WTH Can’t Democrats Quit Trump? The WSJ’s Barton Swaim Explains
What the Hell Is Going On
AEI Podcasts
4.4 • 633 Ratings
🗓️ 11 April 2024
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Joe Biden and the Democratic Party love labeling Donald Trump and his MAGA followers as the greatest threat to American democracy. So why are Democratic-aligned Super PACs funding self-declared MAGA candidates in GOP primaries? In a recent article for the Wall Street Journal, Barton Swaim explains that there are two reasons: The strategy has (so far) helped Democrats win in general elections; more importantly, Democrats long for a time when they were part of the heroic resistance against Trump. But this strategy could backfire: Democratic lawfare against Trump is helping him win over voters who think “the system” is rigged against them. And the moment a Democrat-funded MAGA candidate wins a general election, their warnings about MAGA’s threat to democracy will fall flat on its face.
Barton Swaim joined the Wall Street Journal as an editorial page writer in 2018. He writes a regular column on political books. Before joining the Journal, he was an opinion editor at the Weekly Standard. He is the author of The Speechwriter: A Brief Education in Politics (Simon and Schuster, 2016).
Read the transcript here.
Read Barton's article Why Democrats Can’t Quit Trump here.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This podcast is brought to you by the American Enterprise Institute. |
| 0:03.1 | If you like what you hear, please subscribe, rate, review, and share. Thanks for listening. Here's our show. What the hell's going on? What the hell is going on? What the hell is going on? I don't know what the hell he's talking about. You don't have to know what the hell is on it. What hell's the matter with these guys? We don't know what's going on. Hotels gone on. |
| 0:01.0 | Who in God's name knows what it's all about. |
| 0:29.5 | Hi, I'm Daniel Pledka. |
| 0:31.2 | And I'm Mark Tiesin. |
| 0:32.3 | Welcome to our podcast. |
| 0:33.6 | What the hell is going on? |
| 0:35.6 | Mark, what the hell? |
| 0:37.2 | What the hell is going on is Barton Swain has a great piece in the Wall Street Journal called Why Democrats Can't Quit Trump. |
| 0:44.3 | And this is something you've been talking about on this podcast for a while, which is why I suggest to bring them on, is because you've been talking about how the Democrats just love Donald Trump. |
| 0:53.6 | They say they hate Donald Trump, but they love Donald Trump. They say they hate Donald Trump, |
| 0:55.8 | but they love Donald Trump. They missed the Trump years. It was the golden age of the left when they |
| 1:00.7 | could stand up to the evil of Donald Trump and all the rest of it. They wanted him to be the nominee |
| 1:05.6 | and they've got their wish. And tell me what you think. Now, look, I mean, I thought his piece was really spot on. |
| 1:12.3 | And it is a testament to the bankruptcy of both parties. I said this the other day in a |
| 1:18.0 | substack and I really think it's true and probably needs even more examination than we afford it |
| 1:24.0 | today on the podcast. But the problems with the Republican Party, the bickering |
| 1:29.0 | inside the Republican Party, the internecine sort of kindergarten, you know, I hate you, now I hate |
| 1:35.2 | you more bullshit that's been going on. Rino, Rino. But all of that, all of that really infantile |
| 1:41.6 | behavior has masked a real weakness inside the Democratic Party as well, right? |
| 1:46.8 | The Democrats love Trump, can't quit Trump, and the reason is Trump enables them to paper over their own problems, right? |
| 1:55.8 | What Donald Trump means is we don't have to talk about what's wrong with Kamala Harris. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from AEI Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of AEI Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.