Hakeem Jeffries and Cory Booker host pointless sit-in to protest Trump, achieve less than nothing

The United States is in dire need of a muscular and effective opposition party to fight back against the many evils of Donald Trump. The American people need politicians unafraid to get their hands dirty, willing to sacrifice their careers for the greater good, and pursue every possible avenue to block Trump’s crimes.

Unfortunately, America has the Democratic Party, who couldn’t successfully overturn a parking ticket, let alone a Presidential executive order. Now, fresh from their winning tactic of holding little signs up while Trump’s speaking (or making unhappy faces at him), they have a new tactic! The plan? Sit down on some steps! For a bit!

This is a moral moment in America. Sitting on the Capitol steps with Leader Hakeem Jeffries this morning to discuss what’s at stake with Trump’s budget and affirm the need for action to protect Medicaid, food assistance, and other safety net programs. https://t.co/6md6u5H0Ja

— Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBooker) April 27, 2025

Yup, Hakeem Jeffries and Cory Booker held a sit-in protest on Sunday on the steps of the US Capitol in opposition to Republicans’ proposed budget plan. They sat there for 12 hours, then left, having achieved nothing of note.

Pompously billed as an “Urgent Conversation with the American People”, the sit-in came before Congress’s return on Monday for a session in which Republicans will try to ram through their economic agenda, crammed with cuts to crucial social programs including childcare, education, support for the elderly, medical science, housing support, and many others. As the pair explained:

“Republican leaders have made clear their intention to use the coming weeks to advance a reckless budget scheme to President Trump’s desk that seeks to gut Medicaid, food assistance and basic needs programs that help people, all to give tax breaks to billionaires. … Given what’s at stake, these could be some of the most consequential weeks for seniors, kids and families in generations.”

Arguably, doing something, even sitting down on some steps inconveniencing nobody, is better than doing nothing at all. Even so, this feels like a PR exercise for Jeffries and Booker’s reputations more than any serious kind of protest, and one that’ll inspire nobody, amuse Republicans, and cement the belief that Democrats simply don’t have the cojones to actually oppose Trump.

Here’s the depressing reality of what will happen next: every single part of the Trump economic agenda will sail through, almost certainly aided by a handful of Democrat votes. That’s because, when you boil the situation back to its core, the actions of successive Democrat administrations prove they’ve got no qualms about shrinking social programs. Their real opposition is that they don’t like the specific way Trump is going about it.

Maybe someday soon, there’ll be an actual opposition to the Trump regime, but don’t expect it to come from the timid, decorum-obsessed, and undeservedly smug Democrats.