Chuck Schumer Was Right--But He Should Still Step Down
Oy Vey!
An author went on television eager to talk about his book about anti-Semitism, launching into a lengthy, audience-losing monologue the minute his interviewer allowed him to move on from what she wanted to focus on.
“Leader Schumer, are you feeling pressure to step down?” Kristen Welker asked on Meet the Press this morning. Senator Schumer explained why he supported allowing a vote to go forward that avoided a government shutdown, using language I wished I’d heard more often at the time.
“A shutdown would be 15 or 20 times worse. Under a shutdown, the Executive has sole power to determine what is, quote, essential, and they can determine without any court supervision, the courts have ruled it’s solely up to the Executive what to shut down.
With Musk and DOGE and Trump and this Voght, they would eviscerate the federal government . On Day Two they can say, “Oh, SNAP? Feeding hungry children? Not essential. On Day Four, “Mass transit? Not essential, we’re cutting it. On Day Six, Medicaid, we’ll cut back by 20, 30, 40, 50 percent.”
Their goal is to eviscerate the federal government so they can give more tax breaks to the billionaire class.”
Why yes, that’s a good way of putting it. Or as my Substack colleague (and partner-in-satire), Eric Hensal writes:
Trump, Musk, et. al. would prefer a shut down government. Gets them where they want to go quicker and Democrats cannot escape all blame. Here is where Schumer critics show their magical thinking—that somehow the Republicans would take all the shutdown blame leaving Democrats unscathed and Americans rallied to their side. But this result is far from certain for the popular imagination. In fact, I bet the Republican plan was to bait Democrats into shutting down the government. Why do you think the crazy caucus in the house behaved themselves and voted for the CR? They were assured of a plan that could push Democrats into a shutdown, then blame them for it AND enable DOGE to dismantle government at warp speed.
Also on Substack,
said:This is a failure of leadership. No plan, no strategy, and no attempt to communicate honestly and forthrightly with the base. At no point did we know what Dems were fighting for or what victory would look like. Schumer and some Senate Democrats wanted to be seen as “fighting” up until the moment the fight was set to start. Everyone hoped that Johnson would fail to get the votes in the House, which would force them into negotiations with Democrats. But that didn't happen; and there was seemingly no plan for what Senate Democrats would do if Johnson did get the votes.
And to his Our Land readers, David Corn writes,
The Democrats need to be leading and bolstering this counterforce, not waiting for it. A bunch of them know that and have been speaking out. Sen. Bernie Sanders (not a Democrat) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have scheduled rallies around the country. Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut has been nailing it. While discussing the recent battle over the spending bill, he concisely captured what ought to be the Democrats’ collective message:
This is not a normal political moment. This is not a normal fight. What Donald Trump is doing right now is absolutely insidious. He is every single day acting unconstitutionally, he is trying to destroy the rule of law. And for what? To essentially hand our government over to the billionaire class so that they can steal from us. There is a level of corruption happening in this White House that is absolutely unprecedented… Part of our worry [about the spending bill was that] it gives [Trump] authority to move money around… This to me is a moment where we need to be restraining the president's power, not giving him new authorities.
Watching Chuck Schumer today, I had what I now call a “Michael Steele Jon Stewart moment,” a trick my amygdala started playing on me after The Daily Show host starting casting the then Republican National Committee Chairman as a Muppet. I became unable to separate the “real” Michael Steele from the puppet, just as now, I can no longer see Sen. Schumer without hearing Jon Stewart’s version of his voice and authentic Brooklyn deli accent.
When satire overtakes your image, it’s probably time to listen to what Kristen Welker showed Senator Schumer’s dear colleague Michael Bennett saying,
“It’s important for people to know, you know, when it’s time to go.”
David Corn is right, the Democrats need to be better leaders, and that might mean they need to have better leaders. And reading between David Corn’s lines, I agree there may not be a better Leader-to-be than Chris Murphy.
Chuck Schumer is not the indispensable man. He’s been a good leader and he’s earned the respect of his colleagues, and of two Democratic presidents who couldn’t have gotten their agendas passed without him. But the critics are right—it’s time to pass the torch.
However, while a new messenger is what we need, I’m not convinced about the urgent need for a new message. As I wrote here, we wouldn’t be complaining about a Speaker Jeffries—just about everything I’eve ever heard the Democratic leader say in public is perfectly crafted, brilliantly delivered, and strategically effective—and the same goes for Jamie Raskin. They are both good at articulating the bedrock Democratic message my old boss, Arnold Bennett, used to shorthand as values that defended “the homes, the hearts and the hands of America’s working families.” Those values can still win elections.
As much as fantasists and pundits might like to criticize our politics for not fulfilling their ideal of how it should work, we are stuck with a two-party system in which the party with power gets to do everything, and the power out of power gets to complain.
That’s why I was glad to hear more about the town halls Congressional leaders like Rep. Raskin are having in red districts where the GOP Member of Congress won’t show up to meet voters face-to-face.
And I’m also glad that Bernie Sanders is teaming up with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to do rallies. “We’re going to throw these bums out,” AOC declares, but the words could just as easily have been said by Sen. Sanders.
These two know more than most how important it is to do that, starting with the next election. Indeed, winning back the House in 2026 is still the only thing that matters.
The current GOP majority is held together by a fraying bit of cotton candy that could evaporate at any moment—and is ripe for defeat when Democrats attack the growing number of target Districts where voters are being actively harmed by Republican policies. All this talk about what Democrats are doing wrong is based on observing an engine designed for failure—which is what being in opposition means.
Of course, as
wrote recently, Democrats are furious.In several recent polls, the Democratic Party’s approval rating is at its lowest in history. Of course, the overwhelming majority of Republicans don’t like Democratic leadership. Independents are mostly down on the party, but what’s driving the abhorrent rating is Democrats themselves. In a CNN poll conducted before Schumer’s capitulation, only 72% of Democrats approved of their party. To put that in perspective, in the same poll, 86% of Republicans approved of the GOP.
Second, Democrats want their party leadership to fight harder. A Data for Progress poll found that two-thirds of Democrats and Democratic-leaning Independents believe representatives are not doing enough to stand up against Trump.
If “fight harder” means putting Chris Murphy in the captain’s chair and assembling a Democratic “Shadow Cabinet" of our star players to do town halls in red districts, I’m all for it. The war some Democrats are calling for will be waged in the key Districts that will determine control of the House for the second half of Donald Trump’s term.
We have to focus on 2026, hold on by our fingernails, and see if the next few weeks and months bring more victories in court. And if we do end up with a new Senate leader, please Democrats, stop kibitzing and focus on winning back power. A handful of seats can make Hakeem Jeffries Speaker, Jamie Raskin Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and empower a new generation of Congressional Democrats.
Trump is right about one thing—it’s good to be the King. But right now, a new Speaker of the House and a Democratic majority sound pretty good too.
P.S. While we’re on the subject of anti-Semitism, as a former Hebrew School winner of Temple B’nai Abraham’s Steven R. Bruckner Memorial Award, Donald Trump’s attacks on higher education under the guise of defending Jews is as authentic as mayonnaise on pastrami.