By Gregg T. Nunziata
Tuesday, June 23, 2026
As America celebrates its 250th anniversary,
its constitutional system is plagued by profound dysfunction. The elegant
architecture of checks and balances constructed by the Founders has devolved
into a Caesarist presidency, a supine Congress, and an overtaxed judiciary
governing a people ungrounded in civics and helplessly divided by toxic
partisanship. Whether one believes Donald Trump is the cause, an accelerator,
or merely the product of this state of affairs, the end of his presidency will
offer a historic opportunity to repair and strengthen the Madisonian design.
The next president will face a choice: to strengthen
democracy for future generations or to fuel the forces that threaten its
survival. The country faced a similar choice after the first Trump
administration's disastrous conclusion—and chose poorly. The costs of those
failures compound daily. To fare better next time, we must understand the
mistakes of 2021 and begin charting a better course today.
The republic survived Donald Trump’s refusal to accept
his defeat at the ballot box in 2020 thanks to a handful of men and women who
did the right thing under extraordinary pressure. But the country entered the
Biden administration with shattered norms, weakened constitutional guardrails,
and collapsing public faith in our institutions. The moment called for sober
leadership and a reconstructive agenda, neither of which arrived. We continue
to pay the price for that failure.
***
History will harshly judge Mitch McConnell, Kevin
McCarthy, and other congressional Republicans for enabling election denialism,
flinching from impeachment, discrediting congressional inquiries into the
attack on the Capitol, rehabilitating a disgraced former president, and
delegitimizing attempts to hold him criminally accountable. The Supreme Court,
too, in its poorly reasoned presidential immunity decision, shares some
of the blame for our current predicament.
Much has been written in recent years about the failure
of the right to defend our constitutional values, including
by me. Less has been said about Democrats’ historic failure to
meet the moment. Since 2016, Republicans have lacked courage, but Democrats
have lacked commitment. As a presidential nominee, Joe Biden told the
Democratic National Convention, “We have a great purpose as Americans … to save
our democracy.” But Biden and his party catastrophically failed to strengthen
democratic institutions when given the opportunity. Time and again, Democrats
simply did not govern as a party that seriously believed its own rhetoric.
The flawed and partisan manner in which then-Speaker
Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats handled the second Trump impeachment, before
and after Biden’s inauguration, set the tone. The decision, for instance, to
delay delivering the articles of impeachment to the Senate explicitly placed
the incoming administration’s agenda above the important national reckoning
over January 6, allowing Republican resolve to fade. It also enabled the
(flawed) legal argument that the Senate had lost jurisdiction to act once Trump
left office, which Republicans would later cite to justify acquitting the
former president.
In the 2022 midterms, Democrats actively promoted far-right candidates and election deniers
in Republican primaries in service of short-term political gains. Worse, with a
Democrat in the White House and a majority in Congress, they never prioritized
the hard bipartisan work of strengthening democracy through serious legislative
reforms. Nor did they hold their own accountable for breaches of democratic
norms, not when Biden attempted to bypass Congress to forgive billions in
student debt, nor when his CDC ordered a national eviction moratorium without
legal authorization, nor when Biden left office with a flurry of pardons,
including of his own family, nor when prominent Democrats espoused wildly
reckless anti-court rhetoric in the wake of the Dobbs decision
overturning Roe v. Wade.
This failure to reinforce our democratic system cannot be
blamed on an absence of ideas. During the first Trump administration,
congressional Democrats championed the Protect Our Democracy Act (PODA), a
package of reforms to strengthen Congress, reinforce presidential guardrails,
and increase political accountability. The legislation included ideas with
solid Republican pedigrees that could have served as a basis for much-needed
bipartisan reforms. Separately, former Obama White House counsel Bob Bauer and Bush
Justice Department official Jack Goldsmith offered additional bipartisan ideas
in After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency.
Yet these ideas simply were not a priority for
congressional Democrats once Trump left office; they showed no interest in
partnering with Republicans on good-government reforms. Although PODA passed
the House once (on a near-party-line vote) in the first year of the Biden
administration, the energy behind reform quickly dissipated. Congressional
Democrats, instead, put much more effort into the For the People Act, a wish
list of progressive voting reforms, which predictably proved a legislative dead
end.
The Biden White House also seemed to have its ambitions
elsewhere. Rather than focusing on returning the country to normalcy and the
presidency to its constitutional limits, the White House openly compared Biden
to Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson, presidents who dramatically—and
sometimes unlawfully—expanded the power of government and their own office.
Never mind that Biden never had the congressional majorities or force of will
that those two presidents enjoyed.
Congress managed one exception to this bleak track
record: it reformed the Electoral Count Act (ECA), which governs how
Congress tallies electoral votes and certifies the presidential election
winner. Trump and his allies had exploited ambiguities in that old, poorly
drafted law to try to prevent the peaceful transfer of power after the 2020
election. Importantly, Congress amended the law to clarify the limited,
ministerial role of the vice president during the counting process. Notably,
unlike the other failed reform efforts, this legislation began as a bipartisan
project in the Senate, with the clear intention of strengthening democracy, not
punishing or aiding any party or agenda.
Notwithstanding the ECA-reform exception, Biden-era
Democrats did not prioritize fortifying our democratic institutions. Perhaps,
with their man in office, they no longer saw the wisdom of restraining the
presidency. Perhaps, with Trump disgraced, they thought the dangers to
democracy had passed. Whether from hypocrisy or hubris, they missed a
potentially fertile moment for meaningful bipartisan reform.
The decision to forgo bipartisanship and instead to seek praise from progressives had the further effect of breeding
deep cynicism. Rather than a return to normalcy, the Biden years saw aggressive
pushes left on social and economic policy, from both ends of Pennsylvania
Avenue. Americans could be forgiven for thinking that Democratic rhetoric about
defending democracy rang hollow since Democrats in power did not prioritize it
over the policy priorities of progressive activists. Moreover, after the
Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade in the Dobbs decision,
Democratic senators declared the court illegitimate and extremist. The president himself said
the court had decided to “upend the scales of justice” and that the decision
was “a realization of an extreme ideology and a tragic error by the Supreme
Court.” Later, he would claim that “extremism is undermining public confidence in the court’s
decisions” and call for imposing “reforms” on the court as a response.
Democrats’ pleas for checks and balances are hard to take too seriously when
that’s how they responded to an adverse decision from the one branch of
government outside of their control.
Because of choices like these, Democrats during the Biden
administration left the country more fragile, making Trump’s reelection more
likely and his return to office more dangerous.
***
As the midpoint of Trump’s final term in office
approaches, and his approval ratings sink to historic lows, Democrats
reasonably foresee a return to power. They must begin thinking seriously about
what they will do if they get a second chance to heal the civic damage done by
Donald Trump. The American electorate deserves to hear those plans sooner
rather than later.
Democrats must ask themselves what they object to most
strenuously about this administration: that it pushed the country to the right
or that it undermined the rule of law, checks and balances, and our democracy?
If it's the latter, they must be prepared to prioritize spending political
capital on reforms to strengthen our democracy over advancing progressive pet
projects. The failure to do so would miss a historic opportunity and repeat the
grave mistakes of the Biden presidency.
Yet undeterred by the Biden administration’s costly
missteps, leading Democrats have already expressed a desire to build on
President Trump’s expansive uses of executive power—just in a progressive
direction. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an early contender for the 2028 Democratic
nomination, candidly admitted as much: “In order for us to correct the abuses
that are happening now, we have to act the same in similar capacities that
Trump has given himself.”
Failure to heal our institutions would be bad; doubling
down on their destruction would be catastrophic. It would trap the country in a
vicious cycle of tit-for-tat retaliation where every increasing norm violation
is justified by the childish refrain, “They started it.” Worse still, a future
Democrat might introduce purported institutional “reforms” designed not to
strengthen democracy, but to entrench themselves in power for decades.
Famed Democratic strategist James Carville recently drew
attention to this approach when he said on his Politics War Room podcast: “If the
Democrats win the presidency and both houses of Congress, I think on day one,
they should make Puerto Rico [and] D.C. a state, and they should expand the
Supreme Court to 13. F—k it. Eat our dust.”
Carville’s typically colorful language reflects a real
attitude gaining purchase in some Democratic circles: Should they return to
power, they must change the rules of the game to keep them there. This is
particularly evidenced by their reactions to court rulings concerning voting
and elections. Leading Democrats have called for the next president to expand
the size of the Supreme Court, with the obvious goal of netting more favorable
progressive outcomes. Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader and likely
next speaker of the House, made these intentions plain: “We’re going to have to
do something about this Supreme Court. And let me be very clear: everything is
on the table. Everything to deal with this corrupt MAGA majority.”
These proposals echo the infamous “court-packing” plan of
Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s, designed to create a rubber-stamp Supreme
Court more hospitable toward the president’s agenda. A Democratic Congress
rejected that plan, calling it a “direct violation of the spirit of the
American Constitution” that would destroy the independence of the judiciary. In
a warning that today’s Democrats would do well to heed, the Senate Judiciary
Committee further wrote: “Manifestly, if we may force the hand of the Court
to secure our interpretation of the Constitution, then some succeeding Congress
may repeat the process to secure another and a different interpretation and one
which may not sound so pleasant in our ears as that for which we now contend.”
Some progressives speak not just of packing the court,
but also of stacking Congress to favor Democrats. The party has long championed
statehood (and two U.S. Senate seats) for the District of Columbia, where
Democrats regularly net more than 90 percent of the vote in presidential
elections. Breaking with its historic position, the DNC recently approved a measure to add Puerto Rico to the union, no
doubt driven by the expectation that it will also become a reliable
Democratic-voting state. And Senate Democrats increasingly express an eagerness to abolish the filibuster, which
historically protects the political power of the Senate minority. Relatedly,
former and perhaps future presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris
indicated her opposition to anti-majoritarian protections in our system, saying
there is “real shaking up that we have to do of the rule and the structure” and
seemed to support left-wing voices calling for the abolition of the Electoral
College.
Taken together, these “reforms” constitute a plan for
dominion, not democracy. If Democrats go down this road, they will not only
fail to repair the damage done by Trump, they will accelerate the collapse of
American democracy. There’s a better path forward.
***
If Democrats truly believe that the Trump administration
has embraced authoritarianism and they wish to oppose it, they must govern that
way. That means committing to restoring norms and limited government, paring
back executive power, and revitalizing checks and balances. Doing that in an
effective and durable way requires working with Republicans. And it will mean
prioritizing democracy over progressive policy goals.
Substantively, a post-Trump democracy and rule-of-law
agenda offers a multitude of opportunities for bipartisan collaboration.
Americans across the political spectrum oppose the weaponization of government
to target political enemies, corrupt pardons, and self-enrichment by
politicians, to take a few prominent examples. Democrats appalled by President
Trump’s abuses of emergency powers might consider the leading legislation to
address this problem, the bipartisan Article One Act, long-championed by Utah
Republican Sen. Mike Lee. The parties disagree, of course, about where the
blame lies for past transgressions. But, at least in theory, they could agree
on reforms preventing them in the future. This is urgent work.
The next administration may also propose more structural
reforms to strengthen our system. Limiting gerrymandering to once a decade
would be a modest but salutary step. Reforms to improve the appointments and
confirmation process, including the abuse of the Vacancies Reform Act, which
allows the president to bypass confirmation entirely, should be on the table.
Adjustments to Senate procedure that might reform, but not end, the filibuster
are reasonable. Even reforms to the court, such as mandatory retirement ages or
term limits, might be part of a bipartisan policy agenda. But any structural
reform that yields an immediate partisan advantage should be dead on arrival.
And if an otherwise sound proposal would yield partisan advantage if adopted
today, it should include delayed effective dates, leaving the party that
ultimately reaps its benefits to chance.
Democrats, back in power, will also hear loud calls from
their constituents that Trump and members of his administration should face a
reckoning for abuses of power they may have committed while in office. Abuses
of power should, indeed, have consequences if we do not wish to invite more in
the future. On the other hand, punitive efforts may well seem disproportionate
or vindictive in individual cases and raise the risk of a tit-for-tat cycle of
“lawfare.” Criminal punishment should be a last resort (and may be foreclosed
on the federal level by pardons), and a preference should be given to less
punitive measures: civil accountability, bar discipline, and, more
fundamentally, clear documentation and a public record of wrongdoing designed
to shame and dissuade future abuse. The healing and future stability of the
country must take precedence over score-settling, even if it means
less-than-satisfactory costs imposed in specific cases.
Self-interested electoral politics should also encourage
this approach. A Democratic presidential candidate who fights for the American
system, not just his or her coalition, has the prospect of winning a
comfortable majority for the first time in 20 years—potentially breaking the
toxic cycle of polarized politics that has regrettably taken hold. Other
countries that have reversed democratic backsliding have often done so through
grand coalitions, as recent victories for democracy in Poland
and Hungary demonstrate. Our two-party system makes such an
approach challenging, but there are ways Democrats can capture its spirit. It’s
likely too much to ask that a Democratic presidential candidate consider a
Republican as a running mate. But promising to appoint Republicans to key
positions, including and especially in the Justice Department, would be an
important olive branch.
But personnel is not enough. A Democratic candidate who
wants the support of right-of-center Americans must paint a vision of the
future that includes them. He or she must, at a minimum, forswear any attempt
to pack the Supreme Court, which is vital both to constitutional stability and
an important concession to those skeptical that Democrats would ever
unilaterally disarm. An even more powerful concession would be to endorse a
constitutional amendment permanently setting the size of the court at nine members.
This would take court-packing off the table forever and would be an enormous
sign of good faith. Such a move could even be paired with another reform that
might find more enthusiastic backing from the left. Democrats, of course, would
remain free to criticize the current court and work to fill vacancies that
arise in due course with nominees more reflective of their jurisprudential
preferences.
***
A Democratic presidency in the immediate aftermath of the
Trump administration might find uniquely fertile political ground for reform:
Republicans may suddenly rediscover the utility of guardrails around the
presidency, and Democrats, so recently traumatized by the Trump years, might be
willing to impose them even when they hold the White House.
Donald Trump’s inability to understand his role as head
of state, representing all Americans—Democrats and Republicans alike—has led to
our current crisis. Any Democratic candidate for president who truly wishes to
heal our republic must be ready to put our democracy ahead of his or her party.
And that means embracing a system that has a meaningful place for the voices of
those who lose the next presidential election. Such a president would
inevitably disappoint the left, but generations to come would owe them a debt
of gratitude.
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