Will Democrats actually fight against fascism?

Institutions will not save us, and neither will empty threats

Welcome to a Monday night edition of Progress Report.

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There were two significant news stories today that together elucidate the most important divide in the Democratic Party.

JetBlue and Spirit Airlines announced this morning that they were abandoning their proposed $3.8 billion mega-merger after a federal judge blocked the deal. The deal’s collapse, unthinkable under past administrations, comes as a result of a successful lawsuit by the Department of Justice’s antitrust division, which has shifted from decades of accommodation to confrontation with powerful interests.

On the other hand, the Supreme Court’s decision that states cannot remove Donald Trump from the ballot may have been unanimous, but it was only by a 5-4 majority that the court all but insulated all insurrectionists from future disqualification from elected office. The bare majority decision, the Supreme Court’s second gift to Trump inside of a week, was only possible because corrupt right-wing justices have been assured of their own impunity by Senate Democrats and their refusal to even feign a desire to investigate, pressure, or reform the court.

This is not theoretical game theory or the furious griping of a leftist looking to assign blame: The Senate did nothing to force Clarence Thomas was to recuse from the case, despite his wife’s own involvement in the insurrection, and then he provided the deciding vote to eviscerate the 14th amendment.

Ideology often plays a key role in the friction between various factions of the Democratic Party, especially as it pertains to policy. But politically, the biggest divide is between those Democrats willing and eager to push back against the regular encroachment of corporate neo-fascism and the institutionalists in the party who shrink from fights and invite chaos.

Such acquiescence when in power tells voters that there’s no real problem with such deep-rooted corruption, fomenting cynicism and rendering campaign warnings inert. It all presents as performance, political kayfab. The message ultimately becomes that nothing really matters.

I’ve been semi-fixated on Senate Judiciary Committee chair Dick Durbin for his cowardice for months now, demanding that he investigate Thomas, Samuel Alito, and every other justice that’s hiding so many pleasures from far-right billionaires beneath their black robes. Just yesterday, in a laughably limp press tour, Durbin said he was “disappointed” and “concerned” by the Supreme Court’s call to delay the Trump immunity, as if he’s simply an observer with zero power to impact their decisions.

Joining me now in that campaign is Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who ripped into the Senate in an interview published over the weekend.

We need to go after the Supreme Court… and through the Supreme Court, we explore the entire network of issues that are most important to everyday Americans: The influence of dark money in creating a government that works against the American people, the majority of the American people. The erosion of abortion rights and reproductive freedom in the United States. The actual institution of the Supreme Court itself, and the complete lack of ethical or legal standards that they are subject to, and shedding light on it.

I think it's one of the most important things that we can do and it's one of the biggest missed opportunities that we've had, but it's not too late… The Supreme Court is a political institution that responds to pressure. And absent pressure, they are going to do more of what we saw this week, which is enabling and risking our entire democracy at the behest of Donald Trump and Leonard Leo and the entire network that installed them there. And we have to fight back.

AOC’s point that the Supreme Court is a political institution is key. Thomas and Alito may not care about the court’s reputation beyond getting pouty at allegations made against them personally, but Chief Justice John Roberts and several other conservatives are moveable on certain issues — we saw it last spring, in fact, on the Voting Rights Act. Again, perhaps a bit more pressure (or really any at all) would have driven the court to expedite the Trump immunity case instead of delaying it nearly two months. If only the committee had authorized subpoenas of Leonard Leo or Harlan Crow…

None of this is to say that Democrats will always immediately succeed by placing pressure on institutions, but it’s far more likely to produce results than placing faith in those rotted relics of more collegial times. But as AOC later points out in the interview, simply putting up a fight is far more attractive to voters than accepting defeat.

Presenting as feeble and uncommitted has backfired on the White House, with polls showing Biden now trailing Trump by as many as five points. Americans like a bruiser far more than a loser.

Even wins are turning into losses. For example, the Supreme Court actually ruled in favor of the Biden administration when it sued Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for putting up razor wire around the border, causing migrants to drown. Unbowed, Abbott refused to allow border patrol troops to access parts of the Rio Grande, drawing threats of a potential DOJ lawsuit from the White House that never came to fruition. Biden is now seeking to look tough on immigration, but a month after dropping his legal threats, he mostly seems too weak to stand up to a smarmy and unlikable governor, to say nothing of Donald Trump.

On the subject of the DOJ, when Attorney General Merrick Garland spoke this weekend at a ceremony honoring the civil rights activists who were beaten by cops in Selma, he promised to pursue Republican states that have enacted draconian voter suppression laws. It’s been three years; time is running out.

The Democratic Party is led by a back-slapping consensus-builder from another generation, which may in theory be helpful for crafting legislation, but does nothing either legally or electorally to prevent the rapid ascent of fascism. The way to win this fall is to be seen as a force for change, as the party that will protect peoples’ rights and freedoms.

Why should you believe me?

For the past two years, I have been writing regularly about how Republicans’ penchant for intrusive, pro-corporate governance has opened the door for Democrats to seize the mantle of freedom for themselves. During the first year, it felt as if I were screaming into a void, but over the past six months, we’ve seen different campaigns adopt that messaging. Now, a big (and in some ways unnerving) profile on Biden in the New Yorker indicates that the national party has officially adopted the recommendation.

It’s easy to miss how unusual a “freedom agenda” is for a Democratic Presidential campaign. Since the nineteen-sixties, Republicans have held fast to the language of freedom—from the backlash against civil rights to the Tea Party to the Freedom Caucus. But Democrats have been trying to convince the public that the Republican Party under Trump has transformed into the “maga movement,” an authoritarian crusade bent on dominion.

Donilon said, “At its heart, it doesn’t believe in the Constitution, doesn’t believe in law, embraces violence.” He sees an opportunity for Democrats to be “in a place where they usually aren’t.” They can lay claim to the freedom to “choose your own health-care decisions, the freedom to vote, the freedom for your kids to be free of gun violence in school, the freedom for seniors to live in dignity.”

My version of freedom leans much further into the economic freedoms — Republicans have been working hard to scuttle people’s right to unionize, throw out basic labor protections, and reward the landlords who control tenants’ lives — but this is real progress. Democrats just have to learn that it’s not enough to talk about freedom; now, they must start to fight tooth and nail for it before it’s too late.

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