Democrats can’t decide how to fight Trump’s tariffs
By Michael Jones
Governors lobby administrations all the time to secure policies that benefit their states. So Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s trip to Washington last week—to advocate for jobs in the Great Lakes State, push for funding for a local military base, and warn against indiscriminate tariffs—wasn’t supposed to be all that noteworthy.
But the visit became controversial when the 2028 presidential short-lister was unexpectedly brought into the Oval Office during President Donald Trump’s signing of politically charged executive orders targeting former administration officials and featuring repeated false claims about the 2020 election. Whitmer looked visibly uncomfortable in images from the event—at one point holding binders in front of her face—which were quickly mocked and memed across social media.
Her office later clarified she had no prior knowledge of the signing ceremony and that her presence didn’t equate to an endorsement. But the damage was done. The incident sparked backlash from fellow Democrats—some accused her of being used as a political prop, and others questioned her instincts given her national ambitions. Many felt the moment hijacked her real mission: securing relief from Trump’s sweeping tariffs, including exemptions for Michigan’s auto and energy sectors.
“If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu,” Whitmer said, defending the visit as necessary bipartisan engagement to protect her state’s economy.
In her “Build, America, Build” address earlier that morning, Whitmer had emphasized the need for precise tariff policies, warning that Trump’s broad approach could raise consumer prices and cost jobs in a state where nearly 20% of the economy is tied to the auto industry.
And Whitmer isn’t alone.
Despite the chaos of Trump’s tariffs in global markets and at home, many Democrats—especially in Rust Belt and manufacturing-heavy districts—don’t want to appear reflexively anti-tariff. Instead, they’re attempting nuance: tariffs as a scalpel, not a sledgehammer.
“There is a time and place for tariffs, but they need to be strategic. They need to be thoughtful. They need to protect America and not jeopardize our relationships around the world,” said Rep. Kim Schrier (D-Wash.), who represents Wenatchee, WA, the world’s apple capital, and a district where Canada, Mexico, and China are the top trading partners. “And so, in some cases, I understand the role of tariffs, but this is reckless. It is across the board, and it does not seem at all strategic.”
But in a hyperpolarized environment—and with Trump dominating the headlines as usual—Democratic activists and strategists worry that this kind of subtlety sounds a lot like mixed messaging. They’d prefer the party to go for the jugular: hammer Trump on job losses, price hikes, and economic chaos, rather than engage in a policy argument while he’s executing a political one.
House Assistant Minority Leader Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) pushed back on the idea that this is a difficult needle to thread.
“The tariffs that he has pursued are clearly a tax increase—the largest peacetime tax increase in the history of the country. Those aren’t my words. Those are the words of Mike Pence, his former Republican vice president,” Neguse told me. “So, you know, I recognize your question with respect to more nuanced policy discussions around tariffs, but what this president is pursuing is far afield of them.”
Schrier also warned that imposing tariffs on goods the U.S. still relies on from abroad is a recipe for economic disruption.
“You’re just hurting American consumers,” Schrier said. “You have to do this in the right order and be thoughtful about what the goals are and what the outcome is going to be.”
The disconnect between policy deliberation and political communication has dogged Democrats before. But it’s especially risky now as the party tries to win back the working-class voters who decamped to Trump and the GOP in the 2024 election.
Despite aggressive messaging from party leaders and senior members on the committees with jurisdiction over trade—many of whom have been hammering Trump’s approach—and Trump’s sinking poll numbers on the economy, Whitmer’s misstep and the internal frustration over efforts to frame tariffs as part of a pro-worker policy laid that gap bare.
It also underscored the broader challenge Democrats face in the Trump 2.0 era: how to counter an administration governed by spectacle without letting their message get lost in translation.
Luckily for Democrats, Trump and the GOP seem poised to offer no shortage of opportunities to sharpen their contrast in the weeks and months ahead. The challenge will be less about finding material than choosing how—and how aggressively—to respond.
On national security, the administration remains under scrutiny over the Signal breach that compromised the communications of U.S. personnel and foreign allies. And with Trump waffling between defending and chastising Ukraine as it defends itself against Russia’s war, Democrats see an opening to argue that Trump is making the world less safe and ceding ground to adversaries like Russia.
On the domestic front, Republicans approved a sweeping reconciliation framework in recent weeks that combines deficit-financed tax cuts for the wealthy and big corporations with hundreds of billions of dollars in cuts to Medicaid, SNAP, and other social programs. Democrats, who have struggled to break through with their economic message in the past, now have a chance to draw a clear line: Trump’s economic vision serves the rich, while theirs is built to serve working people.
And on immigration, Democrats are already seizing on the administration’s defiance of a Supreme Court order to bring back Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland resident wrongly deported to El Salvador. Beyond Abrego Garcia, Trump’s mass deportation operation continues to push the boundaries of U.S. immigration law and the American people’s appetite for withholding due process to targets of deportation. These moves could help Democrats reframe the immigration debate—not as a referendum on border security but on civil rights, the rule of law, and the everyday consequences of an unchecked executive.
In each case, the stakes are clear. But Democrats can’t afford to let the moment get lost in nuance. If they want to win the argument—and not just have the better policy—they’ll need to meet spectacle with clarity, moral force, and discipline. The good news is they’ve got the material. Now, they just have to use it.
Michael Jones is an independent Capitol Hill correspondent and contributor for COURIER. He is the author of Once Upon a Hill, a newsletter about Congressional politics.
