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That, right there, is how it’s done.
Sen. Cory Booker, the New Jersey Democrat who has long been a believer that his party should not shy from a fight out of fear, held the Senate floor for more than 25 hours in a history-making show of defiance of President Donald Trump’s chaos-laced agenda. Booker, beginning Monday evening, owned the podium where he stood without any real break in a bold display that drew fellow Democrats to the floor to watch in admiration. They might have done well to take notes about how, even in the minority, their party still can find ways to inspire voters in the face of Trumpism.
“I rise tonight because I believe, sincerely, that our country is in crisis,” Booker said as he began at 6:59 p.m. on Monday.
When he wrapped up at 8:05 p.m. on Tuesday, he was visibly exhausted as he invoked the marching orders from civil rights icon and lawmaker John Lewis. “This is a moral moment. It’s not left or right. It’s right or wrong. Let’s get in good trouble. My friend, Madam President, I yield the floor,” he said as fellow Democrats erupted in applause.
As his party has struggled to find footing in this second Trump term, Booker showed his colleagues that protest has power. His performance ended as Democrats were quietly losing twin special elections in deep-red House districts in Florida. Booker’s prescription for wayward Democrats seemed to be about showing up and using their present powers rather than chasing long-shot causes or hoping Republicans will bow to pressure from anyone but Trump.
“I confess that I have been imperfect. I confess that I’ve been inadequate to the moment,” Booker said a little before noon on Tuesday. “I confess that the Democratic Party has made terrible mistakes that gave a lane to this demagogue. I confess we all must look in the mirror and say ‘we will do better.'”
Booker, in the Senate since 2013 and a promising but unsuccessful presidential candidate in 2020, broke the previous speech record of the modern era, one made by avowed segregationist Strom Thurman in 1957 while blocking a civil rights package. Lost on no one was that Booker is Black, a figure whose right to vote let alone serve in the Senate is in contradiction to the viewpoint that made Thurman a hero to the segregationist South.
Since Trump’s re-election in November, Democrats’ fury has lacked a vessel, let alone a strategy. Some in the party began the year contemplating cooperation on some areas where they thought there could be common ground, such as infrastructure spending and trade deals. But that optimism has largely vanished and little else has emerged as a backstop in Washington beyond hope that states’ attorneys general and legislatures can stand in the breach.
Booker seemed to understand that gap and offered himself to stand there.
“Twelve hours now I’m standing, and I’m still going strong because this President is wrong, and he’s violating principles that we hold dear and principles in this document that are so clear and plain,” Booker said, holding a copy of the Constitution at roughly his halfway point.
Booker, a powerful orator and tough legislator, has often risen to the moment. During his 2020 presidential bid—which ended before Iowa even caucused—he found ways to push his party to reckon with tough realities. His campaign for a monument to Black Wall Street, where a race riot destroyed a prosperous neighborhood in Tulsa, recentered a big part of the conversation about identity in the United States. Similarly, his speech about gun violence and racial equity at Charleston, S.C.,’s Mother Emanuel Church laid down the 2020 campaign’s high-water mark for civil rights discourse.
This week, it was a similar clarity that came from his podium—often speaking to just himself. Booker clearly did not mind. He felt he was on a righteous course.
To be clear, no single speech—even a marathon test of endurance and intention—is going to throw Trump’s agenda completely off the rails. Just as surely as Booker held the Senate floor, Trump holds the Senate’s majority. If Trump and Senate Majority Leader John Thune play their cards carefully, they can wedge a whole lot of their agenda across the finish line with a bare majority, sidestepping the need for any Democratic votes. It’s a lot messier in the House, but Trump has yet to lose a major vote under Speaker Mike Johnson. It’s why, at their core, Democrats are slouching around the Capitol with a sense of irrelevance and contempt.
Booker’s show gave those despondent Democrats reason to think that they still can muster some meaningful, dynamic opposition. It’s tough to overstate just how much heart his protest performance offered his party.
“More Americans need to stand up and say enough is enough,” he said.
The message, it seemed, was finding open ears. On TikTok, Booker’s live stream snagged more than 200 million likes. Even some Republican lawmakers expressed admiration, including Sen. Ted Cruz who took the floor hostage in 2013 over Obamacare. “As @CoryBooker approaches my 21-hour filibuster record, I’m contemplating pulling the fire alarm….” Cruz tweeted.
But Republicans also understood that the show here was not going to derail their plans for a spending plan to get them to the Oct. 1 start of the federal fiscal year. The two chambers are on track to push through mismatched spending frameworks, both replete with spending cuts, and work out their differences later. That is likely to complicate things for Republicans, but they’ve shown plenty of pliability when the White House—and Trump, specifically—comes down hard on lawmakers who may balk at this novel approach.
For his part, Booker only offered to stand and speak.
“My voice is inadequate,” Booker said. “My efforts today are inadequate to stop what they’re trying to do. But we the people are powerful.” Perhaps. That power may find a hard limit against Trumpism, but at least someone is starting to test it inside the Democratic Party.
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