Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN) stood by her profanity-laden assault on Elon Musk despite concerns from Democratic leaders that abrasive messaging is getting the party into trouble.
Smith made headlines last month for calling Musk, who heads President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, “a d***” and “billionaire a**‑hole boss” after he pushed for a new accountability standard requiring federal workers to send their managers a weekly list of five accomplishments.
During a CNN interview on Wednesday, Smith did not back down from her comments after being pressed on whether cursing was the “best way to communicate” with voters.
“People want to see fight,” she said. “And I think with that tweet that I did, it touched a nerve with millions of people because everybody has had the experience of having some boss who treats them with disrespect, who denigrates their work and is just basically using big power-play moves to … terrorize them.”
Smith has long expressed concerns about Musk, with over one-third of posts highlighted on her X account since the beginning of March targeting the DOGE leader. Her rhetoric is in line with that of other Democrats, such as Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), who recently told Musk to “f*** off” and reacted to Trump’s joint address to Congress earlier this month by saying, “Somebody slap me and wake me the f*** up because I’m ready to get on with it.”
Smith’s intense, public antagonism toward the Trump administration is characteristic of many Democratic-caucusing colleagues, such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who accused Trump and Musk of crafting a dangerous “oligarchy” to create “the scariest times in my lifetime.”
However, other Democrats are worried such messaging strategies are counterproductive.
“I would just ask Democrats, like, start talking like a regular person. Most people are not sure what an oligarch is, you know?” Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) said during an MSNBC interview on Tuesday. “There’s also another little secret, too. Democrats, we like billionaires if they’re giving to our causes or to our party as well.”
Fetterman also called on the Left to adjust its messaging tactics following the president’s joint address to Congress. At the time, many of his Democratic colleagues carried out rowdy anti-Trump and anti-DOGE antics during the speech, despite House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries’s (D-NY) call on his conference to conduct themselves with decorum.
Fetterman characterized the protests during the president’s address as “a sad cavalcade of self owns and unhinged petulance.”
“It only makes Trump look more presidential and restrained,” he wrote, worrying that Democrats are “becoming the metaphorical car alarms that nobody pays attention to—and it may not be the winning message.”
“We never learn,” one Democratic strategist lamented after the address to the Hill. “We can’t just be the party that barks at Trump, and I’m sorry, but that’s what we are. And until we learn that lesson, we’re going to lose.”
Despite the warnings, resistance to the Trump administration continues to be broadly characterized by raucous protests, such as anti-DOGE demonstrations at Tesla dealerships and charging stations across the country. Musk’s electric car company has been the object of, in many cases, violent acts that have destroyed or damaged property.
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The competing visions for what opposition to Trump should look like is “normal,” Chris Devine, an associate professor of political science at the University of Dayton, told CBS Austin.
“It is normal for a party to be divided on exactly how to respond, especially right after an election loss. People are still breaking down the results and trying to figure out what lessons should be learned from it and how they should be applied moving forward,” he said. “The contrast that you really saw is whether Democrats should take an in-your-face approach and be as obstructionist and loud and visible as possible … or be calm and focused.”
