SUDDENLY, DEMOCRATIC GOVERNORS AND DEMOCRATIC CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS DON'T SEEM TO BELONG TO THE SAME PARTY

Yesterday, Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker delivered a defiant speech in response to President Trump's threat to send federal troops to Chicago.

Pritzker: This is not about fighting crime. This is about the President and his complicit lackey, Stephen Miller, searching for ways to lay the groundwork to circumvent our democracy, militarize our cities, and end elections.

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— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) August 25, 2025 at 5:07 PM

Illinois Gov. Pritzker vows to pursue Trump officials who participate in an illegal National Guard deployment to Chicago: "If you hurt my people, nothing will stop me - not time or political circumstance - from making sure that you face justice under our constitutional rule of law."

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— Adam Schwarz (@adamjschwarz.bsky.social) August 25, 2025 at 4:36 PM

Up to this point, the highest-profile Democrat expressing open defiance of Trump has been Governor Gavin Newsom, who's backing a redistricting plan meant to increase the number of California Democrats in Congress while continuing to troll Trump and other Republicans on social media. But it's not just Pritzker and Newsom getting salty. Facing threats of a Trump occupation of Baltimore, Maryland governor Wes Moore invited Trump to walk Baltimore's streets with him, and when Trump rejected the offer, Moore stopped playing nice:

President Bone Spurs will do anything to get out of walking – even if that means spouting off more lies about the progress we’re making on public safety in Maryland.

Hey Donald, we can get you a golf cart if that makes things easier. Just let my team know.

— Wes Moore (@iamwesmoore) August 24, 2025

Shortly afterward, Moore, a decorated combat veteran, went there:

Did Donald Trump, the President of the United States, lie about an injury to dodge the Vietnam draft?

— Wes Moore (@iamwesmoore) August 24, 2025

In Minnesota, Tim Walz continues hammering away at Trump:

Walz says Harris "would have been a fantastic president... we wouldn't wake up every day to a bunch of shit on TV. We would wake up to an adult w/ compassion & dignity doing the work, not a manchild crying about whatever is wrong with him. May his fat ankles find something today. Petty as hell."

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) August 25, 2025 at 12:24 PM

And even the governor of New York is running for reelection as a Trump-basher:



But congressional Democratic leaders? They're still meek as lambs. In response to the occupation of D.C., they're listening to consultants who tell them to sidestep the issue in media appearances and pivot to talk about the economy when they're asked about the crackdown.

If you’re mad about Dems avoiding talking about DC, you can blame the Democratic quants, as demonstrated in this memo from David Shor’s Blue Rose Research

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— Will Stancil (@whstancil.bsky.social) August 24, 2025 at 1:59 PM

I wish I could tell you why this is happening. I don't have any inside information to explain it.

You might assume that the governors have a greater sense of urgency because Trump is directly threatening a jackbooted occupation of their cities. But New York is one of the cities where Trump has threatened an occupation, and the Democratic leaders in the House and Senate -- Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, both from Brooklyn -- have responded meekly. You might say that the governors have no connection to the D.C. Democratic Party. But Walz was on the presidential ticket last year, and Newsom, Pritzker, and Moore are all obviously considering presidential runs. You might say that governors from solidly blue states can get away with saying things that the national party, which needs to win nationwide, can't risk saying. But Democrats won Minnesota by only 4 points in the 2024 presidential election, while Tim Walz won his last race by less than 7 points. Hochul's victory margin in 2022 was also less than 7 points.

Maybe the apparently untreatable PTSD that spread among D.C. Democrats after the party badly lost three straight presidential elections in the 1980s has somehow spared Democrats in the states, even as it continues to spread in Washington, infecting even D.C.-based Democrats who are too young to remember the 1980s.

But I think it's something else.

I think the main battle being fought by billionaire Democratic donors is the battle to keep the D.C. party even-tempered and centrist. To these donors, righteous anger mean progressivism, and progressivism means a threat to their tax status. They like Schumer and Jeffries. They want more Democrats like Schumer and Jeffries.

There seems to be a groupthink among D.C. Democratic leaders that favors the interests of the wealthy and the advice of don't-rock-the-boat consultants. But the governors don't seem to be shaking off this mindset.

In reality, most of the angry governors aren't flaming progressives. Newsom has tacked to the right on issues such as trans rights and the homeless. Hochul is a centrist who still won't endorse her party's nominee for mayor of New York. Moore is an ex-Wall Streeter.

But the D.C. Democratic establishment believesthat an angry Democrat is a dangerous Democrat. The D.C. party's consultants agree. Let's hope there are more governors and mayors who are listening to other voices.