Democrats rage over their leaders' impotence
"If I cannot move heaven, I will raise hell." So wrote the Roman poet Virgil in his epic poem, "The Aeneid."
At the moment, congressional Democrats can’t move heaven, and they are not raising hell either. And polls show that raising hell is precisely what their voters want Democrats in Washington to do.
Sixty-five percent of Democrats told an NBC News poll last week that they want congressional Democrats to raise hell in opposition to President Trump and “stick to their positions even if that means not getting things done in Washington.”
People who voted for Democrats are tired of hearing comedian Bill Maher quip that a mule symbolizes Democrats because “it’s the other thing that just stands there when you beat it.”
That too-close-to-the-truth humor brings us to the case of Senate Minority Leader Charles “Chuck” Schumer (D-N.Y.). He just voted for a Trump-backed plan to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year. It will keep the government open, but it also gives Trump more power to slash government programs.
Why did Schumer run away when he should have stood up to Trump’s power grab? Without congressional approval, Trump is already wildly firing federal workers, shutting down federal agencies and pulling federal funding.
Schumer decided it was best to go with Trump’s power grab and keep the government open.
The fury from Democrats nationally was so intense that Schumer had to cancel stops on his book tour.
"If we ended up in a shutdown, three weeks from now people would come to me and say, 'They just cut off my Medicaid,' 'They just got rid of my veteran's benefits,'" Schumer explained. "Then they'd say to me, 'Why did you let the shutdown happen?'"
But that explanation is not quieting the rage.
The dean of congressional Democrats, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), fueled the fire: “I myself don’t give away anything for nothing,” Pelosi told reporters in a not-so-subtle swipe at Schumer.
“It’s unforgivable that Democrats didn’t… let the chips fly,” said podcaster Scott Galloway.
That kind of rage against Schumer remains widespread. But did he make a strategic error?
In a government shutdown, Trump would have gained broad power to label millions of government employees as "non-essential," and then fire them.
Schumer saw Trump’s ploy and stopped it. With the government remaining open, Schumer is betting Trump and congressional Republicans will bear responsibility for any fallout as Americans begin complaining about Trump slashing the federal workforce and hammering spending on programs for the elderly and needy.
Also, it is a fact that the party forcing a shutdown typically pays a political price. That would have hurt Democrats’ efforts to win a Senate majority next year. So I’d argue that as a matter of political strategy, the pragmatic Schumer made the right move.
But that does little to mitigate the rage among Democrats.
Schumer once saw John Boehner (R-Ohio) make a similar move and be consumed by the fire. The former Republican House Speaker once made a deal with Democrats to keep the government open under President Obama. Boehner’s caucus soon forced him to step down.
The same fallout now threatens Schumer.
“Let me just say it’s important for people to know when it’s time to go,” Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) said last week when asked about the 74-year-old Schumer. “We’re going to have conversations…about all the [party’s] leadership.”
The anger that is splitting Democrats crosses the lines of generation, region and race. Thirty-five-year-old Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) is already being urged to mount a primary challenge to Schumer for his U.S. Senate seat in 2028.
Eighty-three-year-old Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont socialist, is creating a sharp contrast with Schumer by traveling nationwide on a “Stop Oligarchy” tour. Sanders is firing up packed auditoriums, some in red states, by attacking Trump and the “millionaires and billionaires,” working with Trump.
Seventy-seven-year-old Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) showed the same willingness to take the fight to Trump when he stood during Trump’s televised address to Congress and shouted that no one elected Trump to cut Medicaid and Social Security.
His cane-shaking display earned Green a police escort out of the House Chamber, a congressional censure and an effort to boot him from his committee assignments. It also earned him respect from a lot of Democrats who want to see someone fire back at Trump.
The same political podcasts and talk shows that excoriated Schumer quickly lionized Green. And they delighted in noting that Republican Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.), was only reprimanded, not censured, by Republicans for heckling President Obama during an address.
Forty-three-year-old Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) is another rising star among Democrats looking for a champion to take on Trump. She is all over television warning that Trump is trying to cut federal programs for the poor to pay for tax cuts for the rich.
I come back to podcaster Galloway. He contrasted Schumer’s willingness to vote with Republicans with former GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell's (R- Ky.) hard-nosed opposition to Senate Democrats under President Obama.
“I think we should have channeled Mitch McConnell, who has bested and beat the s--- out of Charles Schumer every round for 15 million rounds running," he said. "It’s an enormous strategic error.”
Honestly, if McConnell were leading the Democrats, do you think he would have caved?
Juan Williams is senior political analyst for Fox News Channel and a prize-winning civil rights historian. He is the author of the new book “New Prize for these Eyes: the Rise of America’s Second Civil Rights Movement.”
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