Senator Chris Murphy: “This Is How Democracy Dies—Everybody Just Gets Scared”

The Political Scene | The New Yorker

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🗓️ 31 March 2025

⏱️ 24 minutes

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Summary

With congressional Republicans unwilling to put any checks on an Administration breaking norms and issuing illegal orders, the focus has shifted to the Democratic opposition—or the lack thereof. Democrats like Chris Murphy, the junior senator from Connecticut, have vehemently disagreed with party leaders’ reversion to business as usual. Murphy opposed Senator Chuck Schumer’s negotiation to pass the Republican budget and keep the government running; he advocated for the Democrats to skip the President’s joint address to Congress en masse. Murphy believes that the Democrats have a winning formula if they stick to a populist, anti-big-money agenda. But, he concedes, some of his colleagues are playing normal politics, “where we try to become more popular than Republicans. People like me believe that it won’t matter if we’re more popular than them, because the rules won’t allow us to run a fair election.” By attacking democratic institutions, law firms, and other allies, he thinks, Republicans can insure that their party wins indefinitely, as in failed democracies around the world. “If you think that democracy is the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 story,” Murphy tells David Remnick, “then you have to act like it. You need to show that you’re willing to take a political risk.”

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the political scene. I'm David Remnick.
0:08.6	Early each week, we bring you a conversation from our episode of The New Yorker Radio Hour.
0:15.6	As Donald Trump carries out a radical plan to slash the federal government to a nub, no matter what the cost
0:22.0	or who's going to pay it, his most obvious accomplices are congressional Republicans. Politicians,
0:28.2	who, with almost no exceptions, will not dare risk his wrath or risk a primary challenge.
0:34.9	But also notable is the Democratic opposition, or the lack thereof. In the House,
0:41.0	minority leader Hakim Jeffries says he won't swing at every pitch from the administration,
0:46.8	as though this were a baseball game. Chuck Schumer's vote to back the Republican budget in order to
0:51.7	avoid a government shutdown enraged many in the congressional
0:55.2	rank and file. So the Democratic Party now seems paralyzed. Senator Chris Murphy has emerged as one of the
1:02.7	most vehement critics of what you might call the business as usual approach by the Democrats.
1:08.6	Murphy says, we have months, not years, before American democracy is
1:13.9	damaged beyond repair. In other words, if there's an emergency, act like it's an emergency.
1:21.0	I spoke with Senator Chris Murphy last week. Senator, I wonder if we could try to define the crisis that we're in.
1:31.3	I'm of the opinion that the Trump administration is intent on creating a kind of American-style
1:39.0	authoritarian situation.
1:41.5	Do you agree with me?
1:42.5	I do.
1:43.5	Long ago, the Republican Party decided that they cared more
1:48.4	about power than they did democracy. That's what January 6th was all about, regardless of who won
1:55.8	the election. They wanted to make sure that their person was in charge. They believe, and have long, believe, that the Democratic Party progressives are an existential threat to the country, and thus any means justifies the end, which is making sure that a Democrat never again wins a national election.
2:17.2	So this seems pretty purposeful and transparent, this decision of, that a Democrat never again wins a national election.
	...

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