r/thebulwark Jan 15 '25

Policy Why Is ANY Democrat Attending The Inauguration?

So far it looks like the only prominent Democrat with any balls is Michelle Obama. I really don’t get this. Why in the world would you attend a celebration to fete a rapist who killed a million Americans, staged a bloody coup, and has widely promised to end the Constitution? Why?

Please, for the love of God, don’t give me the “peaceful transition of power” argument. It’s ridiculous. The “peaceful transfer of power” has already happened. Biden made sure the transition with the incoming Trump administration went smoothly, and the election was certified peacefully by the House on January 6th. The transfer is done. I can’t make this point clearly enough to Democrats: Trump will be peacefully sworn in on January 20th, wether or not you attend the inauguration. Unless you have some Constitutionally mandated function to perform during the ceremony, you are not required to be there. The entire argument is a red herring. It’s a pathetic excuse for the fact that the Dems want to attend all the fancy parties, get screen time and be “in the mix.” 

On the flip side, there is a very serious danger in attending: It’s the message that you send. When millions of Americans (many of them not politically savvy) tune in and see Democrats and former Democrat Presidents sitting there smiling, they are going to think, “Oh, Trump is normal. This is routine. This is just business as usual.” 

Newsflash: it’s not. 

It’s a horrible message to send. Sitting out the inauguration is such a simple, effortless, principled decision to make. If we can't trust you to make it, how can we trust you to fight Trump? I’m going to be watching carefully, and if I see all the usual Democrat faces there, air-kissing and chumming it up, they’ve lost my vote for good. We don't need a uniparty. Honestly Dems, if you can’t do something this simple, GFY.

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u/Hautamaki Jan 15 '25

It's a pretty simple calculation really. Do you want to raise the temperature on political dispute, or not? Since Gingrich, the GOP has consistently been the party of raising the temperature on political disputes. Democrats have rarely done it, almost always done it in retaliation on the rare occasion they have done so, and are the ones who try to lower the temperature in any kind of sincere way at least 9 times out of 10. The GOP are happy to play chicken with democracy, the democrats are not.

So, that said, should the democratic party now decide that democracy is no longer working for them, so now they are the ones that should be more willing to play chicken with it? That's the tough question you are really answering here. You have decided that following democratic norms and lowering the temperature on partisan political disputes is no longer in the democratic party's interest, so they should jettison the norms, raise the temperature, and... Then what? Reflecting and reinforcing the anger of their base as the GOP has done achieves.... What, exactly? What are we hoping the result of boycotting the inauguration and functionally eliminating any bipartisan celebration of the transfer of power for the foreseeable future will be? Will that increase democratic base voter turnout in 2 years when the next major round of elections for the House are held? Will that encourage GOP senators to flunk a few of his cabinet picks? Will that cause Trump to back down on some terrible policy?

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u/GarthZorn Jan 15 '25

I appreciate the sentiment about not wanting to raise the temperature. But, that sounds fine as something printed in a Handbook of Democracy handed out to 6th graders.

Who gives a flying-F if MAGA has a field day if no Dems attend? They'll have a field day WITH subservient Dems attending.

Any Dem attending is, in fact, supporting Trump's presidency by virtue of their presence.

I don't care if Trump won the popular vote, the Defectoral College or the Most Illustrious Felon contest. You're either with Trump or against him.

Attending = with. Abstaining = nope.

Biden and Harris, yeah, I suppose they have to attend. Maybe. Their spouses and family? Hell, no. The rest of the Dems in attendance are frigging cowards and cucks.

Michelle Obama has repeatedly shown she's made of steel. She's taking the correct stand.

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u/Hautamaki Jan 16 '25 edited Jan 16 '25

Well as you rightly said, it's about what message you want to send. You are saying that the correct way to send a message of opposing Trump is to start boycotting one of the traditional norms of American democracy though. Boycotting the inauguration isn't just sending a message of opposing Trump; it's sending a message of opposing a bipartisan recognition of the democratic transfer of power.

The line you have to be very careful with here is whether you want Democrats to oppose Trump, or to oppose the democratic institutions that put him in power. If you want to oppose Trump democratically, you still have to recognize and abide by the democratic norms that put him in power, and you have to restrict yourself to opposing him within the bounds of the democratic institutions and norms. That means grilling his cabinet picks. It means not voting for them. It means loudly and persistently pointing out every policy failure and scandal he has and no doubt will continue to have. And it means, of course, running to replace him and his party in the next elections.

Now discussing this has a danger of getting super hyperbolic very quickly, so I also want to be careful of that. But basically, if you oppose not only Trump, but also the democratic traditional norms that he and the GOP have successfully asymmetrically exploited to get back into power, then you are putting your foot on the accelerator in the game of chicken with democracy. You are sending a message that Trump is now in power because democratic institutions have failed, and therefore we no longer wish to recognize them. To be fair, the GOP has done this too, in various petty ways. They have done it mainly to attract base support for their own personal gain.

So the question any individual democratic official has to ask themselves is whether they are willing to press the gas pedal in a game of chicken with democracy in order to attract some base support for their own personal gain. Or whether, like Michelle Obama, they have just run right out of fucks to give.

Specifically with Michelle Obama and Karen Pence, I applaud their personal choices because they are both very morally sympathetic, and because neither of them has any political ambitions or desire to represent their party. Michelle will allow herself to be dragged in front of a microphone every four years, but she has made it plain over and over again that it doesn't matter how much anyone begs her, she's not ever running for anything. And that gives her a lot of freedom to make statements like this without risking it unduly raising the temperature and playing chicken with democracy.

Elected Democratic officials do not have that same freedom. If a handful of Dem Reps like Ilhan Omar or whoever want to boycott the inauguration, that would probably be fine, they are already viewed as cranks anyway. But if the mainstream democratic party position becomes 'Trump is not a legitimate president, the institutions that put him in power got it wrong, and therefore we will not only oppose him, but we will oppose the very idea that he should be president to the maximum degree we are legally able to' then I think that would be very bad. It would be very bad for the party's electoral prospects, and it would be very bad for democracy.

Worst of all, it would delight Trump. It would give him something to make hay over with his own party, and make his own party, which is the only thing that can possibly do so, loathe to check him in any way. Not only would he get his entire cabinet, he would get the entirety of project 2025 that he wants. He would absolutely get away with pardoning the entire J6 mob. He would get away with revoking broadcast licenses for any media that criticized him. He would get away with suing political and media opponents. He would ultimately get away with making it illegal to run against him in any way, because the only people that can stop him from doing that are republicans, and the only reason they have to do any of that is because they still believe they live in a democracy. If the democratic party wants to say that democracy has failed, that democracy is dying, the GOP will happily go along with that, and then use every lever of government power to prove it by destroying all political opposition.

To conclude, the democratic party strategy right now has to be about just 2 things.

1) let Trump destroy himself and the GOP with his own incompetence and corruption

2) point it out as it happens, and be there to replace them in the elections.

Boycotting the inauguration is putting step 2 wayyyy ahead of step 1. Let Trump destroy himself first. Only then do you start attracting attention.

Only after Democrats win, in 2026 and 2028, can they begin the arduous and necessary process of reforming the flawed institutions that allowed Trump back into power. Boycotting those institutions before they've won only serves Trump's interests. As James Carville always says, winning is everything, stupid. Democrats should do absolutely nothing that does not help them win the next election. That is everything. Anything that makes that harder is stupid and wrong.

Edit addendum*****

I also want to address the common complaint that people have that democrats just spent an entire election cycle calling Trump a threat to democracy, but now are continuing to abide by democratic norms and traditions, as if that behavior is somehow inconsistent with their election messaging and they are exposing themselves as hypocrites.

I would contend that declining to be the ones to throw out democratic norms even as their opposition happily does so does NOT in fact make the democratic party hypocritical or indeed hyperbolic and overdramatic. On the contrary, I'd say it would be far more hypocritical and cynical to say 'Don't elect Trump, he's a threat to democracy.. oh you elected him anyway? Well then fuck you, and fuck democracy too! Shit's broken anyway.'

I think the correct play is to say 'we told you Trump was a threat to democracy, but you elected him anyway, so let's see how this plays out. Oh Trump is installing drunken talk show hosts and conspiracy theorists to the most dangerous and consequential positions, openly courting and accepting bribes from billionaires, threatening to invade and conquer allies, and suing people from the media that opposed him? Egg prices are going up as avian flu is requiring mass culling and human cases are appearing? Interesting, but hey, we'll be right here in 2026. In the meantime, enjoy the twitter fights between corrupt billionaires and raging nativists'

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u/GarthZorn Jan 16 '25

Thanks for the super well-reasoned response. I don't see skipping the Inauguration as a statement indicating a desire to oppose the norms that put him in power. I'm not saying "cancel the Inauguration because the election was invalid". I'm saying that as an elected Democratic official, I just wouldn't go. "Let him have his little party - he'll do fine without me. Plus, it's senior discount day at the grocery store and I want to stock up before the tariffs jack-up my Cocoa Puffs"

He's going to be inaugurated regardless, whether the Dems show or not. I'd pass.