The New Yorker Radio Hour
Senator Chris Murphy: “This Is How Democracy Dies—Everybody Just Gets Scared”
Fri, 28 Mar 2025
With congressional Republicans unwilling to put any checks on an Administration breaking norms and issuing illegal orders, the focus has shifted to the Democratic opposition—or the lack thereof. Democrats like Chris Murphy, the junior senator from Connecticut, have vehemently disagreed with party leaders’ reversion to business as usual. Murphy opposed Senator Chuck Schumer’s negotiation to pass the Republican budget and keep the government running; he advocated for the Democrats to skip the President’s joint address to Congress en masse. Murphy believes that the Democrats have a winning formula if they stick to a populist, anti-big-money agenda. But, he concedes, some of his colleagues are playing normal politics, “where we try to become more popular than Republicans. People like me believe that it won’t matter if we’re more popular than them, because the rules won’t allow us to run a fair election.” By attacking democratic institutions, law firms, and other allies, he thinks, Republicans can insure that their party wins indefinitely, as in failed democracies around the world. “If you think that democracy is the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 story,” Murphy tells David Remnick, “then you have to act like it. You need to show that you’re willing to take a political risk.”
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From the online spectacle around Leo XIV's election to our favorite on-screen cardinals. This week on Critics at Large, we're talking all things Pope.
The Catholic Church was made for this moment. I think 2,000 years ago, the Catholic Church basically anticipated TikTok, Instagram, X. You don't have those little Swiss guard outfits and think they're not being photographed. Oil painting is not enough.
I'm Vincent Cunningham. Join me and my co-hosts for an episode on what can only be described as Pope Week. New episodes of Critics at Large drop every Thursday. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.
This is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
Welcome to the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. As Donald Trump carries out a radical plan to slash the federal government to a nub, no matter what the cost or who's going to pay it, his most obvious accomplices are congressional Republicans, politicians who, with almost no exceptions, will not dare risk his wrath or risk a primary challenge.
But also notable is the Democratic opposition or the lack thereof. In the House, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries says he won't swing at every pitch from the administration as though this were a baseball game. Chuck Schumer's vote to back the Republican budget in order to avoid a government shutdown enraged many in the congressional rank and file. So the Democratic Party now seems paralyzed.
Senator Chris Murphy has emerged as one of the most vehement critics of what you might call the business-as-usual approach by the Democrats. Murphy says we have months, not years, before American democracy is damaged beyond repair. In other words, if there's an emergency, act like it's an emergency. I spoke with Senator Chris Murphy last week.
Senator, I wonder if we could try to define the crisis that we're in. I'm of the opinion that the Trump administration is intent on creating a kind of American-style authoritarian situation. Do you agree with me?
I do. Long ago, the Republican Party decided that they cared more about power than they did democracy. That's what January 6th was all about. Regardless of who won the election, they wanted to make sure that their person was in charge. They believe and have long believed that the Democratic Party progressives are an existential threat to the country and thus impoverished.
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