody makes on the Democratic side if they're not going to run for president, because the assumption would be there's no way you could win a primary if you were somehow part of private equity. I think Rahm Emanuel is trying to bet differently on that.
I think you might see some other governors, whether it's Andy Beshear or Josh Shapiro, try to sort of remove themselves a little bit, at least from the from the cultural stereotypes that have that have been seen as a negative thing. for the Democratic side. But I would say this, I do wonder if there is such exhaustion with
And such disappointment with both parties that the thing the Democrats have to, I think, be really worried about is if there is true disruption, not just inside their own party, which could be healthy. I would argue with whatever you think of Donald Trump, Donald Trump disrupted the Republican Party on the inside, created a big fight and in essence built a new coalition.
that we're going to find out how durable it is. It turns out I don't think it's very durable if Donald Trump's not on the ballot. But he built a coalition that was successful. He won the popular vote for the first time. He's figured out how to win. He's created a working class coalition that is beyond just white working class voters.
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Chapter 4: Is Mike Johnson powerless without Trump?
That's an impressive feat as far as political organizing is concerned. And If the Democrats get disrupted internally, it could be a healthy thing. That's what Bill Clinton did. But what if the disruption comes from the outside? What if these independent candidacies, we've got a big one in Michigan with the Detroit mayor running for governor as an independent.
I'd be keeping an eye out on California. I certainly don't think a conventional Democrat is what Californians are going to want to see for the for a fifth straight term. Right. They've had eight straight. Excuse me. They've had four straight gubernatorial elections that they've won. Will they win a fifth with somebody whose title is U.S. senator, former U.S.
senator, former vice president, lieutenant governor or. Is the only way the Democrats win a fifth, you know, sort of a fifth straight term in California is they have some outsider, somebody who hasn't held elected office.
Chapter 5: What is the revenge mindset among Republicans?
Or does somebody say, you know what, I'm going to run as an independent, see if I can peel off the third of Republican voters that live out in California, get some some sort of pro-business Democrats and create a new coalition. And I think that that is why there is, I think, some urgency on the Democratic Party side to sort of.
Show some openness to debate and not, you know, go ahead and have a fight, but almost be open to having the debate inside your tent. Because if they at all try to sort of squelch this, I think you could start to see more interest in that. And, you know, one word of warning on there.
I've often wondered, for instance, if when it comes to Israeli politics, I joke, have we exported our politics to Israel or is Israel exporting their divisive politics to us? 30 years ago, there was a robust left of center party called the Labor Party in Israel, won a lot of elections. the first election of Bibi Netanyahu seemed to fracture.
And it was sort of, in many ways, the Israeli left has been obsessed with defeating Netanyahu so much it has crumbled the Labor Party. And in order to defeat Netanyahu or come up with different coalitions to do it, they sort of have to grab, let's try this. They've created new parties to try to beat them, and they've won a couple of times.
But there is no sort of center of gravity for the left of center political movement in Israel the way there used to be. And that to me is the risk. that Democrats have in this moment, that they can't continue to just organize themselves around being anti-Trump, because at some point, you sort of lose your own brand. And it's possible, frankly, that over the last three presidential elections,
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Chapter 6: How are tariffs affecting Republican strategy?
by organizing themselves. Look, in fairness to them, it certainly looked like a good strategy in 16. It was a good strategy in 20 since they won, and they got really close doing it again in 24. But is it really a long-term strategy? And in some ways, are you seeing some diminishing returns here? So
It's it's it's something that I've been holding off on saying something I probably would have written a month ago if I'd had a place to write it. This is something I wanted to share now. So it is I'm hoping that we start to see more of these robust debates, whether it's a Gavin Newsom, a Cory Booker, a John Fetterman.
The louder these fights are inside the Democratic Party, ironically, it may be a sign of real health, because I think if you look at the fights inside the Republican Party, It is actually over the last decade been a net positive for them, not necessarily a net negative. All right. I'm going to quick sneak a break in here.
And when we come back, my conversation with the man who probably knows more about what's happening on Congress than any other individual in Washington, D.C., that's not named Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House. And that is Jake Sherman, the founder of Punchbowl News. Hey, joining me now is Jake Sherman. He is founder, one of the poobahs of Punchbowl. Mr. Sherman, good to see you, sir.
Good to see you too, Chuck. And, you know, I'm assuming I have some new listeners, new viewers. Yes, you are. I have a YouTube channel now, Jake. So you are actually going to be seen as much as you're heard. But for those that may not know what Punchbowl is, you know, I think it's the only way to understand Congress, the only people that cover Congress correctly and well and thoroughly.
I'm not saying there aren't others that do it sporadically well, but you guys... You guys are doing it at such a granular level that I don't think it's anybody else can match it. But what is give me your elevator pitch on Punchbowl these days?
Yeah, well, thank you, Chuck. We started God. We started almost four and a half years ago now. Myself, Anna Palmer and John Bresnahan all worked on Rachel Schindler. We all worked together at at Politico for many years. And in 2020, COVID, we were just like, we got to we got to do something on our own. We had written a book, which our first appearance was on was with you, Chuck.
So that was very nice in 2019. And we were just we just kind of were willing, were ready to spread our wings. This was at the end of 2020, 2021. I mean, we said, what would we do if we started a publication like with our own with when we could do anything and we could cover Congress anyway? And we said we would focus on the leadership.
And kind of the circles that run around the leadership and the incentives and the inside game and use that to illustrate policy and politics. Power people politics are a motto. So that's number one. Number two, we've now expanded into a bunch of new areas. Financial services and tech were our first two kind of verticals. And we cover that like we cover politics.
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Chapter 7: What does the future hold for Congressional leadership?
No, no, no. That's not the business model. That's not the business model. The business model is this building that I'm sitting in now, the Capitol, and all of the concentric circles that revolve around the Capitol, which, by the way, include Wall Street, include Silicon Valley, include the oil and gas business, include all sorts of parts of the country. Those are the people that we really target.
So let's talk about where I look, you were, I'm going to sign post here. We're talking on a Wednesday afternoon on April 2nd. And, um, You're frankly not as busy as I think you should be this right at this moment. Right. Congress abruptly left town. It had to do with the speaker not being happy by a forced vote on him. I guess it was a discharge petition.
My apologies for using that kind of lingo for those. But essentially, they that some members of Congress led by a. a former Freedom caucus, I say former because I believe Anna Luna has now quit the Freedom caucus, who was trying to allow proxy voting for essentially maternal and paternity leave.
And I'm going to guess any sort of like, you know, major health crisis where you were going to be away, either a family member, et cetera, away. Seems like a pretty, it was interesting that she got some bipartisan support for this.
Yeah, so it was actually just pregnancy, right?
It was OK. This was just for pregnancy.
Yes. OK.
So basically, not even paternity.
Well, you know, maternity and paternity. Basically, what she did is a discharge petition is a way for for somebody who is being ignored by the leadership to get something on the floor. She got 218 signatures, which is the prerequisite. And then that triggers an automatic vote. So Mike Johnson didn't like that. This bill that she triggered a vote on would allow 12 weeks of proxy voting.
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Chapter 8: Was the Trump third term debate a distraction?
You certainly were told. I mean, I remember, you know, don't go on an airplane in eight months.
Right, right, right, right, right. So, OK, so what happened is Johnson doesn't like that, doesn't like proxy voting. So he indebted in a in I'm sorry for the this is like getting the full capital.
You're in the Capitol Hill cubbyhole office.
No, no, no, no, no. This is the action.
This is where where news is being made.
Texture. Yeah. So it's the sausage. Mike Johnson put in a unrelated bill, a provision that would kill that that petition. He lost. Annapolita Ludo won, which was very surprising that a member of the rank and file was able to defeat the speaker. She had she held her coalition together. And Johnson said, forget it. We're going home. We're going to regroup next week.
He said this on a Tuesday afternoon. They'd only been in session for about 20 or so hours at that point. So in cancel the week, he was really upset. And he has two different things pulling at him.
Let me pause here. Let me pause here. Why did he cancel the week? So he canceled the week. He didn't have to cancel the week.
Why couldn't they?
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