Congratulations to the Democratic Party on the good news you received Tuesday night. And it’s not the one that a great deal of you (us?) are crowing about.
Apparently the hero of the moment is New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, at least according to NBC NEWS’ Sahil Kapur and others who reported glowingly on how he spent most of Tuesday–and a good deal of Monday, too:
Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., wanted to do something extraordinary. He knew Democratic voters were desperate for it.
So he took to the Senate floor with little fanfare and went on to deliver a marathon speech — excoriating the Trump administration for lawlessness and undermining American values and in the process breaking the record for longest Senate speech ever, yielding Tuesday after 25 hours and 5 minutes.
It was a cathartic moment for a vast swath of demoralized voters across the country, who tuned in amid hunger for some action by the opposition party beyond the traditions of business as usual.
And for a Democratic Party that has been lost in the wilderness since its bruising defeat to Donald Trump last fall, it offered a rare moment of hope to pursue what may be its only chance of slowing Trump down: inspiring a mass popular uprising against him.
“There’s a lot of people out there asking Democrats to do more and to take risks and do things differently,” an exhausted Booker told reporters after he walked off the floor. “This seemed like the right thing to do. And from what my staff is telling me, a lot of people watched. And so we’ll see what it is. I just think a lot of us have to do a lot more, including myself.”
Liberal Dane County Judge Susan Crawford scored an unexpectedly easy victory in the high-stakes race for a crucial seat on the state Supreme Court in the most expensive judicial race in U.S. history.
Crawford, 60, had received 55% of the vote to conservative Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel’s 45% with 82% of the vote in, according to unofficial results. Decision Desk HQ called the race less than an hour after polls closed at 8 p.m.
At Crawford’s election night party in Madison, supporters cheered in response to calls that she had won the race early in the night. Groups in justice’s robes and cow-printed cowboy hats flooded the party to celebrate, while others dressed in America-themed outfits broke out in dance.
When Crawford took the stage, she called the campaign an “incredible, life-altering experience.” “As a little girl growing up in Chippewa Falls, I never could have imagined that I’d be taking on the richest man in the world for justice in Wisconsin. And we won!” she said to cheers, referring to the $20 million-plus billionaire Elon Musk in an attempt to defeat her.
What the J-S staff reported on was a real celebration of a real victory by real people whose actions actually impacted their lives. What Kapur reported on was a bunch of media metrics of a whole lot of virtual partying:
Throughout Tuesday afternoon, Booker was trending across social media, including on TikTok, BlueSky and even Elon Musk’s X. The speech got over 350 million “likes” on Booker’s TikTok livestream of his remarks, according to his office, including more than 300,000 people viewing them across his platform at once. And it drew over 28,000 voicemails of encouragement on Booker’s office phone line, along with public accolades from Democratic luminaries like former Vice President Kamala Harris and Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the former House speaker.
You know who benefits directly from all of that? Senator Cory Booker.
And the fact that these two seminal events occurred on the same day, competing for the same news cycle, is where I can’t help but yet again roll my eyes at how much Booker’s party seems to be obsessed with the perception of rebellion rather than the actual impact of one and, more significantly, any game plan that might offer folks some sort of idea that they’ve been paying as much attention to detail as the zealots they’re speaking out against.
Maybe Booker was motivated to action the same way the previous Senate filibuster record-holder Strom Thurmond was. In advance of what he feared was a seminal and dark day in American history, with President Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” speech already slotted for yesterday afternoon. And Booker all but confirmed such a theory with his post-game interview, as Kapur further reported:
Booker got a standing ovation when he crossed Strom Thurmond’s record of 24 hours and 18 minutes. It was a deeply symbolic moment for Booker, who is African American, to end a record held for nearly 70 years by a man who was a symbol of segregation politics and was fighting at the time to kill the Civil Rights Act in 1957.
But Booker was no more successful at thwarting the determination of those ultimately in charge than was Thurmond. Trump indeed waddled and railed in his overcoat on the Rose Garden lawn on schedule and read off a series of percentages from a handy visual aid chart that allowed him to cackle about how the likes of Cambodians have been ripping us off with 97% tariffs. I made the mistake of watching him rattle of these numbers in real time and it was painfully obvious the man hasn’t a f–king clue about what any of this actually translates to in terms of real world impact. But THE HILL’s Tobias Burns and Sylvan Lane did:Businesses and trade groups saw Trump’s tariff announcement as nothing short of a “game changer.” Many looked to history books to find a precedent for the evolving U.S. trade posture, which used to congeal around a so-called Washington consensus that has been eroded over the course of the first Trump administration and the Biden administration.
“The U.S. tariff rate on all imports is now around 22 percent from 2.5 percent in 2024. That rate was last seen around 1910,” Olu Sonola, head of research on the U.S. economy at Fitch Ratings, wrote in a commentary. After-hours trading of stocks, which takes place in futures contract markets, showed a decisively negative response to the news, following several weeks of souring sentiment from both consumers and businesses amid numerous policy announcements and reversals by the Trump administration. S&P 500 futures were down more than 3.6 percent in after-hours trading. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were down more than 2.5 percent, and tech-heavy Nasdaq composite futures were down more than 4.6 percent.
Those are the percentages that a simpleton like Trump actually can grasp, and I suspect he has an even worse stomach and insomnia right now than I do. And on the heels of his comrade in arms and fellow unloved nepobaby failing to buy an election even when willing to adorn himself with fake dairy. Turns out Fat Orange Jesus is now even less thrilled with his Wonder Twins arrangement, as THE MIRROR’s Elizabeta Ranxburgaj observed early this morning:
Donald Trump shared a telling comment about Elon Musk after reportedly informing his cabinet the Tesla boss will soon be stepping back. The controversial tech boss – turned president’s right hand man – has shaken America with his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), but Trump has suggested the businessman’s department will soon cease to exist.
Say what you will about Musk’s buffoonish demeanor and inexcusable insensivity but he’s a damn sight smarter than Trump. As are the folks that crafted the narrative that Trump blustered his way through on the blustery Rose Garden lawn yesterday. If falling short in an election that they felt was significant enough to drop 20 large on has helped to minimize the presence of at least one intelligent adviser in MAGALand, THAT’S a win.
A win that resulted from ordinary citizens listening to facts and reasons and spurning token rewards for signing a petition and having little more than a lottery entrant’s chance at real wealth. With a playbook that reinforced those crucial differences between two people as diametrically opposite as Crawford and Schimel. A playbook that didn’t include filibusters and plays for social media metrics and pacifying a sliver of people who piously believe merely bitching is a significant achievement.
A playbook that someone like Cory Booker should have at least acknowledged, let alone begun work on applying to the massive uphill battle he conceded is still ahead.
And he could have started that process a couple of days-or weeks–ahead of what they already knew was the day that the Wisconsin verdict was pending. Maybe get two bites at the news cycle they claim to be so attentive to. Maybe celebrate those that actually TOOK action Tuesday rather than hinted at it.
Do better, Senator Booker. We now know you can talk with the best of them. Now maybe listen?
Until next time…