President Donald Trump's "deportation trains" will continue running if Democrats don't change their tone during budget negotiations, one analyst warned on Sunday.
Over the last several weeks, Democrats in Congress have threatened to defund Trump's Department of Homeland Security after immigration officers killed two American citizens in Minneapolis. However, the tone of those conversations has shifted, leading journalist David Shuster to warn in a new Substack essay on Sunday that Democrats appear to be engaged in "moral bookkeeping" rather than showing the courage to stand up to Trump's immigration regime as voters expect.
He noted that Democratic leaders appear to be walking back threats to defund DHS during the next budget talks. The Democrats have also dropped their demand that DHS Secretary Kristi Noem be fired, Shuster wrote.
Shuster warned these actions all but ensure that "the deportation trains keep running on time."
He called on Democrats to continue pushing for structural reforms, even if it means shutting down DHS entirely.
"If Democrats are ever going to produce meaningful change, we should be willing to take real, structural action and not settle for symbolic reforms. This isn’t a time for democratic party modesty and pragmatism," he wrote. "People are being rounded up and disappeared. Protesters have been shot and killed. And DHS still refuses to fully cooperate with local Minneapolis prosecutors."
"Defunding is not radical," Shuster continued. "It is the only language Donald Trump and his republican enablers in Congress will understand. Everything else is sermonizing—cheap, shallow, and utterly ineffective."
"Politically and morally, democrats must be bold and strong. It’s not enough to express shock at Trump’s DHS, request technology changes, and ask federal agents to be more respectful of the Constitution," he added.
