Since Trump’s Return, Democrats in Disarray: An Uncertain Road Ahead
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Ever since Donald Trump’s resounding victory in November, Democrats have appeared uncoordinated and off track. That theme continued this week during the president’s speech to a special joint session of Congress.
Caught flat-footed by an election victory and calls for change, Democrats couldn’t come up with a cohesive pushback strategy as Trump laid out what he has done and plans to do the next four years.
Some Democrats walked out and others held protest signs while one rudely interrupted the president’s speech, forcing the Speaker of the House to remove him from the chamber. “I look at the Democrats in front of me and realize there’s absolutely nothing I can say to make them happy, or stand, or applaud, nothing I can do,” President Trump explained.
Indeed, that seems to be true. Party leaders like David Axelrod realize the Democrat disconnect is real. “The Democrat Party has become too much seen by too many Americans as the party of elites and institutions that have failed them,” he recently said. “And so, I worry that the party of working people, the self-styled party of working people, is perceived by working people as elite, disdainful and removed from their experience.”
Polls show it’s the GOP that’s now more in sync with Americans on top issues like the economy, taxes, and immigration. That disconnect brings with it a 57 percent unfavorable rating for Democrats.
Long-time party influencer Roland Martin, however, says don’t count them out quite yet. “People who are saying that they’re in disarray, that’s a level of silliness,” Martin tells CBN News. “The reason I say that is we always see these stories after there’s a loss.”
But Martin does acknowledge a communication problem. “Democrats’ messaging is horrible,” he continues. “What they’ve done is they’ve passed things, they’ve supported things that actually benefit the American people, and they don’t talk about it.”
Additionally, the embrace of leftist ideas has hurt them with their once blue-collar base. “If you’re Democrats, you have to recognize where people are, and now begin to say, hey, either I’m going to push that hard and suffer the consequences, or I’m going to have to somehow recalibrate.”
The fraught situation has left Democrat politicians with a choice in their attempt for a strategic comeback. Some are taking the road less traveled like Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, who, at times, is trying to find some common ground with the Trump Administration. “I don’t want to pretend we’re always going to agree, but I will always seek collaboration first,” Whitmer told a Michigan audience recently. “I won’t go looking for fights. I won’t back down from them either.”
Other top Democrats, like Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, remain “never Trumpers,” accompanied by provocative rhetoric. “A seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago did not arrive overnight,” he said in a recent speech. “I am watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now.”
Clearly, there are two different strategies here for Democrats, but not a true plan. That makes for a bleak future. It’s projected that in the next five years, liberal states like California, Illinois, and New York will lose congressional seats due to a shrinking population.
Conservative states like Texas and Florida are expected to pick up seats.
“You’ve got to have a much more aggressive Democratic National Committee,” influential Democrat commentator Roland Martin tells CBN News. “They’ve got to stop listening to these overpaid consultants and posers who don’t understand people.”
And if all that isn’t bad enough, the money is starting to dry up too, with many top-dollar Democrat donors saying they’re done with a party that appears out of touch with voters.
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