{"id":16050,"date":"2025-11-26T23:16:48","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T23:16:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/how-trump-targeting-these-democrats-could-backfire\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T23:16:48","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T23:16:48","slug":"how-trump-targeting-these-democrats-could-backfire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/how-trump-targeting-these-democrats-could-backfire\/","title":{"rendered":"How Trump targeting these Democrats could backfire"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Donald Trump is going to war with Democrats over the military. It could backfire on him.<\/p>\n

The president\u2019s attacks on six Democrats who recorded a video encouraging military members to buck unlawful orders are elevating members of a faction that just delivered big off-year wins for their party. Most hail from swing states or districts, identify as centrists and are leveraging their national security backgrounds to argue that Democrats can retake the patriotic lane.<\/p>\n

Trump is also boosting some potential 2028 presidential hopefuls, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly and Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin, while further undercutting the GOP\u2019s attempts to make New York progressives like Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez the face of the Democratic Party.<\/p>\n

\u201cPete Hegseth and Donald Trump are providing Mark Kelly with the kind of visibility that almost no amount of money could buy,\u201d said Barrett Marson, an Arizona-based Republican strategist, referring to the Defense secretary who ordered an investigation of Kelly. \u201cEvery 2028 contender wishes they could be attacked like this by the Trump administration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since Trump accused the six of \u201csedition\u201d and even suggested they could be executed, they\u2019ve racked up millions of views on social media, done the cable news circuit and blasted out fundraising appeals highlighting the attacks.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s heightened the stature of even those who have already been the subject of speculation about their 2028 aspirations. Kelly, who was on the short list to be Vice President Kamala Harris\u2019 running mate last year, has already visited a raft of early primary<\/a> and general-election battleground states this year. But only after Trump\u2019s attack was he invited on \u201cJimmy Kimmel Live!\u201d this week.<\/p>\n

In recent months, Slotkin has been testing what she calls a \u201cwar plan\u201d<\/a> to \u201ccontain and defeat Donald Trump\u201d in speeches outside of her state, meeting with low-propensity voters<\/a> and theorizing about what she calls \u201cProject 2029.\u201d Now she\u2019s brought those themes to a series of interviews and public appearances over the past week.<\/p>\n

As Democrats debate how far to lean into themes of patriotism more often claimed by conservatives, a group of lawmakers organized by Slotkin released a video with anti-authoritarian themes<\/a> ahead of the \u201cNo Kings\u201d protests last month. A follow-up video last week<\/a> called on troops not to obey unlawful orders, prompting Trump\u2019s explosion.<\/p>\n

The president posted on social media they were committing \u201cSEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL\u201d by suggesting military members ignore their chain of command and shared a post calling for traitors to be hanged. The White House later denied Trump was threatening the lawmakers with death. Since then, the Pentagon has opened an investigation<\/a> into Kelly, who is a retired Navy captain, and the six lawmakers claim the FBI has made inquiries<\/a> through congressional authorities.<\/p>\n

\"Rep.<\/p>\n

Democrats, particularly those with military backgrounds, have leapt to their colleagues\u2019 defense, echoing their message about following the law and accusing Trump of weaponizing the government against his political opponents.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump knows that we\u2019re a threat\u201d to Republicans\u2019 grip on Washington, said Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), a military veteran whose Serve America PAC supports several of the Democrats in the video. \u201cThese are great leaders who can take the fight to Trump and MAGA.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s classic Trump \u2014 he ratchets everything up to an 11 and it blows up in his face,\u201d said Austin Cook, a Democratic strategist and former Slotkin spokesperson. \u201cNot only did it reinforce everything swing voters have always hated about him, but it\u2019s also given this group the biggest megaphone they\u2019ve ever had.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Tim Edson, a GOP strategist and former political director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said the video will only confirm the GOP base\u2019s preconceived, negative views of Democratic officials.<\/p>\n

\u201cRepublicans believe these Democrats are deranged with hatred of Trump, and it\u2019s just their latest attempt to undermine lawful policies simply because they\u2019re Trump\u2019s policies,\u201d Edson said. \u201cThese embarrassing antics only rally Republicans to the president.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some Democrats think it\u2019s too early to tell how things will shake out for the \u201cseditious six,\u201d as some Trump officials are calling the lawmakers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhether it works or not will depend on what comes next, if an illegal order actually does come down they get to be leaders saying \u2018I told you so,\u2019\u201d texted one strategist who has consulted for Democratic veterans and was granted anonymity to speak candidly. \u201cIf one doesn\u2019t, they\u2019ve simply made themselves victims to Trump\u2019s latest attacks. Most Democrats fail at playing on his turf.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kelly doubled down on the video\u2019s message during his talk-show appearance Tuesday night and noted some of his Republican colleagues are expressing support: \u201cPeople are starting to take a look at this and saying, \u2018Wow, this is just nuts that he’s going after U.S. senators and members of the House for something they said.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump is going to war with Democrats over the military. It could backfire on him. The president\u2019s attacks on six Democrats who recorded a video encouraging military members to buck unlawful orders are elevating members of a faction that just delivered big off-year wins for their party. Most hail from swing states or districts, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16050","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16050\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}