The Divisions in the Democratic Party Over the Recent Continuing Resolution Show the Left is Still in Denial

Political divisions in today’s polarized climate almost always boil to the surface. The United States is as schismatic as the country has been in centuries, and in this kind of tense environment, very few politicans can get away with being perceived as not taking a so-called side. Either a person is willing to work with Donald Trump or they aren’t, there isn’t a lot of middle ground in US politics right now. It’s a black-and-white political universe in America in 2025, and there is little nuance in the current conversation.

The Democrats never accepted the results of the 2016 election, the Russian hoax Mueller investigation was in reality an attempt to deny the legitimacy of Trump’s win and his presidency. Still, while the left hid behind the Trump not winning the popular vote in 2016, the Democrats don’t have anywhere to go now.

This is why what is happening in the Senate with Democratic minority leader Charles Schumer is so interesting. Schumer has been known as a liberal and a partisan for most of his political career,; the New Yorker wasn’t even viewed as a moderate for most his time in the Senate. But today, the Democratic party has moved so far to the left that Schumer and his liberal-but-perhaps-not-outright-Marxist brand of politics is no longer welcome with most Democrats.

The real reason the Democrats now want to scapegoat Schumer, who had no real cards to play in the recent negotiations with Republicans, is that the left still refuses to accept the outcome of the 2024 election.

Elections have consequences, and the reality is that the continuing resolution Republicans passed in the House that eventually got through the Senate was simply a restatement of the priorities that Trump ran on in 2024.

Trump won the election. He won the popular vote and an electoral landslide, he is entitled to his agenda because the President has a clear mandate from the people. The same Democrats who have nothing to offer to the public, like AOC and Nancy Pelosi, wanted Schumer to shut down the government by convincing his Senate colleagues to vote unanimously in favor of a filibuster of the budget continuing resolution funding the government through September.

But the country has spoken based on the results of the November election, not to mention Trump’s quite favorable approval ratings and poll after poll showing a revulsion to government shutdowns. The message sent by the citizens of this country was loud and clear in November and nothing has changed since then.

Schumer may be a flawed and corrupt politician, but the longtime Senator from New York is not dumb. He knew that now was not the time to relitigate an election where Trump got nearly 3 million more votes than Kamala Harris did. The elections is over, the Republicans won, and Trump is entitled to his budget that he campaigned on which is also supported by most of the American public. To stand in front of that bus is to get run over, and that’s not a ticket to political relevance in the foreseeable future.

But in the aftermath of last week’s budget resolution cave-in, the leaders of the left often are vigorously eating their own.

The loudest elected Democrats would apparently rather blame others for what happened in the 2024 election than accept the flaws of their own party and do the introspection required of a political entity which takes a beating from the voters. The left will not accept that Trump won and the American people support him; instead, these radicals would rather keep blaming people for what happened last November.

The only path forward for the Democratic party is to accept Trump and be willing to work with him, which is a position that some Senators such as John Fetterman, and even on a couple of issues, Bernie Sanders, have taken. That’s wisdom the Democrats won’t listen to, however.

The current Democratic party is a broken entity.

The left tried to brand themselves as defending “our democracy,” but now that the public has resoundingly sided with Trump, their party can’t figure out how to pivot.

The left needs – but refuses – to accept what happened in 2016 and 2024, learn to listen to the American public, and be willing to work with Trump, that’s what the country wants. Acting like petulant children and sitting in the corner while Trump is governing with the support of the public is not a winning strategy for Democrats, and Schumer knows it.

The Democrats’ path forward is to accept Trump and his movement as not being racist or illegitimate, being willing to work with the President on ideas the party supports, and pick their battles more carefully. Being the anti-Trump party didn’t work in 2024, and this kind of messaging won’t work moving forward either.

Schumer is being punished for accepting the results of the 2024 election, but the reality is neither he nor the Democratic party have a choice. The people have spoken and our will is the mandate of the government. That’s what it means to have actual democracy – rather than whatever it is they’re pretending to defend.