Lots of talk of late about how we fight back against the most extreme attacks on democracy, such as the outrageous gerrymandering being undertaken in Texas (and Ohio). And I’m open to all sorts of ideas that can stop these shameful and often lawless attacks on democracy.
BUT….
Let’s be clear.
There simply are no shortcuts to securing democracy in the long-term.
And playing defense (or even offense) in blue states is not enough.
The only LASTING way out of this mess requires seeing WHY it is that those attacking democracy are in the strong position they are in, and seeing how the pro-democracy side’s approach has been too-narrow and short-term.
And then, we must adjust accordingly! By going directly to the place where THEY have been dominating that battle.
Immediately, relentlessly, and over the long-term.
In short, we must go on offense in the purple and red states where most of the damage is being done. When it comes to democracy itself, there is no “flyover country.” Because as we’re seeing with Texas, and as we saw with Dobbs and Mississippi, lack of functioning democracy and accountability anywhere is a threat to the nation’s rights and democracy everywhere.
There may be no more important chapter in my new book “Saving Democracy” than the one that walks through this overall shift in mindset we must make.
(By the way, the new book remains one of the best selling books on Amazon on democracy. Currently in the Top 10! You can get your copy here, or read it all by being a paid subscriber).
I call this chapter “The Two Battles,” and it tries to frame the problem in a way that—once you see it—you will never unsee it.
My whiteboard above tries to do the same.
They’re a little long, but if you read anything I’ve ever written, take a moment to read this. Because once you see it, my hope is that it shapes everything we all do going forward. Then, I hope you share it.
Chapter 4:
The Two Battles
Why did Karl Rove focus so much on statehouses in 2010?
Why has the side fighting for democracy struggled so much of late?
The answer to both questions turns out to be the same.
Let me break it down with a basic analogy.
And to do that, let me introduce you to my son, Jack. He turned eight around the time that I first wrote these words. He’s ten as I write now (for this second edition).
Jack loved soccer then. (Now he’s more into lacrosse and basketball).
And even at eight years old, he already understood a core concept: if one team is always on the other team’s side of the field, firing away at the goal, that team will likely win. The longer the game goes on, the more likely the side always on offense will win. And the more games that take place, the more games the side always on offense will win.
Jack got this. He preferred defense, and is quite fast (for a Pepper especially!). Whenever the ball crossed over to his team’s side of the field, he raced as fast as he could to kick the ball back to the other side. The young man was like a guided missile with one mission in mind: get the ball back to the offense.
So, Jack, at only eight, would have quickly understood a key reason why those who are fighting for democracy in America have been losing that fight. And why Rove’s strategy worked so well in 2010, and after.
It’s slightly more complicated, but the one-sided soccer game eight-year-old Jack so intuitively understood captures what’s happened in American politics for a generation, and still today.
And if the team that cares about democracy doesn’t figure out quick that that’s the predicament we’re in, and adjust everything we’re doing to reverse it (rush to the ball like Jack does, kick it to the other side, and then keep it there), the other side’s going to keep winning.
Some of the most painful parts of our history, and other countries’ histories, confirm young Jack’s instinct. If one side continually attacks democracy in the places and institutions that shape democracy, and the other side doesn’t engage in that battle, the attacking side wins.
To be blunt, that’s how we got Jim Crow. And it’s why we find ourselves where we are today.
Before getting to what you and every American can do to effectively battle for democracy, it’s crucial to understand why,for so long, the battle over American politics grew akin to the one-sided soccer game that would so trouble an eight-year-old. Then adjust our approach accordingly.
I promise—we’ll get to solutions quickly. But recognizing the dilemma is essential to overcoming it, helps us avoid costly mistakes we’ve been making for a generation, and ensures that in striving to turn things around, we budget our limited time, energy, and resources most effectively.
Beyond that, seeing that there’s a far better way to protect democracy than what we’ve been doing can be downright energizing. It is for me!
At the risk of oversimplifying things, I’m going to present the two sides that have engaged in the grand battle of American politics for decades.
Brace yourself—it’s not what you think. Let’s call the two sides Team D and Team A.
And let’s zero in on the battle as each team has understood it. It turns out, the two teams have seen the battle very differently, and this means they’ve waged it differently as well.
In fact, for a generation, two battles were taking place. The sooner we see that, and come to terms with it, the better. (Since first writing this book, it’s become far more clear to more people).
Either way, once you see it, you can’t unsee it. . . I hope.
Team D’s Battle: Election Outcomes
Those on Team D support democracy, and desire to live within the confines and rules of a robust, representative, rule-of-law democracy. Importantly, two assumptions have shaped Team D’s political battle for a long time.
First, for a generation or more, Team D generally assumed that American democracy is inevitably intact. That it’s naturally stable—on autopilot. “We’re the USA—we’re a democracy.” Simple. Democracy was as American as mom and apple pie. It’s just who we are. Of course it’s here to stay. Right? (Wrong, we now know, but we’ll get to that in a few.) Regardless, this assumption of a stable and intact democracy grounded Team D’s battle for a long time.
Second, most on Team D have been buoyed by a second assumption— they’ve been confident that their policies and preferred directions generally reflect the broader preferences of America’s diverse majority. And from abortion access to common sense gun reforms to a middle-class based economics (as opposed to trickle-down) to public education, polls back them up on this. So, elections on a fair playing field, over time, are the logical vehicle for Team D to implement its policies and overall worldview. Because if given a choice, an informed electorate will choose their preferred outcomes and those who advocate for them.
Grounded on these two assumptions—that democracy is stable and that it represents a majority viewpoint—Team D long devoted its time, energy, and resources to contesting elections on that assumed level playing field. By winning those elections, Team D believed it could implement its desired substantive outcomes within that stable democratic world.
So those have been the basics of the Team D battle.
One outgrowth of this approach is that Team D has long prioritized the elections it perceives to offer the most effective and efficient path to 1) win and 2) implement its desired outcomes.
Federal elections.
Which naturally led to a cyclical frenzy of activity and energy every two years—when federal elections take place—and an explosion of energy, passion, and investment for the presidential election every four years.
And it also led to a relentless focus on the “swing” states and “swing” districts that together add up to those sought-after federal majorities. Win certain states and you win the presidency and the US Senate. Win certain districts and you win the US House. So, the thinking was that focusing by far the most time and resources on those areas—maybe a half-dozen states, and a few dozen districts—was the most effective and efficient way to win the battle of American politics.
When Team D won these federal goals—as it did in 2008 or 2020—it celebrated as if it has won the entire American political battle. Remember? Democracy was saved!
The media, by the way, generally covered politics in this same frame: stable democracy, focused largely on federal elections and battles over federal policy, determined by swing states and districts. And this was largely how everyday Americans saw it as well. All other politics was secondary, if that.
(Importantly, even as folks on Team D came to understand that democracy is at risk, they still largely adhered to political strategies that assume it is stable. And even as the media are waking up to the risk, they continue to cover politics through a frame that assumes it is stable).
Team A’s Battle: Democracy Itself
Now let’s look at the folks on the other side. We’ll call them Team A.
Team A finds itself in a very different battle—and knows it. In fact, its entire approach is grounded on the polar opposite assumptions from those made by Team D.
First, this collection of groups and interests correctly understands that the policies they seek are generally unpopular (often toxic) and would not survive long in a world of robust democracy. Whether those policies be the details of Project 2025, intense trickle-down economics, a vision of “economic freedom” that leaves most Americans out, the plundering of public assets for private gain, toxic social policies that are opposed by a majority or supermajority of Americans, or the long-simmering desire for white-dominated governance in an ever more diverse majority—these groups understand that their views are mired in minority status. As I write in Laboratories of Autocracy, they acknowledge this reality explicitly. It’s why they worked so hard to distance themselves from Project 2025. It’s why, as Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell so regularly shut down his own members from talking about issues, be it Lindsey Graham (abortion ban20) or Rick Scott (gutting social security). McConnell understood that their stances on these issues are unpopular—even if they form core parts of their agenda. And it’s why they protect nothing as fiercely as their ability to gerrymander.
This keen-eyed understanding that their policies are deeply unpopular shapes their entire battle. Because that unpopularity means that if all this side does is engage in a repeated battle to win elections in a robust democracy (i.e., Team D’s battle), over time, that will surely be a losing battle. In other words, robust democracy is inconsistent with the long-term, sustained fulfillment of their unpopular agenda. And this cold reality— that robust democracy is an obstacle to their agenda, and not a mechanism to achieve it—is the anchoring insight that shapes their battle.
Which leads to Team A’s second assumption: that democracy is not necessarily stable, or intact. That democracy can be undermined, or worse, in all sorts of ways. Sadly, the history of our country and countries around the world confirms that this sober assumption about the vulnerability of democracy is entirely correct. There are even helpful recent examples of how countries can weaken representative democracy.
So, with those two assumptions in mind, Team A chooses a different battle than Team D.
Theirs is not a battle to win elections in a robust and representative democracy. Because they know that would be a losing strategy.
Their battle is to subvert democracy itself, at least enough to lock their unpopular views into place on a sustained basis.
When I first wrote these words several years back, some treated this as a really controversial assertion. So I found myself mustering evidence that it was true. For example, I’d tell people, Peter Thiel, the billionaire who bankrolled the rise of JD Vance, wrote in 2009, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.”21 Or I’d point out that the Koch Brothers have been operating from that philosophy for a generation. Or I’d point out that American conservatives are having a love affair with Hungary’s Viktor Orban. Or I’d point to direct attacks on direct democracy in states like Ohio, driven by the fear of voting majorities on issues like abortion.
Now, people don’t seem to need as much proof as they once did.
Either way, what is Team A’s strategy to win their very different battle—an open battle against a robust democracy to impose their unpopular agenda?
Simple: target the places that can 1) advance their unpopular agenda and 2) maximally seal themselves off from democratic accountability for those unpopular policies and stances.
And where can you do that?
Hint: in the United States, those places do not reside in the federal government—at least not primarily, and not at first. AsLaboratories of Autocracy walks through in great detail, they are in states, starting with state legislatures/statehouses22. Along with other positions at the state and local level.
Why?
First, these state legislatures control almost every substantive issue Americans care about, and that Team A especially cares about—everything from the economy, to regulations, the administration of justice, to social issues. So, an investment in statehouses turns out to be returned many times over in the form of tax breaks, deregulation, giveaways to corporations, mass privatization of public resources and assets (i.e., public schools, energy, etc.), anti-worker policies, and other steps. In the right hands, a state legislature offers an outright bonanza for Team A.
And as we witness with never-ending attacks on Roe v. Wade, ever looser gun laws, attacks on equality itself, censorship, and the like, these legislatures can ram through a deeply unpopular agenda on social issues as well. Add it up, and almost the entire agenda Team A values can be accomplished via statehouses, before we ever talk about federal power.
But crucially, these statehouses also enjoy enormous power to shape democracy itself. For example, they play a major role in setting the rules and processes of elections—state and federal—which can alter who votes in these elections in ways that impact the ultimate outcome. In most states, they wield the power to draw their own legislative districts, as well as those for Congress, which can change outcomes, thwart representation (locking a minority into majority power), and, at its most extreme, remove any accountability for almost every elected member of these legislatures, as well as a large chunk of the U.S. House of Representatives. At the highest level, state legislatures even allocate the electors who determine the President of the United States.
In the wrong hands, these levers of control over democracy allow statehouses to construct fortresses of power wholly removed from and unaccountable to the people of these states. In recent decades, especially, they have sealed themselves off from the voting public—untouchable when it comes to their own electorate. This allows them to repeatedly enact measures that serve Team A’s narrow and unpopular agenda, and there’s little the people of these states or anyone else can do about it.
Understanding the immense power these states exercise over both their substantive goals and democracy itself, Team A naturally focuses most of its battle there—the state legislatures and all the accompanying offices that can bolster (or if they were to lose them, undermine) their agenda, while creating untouchable federal districts all over the country This allows them to protect an agenda which would, again, face inevitable failure in a world of robust democracy. But it’s an agenda which thrives when conducted in a political world with no accountability.
Now, because any state can help implement Team A’s substantive agenda while stifling democracy and accountability, each state represents power. Control of any state represents enormous opportunity. So, in recent decades, Team A hasn’t limited its battle to a narrow field of federal swing states. It’s battled in ALL fifty states, and has done so whenever there are elections at any level that might impact its agenda, or democracy. Which is, in the end, every year.
And Team A has also learned that these states can accomplish far more of their agenda when they work in concert with one another—pushing parallel measures all at once, learning and adjusting to various states’ successes and failures. In short, they can provide the inverse role that Justice Brandeis envisioned when he labelled states “Laboratories of Democracy” a century ago.
To be clear, now that it’s secured majorities at the federal level, this side also wages a fierce battle at that level. In America, the presidency will always be the grand prize. And federal positions also can impact regulation, taxation, spending and other issues such as climate change.
Those federal elected positions also have roles to play in Team A’s broader battle against democracy. With federal majority power, this side will attempt to pass laws such as voter suppression that undermine democracy in states across the country. And when in the minority federally, Team A must attain at least enough power at the federal level that, using tools like the filibuster (where they can obstruct measures even when in a minority) and federal judgeships, it can stymie the federal government from blocking its relentless advance in states.
But up until now, this side never lost sight that the heart of its success arose from permanent control of as many states and legislatures as possible. That’s where it has imposed almost its entire agenda, while also maximizing—and ultimately capitalizing on—its prospects at the federal level.
One other thing: because there is so little attention on state legislatures, and so little comparative pushback from the other side at that level, this battle turns out to be a far easier battle than the one at the federal level. Much of it takes place with almost no one paying attention, including the media, which covers the federal battle almost exclusively while local media withers on the vine. Many of Team A’s seats across this battlefield go uncontested. And even when contested, countless campaigns for those seats have been so underfunded by those who support democracy, they may as well have been uncontested. Many of Team A’s officials—both state and federal—have therefore spent their entire careers in worlds with no accountability.
To return to my son Jack—this all built into the ultimate nightmare. Team A has been aggressively on offense on the side of the field that shapes democracy, while Team D has hardly engaged on that side of the field at all.
And because of tools such as gerrymandering and voter suppression that come with controlling statehouses, the battle at both the state and federal level grew easier as they went. Once Team A locked up a state, seizing power over that state’s democracy, it became ever harder for Team D to reassert itself. (A true nightmare for poor Jack—the more the opposing team scores, the easier it gets for them to keep the ball on his side of the field and score again.)
So, in the end, there hasn’t been just one battle taking place in American politics.
The two sides have been engaged in two fundamentally different battles.
One side was battling for election outcomes, focused largely on the federal level. The other side was battling democracy itself. . . in states. . . everywhere. Always on offense, the battle getting easier with each iteration.
The Two Battles Joined: Who Wins?
Now what happened as these two teams engaged in their respective battles, repeatedly and over time?
It played out just as Jack would’ve warned.
Team D won its fair share of its battle for federal seats in swing areas. The House. The Senate. The Presidency. It was cyclical, of course. But in good cycles and with good candidates, this side won and celebrated as if all was won. In bad cycles and with bad candidates, this side lost, thinking it has lost everything.
But what of Team A, leading with its state-based battle, usually against less-organized and underfunded opposition?
Whatever happened at the federal level, Team A almost inevitably won its battle at the state level. And every Team A victory in any state created an important foothold—often a permanent gain— in its long-term battle.
Even worse for Team D, Team A often won even in years where it lost at the federal level. And even amid Team D’s federal victories, Team A still used the filibuster and the federal judiciary to prevent Team D from scoring points for democracy through federal legislation. Ask yourself, who had the better year in 2021 when it came to the long-term battle over democracy, even after Team D won its battle in 2020, celebrating as if it had won everything?
Did Team D make any structural advances? Nope. But Team A sure went to town on gerrymandering and voter suppression in states.
In summary, in its battle, Team A—the side attacking democracy—was almost always winning.
Always on offense.
Almost always making gains, which then secure future gains.
Team D—the side supporting democracy—sporadically won its more narrow federal battle. But it almost always lost the broader battle for democracy because it was hardly engaged in it. Largely didn’t even see it. As in 2020, it sometimes lost the broader battle for democracy even in years when it won its federal battle. In other cases, like 2010, it was still celebrating winning its battle as Team A dominated its own.
Add it all up, and Jack could’ve told you what would ultimately happen.
In early 2025, can we all finally see it?
The stark reality is that those attacking democracy will keep advancing—and hold firm to all their gains—until Team D engages in the same battle.
With equal vigor. Wherever the battle is taking place. Which is everywhere, starting in the states.
And if the side for democracy doesn’t engage in that same battle, history tells us that the side attacking democracy will keep succeeding.
But crucially, as those bright spots in 2022 and 2024 showed, if the side for democracy does engage in that battle in the right way, it can still succeed. To answer a question I’m asked all the time, it is not too late.
Much of the rest of this book walks through how Team D must learn from its failures, and reframe and re-strategize all it’s doing to go on offense for democracy.
And that new frame turns out to be empowering, because it clarifies the most productive ways every reader and every organization can work to save democracy. I’ll review many of those lessons as well.
The bottom line is—there is so much more we can each do. And that together, we can all do.
That we must do.
