The First Week of the New Trump Era Leaves House Democrats Spinning

President Donald Trump, center, speaks with Democratic and Republican congressional leadership as he signs documents on Monday, the day of his inauguration. From left, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota), Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-New York), Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Nebraska), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota), Vice President JD Vance, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana), House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York).
17:21 JST, January 26, 2025
House Democrats were preparing a united front to strategically counter President Donald Trump before he was sworn back into office. Then he signed a flurry of executive orders dismantling Democratic priorities.
The whiplash after less than five days of drastic changes has tested House Democrats’ attempts to stay united against a far-right president who has long irked the party, but also won a significant swath of voters in November that Democrats are eager to win back. House Democrats – the only caucus in government to net seats during the 2024 election – find themselves at a crossroads over how best to do battle with Trump and congressional Republicans.
Trump’s orders to end birthright citizenship, repeal affirmative action and pardon almost all Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot defendants have particularly rankled House Democrats, who must rely on lawsuits to halt the actions since they have no levers of power in Washington to stop them.
Some lawmakers feel passionate about responding to every rollback Trump has unilaterally enacted, particularly those who have never served in the minority during the previous Trump administration. Others believe they should remain focused and respond more strategically, fearing that voters will again become numb to Democrats’ fire-alarm responses to Trump’s every move.
“There are going to be people that are going to respond to everything that Trump says and want to form some sort of a narrative,” said Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas), who belongs to the pragmatic New Democrat Coalition. “I do think that we have to be careful on which fights we pick with him and what we choose to respond to. … Otherwise, he is going to win to a certain degree if we’re not really careful in that area.”
Many House Democrats also say they are willing to work with Republicans on some issues and predict that they will to meet critical funding deadlines this year given Republicans’ narrower majority this term. That willingness has infuriated a corner of House liberals who believe unity means Democrats must always vote together and reject the idea of possibly supporting GOP-led policies in the Trump era.
“I think we have to oppose him vigorously. I think the idea that we’re talking about holding hands with Donald Trump and extremist Republicans and like, kumbaya, I think is a huge mistake,” said Rep. Robert Garcia (D-California). “We know what he’s going to do. We should oppose that and be very vocal and tough and push back.”
But Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York) argued during the caucus’s weekly meeting Wednesday that Democrats cannot chase every outrage, especially since the Trump administration will purposely “flood the zone” with maddening changes, according to people in the room, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak freely about an off-the-record meeting. He argued that Democrats must remain united in their messaging and disciplined in holding House Republicans accountable on key issues – particularly cost-of-living issues, border security and community safety – warning that if they don’t, their message will not sink in with the American people.
“The difficulty in life with Donald Trump as president, as we have seen in the past, is he will throw a lot of things at the wall as a distraction to the real concerns and the real issues that Americans are facing,” Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar (D-California) said. “Our job is to sift through it and to make sure we have unity of purpose and unity of message.”
Democrats have found genuine common ground across their ideological factions on needing to strike a more populist tone to resonate with working-class voters who blamed the Biden administration for rising prices. Democrats are beginning to do that by stressing that Trump is in the White House “to help himself or … to help one of his billionaire buddies,” as Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) put it.
“I do think Democrats can turn this thing around if we’re willing to point out what Trump made so obvious at his inauguration: that he’s really just there for the rich guys,” said Casar, who chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Many Democrats feel that Trump’s and Hill Republicans’ initial focus on culture-war issues is already helping them make that point. House Republicans have, so far, passed bills that would green-light law enforcement to detain undocumented immigrants accused of theft-related crimes, known as the Laken Riley Act, and bar transgender students from participating in women’s sports, among other noneconomic measures.
“We’re in the third week of the new Congress,” said Rep. Chris Deluzio (D), who represents a swing-district in eastern Pennsylvania. “[Republicans] haven’t introduced a single bill to make life less of a rip-off for people.”
Democrats also threw Republican attacks on public safety back at them. Upon arriving to their weekly meeting, Democrats were greeted by a piece of talking points on their chairs that pointed out how Trump’s decision to pardon hundreds charged for their participation in the Capitol insurrection would “release violent criminals into our communities” and that it would make “America less safe,” according to the document obtained by The Washington Post.
But the party has already splintered on some issues, and a number of Democrats believe that to win back the House majority in 2026, colleagues in swing districts will have to vote alongside Republicans on issues of concern to voters. That ideological split is not a new tension for Democrats, and is one Republicans are aiming to expose with some early bills.
Democrats have seen few defections on the GOP culture-war bills that they crafted a cohesive attack around, such as a bill barring transgender women in sports that Democrats argued could lead to sexual abuse. But voting together on immigration and border security has proved more difficult.
Democratic leaders did not whip – or try to convince lawmakers to vote a certain way – on the Laken Riley Act. As a result, 46 Democrats voted with Republicans to send the bill to Trump’s desk to become law. Asked why, Jeffries made the case for vulnerable swing-district Democrats – and winning back the majority: “House Democrats are going to continue to make decisions based on what’s right for the districts that we represent, and the politics will take care of themselves.”
Some liberals believe that their moderate counterparts are overreacting to voter pushback on immigration and impulsively voting “yes” on any GOP border security measure. There’s a more widely held belief that Republicans’ quick actions are so dizzying that Democrats haven’t had enough time to find consensus on a counternarrative. Rep. Salud Carbajal (D-California), who served in the minority during the last administration, said sifting through the noise “is a process … to not give his audacious, stupid statements airtime, but at the same time react to the things that need to be addressed.”
Democrats think they can work through misunderstandings on process and policy by holding more conversations with each other, but that takes time. A starting point for many as they continue to craft their offensive is the feeling that they can’t just attack Trump, but that they have to explain why his actions may not be helpful.
“It’s not just enough to say he’s doing bad things. He’s going to do bad things. He’s going to do crazy and reckless things. And we should, of course, criticize those things,” DeLuzio said. “We have to articulate our own strong vision and rebuild trust where we’ve lost it and keep it where we still have it.”
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