They Sold Us Out

“I feel good about the Republican Party. I feel good about where we’re going as a nation. We’re killing all the right people, and we’re cutting your taxes.” -Sen. Lindsey Graham

For most of us who are not in a cult and have no allegiance to a single person above our country, we have no problem being critical of our own party or the opposing one when it’s warranted. For many with no party affiliation, it’s the same. For Trump’s followers, it’s different. They might feel deep down that their party has gone astray, but saying it out loud, that’s a step too far. Because I haven’t seen any outrage over the comment Graham made above from anyone in his party.

A sitting United States senator said he feels good about “killing all the right people.” And not one Republican denounced it.

For some reason, that speech has stayed with me. It felt like another test, another moment to gauge the country’s temperature. Would anyone speak up? Would it be met with cheers? Even a year ago, that could have been career-ending. But today? Just another moment in Trump’s America.

And as much as I demand better from Republicans, tonight I’m just as disappointed in the Democrats. I expect things like that from the GOP. I didn’t even blink when I heard him say it. It disturbed me, but it wasn’t shocking. What did shock me was the lack of spine coming from the Democratic Party today.

I’ve said from the beginning that the party lacks leadership. When Trump lost, he immediately set out to win the next time. He never let up. There was never any question about who was leading the Republican Party or who was controlling the message. He dictated it from top to bottom.

The Democrats? I still don’t know who’s steering the ship, or if anyone really is. And even if it’s too early to appoint a 2028 candidate, that doesn’t mean we don’t need someone at the top providing direction and unity. Someone pushing back against the propaganda and lies pouring out of the White House. Someone we can look to for confidence, clarity, and proof that there’s a plan to take back our country.

And before you throw Gavin Newsom’s name at me, I’d gladly get behind him right now. Even though a few other governors are stepping up, Newsom has taken the lead. I just don’t want to rally behind someone who doesn’t have the full party’s backing, because the last thing we need is more infighting or vote splitting. And the irony is that I’ve been outspoken about his shortcomings. I didn’t like some of the people he platformed on his podcast. I haven’t loved every decision he’s made. But as a Californian, I’ve felt at least somewhat protected from the wrath of MAGA because of him.

I also understand these are early days, and normally you don’t talk presidential choices three years before an election, but we’re not living in normal times. My only concern is how polarizing California is, and I don’t want that used against him.

Tonight, though, it became even more obvious that we need to have this conversation. We need to make some hard choices about the two-party system and whether either one is capable of surviving what’s coming. The Republican Party has been taken over by a cult leader. The GOP as we knew it is gone. On the other side, the Democrats have lost their way. They haven’t been able to articulate what they stand for or who they’re fighting for. And they have no real leadership or united messaging.

The cloture vote tonight proved just how lost they are. To have any Democrats align with Republicans to take away healthcare subsidies is unimaginable, but to have eight? That’s unforgivable.

Today marked day forty of the government shutdown. Forty days of missed paychecks, forty days of children losing access to food programs, forty days of fear and uncertainty. Forty days of Americans sacrificing and suffering for the greater good. And tonight, Democrats caved with nothing to show. They didn’t signal the end of the shutdown by standing their ground for working families, they surrendered to the very extremists who caused this crisis.

Bernie Sanders said it plainly: this deal will cost over fifty thousand lives. Not metaphorically, literally. People will pass away because of this. All the suffering, the fear, the damage of the past forty days will have been for nothing.

So tonight they voted, in essence, to move one step closer to ending the shutdown. This was the cloture vote on the motion to proceed. Then there will be debate, another cloture vote, and eventually, a final vote on the bill itself. It all starts again tomorrow morning at 11 a.m. EST. You can watch it live on PBS.

And even though we all want the shutdown to end, we don’t know the full scope of what they are almost guaranteed to pass. No one will say whether the federal abortion restrictions are still in it. No one can confirm what else was quietly inserted. The White House is calling it a “clean resolution,” but no one is talking. So let’s call this what it is, not a bipartisan victory, but a bipartisan collapse.

What makes it sting even more is that voters turned out in record numbers this week to reject Trump’s cruelty and chaos. They sent a message that America was tired of authoritarian rule. And what did the Democrats do with that message? They turned around and handed him a win. They told every voter who stood in line for hours that their voices didn’t matter. When the pressure came, they didn’t hold the line, they bent it.

Eight Democrats joined Trump’s bloc to end the shutdown on his terms. Eight senators elected to defend the Constitution and protect the people instead protected their own comfort. They voted yes, not for compromise, but to hand Trump exactly what he wanted. Some had just been re-elected, others are retiring or not seeking re-election. This wasn’t random, it was coordinated. And it happened under Chuck Schumer’s watch. Maybe he didn’t lose control of his caucus; maybe he directed them. He told them to take the vote he didn’t want his fingerprints on. If that’s true, it’s cowardice disguised as leadership. And if it wasn’t intentional, if it was just a total loss of control, that’s even worse.

I’ve been watching this unfold all day, and as I write this, I don’t see any winners. Just a country full of people who lost.

The messages I’ve received today say everything:
“To hell with both parties. The blood of millions is on both of their backs.”
“After this cave, can we all agree Democrats and Republicans are the same? Just different stripes?”
“Changing to an independent, why vote when Schumer keeps handing us to Trump?”
“Betrayal.”

I could go on and on. And I don’t blame people for feeling this way. But don’t mistake any of this for me saying Democrats are the same as Republicans. They’re not. This isn’t just a political failure, it’s a fascism problem. It’s about the survival of our country. Which raises the real question: where does this leave us? How do we not just survive, but win?

Because this isn’t just about subsidies or shutdowns. This is about the slippery slope toward gutting the Affordable Care Act entirely. They’re following the Project 2025 playbook, systematically breaking down government to make it easier to control and to funnel money into Trump’s inner circle.

This is how democracy dies, not with a single blow, but with a thousand quiet edits in the dark.

Donald Trump and his party don’t want Americans to have food or healthcare because people without security are easier to control. Every MAGA supporter who says Trump “cares about the American people” needs to face the truth: if he cared, he’d want you to see a doctor, to afford your medication, to live without fear of losing everything over a medical bill. But that’s not his plan. The GOP is packaging millions of Americans no longer being able to afford health care as patriotic and the ultimate freedom. But we know the truth and don’t believe their cult propaganda.

And it’s not just about healthcare or food insecurity or even SNAP benefits that haven’t gone out. We can’t forget the hundreds of thousands of federal workers who weren’t just furloughed, they were fired. Agencies used the shutdown to permanently eliminate positions. Those jobs don’t return when the lights come back on. That’s exactly what Trump wanted. It’s written into Project 2025, a blueprint for a weaker, easier-to-control government. The smaller the system, the fewer people it serves, and the easier it is to corrupt. Every time Democrats cave, they make that plan real.

This is no longer just a constitutional crisis. This is a party crisis. Chuck Schumer isn’t leading, he’s managing collapse, keeping the lights on in a house that’s already burning. We’ve reached a point where moral clarity should be simple. A senator bragging about “killing the right people” should unite every decent human being against this sickness. Instead, Democrats issue press releases and call it courage. What good is winning elections if you lose the soul of the people who trusted you to fight for them?

Both parties are failing us. Republicans have abandoned morality for power. Democrats have abandoned courage for comfort. And ordinary Americans are being crushed between the two. We keep hearing that democracy dies in darkness, but the truth is it dies in daylight too, when no one has the courage to tell the truth out loud.

And if this is what it looks like when the so-called “good guys” use all their power to protect us from unimaginable harm, then maybe the only ones who can save this country now are the people outside the halls of power. Maybe it really is up to us to end this insanity once and for all, because from where I’m sitting tonight, we’re the only ones I still trust to do it.

We are the ones who march, who vote, who still speak up when it’s dangerous. The ones who see through the slogans and the lies and still choose decency over despair. Both parties may be broken, but the people are not. And if they won’t fight for us, then we’ll fight for each other. That’s how we rebuild. That’s how we win.

And that might mean rebuilding both parties from the ground up, and understanding that the world isn’t black and white. There are gray areas where we can and must compromise, where meeting each other halfway is the only way forward. But not when it comes to human rights. On that, there is no middle ground. We hold strong that all people deserve safety, dignity, and equality under the law.

Because if we forget that, then nothing else we rebuild will matter. We have a long road ahead of us. And even though I write this with deep disappointment in my heart, I know that better days are ahead, because we are in this together. And together, we can accomplish anything.

I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather