Elissa Slotkin knows something about strategy. The Michigan senator formerly worked for George W. Bush’s National Security Council and Barack Obama’s State Department and Department of Defense before first winning a Michigan congressional seat in 2018. Last year, her Senate victory was one of few bright spots for Democrats. Now, Slotkin is applying her strategic thinking to puzzling through how Democrats can best fight Donald Trump.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
Do Democrats have a plan for countering Trump? And what is it?
I don’t think it’s a secret that Democrats have been on their heels since Trump was elected. And I come from the national-security world, so what I constantly am looking for is a strong, comprehensive strategy in whatever I’m doing, but certainly to counter Trump. It can’t be kind of reacting every single day to every single thing that he does.
What do you think the plan should be?
I think that most Americans who voted for President Trump voted for him because they wanted more money in their pockets. They did not vote for chaos. They did not vote for the instability that he’s created. They didn’t vote for cuts to veterans. They didn’t vote for will-he-won’t-he on tariffs. Certainly in my state, it was an economic security vote. We need to spend time clearly articulating that he is gonna make you pay in every corner of your life.
Trump voters come up to me and say, “I voted for change. I didn’t vote for a yo-yo on tariffs.” I just came from the Flint engine plant and a huge number of the parts that are going into the the GM trucks that are made at that plant are produced in Canada. You could have a part go up by 300% in cost if it’s tariffed on both sides of the border. And people understand that here.
People may be okay in theory with some of the DOGE cuts, but they certainly understand their family budget, and they understand what they’re spending on groceries. They understand there’s no plan for their mortgage or for their rent. They understand that the tariffs could cost them money. They understand that their Medicaid, their Medicare, their Social Security, their VA benefits are being looked at as a potential area to cut. A lead foot in whatever we do has to be pushing back on the complete fallacy that he’s gonna save you money. He’s going to cost you money. He may create a self-inflicted recession.
Some other Democrats are arguing that [Senate Minority Leader Chuck] Schumer doesn’t have what it takes to counter Trump and that the party needs new leadership in the Senate. What do you think about that?
Well, Schumer is our leader. It’s a very tough job. There are very intense debates within the Democrats right now. So it is not an easy cakewalk to be leader.
Democrats in general need to have more comprehensive strategies. We need to be on the same page and speak from the same sheet of music if we want to be effective. I have not been shy about saying that to him and lots of other senior leaders in the party. It’s on all of us to buckle down and come up with a strategy, that we can share amongst ourselves, but also communicate to Democrats who are asking us to meet the moment.
Do you feel like the party isn’t meeting the moment right now?
I think that Trump is very effectively flooding the zone. I think that he has people on their heels. People don’t know where to look first on any given day. I think that we have a general approach of legislation, litigation, communication, and elections, focusing on those four buckets. But I think the moment demands more than that.
As a Midwesterner who won on the same ballot as Trump, I’m going to be banging pots and pans about the economic message over and over and over again, because I think in general, as a party, we’ve drifted away from a central focus on the economy and on families, and that to me is an essential center of gravity.
You’ve said that you’re focused on making moves that are both strategic and irreversible. Can you tell me about what those might be?
I’m a national-security person, so I made a quad chart. The top axis is tactical and strategic: when Trump announces something, is it tactical (meaning short term) or is it strategic (long term)? And then on the other axis of the quad chart: is it reversible or irreversible? Can a new president or a new Congress come in and reverse his bad choice, or is it permanent? And I decided to work on the issues that fell into the quadrant that was both strategic and irreversible.
Many of those things are constitutional, they are about our rights and our democracy, but they’re also about the long-term economic viability of my state. We know what it’s like here to live through a recession. In 2008, 2009, 2010, our recession was pretty close to a depression in Michigan. And I’m not gonna stand silent while he threatens that in my state.
If you had a magic wand and could remake the party to be able to win again in places like Michigan, how does the party need to change?
I think we need to get back to the fundamentals. The middle class is an absolutely essential part of American life. We need to grow and expand it. And we need to focus on the three big things that most Americans can agree on, which is strong economic security, strong national security, and strong democracy.
I come from a world of war planning, a world of constant, prudent planning. I come from a world where you can’t just play defense only. There’s no such thing as winning, in any operation or in any war, by just playing defense. What we owe the country is a strategy that does more than play defense.
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