The Washington Examiner’s Kaylee McGhee White suggested that Democratic lawmakers’ desire to work with President-elect Donald Trump is a response to “the shift in power” within the country.
Following the 2024 election, in which Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris in both the popular vote and the Electoral College, multiple Democratic lawmakers have offered to lend a hand to the Trump administration and its proposed policies. As such, White, the Restoring America editor for the Washington Examiner, assessed that it is because many Democrats recognize “they have no other choice.”
“The shift in power has been so thorough that Democrats know that they can’t really resist Trump even from inside Washington, not just because they have lost their congressional majorities, but because they risk their future political power if they don’t,” White said on Fox News’s The Faulkner Focus. “Nearly every single state in the country, Harris, swung to the right this past election. Even deep blue urban areas shifted several points toward Trump.”
White suggested that the shift toward Republicans is why Democratic governors are “paying lip service” to the incoming administration, referencing Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) in her argument. Hochul issued a statement revealing she intends to work with Trump after he won the election, which White argued is because “she cannot afford to alienate” both the Trump administration and her own supporters.
Beyond Democrats seeking to secure their political future, White also argued that Trump’s newfound respect could be partially due to President Joe Biden and the four years of his presidency. Trump faced constant resistance during his first presidency, and it may have taken “Biden’s failures, over and over and over again” to receive the respect he is now getting going into his second term.
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Among the Democrats who have offered to work with the Trump administration is Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL), who became the first member of his party to join the House Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency Caucus. The Florida Democrat argued that his fellow party members ought to debate with Republicans in areas such as the Department of Government Efficiency, as voters expect their lawmakers to make the government as efficient as possible to save them more money.
Likewise, New York Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat, has also expressed his intention to cooperate with the incoming Trump administration, stressing that he would not be “warring” with the president. He added that he wants people of both political parties “to talk to each other” rather than “at each other.”
