podcast
CNN Political Briefing
Join CNN Political Director David Chalian as he guides you through our ever-changing political landscape. Every week, David and a guest take you inside the latest developments with insight and analysis from the key players in politics.
Terry McAuliffe: Donald Trump is the Democrats’ Best Weapon
CNN Political Briefing
Nov 14, 2025
In the wake of big electoral victories, Democrats are at odds over how and why they just ended the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. Visiting the studio today is a man who has certainly navigated moments of intra-party tension. Terry McAuliffe was the 72nd Governor of Virginia, he led the Democratic National Committee from 2001-2005, and he was Chair of Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign. He’s here with an assessment of the Democrats’ shutdown strategy and a prescription for winning the 2026 midterms.
Producer: Dan Bloom
Technical Producer: Dan Dzula
Executive Producer: Steve Lickteig
Episode Transcript
David Chalian
00:00:01
Last week, Democrats had big victories in New York City, California, New Jersey, and Virginia. And just days afterwards, a group of moderate Democratic senators broke ranks with their party's leadership to vote with Republicans to reopen the government.
Sen. Tim Kaine
00:00:17
This was the reality, SNAP recipients suffering, nothing happening on ACA. So from suffering and no path, we've now got robust benefits and a path.
David Chalian
00:00:29
'Just as the longest government shutdown in American history ended, Democrats' hand-wringing and recriminations began.
Sara Sidner, CNN
00:00:38
Congressman Seth Moulton, Caving now makes no sense. California governor Gavin Newsom called it pathetic and says America deserves better. Senator Chris Murphy added, submission emboldens the tyrant.
Terry McAuliffe
00:00:48
Whatever you want to say about Donald Trump and his folks, they fight. They fight every single minute of every single day, and they want us to fight.
David Chalian
00:00:53
Terry McAuliffe was the 72nd governor of Virginia. He also was the chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 2001 to 2005. With the shutdown now in our rearview mirror, I asked Governor McAulliffe to evaluate the Democrat strategy and how he thinks the party can channel voter frustration into electoral wins. I'm David Chalian, CNN's Political Director and Washington Bureau Chief. And this is the CNN Political Briefing. Stay with us.
David Chalian
00:01:31
Terry, thanks so much for being here.
Terry McAuliffe
00:01:32
Great to be with you, thank you.
David Chalian
00:01:34
Let me start, just this last year in politics, in Democratic party politics, I feel like the question has been sort of, wither the Democrats? Just trying to figure out after the election loss to Trump, a path back. And then obviously, Democrats had a hugely successful 2025 election just over a week ago, immediately followed by this instant infighting over how the shutdown came to an end.
Terry McAuliffe
00:02:01
I wrote a New York Times bestseller called What a Party. So there you go.
David Chalian
00:02:06
I read it.
Terry McAuliffe
00:02:06
There you go!
David Chalian
00:02:07
Put those two things together for me. The big election win and now Democrats sort of just in a total battle with each other about how the shutdown came to an end here.
Terry McAuliffe
00:02:17
Well, first off, it was never as bad as people said it was with the party. I've been saying this for a year. You know, I lived through 1980. Believe it or not, I started as President Carter's National Finance Director at the age of 23. I became chairman of the Democratic National Committee after the 2000 election. After '80, they said we're wiped out. After 2000, they said we were wiped out, and we always came back. And Trump's been the greatest gift ever to the Democratic Party. In 2016, he won. 2017, we swept the country, swept Virginia, picked up, what, 15 House of Delegates seats, and same thing happened that we just went through the other night. So, you know, listen, it was a great night for the Democrats on Tuesday. But sometimes we just can't help ourselves. Then we have a great week. I mean, David, we won not only Virginia and New Jersey and New York, you no two state Senate seats in Mississippi, we won in Georgia, the public service, we want and the judges up in Pennsylvania. You know, where I grew up in Syracuse, New York, I was just reading yesterday, I mean, huge wins up there in Onondaga County. We flipped the Onondega County legislature, which nobody ever thought was possible. It was 12, five Republicans after last Tuesday, 10, seven Democrats. We won seats that a Democrat has never won before. So great night. And then we come to the shutdown. And you know, I'm disappointed. I would not have voted to end the shutdown, personally.
David Chalian
00:03:41
Why?
Terry McAuliffe
00:03:42
Number one, we were fighting for healthcare and we have to take a sledgehammer to the Trump administration and force them to give people healthcare. I can tell you you know you're going to see upwards of forty million people have their healthcare premiums increased you look at the chaos we're going through with SNAP benefits they just don't play fair and they don't play straight, so we have to play tough. And here we were, we're heading toward Thanksgiving, the TSA was in a meltdown mode. Trump was getting a lot of grief.
David Chalian
00:04:14
Americans were also experiencing a lot of pain on what you're saying.
Terry McAuliffe
00:04:17
You bet they were. And sometimes you have to have some pain to have a big gain. And I was willing to fight it out for healthcare because, you know, when I was governor of Virginia, I fought every day for the Affordable Care Act, for to bring that to Virginia. Because, you know, David, as I travel around Virginia, people grabbing my arm, a woman saying, Governor, I'm going to be dead if I don't get healthcare. I can't get that mammogram screening. And it really impacts you personally, people's healthcare. And we had a shot, I truly believed if we'd stayed tough, we would have had a shot of fixing healthcare and getting people the relief they needed.
David Chalian
00:04:55
Your friend and fellow Virginian Tim Kaine was one of the eight senators who voted to reach this deal with Republicans, those eight senators made the case there was no shot, that there was no path to get President Trump and the Republicans to engage on solving the ACA subsidy issue before the government got open, and that all that was going to happen was more and more pain for the American people. To that argument, you say?
Terry McAuliffe
00:05:24
Then why did we do the shutdown in the first place? Then why'd we do the shutdown? I mean, if that were your argument, why did we do it in the first place and cause any pain at all? But listen, we're fighting on principle. We're fighting on healthcare. We are fighting to get 40 million people, you know, coverage. And I don't, you know, you got to stay tough. You got to fight. I love Tim. And listen, every senator votes what they think is right. And Tim's wife was my secretary of education. You know, I'm very close. But I stand were senator Mark Warner, my other senator was and, you know, listen, I think another couple weeks another week another two weeks I think we really would have got to an inflection point because of the slowdown of the TSA and the flight delays and so forth, I think that was really having impact on Trump.
David Chalian
00:06:12
What do you make, even though Senator Schumer was not one of those eight senators, the leader of the Senate Democrats, he is receiving a ton of heat, as he did when he did cut a deal in the spring. He's still receiving a tone of heat from the grassroots, from Democrats across the country about being the leader in this moment and the party or a lot of the grassroots not being pleased. As you're saying, you're not pleased with this outcome. Is he in a precarious position?
Terry McAuliffe
00:06:37
He probably is. I think he hurt himself the last time because he originally said, you know, we're going to fight on this shutdown and then immediately within 48 hours went the other way. I think that caused the huge problem we had before. And this time, I think a lot of people were proud of Chuck Schumer out there fighting on healthcare. We were fighting on a principle, David, that's what matters. We were fight on a principle and we were for something we should fight for in healthcare. And you know when you're the leader, you're the leader and you know you've got to take the responsibility for everything. I don't know I don't vote on the Senate leader but you know it just wasn't a good moment for the Democratic Party. I think a lot of people who vote for us and count on us and do the grassroots and knock on the doors, they expect us to fight they want us fight. Whatever you want to say about Donald Trump and his folks, they fight. They fight every single minute of every single day and they want us to fight. He's fighting for things that we're a hundred percent against Trump. We're fighting for things that people actually want. And I always believe it's a fight worth having. And listen, as governor, as you know, I restored the rights of 200,000 felons more than any governor in American history. And everybody told me, Terry, do not do this. Do not do this. Morally, it was the right thing to do, give felons back the right to vote. So I just think when you're in leadership, you got to fight for the things you believe in. I fought to protect a woman's right to choose, I fought for marriage equality after the historic ruling. I was the first governor of America to perform a gay marriage. I fought on things that I thought were worth fighting for. People elected me to get things done.
David Chalian
00:08:09
So where do you think this moment of this disappointment inside the Democratic Party, yet just days after the successful victory, where does this leave the party right now as we turn the page towards '26?
Terry McAuliffe
00:08:22
'Listen, the overarching, the gigantic thing that over affects all is Donald Trump. And Donald Trump is -17 today or whatever he is in America. He's the lowest approval rating of any president in American history. Every day, every single day, he does something the American public does not like. And, you know, from what he's done on USAID to SNAP and, you even taking down the east wing of the White House and you know redoing the oval office, it looks like Liberace's bedroom. I mean, it's just crazy the things he's done.
David Chalian
00:08:53
And you think that opposition galvanizes your party.
Terry McAuliffe
00:08:56
Yes. Over everything else.
David Chalian
00:08:55
And papers over all of this division we're seeing.
00:08:58
'And that's what you saw last Tuesday. It didn't matter what Democrat if you were a progressive Democrat, if you were a moderate Democrat, it didn't matter. We won everywhere in America, so that's not going to change and we'll see with the economy goes. I think the tariffs are going to have a big kick in, David, next year. I think as of today, I think most companies are eating the tariffs because they're scared to death of Trump. They don't want him to come after them. You can only do that so long, you know, if you're running a company. So, you know, the way he's going with this economy, I think they're going to face huge headwinds. I would predict today, and I feel very comfortable about winning '26 in the house. People say the Senate map is impossible. It's not impossible. Anything can happen depending on where we are with Trump, but I can't overstate. Look what happened Tuesday. In Virginia, Trump was -15. We won by 15. In New Jersey, Trump is -13. What did Mikie win by?
David Chalian
00:09:52
13.
00:09:53
'13. In California, Trump was 2 to 1 down, the proposition 2 to 1. And that's one thing I got to tell you. Voter motivation, that is on our side. Before going into Tuesday, 22-point lead, nobody likes either party today, but are you motivated to vote? We had a 22-point lead before the election. And you looked at what happened. And what was shocking to me, California, David, a ballot proposition. Not the most sexy thing in the world. Generally people don't come out on ballot propositions. There were no candidates on the ballot. There was nothing. They had a presidential-level turnout for that ballot proposition and I remember I was watching CNN that night and the polls closed and there were long lines. This was not a presidential election.
David Chalian
00:10:37
No, but Gavin Newsom raised it to that level, right?
Terry McAuliffe
00:10:40
You bet he did. He did a great job on that. And people understand, we have got to win the House because we need accountability. We have to have subpoena power. You know, we ought to, you know, be able to go after all of these deals that the family has done and all the other things that he's done, the DOGE cuts. Here we are in Virginia, hundreds of thousands of people being affected, #1 state with federal workers. You know, I want to look into behind all the DOGE cuts and you know who benefited and so forth. That's what you get with subpoena power and you do not get that without a majority. And that's why, David, people are so jacked up for next year's election.
David Chalian
00:11:15
We're going to take a quick break right there. We'll have a lot more with former governor, former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe in just a moment.
David Chalian
00:11:28
Welcome back. We're chatting here with former Virginia governor, former Democratic National Committee chairman, Terry McAuliffe.
00:11:35
Governor McAulliffe, I take everything you just said about the enthusiasm Democrats have about Trump as the overriding factor in '26. Midterm elections tend to be referenda on the president. Let's say you do win the house and get the accountability measures in place that you were just talking about. Do you think the divisions within your party are not as real as we in the press make them? Or do you think that that is still something that only a presidential contest can sort out?
Terry McAuliffe
00:12:01
Listen, you, David, you guys in the press, you love this stuff. I've had this conversation with you and so many people. The party was never as bad as they thought it was, and it's never as good as, you know, so. And I said a year ago, and I was chairman of the Democratic National Committee, and we won in 2001. We won Virginia with Mark Warner. We won in New Jersey with Jim McGreevey, and of course the party's back, blah, blah. Then of course 9/11 occurs, you know, and the whole world changes. We don't know. Things could intervene that we don't know today. You've always got to remember that. You know, listen, we'll get through '26. I think we win the House, hopefully win the Senate. And then we head for '28. There's probably going to be 25 people running for president, which is a great thing.
David Chalian
00:12:41
And what do you think that's about? That that race. I know we're far out and obviously intervening but yeah, what do you think the real cleavages are in your party for your party to hammer out in a presidential nominating contest?
Terry McAuliffe
00:12:52
'Well, I think what will bind us in what this election is going to be about in '28 is going to be affordability. I think you saw that, David, all over last Tuesday's election. You know, just the cost, people going grocery stores today, you know, the costs are up for everybody. So, and then just all the plain insanity of the Trump administration, that's not ending. And here's where he really hurt himself. You know as you know we're off-off year in Virginia and New Jersey.
David Chalian
00:13:17
Right.
Terry McAuliffe
00:13:17
The goal is to get voters out. They just voted in the presidential. I'm not going out. You know, I mean, they just didn't care. They're not thinking about politics. Because of Trump, they think about it every single day, because every day he comes out with some new lunacy, and people are all talking about it. So it actually backfired on him, you know, the sitting down at the Oval Office at the desk every day just spewing out insanity. People talking about Trump every single day. That's keeping people engaged. David, that is not ending as we head towards 2028. And he's going to stay, he's not going to endorse JD Vance early. He's not. You know, the second he endorses, he's no longer the king. He can wait right 'til the end and whoever endorses he endorses. So, the Trump insanity will go on all the way up through November of 2028, that's what will bind us together. Affordability, you know, where we are on energy costs, I think. Listen, we're going to have all different parts of our party run, and we should.
David Chalian
00:14:13
And what do you think the party needs in leadership?
Terry McAuliffe
00:14:17
'We need someone who can get out and articulate a message, bringing Americans together, dealing with the issues of affordability. You know, as you know, I've always been a very pro-jobs Democrat, you know. As governor, that's what I focused on. I brought 2,200 new companies back to Virginia, 210,000 new jobs. Personal income went up 10.5%. That's what people want to hear about their personal economic situation. And that's what hurt us so gravely in 2024, with inflation running as high as it was, the issues of immigration. We got crushed on those two issues, and two-thirds of the voters in America, those were the two issues 1 and 2 they voted on. So I don't think immigration will be that issue again. I do think clearly, inflation...
David Chalian
00:14:58
Not be that issue again because of Trump's success at closing down a lot of the illegal crossings, right?
Terry McAuliffe
00:15:05
'No question. Right. Yep, absolutely. Nope, absolutely, and so he's taking that issue off the table. But as I said earlier, we had 9/11, there's just things, David, you and I sitting here today we do not know may happen somewhere around the world with the issues of the Middle East, with Iran, we just don't know that today, but outside of that, listen, people want to know, and they generally don't vote foreign policy, but what are you going to do on the economy? What are you going to do to help me? What are going to do to bring costs down? And that will be the message, I think, of all the Democrats and people. You know understand that we have to have a pro-jobs pro-growth economic message that benefits everyone and that's what it's going to be about.
David Chalian
00:15:42
And you said somebody who could communicate that.
Terry McAuliffe
00:15:44
And you've got to be able to communicate that. We don't know what our calendar is going to be yet. I sat with the rules and bylaws the other night at dinner was sort of...
David Chalian
00:15:51
For old time's sake?
Terry McAuliffe
00:15:53
Well, you know, I just love it. I've done this for the party for 45 years. And, you know, we have to have a good calendar, good states that represent our party. Remember, when I was Chair, I'm the guy who brought up South Carolina to get the Black vote earlier. I brought up Michigan to get to labor in earlier. And I brought New Mexico to try and get the Hispanic vote in earlier and Colorado. So, we'll see where the calendar goes, but I do think a calendar, David, this is really important, I mean, you love politics, has to reflect our party. Has to. And that's why I changed it back to the 2004 presidential nominating contest. And Ken Martin and his team, I hope will do a very good job, I know they will, but let's have a calendar that reflects the diversity of our party, the strength of our party, and unifies our party
David Chalian
00:16:37
'I do want to dig in a little bit in Virginia and what happened there last Tuesday with Abigail Spanberger's win. There are a couple things that jumped out to me that I want to get your take on. First of all, it's not, not everything in the exit polls indicate an electorate in Virginia that was hungry to just flip to the other party. Interestingly, your - the guy who beat you four years prior, Glenn Youngkin, one your successors. His approval rating was +10. He was 53% approve, 43% disapprove in his job in Virginia with this electorate that showed up that elected Abigail Spanberger. I thought that was intriguing. That's not, you know, Phil Murphy in New Jersey was upside down and, and Youngkin was not...popular. Also, of all the states that you were talking about, California, New York City, New Jersey, that we had exit polls, the economy, voters who voted for Abigail Spanberger on Tuesday, 58% said good or excellent, the Virginia economy, 40% said poor or bad. So people's perceptions of the economy, which is obviously issue #1 as you're saying, were actually very positive Virginia. And yet, and yet, Spanberger flips party control of the governor's mansion. Is that just a reflection that Winsome Earle-Sears was such a bad candidate? And why was Youngkin's positive standing and positive impression on the economy do think, not a tougher headwind for Spanberger?
Terry McAuliffe
00:18:01
'Well, first of all, in Virginia, they always love their governors. They do. If you go back historically, no matter who you are, you have good favorable, you only have one term, as you know, in Virginia. You're making my point. This was all about Trump, which was really important. So you had Trump, you know -15 in Virginia. You had the DOGE cuts. You have a shutdown. I cannot, you know when I ran in '13, we had a shutdown, I went up 10 points. I can not stress to you. You've got, you know several hundred thousand people in northern Virginia impacted by a shutdown. They're sitting home. Or a relative sitting home hearing about it, I'm going to vote. So it was a perfect storm. And then you had a crazy ticket on the other side. I mean, they had no money, embarrassing, literally an embarrassing ticket. So it a perfect storm for us in Virginia. But you go to my point, you know, and for your listeners, you've got to understand, in Virginia for 48 straight years, 48 years, 12 straight governor's elections, the party that wins the White House the year before. The other party wins the governor's mansion.
David Chalian
00:19:01
Except when? Who broke that streak?
Terry McAuliffe
00:19:02
Only one man broke it.
David Chalian
00:19:03
Who was that?
00:19:03
'Well, you're sitting with him. Obama won in '12 and I won in '13 by a point. But there's always a kickback. And then just turbocharge that kickback with Trump. And, you know, we have a lot of USAID-related structures in Virginia that we deal with that help finance things. We have the tariffs, which impacted our soybean farmers. They were not selling one soybean to China.
David Chalian
00:19:28
So I take your point. The Trump factor overwhelmed everything.
Terry McAuliffe
00:19:29
In the whole country.
David Chalian
00:19:30
And do you think.
Terry McAuliffe
00:19:30
And she was great candidate with Abigail.
00:19:32
Absent Donald Trump, does Jay Jones with that texting scandal get over the finish line?
Terry McAuliffe
00:19:39
'Trump being -15, I think it would be very difficult.
David Chalian
00:19:41
Okay. So it had everywhere, up and down.
Terry McAuliffe
00:19:43
Jay ended up winning by 6. I know Jay, I know his family. His father was a judge, his mother was a judge, his grandfather was a great civil rights attorney, and he just royally screwed up on those texts. But as I also make the point, where was all the outrage when Trump said that he'd shoot someone on 5th Ave? Come on.
David Chalian
00:20:02
The other thing, looking in the exit polls in Virginia, that I wanted to get your take on.
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:06
How many, let me ask you an honest question here. How much credence do you put in exit polls?
David Chalian
00:20:10
'Well, I think they-
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:11
'I'm just wondering, you know, I've never-
David Chalian
00:20:13
'I mean, like any poll. I don't put-
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:14
Yeah. Okay.
00:20:14
'You put enough credence to get information, but that, you know, we've already seen the exit poll perform pretty well against individual voter-verified records in New Jersey already. So I think it gives us, I do think it give us a sense. In Virginia, you, four years ago, lost independents to Glenn Youngkin by 9 percentage points. Abigail Spanberger won independents by 19 percentage points, that is a 28-point swing from Republican to Democrat among independents. Extraordinary. You don't usually see that kind of swing.
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:50
And where was Biden's approval rating?
David Chalian
00:20:52
What was Biden's approval rating when he lost?
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:55
'-16.
David Chalian
00:20:55
'-16.
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:55
'And where was trump? -15.
David Chalian
00:20:56
Okay.
Terry McAuliffe
00:20:57
'-15. That's a 31-point shift.
David Chalian
00:21:00
So there you go.
00:21:02
We are very tied to the federal.
David Chalian
00:21:04
Yeah.
00:21:05
And you know we Afghanistan, we had the withdrawal out of Afghanistan, whatever, we can go through the whole thing, we're not going to go through all of it. But, I mean, we are really tied, 'cause listen, we have the most federal workers and really, you know, we have the largest naval base in the world we have Pentagon we have the CIA, we have Quantico Marine headquarters so, you know, what happens up here really has an impact on the Virginia economy and yet with him being under 16 was very close, 1, 2 points, so...
David Chalian
00:21:32
I don't want to relitigate.
Terry McAuliffe
00:21:32
We're not going to relive that again.
David Chalian
00:21:34
I'm sure you don't want to do that.
Terry McAuliffe
00:21:35
Yeah. It was fine.
David Chalian
00:21:38
So my last question for you gets us back to where we just were talking about with the Democrats on the Hill and your disappointment in that. I have not seen any potential 2028 contender on your side say that they would have voted for that deal, that they had been one of those eight senators. I have not seen anybody running in 2026 from the whole spectrum of Democrats, whether you're one of these progressive insurgents in a primary in a place like Michigan or Maine or Minnesota, or you're sort of the establishment old guard Democrat that Chuck Schumer and the DSCC is recruited into the race, across the board, if you're facing voters, you were opposed to this deal. So, what does that, I guess I'm just trying to understand are these eight senators so isolated from the broad sense of the Democratic Party or do you think as Tim Kaine said, you know what? We're doing this. We're not running for reelection this cycle, a couple of us are retiring, we're doing this but a lot of folks asked us to do this because the government had to get reopened. Are they are these 8 senators on an island missing something about the Democratic Party right now?
Terry McAuliffe
00:22:47
Listen, if you know Tim Kaine, one of the most honorable, decent folks you'd ever know, he voted what he truly believed, and he voted his conscience. And that's Tim Kaine, and Maggie, and you know, the rest of them who did it, I think they just voted, you know what they believed in. They're entitled to it.
David Chalian
00:23:01
But are they out of touch with the party?
00:23:03
I just think, listen, I don't think there was a deal there. You keep saying voted for the deal, there was no deal. The deal was, we're what? Going to let the Senate vote? And they're going to vote no? That's not a deal to me. I mean, what's on the other side? I mean, you know, they balanced, and certainly they're right to do it, they balanced that there were people out of work and not being able to pay their rent, not being able pay their groceries, and it had to come to an end. That's what they were hearing from people.
David Chalian
00:23:28
So then I guess the question, Terry, becomes how does either Chuck Schumer or, you know, other Democratic, maybe these eight Democratic senators, what has to happen now to sort of heal the party past this moment?
Terry McAuliffe
00:23:44
'I don't think there's anything we can do because we have no power to change. Let's be very clear. We have no power. When you're in the minority in the House and Senate, you have no power. And especially now. I mean, the Republicans will not even say hello, let alone work with Democrats. That's just unfortunate. You know, listen, I come from a place you ought to work with the other side, try to get things done. As governor, I got 75% of my governor's bills passed with a right-wing legislature. I compromised, they compromised, you know, I like to get things done, but that's not the place we're at today. I keep going back to the point, what is going to unify us is Donald J. Trump. This is the craziest presidency anyone has ever experienced. From day one going in all the things and all the people hurt I mean, David, which president would have a Halloween party, a Great Gatsby-themed Halloween party the night before 24 million Americans are going to lose their SNAP benefits? That is cruel, that is callous. They just don't care, he's not going to change, and that motivates us to come together. We may have our differences in a party, but what binds us, unites us, excites us motivates us is Donald Trump.
David Chalian
00:24:58
Terry McAuliffe, thank you so much for your time, sir. Really appreciate it. That's it for this week's edition of the CNN Political Briefing. We'll be back with a new episode next Friday. Thanks so much for listening.
