Wes Moore versus the cancel culture
LESSONS NOT LEARNED — Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is headlining a dinner and fundraiser for South Carolina Democrats tonight, marking the first real political foray into a key early presidential state by one of the brightest stars in the Democratic Party.
But if it was up to some South Carolina Democrats, he wouldn't be there at all. Moore, as POLITICO's Brakkton Booker reported this week, was the target of a failed effort to rescind his speaking invitation because of his recent decision to veto a slavery reparations bill in Maryland.
Moore's position is squarely in the political mainstream — roughly seven-in-ten adults say descendants of enslaved people should not be repaid, according to a 2022 Pew Research Center poll. A more recent poll in California found nearly 60 percent opposed to cash reparations. Even so, the first-term governor, widely viewed as a top presidential prospect in either 2028 or beyond, was considered by some party leaders to have forfeited his right to address the party by virtue of staking out this one position.
It's a reminder of how far the Democratic Party still has to go in diagnosing and addressing the weaknesses revealed by the 2024 election results — among them, the perception that Democrats have moved too far to the left, focused too much on identity group politics, spent too much time on language policing and became too dogmatic and intolerant of differing views, even within their own party.
Moore's brush with the party's cancel culture puts him in the company of a number of other Democratic lawmakers who also have been stung by intra-party demands for ideological conformity.
Massachusetts Rep. Seth Moulton has faced harsh Democratic attacks for departing from party orthodoxy on the issue of transgender athletes. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democratic centrist in Washington state, has come under frequent fire for a variety of ideological transgressions, with surprisingly little consideration given to the political imperatives of representing a rural, Republican-oriented House district. The same is true of Maine Rep. Jared Golden, another House Democrat precariously perched in Trump Country.
The buzz surrounding Original Sin, the recently published account of Joe Biden's ill-fated decision to run for a second term and the efforts made to hide his diminishment, has renewed attention to the fate of former Rep. Dean Phillips. The Minnesota Democrat was ostracized and essentially exiled from the party for raising questions about Biden's age and health and then challenging him in the 2024 primary — a debate that, in retrospect, the party desperately needed to have.
The Trump-era GOP isn't exactly a party that brooks internal dissent either. But it hasn't recently emerged as a competitive impediment — the party is in a period of expansion, not contraction. The Republican brand is not nearly as damaged with voters.
There's an important distinction in how the parties view their apostates. Dissent in the contemporary GOP is seen as disloyalty to Trump, who metes out his own political justice to wayward Republicans. There is no such figurehead in the Democratic Party, where dissenting views are characterized as moral failures, unworthy of public airing and perhaps deserving of exile.
When Moore walks into dinner this evening, he'll almost surely be greeted warmly by the majority of the guests in the room. The effort to cancel his appearance failed, after all. But the mere attempt suggests the party still has a ways to go in understanding where it went off the rails. Moore is a combat veteran, a Black rising star, a dynamic talent and a landslide winner who is aligned with the party on most of its priorities. If his voice can be stifled, then the Democrats have completely missed the lessons of 2024.
Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com. Or contact tonight's author at cmahtesian@politico.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @PoliticoCharlie.
What'd I Miss?
— State begins rolling out expanded student visa vetting — starting with Harvard: The State Department has told U.S. consulates and embassies to immediately begin reviewing the social media accounts of Harvard's student visa applicants for antisemitism in what it called a pilot program that could be rolled out for colleges nationwide. The cable signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, obtained by POLITICO, was sent late Thursday. It says consular officers should 'conduct a complete screening of the online presence of any nonimmigrant visa applicant seeking to travel to Harvard University for any purpose.' The policy, while primarily affecting students, will also include faculty members, researchers, staff members and guest speakers at Harvard.
— Trump allies urge crackdown on Cabinet secretaries meddling in GOP primaries: President Donald Trump's allies are fuming at Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy for getting involved in Michigan's Senate primary, a race that now threatens to divide Republicans. Duffy is headlining a planned June 4 fundraiser for Rep. Bill Huizenga, according to an invitation obtained by POLITICO — a move that puts Duffy at odds with the National Republican Senatorial Committee and 2024 Trump co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita. Duffy has also been advising Huizenga, according to a person familiar with the race. Duffy, according to the two people close to Trump, never cleared his political engagement with the White House political shop and has now drawn the ire of Trump's top political hands. The transportation secretary's move to fundraise for Huizenga has now prompted threats of a crackdown on Cabinet secretaries' political activities ahead of the midterms, POLITICO has learned.
— White House convenes meeting to brainstorm new Harvard measures: The Trump administration is escalating its campaign against Harvard University — and looking for new ways to bring the storied institution to heel. The White House convened officials from nearly a dozen agencies on Wednesday to brainstorm additional punitive measures, according to one administration official and a second person familiar with the meeting, who were granted anonymity to share details. The administration official said that forthcoming actions are expected from the State, Treasury, Health and Human Services and Justice departments, among others, and could happen as early as next month.
— Trump says he's fired National Portrait Gallery director amid Washington arts scene takeover: President Donald Trump said he was sacking the longtime director of the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery, Kim Sajet, today, ending the 12-year tenure of the first woman to serve as the gallery's director. 'Upon the request and recommendation of many people, I am herby (sic) terminating the employment of Kim Sajet as Director of the National Portrait Gallery. She is a highly partisan person, and a strong supporter of DEI, which is totally inappropriate for her position. Her replacement will be named shortly. Thank you for your attention to this matter!' Trump wrote in a Truth Social post this afternoon.
AROUND THE WORLD
WARNING SIGN — French President Emmanuel Macron warned China that NATO could become more deeply involved in Asia if Beijing does not do more to stop North Korea from taking part in Russia's war on Ukraine.
'North Korea in Ukraine is a big question for all of us. If China doesn't want NATO to be involved in Southeast Asia, it should prevent [North Korea] from being engaged on European soil,' Macron said today during an address at a major defense summit in Singapore.
France has long maintained that the transatlantic military alliance shouldn't expand its reach into Asia and led the campaign to block the opening of a NATO liaison office in Japan in 2023.
'I had objected to NATO having a role in Asia because I don't believe in being enrolled in someone else's strategic rivalry,' Macron said, hinting that Paris could revisit its stance.
NE FUME PAS — France is banning smoking in areas where young people socialize including beaches, parks and sports facilities from July 1 to clamp down on the harmful habit and make it less attractive.
The ban, which extends to bus stops, gardens and areas close to schools, is intended to 'denormalize tobacco and limit its attractiveness,' the French health ministry said today. The fine for smoking in such areas will reach €135.
The move comes as data shows smoking is at a 'historically low level' in France and tobacco sales fell more than 11.5 percent last year. Nonetheless, tobacco consumption still kills 75,000 people each year, equivalent to 200 deaths per day in the country. The health costs amount to €150 billion per year.
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RADAR SWEEP
IT'S MARGINAL — Large farms dominate America's landscape, producing the grand majority of the American-made food that we consume. But in some pockets of the country, small farmers continue to subsist, living on increasingly tight margins in communities that are shrinking. One such place is a cattle branding farm in Nebraska that's the subject of a photo essay from Alyssa Schukar in The New Republic. Schukar goes into the Burdick farm and explains how cattle branding remains an industry in flux, relying on neighbors and high school wrestlers to get the job done.
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'Missoulians deserve better, and fortunately, two council members voted against imposing this divisive, far-left agenda on their community.' Mitchell stated during his bill's Senate hearing that he'd seen Black Lives Matters and Pride flags in his classrooms growing up, and said he did not feel those issues should be pushed in schools. 'Leave it to Missoula to turn their city flag into a Pride flag. Nothing says 'unity' like politicizing public property,' Mitchell said in a statement. 'The ultra far left Missoula City Council and their mayor are completely out of touch with reality and the values of the vast majority of Montanans. Taxpayer owned property should represent everyone, not just the loudest political movements of the moment. The Pride flag, like any other political symbol, has no place replacing a city's identity.' He added situations like this are exactly why he pushed the law. 'We resoundingly passed HB 819 to stop governments from hijacking public property to push ideology,' Mitchell said. 'If this resolution passes, it only proves how necessary HB 819 is, and I'm sure it won't be good for Missoula's local economy either.' Missoula City council members Sandra Vasecka and Bob Campbell voted against the measure. Councilor Campbell said he had a request for the people who said the flag makes them feel safe. 'Stop and think for a minute whether or not that's true for everyone in the community, whether or not that the flag is the cure, the be all, the end, to feel safe,' Campbell said to council on Monday night. 'And I propose that's not always the case.'
