The Art of Saying Nothing at All
Democrats are having a ‘family conversation,’ and it doesn’t seem to be going particularly well.
Not one of the elected Democrats on Capitol Hill wants to be talking to the press right now. They’re nervous and annoyed. Their aides are perhaps even more nervous and annoyed, having spent the past few days shepherding their bosses through oppressive D.C. heat, into elevators, and around bends in the tunnels of the U.S. Capitol Building, their heads swiveling so quickly it would make the most elite free safeties jealous.
This is the life of the congressional Democrat and his or her staff in 2024 AD (After Debate). Like everyone else, they are grappling with urgent questions about President Joe Biden’s health and re-election chances. But unlike the millions of other Americans wondering whether he is up to the task of serving another term, they have to answer to voters.
And so they have spent the past few days deploying familiar tricks: taking fake cell phone calls to avoid questions from the press, shuttling down halls at risky speeds (this is a gerontocracy, after all), pleading for empathy (never has the phrase “family conversation” been so readily deployed). All while being mobbed.
On an average day, both parties get their fair share of questions, with the chattiest legislators receiving the most. Monday, every reporter was intent on cornering Democrats. This is for a few reasons.
Everyone knows that apart from Mitt Romney and a few others, every single Republican wholeheartedly backs Donald Trump—not just for the presidency, but for anything he wants or does, no matter how absurd, deranged, or illegal. It’s also known that they all oppose Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. On these subjects, what is there to ask Republicans about? Virtually nothing, which is why Republican senators have been free to roam around the Capitol this week unbothered by the press—again, a very rare occurrence. (I did speak with Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) about an unrelated matter—more on that Thursday.)
But what journalists don’t know is what Democrats are thinking about President Biden and his re-election chances after his horrendous debate performance and the bad polling that followed. So while Republican lawmakers ambled around with coffees, luxuriating in the media’s indifference to their presence, Democrats got absolutely mobbed heading to and from the vote series Monday evening. Here are some snapshots of the scenes on Capitol Hill.
As a staffer repeatedly shouted “we have to go,” Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) got in a quick word on Biden: “As long as he’s in, I’m still his supporter.”
Mark Kelly, the soon-to-be senior senator from Arizona, batted down questions about whether he may be favored for the VP slot on the ticket should current Vice President Kamala Harris become the party’s presidential candidate. “You know,” he said, “it was really hard to convince me to get this job I'm in right now.” Informed mid-step that his comment wasn’t exactly a “no” on the question of whether he’d take the job, Kelly popped his head back out of the Senate subway to say:
I mean, we know who the vice president is going to be after january—it's Kamala Harris. Joe Biden is going to be re-elected as president. Our democracy is literally on the line here.
Other senators ignored questions entirely. Kyrsten Sinema, the Democrat-turned-Independent from Arizona, sprinted into an elevator, turned on her heel, and stared at the floor until the doors shut, the cacophony of shouted questions from reporters failing to draw her out.
Other Democrats tried to use strategic brevity as a shield. Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) paused in the Senate basement to offer a comment—“just once,” he said tersely—telling reporters:
The most important thing for Democrats—and for the country—is to beat Donald Trump, and we just arrived [in Washington]. And so it's important that we have in-person family conversations about the best way to do that, and I'm not going to comment further.
Family conversation. Drink.
Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado, who briefly mounted a presidential run during the 2020 cycle, held court in the Senate basement, where he declared Trump to be a “clear and present danger.”1 He attracted so many hungry reporters that the unruly scrum blocked access to the escalator; staffers had to move everyone to let others through.
Some pols tried the cryptic approach. This was the stratagem of Sen. Joe Manchin (I-W.V.), who for months flirted with the possibility of running a third-party presidential campaign.
Let this week play out and see what happens . . . That's all. There's a lot of senators. And if you wanna know what's really going on, speak to the senators that are in cycle in tough areas. They'll pretty much give you a reading of what they're seeing.
But if those battleground senators are to serve as our political barometers, then perhaps they need some recalibration. Because for now, they’re like virtually everyone else on the Hill: either saying very little or using lawyerly deflection to say nothing at all.
Democratic incumbents like Bob Casey (Pa.) offered a lukewarm defense of Biden, while Tammy Baldwin (Wis.) avoided campaigning alongside him during his visit to her home state last week.
And It's Hot, Tuah
This morning outside the Democratic National Committee headquarters, just a couple blocks south of the Capitol building, House Democrats met for a discussion so sensitive, they had to relinquish their cell phones before entering the room. Outside, it was quite literally a hot mess.
As the heat index neared 100 degrees, the Republican House campaign arm demonstrated their continued opposition to OSHA regulations by deploying three young staffers in black worsted wool2 suits to picket the front of the building. Their signs all posed the same exclamatory question: “IS JOE BIDEN FIT FOR OFFICE?!” Their faces glistened in the sun as camera crews, reporters, and still photographers around them drew all the same non-answers out of Democrats on their way into the building.
Many Democrats had their cars drop them right up front so they could run in without answering the shouted questions. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), widely considered one of the thirstiest lawmakers in Washington, was chatting with political strategist Joe Trippi when he arrived. But even he had no appetite for the fourth estate, peeling off before reaching the press scrum while the casually dressed Trippi kept walking down the street.
Their exits were little different from their entrances. Tight-lipped and moving at a brisk pace, members declined to give a consensus or their read of the room, though some acknowledged the mood wasn’t pleasant or cohesive. “They’re not even in the same book,” declared a seersucker-jacket-wearing Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) when asked if his colleagues were on the same page.
To leave, Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) walked out of the dock area where the dumpsters are placed instead of using the front door. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) made a beeline to a rack to unlock his bicycle.
A few actually took the time to speak. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) briefly attempted to hold a gaggle. But the tree under which he stood was too scraggly to give shade, and he quickly gave up.
Amid the larger recognition that the party remains painfully fractured, there was also a moment of hope for Biden: Members of the Congressional Black Caucus and progressives remain firmly in his corner.
In general, opinion among Democrats also might be glacially moving in the president’s favor. Jerry Nadler, the longtime New York lawmaker and top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, told reporters he had reversed his position that Biden should not be the nominee, but he added, “My concern really is that he could have another bad debate performance.”
Biden is certainly not out of the woods yet, but he has so far managed to avoid a sudden and dramatic loss of support. That might be just what he needs—to show that not everything melts in this heat.
Age Can Be Conquered
Speaking of the past-their-prime-but-still-up-to-the-task set, 50-year-old professional skateboarder Andy Macdonald will represent Great Britain in the Olympics this summer. Macdonald was born and raised in the United States, but thanks to his bona-fide British father, he is qualified to compete under the Union Jack.
Macdonald described his path to qualifying for the Olympics in an interview with the New York Times:
It hurts more when you fall. It takes longer to heal. But just don’t stop. That’s how you keep doing it into your 50s.
I’m skating with kids a third of my age, and I get their youth and their exuberance and their resilience through osmosis.
I’ll see them take a fall and think, “Man if I fell like that, I’d be out for two weeks.” And they’ll just bounce right up and be, “Let’s try that again.”
I watched Macdonald and Tony Hawk compete together and take the gold in vert doubles (two skaters in a halfpipe at the same time) at the 1999 X Games in San Francisco. Word is still out if King Charles will let Macdonald wear his signature yellow helmet while representing the crown.
Read the whole interview with the Times.
Perhaps like me, Bennet also watched the Harrison Ford classic Clear and Present Danger recently. It’s streaming on Max along with many of the other Jack Ryan thrillers.
Worsted wool suits are made from a shiny, medium weight fabric that is optimal for most types of weather, but certainly not D.C. in July.
I think these people are playing their cards exactly right. Do Democrats have any reason to show their hand before the Republican convention, which is only a week away? Seems like it would make sense to let that happen with Republicans having to message and choose a VP while in the dark about who Democrats will be running.
The nerve of those children with the signs asking whether Biden is fit for Office when they're there at the behest of a campaign for a criminal like Trump.