Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on Sunday urged Democrats to be bolder in their approach to winning over voters, saying in an interview that his party has been guilty of not “thinking big” or “acting big.”
In an interview on NBC News’s “Meet the Press,” moderator Kristen Welker asked Schiff about a moment from Sen. Cory Booker’s (D-N.J.) historic marathon Senate floor speech when he said his own party “has made terrible mistakes and gave a lane to this demagogue,” referring to President Trump, adding, “I confess we all must look in the mirror and say we will do better.”
“I definitely agree with him,” Schiff told Welker. “I think we were guilty of not thinking big and not acting big.”
Schiff said, in a sense, his party could take a note out of their political opponents’ playbook.
“One thing that we see, you know, with the Trump administration is you could move the country far and fast if you had courage of your convictions, if you’re willing to be bold,” Schiff said, noting the Trump administration is “being bold in a horribly dangerous, destructive direction, which is really hurting, you know, working families.”
“But that’s no excuse for Democrats not being bold in our own ideas and pushing the country forward,” he continued. “We’re going to have to do that, and there’s nothing that succeeds like winning.”
Schiff pointed to Democrats’ recent win in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race as motivation to keep pushing, calling the victory “a real shot in the arm.”
“The energy you’re seeing now manifest around the country in these mass demonstrations show that, you know, the Democratic Party is waking up, and I think Cory Booker did a lot to help Democrats in Washington in particular, wake up and see these are not normal times,” Schiff said.
“We’re not going to be able to fight what they’re doing in a normal fashion. But in addition to pushing back aggressively and hard — and hours in a row like Cory Booker — we’re going to have to be pushing hard on our own big ideas.”
Booker made history earlier this week, speaking on the Senate floor for 25 hours and 18 minutes, protesting the Trump administration’s policies. He has said the decision to give the longest floor speech in history was, in part, a response to constituents’ demands for Democratic lawmakers to do more to push back against Trump.
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