What Should the Dems Do to Win—And Then to Govern?

Building a positive version of Project 2025. An author explains how to start.

Closing scene in Robert Redford’s classic 1972 movie The Candidate. Redford’s long-shot candidate stages an unexpected victory. As the returns come in, he asks his advisors: What do we do now? Winning is one thing. Governing is different. Dems hope they’ll be in a position to ask—and answer—this question one year from now. (JF screenshot.)

The past year’s political energy for many Americans has mainly, and necessarily, been anti. As a reminder, here are some examples of people bravely working against what Trump/Doge/MAGA/ICE/CBP and all their lackies have tried to do:

-Citizens standing together, from Los Angeles to Minneapolis to Portland to Charlotte and beyond, against thugs from ICE and CBP who are killing their neighbors and making Kavanaugh Stops.

-Grand juries standing together against bogus indictments of fellow citizens. Judges at every level except the Supreme Court standing together against assaults on the rule of law.

-Legislatures from California to Virginia standing together to offset Trump/Abbott gerrymanders.

-The Chairman of the Fed, the president of Harvard, the leaders of major foundations, and other people with great influence standing together against assaults on their independence.

-Canada, Mexico, and traditional US allies as a whole standing firm against Trump-era aggression.

-Late-night comedians standing up against censorship. Librarians and museum directors doing the same in their realms.

-Scores of Epstein survivors standing together against Trump/ Bondi/ Blanche efforts to shield a vile pedophile.

-Millions of “ordinary Americans” turning out to say “No Kings!” and stand against infringements on their liberties. The same happening on a smaller scale around the country, at teach-ins, town meetings, organized volunteer citizen groups, and other gatherings against un-American governmental over-reach.

This is the anti energy and courage called for at the moment. This will stand as history’s counter-example to the cowardice, subservience, and corruption of the Congressional GOP as a bloc, and much of today’s powerful financial and corporate leadership. The latter range from the flagrant cases like Musk and Thiel, to full-on collaborationists like Bezos, Zuckerberg, and Tim Cook.

But at some point, MAGA will be gone. Who has a plan for what comes next, beyond repairing what has been destroyed?¹

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Some Practical Q-and-As, about preparing for post-Trump times.

There are reasons not to get ahead of ourselves. Some are listed in the footnotes below.² But recently I talked with a longtime friend who has long experience in planning for presidential transitions, about what Democrats regardless of faction could and should be thinking about now.

This friend is Derek Shearer. He is a veteran professor at Occidental College, in California. He is a former US Ambassador to Finland. And he is a longtime political participant, including as a major figure in Bill Clinton’s victorious 1992 campaign. By all accounts it was Derek Shearer who came up with the slogan “Putting People First” for Clinton’s economic platform.

Recently Shearer has been working with two colleagues who are economics professors—Martin Carnoy, of Stanford, and Michael Reich, of UC Berkeley—on a plan that they hope will begin discussion among Democrats about what they should do, whenever they gain power again. And what they should do, to hasten that moment.

Last week I spoke with him about the results of their work so far, mostly a 100-page document called “A Bold Economic Program for America.” (Available here.) The program they lay out is both highly detailed and intentionally flexible. It has precise cost/revenue assessments for each of its proposals. But it also, in explicitly first-draft form, invites additions, corrections, improvements, and evolutions by other experts, plus future candidates and their staffs.

I spoke with Derek Shearer about the obvious questions. Why now for such a proposal, when the party’s momentum was mainly anti. Why such details, when it’s at least three years until a Democratic president could propose any of them? Why suggest anything that might be divisive within the party, when solidarity against MAGA was the paramount goal?

He addressed all those questions, in ways I find interesting and provocative. I’m offering the results in three forms:

-Here is a 45-minute podcast discussion, which you can listen to or download and hear later.

-For subscribers, after the paywall, I’ll have an edited transcript of our talk.

-Just below, I’ll highlight some of the main points.

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Why Democrats need to start talking about what they’re for, even now.

Some main points Derek Shearer makes about Dems beginning a discussion about their specific and detailed how-to-do list, for if and when they regain power:

• Democrats in Congress need to start talking about these ideas now—for instance, with bills about corporate accountability, and changes in the minimum wage and Social Security funding—to “normalize” them, and prepare the ground for when they can enact them.

• Democrats in Congress also need to force votes on these issues now, to put themselves—and Republicans—on the record.

• Dems need their own, “non-evil” version of Project 2025. Donald Trump’s second administration hit the ground running, with the destructive playbooks of DOGE and Project 2025, even though they had not raised these in the campaign. Democrats need to be similarly prepared. But they shouldn’t be secretive or deceptive about their ambitions, as Trump was about Project 2025. On the contrary, they should be transparent about their goals—as Bill Clinton was—to build support and trust.

• The time to start talking about specifics is, again, now—before proposals are tied to any one candidate, and when there’s time to refine and evolve ideas. And what has to happen now is an iterative process—saying this idea could be improved in X or Y way, without tying it to any candidate.

• One specific-specific that Derek Shearer is looking for is a 2028 counterpart to his 1992 Clinton label, “Putting People First.” Proposals welcomed.

• Some of the problems that seem “impossible” to solve, especially housing, actually have a track record of practical solutions. Others—notably the eons-long struggle to make the rich pay their fair share of taxes—remain fundamental struggles. And, why as a progressive he is skeptical of California’s “billionaire tax” proposal.

• The “abundance agenda” has gotten a lot of attention in Democrat-world. Shearer says: Not so fast. '

• For scale and readability reasons, the transcript below is condensed in several points. (The audio is the full, original conversation.) One point I boiled down was a list of politicians and groups with whom Shearer and his colleagues have been in touch about the plan. They include the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) and the Center for American Progress (CAP). He names a lot more.

The specifics of the Shearer/Carnoy/Reich plan have been carefully thought-through, notably for job-creation and economic fairness, and deserve consideration at least as a starting point. You can see them here. He, and I, welcome questions, comments, and suggestions for improvement.

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Now, the transcript.

Here is a transcript of what Derek Shearer told me last week, edited and condensed in some places: