Longtime Democrat strategist James Carville said his party’s defeat in the 2024 presidential election partly was due to ignoring President Donald Trump’s strongest supporters.
On the latest episode of his “Politics War Room” podcast, Carville told co-host Al Hunt that Trump addressed frustrations and offered solutions to people who wanted to make America great again (MAGA).
Carville added that Democrats need to make inroads with MAGA supporters to win elections.
“Democrats acted like these people didn’t exist, awright, they just did,” Carville said. “Don’t come back and say, ‘We acted like working class, particularly working class, noncollege whites were not part of our too cool for school group.’
“There were some real, and some real high-end people, that kind of bought into that s***.”
The former chief strategist for former President Bill Clinton suggested Democrats should explain to MAGA supporters that Trump’s actions in office are different than what he promised.
“The brilliant thing about MAGA is it gives you an explanation other than yourself of why your life didn’t turn out the way you wanted it,” he said. “And we should say to these people, we kind of understand what you were trying to say, but you were betrayed.
“And, you know, I can see it, but the best thing to do is not punch him in the mouth, but to say, ‘You know, man, I could hear where you’re coming from, and you just got betrayed. And we betrayed you somewhat and we now have learned our lesson.’ I think that’s the best way.”
At 80, Carville continues to offer Democrats talking points as the party tries to win a House majority in next year’s midterms.
In April, Carville wrote a guest column for The New York Times and said Trump broke the “cardinal rule” of politics by destabilizing the economy with tariffs, calling it one of the most “ignorant acts” in political history.
In another guest column for the Times in February, Carville proposed that congressional Democrats engage in the “most daring political maneuver” in the party’s history: “roll over and play dead.”
He suggested a “strategic political retreat” on the theory that Republicans and Trump inevitably will “crumble beneath their own weight.”
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