In the fight over whether the republic endures, advocates for democracy should welcome everyone. They should accept, and encourage, whatever help people are willing to provide, leaving the door open for new allies to offer more and for new people to join them.
The goal is always to preserve the democracy, not to correctly assess whether various political actors have done the correct thing.1
What brings this up are the reactions I saw from some Trump opponents to Ohio Governor Mike DeWine’s New York Times op-ed defending the (hard-working, legally here) Haitians of Springfield. I’m not going to quote them, but quite a few people were upset about praise for DeWine despite the fact that he wrote it as “a supporter of former President Donald Trump and Senator JD Vance.” He denounced the “claims that lack evidence and disparage the legal migrants living in Springfield,” but he didn’t denounce the people who spread those falsehoods beyond saying he was “saddened” by what they were doing.
Which sparked a bunch of people complaining that if DeWine really meant it, he wouldn’t still be supporting Trump/Vance. After all, bigotry is basically a leading theme of Trump’s career, and in particular the last couple of weeks of this campaign. If DeWine recognizes that, how can he support Trump anyway? It’s hardly a unique reaction to DeWine; when Dick Cheney actually endorsed Kamala Harris, I saw plenty of people whose response was not just to remind everyone about Cheney’s record on torture and the Iraq War, but to insist that was the only relevant thing to talk about in response to Cheney’s endorsement.2
Look: It’s easy for Democrats right now to say that they would do the right thing if the situation was reversed. But opposing one’s own party is a lot harder than it might seem. Mike DeWine, for example, has been an active Republican all his adult life, which in his case goes back at least to his first election to the Ohio state legislature in 1980. He very likely cares a lot about the Republican platform. He very likely cares a lot about the party winning local, state, and national offices. He very likely feels a responsibility, as a Republican governor, to his fellow Republicans in the state. Even his very limited attack on Trump puts all of that at risk.
He may – he should! – also have a competing loyalty to democracy and the truth and, for that matter, the economic and civic health of his state in the face of attacks by Trump and (Ohio Senator) Vance. But like it or not, it’s only natural that a Republican should give his own party the benefit of the doubt. It’s all too easy to convince oneself that, well, Trump (and Vance, and maybe some of the most obvious radials in Congress) are acting poorly, but that the rest of the party is basically okay – and on the correct side, after all (from DeWine’s perspective) on most policy questions.3
That’s not to say that such thinking is correct. It’s just…understandable. And at the end of the day, one can still be democracy’s friend despite falling short in all sorts of ways.
Democrats legitimately deserve credit for policing their own party and marginalizing bigots, demagogues, and other anti-democratic voices. Absolutely. But potentially sacrificing the odd House seat and risking a bit of intraparty unpleasantness is just not the same thing as attacking one’s party’s presidential nominee. Especially in the weeks leading up to the election.
Now, it’s important here to be clear that some “policy” isn’t neutral from the perspective of democracy. One may argue (in my view, correctly) that reproductive freedom is a democracy issue; others argue that questions of economic inequality are democracy issues. And that’s without getting to policy questions that are perhaps more obviously critical to democratic government, ranging from civil rights to making it easier or harder to vote.
At the same time, I’m reluctant to say that only those who agree with me on a long list of policy questions can be an ally in the fight to preserve the republic. Even if I think (and I do) that some of those policies really are important to making democracy meaningful. That may sound paradoxical at best and both-sides-ish at worst. But again, and this is the key point: This isn’t about deciding whether DeWine or Cheney (or Mitt Romney, or anyone else) is meeting some “pro-democracy” standard we can concoct. It’s about actually winning. Attacking partial or potential supporters for falling short is no way to do that.
The bottom line here is that anyone who thinks that purity will work is nuts. Important political battles of any kind, and certainly the current fight to save democracy, cannot succeed without compromise — without alliances with folks you might well rather not be allied with.4 Politics is difficult. Democracy is hard work. Coalition politics, which is the only politics worthy of the name and also the only politics that can win real battles, is painful. There is no one cool trick to make things work out fine. There never was.
The good news is that many of those who have been through tough battles report that political action can be incredibly rewarding to those who experience it, no matter how brutal it can be as well.
At any rate: The way to win any political battle is to win over reluctant people and get what one can out of them, not to shun them if they are insufficiently committed to the cause or are otherwise unappealing partners. And sure, when the fight is over then there will be plenty of time to grade everyone. But that’s not likely to be any time soon.
[One awful error corrected — now correctly says that bigotry is a theme of Trumps career]
Some, of course, argue that Trump and his movement simply are not a threat to democracy. This one isn’t for them, although the points here hold in general.
And to be clear: Those things were really bad. Were we to have an assessing-Cheney’s-career session, we would start with them.
Clarifying required here, too. None of this means that Democratic critics are responsible for anti-democratic choices by Republicans. All it means is that advocates of democracy should offer as many paths to potential allies as possible because that’s how one wins.
And don’t kid yourself; some of your closest political friends are going to turn out to be unsavory characters, and some of your political opponents are very nice people outside of their horrific positions. It would be really nice if that wasn’t the case, but really nice only occasionally happens in politics, and it’s not something one should rely on. At all.
Really good piece Jonathan. Also insightful for thinking about GOP State Sen. Mike McDonnell in Nebraska who said he would vote against changing the electoral college approach in Nebraska. He was a pro-life Democrat but he was censured by the Democrats over r reproductive rights and rights of transgender Nebraskans. Now he is a Republican. I don't know the details and maybe the Democratic Party needs bright lines on human rights issues. But there will also have to be a reckoning with who is an ally. Your piece was clarifying for me.
Thank you for this. The hatred among the left for the Democrats' MVP Joe Manchin fits here.