It should be easy to defend constitutional democracy against a would-be authoritarian leader — shouldn't it? After all, people everywhere should rally to defend democracy if they understand that they benefit from competition among parties to offer better public service, just as consumers can benefit from competition among suppliers in any market.
But when large groups of voters have become convinced that only one party really cares about them, then they may feel no stake in democracy itself, and instead, they may support their leader in shaking off its inconvenient constitutional constraints. With such mass support, an unprincipled president could subvert democracy while portraying his actions as its ultimate fulfillment.
Our constitutional democracy can survive a determined attack by a sitting president only if Americans in every part of the country see how they can benefit from competition between two parties that care about their local concerns.
Sen. Chuck Schumer's (D-N.Y.) hope for Republican senators to help curb the president will fail if their constituents think that only President Trump understands them. An effective defense against presidential authoritarianism would require some offensive moves to challenge the president's hold on his base in red states.
Many leading Democrats have struggled to find the right response to an authoritarian challenge because the standard playbook for winning national elections generally demands a strategic focus on purple states and swing districts. But when the mission is to preserve American democracy, Democrats need to reach out to the reddest states.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who has gone to town hall meetings in red states, was one of the first leading Democrats to show some real understanding of this vital point. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) have also recognized the importance of including red states in their “Fighting Oligarchy” tour.
The need for new outreach may be greatest in the 12 states with no Democratic representatives in the 119th Congress.
Voters in these states know that there is no voice representing their priorities in the congressional Democratic caucuses, where the Democrats' national political agenda is largely determined. People cannot be expected to trust a party that has no effective mechanism for communicating their local concerns to its national leaders.
When democracy in America is at risk, it is vital that local Democratic parties in every state should be able to assure local voters that their concerns can be heard by national Democratic Party leaders who care enough to listen. Public meetings of local voters with Walz and other Democratic leaders should be seen as an urgent first step.
Then, for a continuing commitment to hear people's concerns even in the states that lack Democratic representation, the House Democratic Caucus could invite these states' Democratic parties to designate a recent congressional candidate to serve as their liaison with the House Democrats.
As Kael Weston and I suggested in a recent article, the House Democratic Caucus already includes nonvoting members from Washington, D.C. and the Virgin Islands, so perhaps it could add a few more to represent people in states like Iowa and Utah, where over a million Americans voted for Democratic congressional candidates last year.
Thus, while many have argued about what Democratic leaders should be saying to Americans in this time of constitutional crisis, the real question may be how Democratic leaders should be listening.
The reason for listening more to red-state voters now is not just to make them want to vote Democratic in the next election. The essential goal is to remind them that their hopes for better public service, even from a Republican-led government, depend crucially on their ability to vote for competitive Democratic candidates in the American system of constitutional democracy we are trying to preserve.
Roger Myerson is the David L. Pearson Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy.
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