James Carville: It’s Time for Democrats to do nothing.
By Curt_Anderson February 25, 2025 4:52 pm Category: Politics (0.0 from 0 votes)
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I have edited Carville's op-ed into a shorter Cliff Notes version. If you have an NY Times subscription, read his entire piece at the link below. To be even more succinct, Carville recommends allowing Republicans to have enough rope to hang themselves.
The Republican Party is all too often effective at campaigning and winning elections, but there’s another fact about it that a lot of Americans forget: The Republican Party flat out sucks at governing.
[Instead] of prioritizing the problems he campaigned on — public safety, immigration and the border and, most of all, the economy — President Trump is hellbent on dismantling the federal government. To accomplish this, he has put his faith in the most incompetent cabinet in modern history...Which will result in one clear thing: disorder. There will probably be more enormous tax cuts for the wealthy and Medicaid cuts hitting a lot of other people, but there is nothing the American public despises more than disorder and a broken economy.
And there’s nothing Democrats can legitimately do to stop it, even if we wanted to.
With no clear leader to voice our opposition and no control in any branch of government, it’s time for Democrats to embark on the most daring political maneuver in the history of our party: roll over and play dead. Allow the Republicans to crumble beneath their own weight and make the American people miss us...I’m calling for a strategic political retreat.
Instead of gearing up to fight them — as we love to do — the most radical thing we can do is nothing at all. Let the Republicans disagree with themselves publicly. Do not offer a single vote. Do not insert yourself into the discourse. Do not throw a monkey wrench into the equation. Simply step away and let ’em flirt with a default. Just when they’ve pushed themselves to the brink and it appears they could collapse the global economy, come in and save the day. Be the competent party and not the chaos party. House Democrats know this.
The people did not vote for the Department of Education to be obliterated; they voted for lower prices for eggs and milk. Democrats, let the Republicans’ own undertow drag them away.
At this rate, the Trump honeymoon will be over, best case, by Memorial Day but more likely in the next 30 days. And in November 2025, we start turning the tide with what will be remembered as one of the most important elections in recent years: the Virginia governor’s race. From tax enforcers to rocket scientists, bank regulators and essential workers — the Trump administration is hellbent on drastically firing the federal work force, despite the fact that federal civilian employees account for just 3 percent of the federal budget. These workers are highly concentrated in Virginia, home to around 144,000 civilian federal employees.
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I have edited Carville's op-ed into a shorter Cliff Notes version. If you have an NY Times subscription, read his entire piece at the link below. To be even more succinct, Carville recommends allowing Republicans to have enough rope to hang themselves.