Ex-NBC News host Chuck Todd laments Democratic Party a 'collection of people that don't like Trump'
"I think this is the identity crisis that they have. I think it's just a collection of people that don't like Trump right now, right? And that's served them well in '20, but imagine trying to create a big tent that had AOC and John Kasich in it, right? You know? Or Liz Cheney and AOC. You sort of got to rip a hole in the middle, right, as you're trying to stretch that tent," Todd told disgraced former CBS News anchor Charlie Rose.
Todd and Rose discussed Zohran Mamdani's New York City mayor primary win and more during the conversation.
"It feels like they're way too poll-tested. It feels like that they're trying so hard to sort of keep their suburban voters, and that's been part of their problem. The growth in the Democratic electorate is in the suburbs, wealthy suburbs, and so the growth of the Republican electorate has been in the working-class exurbs and actually, even in working-class urban areas. And, I think that that's been their disconnect, is that their voters are in one place, their messaging is in another, but when they try to message to their suburban voters, they've sort of lost touch with their working-class roots," Todd continued.
Todd said both parties' coalitions were too big and added, "we would probably be a better democracy if we could have 4 major parties."
The ex-NBC "Meet the Press" moderator has been critical of the party in the wake of former Vice President Kamala Harris' loss to Trump.
He questioned whether the public was sold a "40-year bill of goods" with regard to former President Joe Biden's family-man image during a conversation with CNN host Jake Tapper on the "Chuck Toddcast."
"You and I covered, for most of our professional lives, the story of Joe Biden was: This guy cared about his family so much he commuted home every night from Washington," Todd said. "You know what else you could say is, this man was so ambitious that after his family went through that tragedy, he commuted every day to work, like it's the same story. I sit here, I look at this, and I think, were we sold a 40-year bill of goods?"
Todd said in March that Democratic leadership, specifically House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, were feeling "paralyzed" by the two different constituencies within the Democratic Party.
"Jeffries and Schumer are acting paralyzed because they have two different constituencies. They have ones who are worried about a left-wing tea party, and they should be worried about that, because I do think this anger inside the base is real," Todd said. "Then you have others who are like, hey, I won, and Trump carried my state. So I've got to do this. So, I think that's why Jeffries and Schumer come across as paralyzed, because they're trying to placate a coalition party that doesn't know which direction to go to."
Todd suggested during his conversation with Rose that the Republicans might not have stuck with Trump as their nominee if Biden didn't run for re-election at all.
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