For those that haven’t seen the clips floating out on social media, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) still made time Tuesday for CBS Mornings despite having largely cancelled the rest of the book tour for his publication on anti-Semitism due to alleged security concerns, but the real reason was clear in this 12-minute-plus CBS sit-down as the three co-hosts voiced the left’s anger over his caving to Republicans over last week’s continuing resolution.
So, while it may have felt like a grilling, it was actually a public lament and airing of grievances from a place of concern for their ideology — progressivism — and strategizing about how to mount a comeback to power.
Before diving in, co-host Tony Dokoupil first acknowledged he’s probably “looking out your window when [you] woke up this morning” with “protesters out there” and had “a difficult couple of days.”
Dokoupil — who might have almost lost his job for defending Israel and denouncing anti-Semitism — started off with a question about the end of the Gaza ceasefire and then let co-host Nate Burleson begin the public kvetching, wondering why he didn’t “push back and fight” the White House and GOP-controlled Congress.
Hilariously, take notice of how both Schumer and co-host/former Democratic donor Gayle King argued the Democrats would have been blamed in the court of public opinion for the shutdown (click “expand”):
BURLESON: Now, last week, you and nine other Democrats helped avert a government shutdown by voting for a Republican written bill, which many Democrats have been angered by, and we’ve seen it described as a Civil War, as a train wreck. Many Democrats believe, you know, if you have a government shutdown, that will force President Trump and Republicans to the negotiating table. Why not use your vote to push back and fight?
SCHUMER: Because the idea that they would go to the negotiating table is absolutely — is they don’t do it. This is a new group. This is not the old group. Let me explain. I knew when I took this vote there would be a lot of protests, but I felt I had to do it for the future, not only of the Democratic Party, but the country, because here’s — as bad as that CR bill was, and it was bad, a shutdown is 10 times worse. Let me give you what happened —
GAYLE KING: And it would have been blamed on the Democrats.
SCHUMER: — and you’re right, Gayle.
KING: But you had been saying —
SCHUMER: But can I just explain why —
KING: — but you had been saying you were not going to vote — that you — I think people were upset with you, and people are very upset with you because you had led people to believe that, no, I’m going to vote against it.
SCHUMER: Okay. Well, let me explain why —
KING: Yeah.
SCHUMER: — why first the shutdown is terrible. People ought to know that. The Executive Branch, in this case, Musk, DOGE and this horrible guy, Vought, who have no concern for working people, would have had sole power to determine what opens and what closes. They determine what is essential. You can’t go to court. So, on day two, get rid of SNAP and food for hungry kids. It’s not essential. Day four, get rid of mass transit aid. Let New York City do it, not essential. Cut back on Medicaid and health care. Within two weeks, everyone would have been howling. Furthermore, it’s even worse. It has no off ramp.
Shortly after, Schumer received zero pushback and a “yes, yes” from King as he hurled invective at Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought: “Guess who determines when we leave the shutdown? The Republicans and just not — let’s not forget how bad they are. This guy, Vought, probably the most evil man. He’s the guy who came up with that Project 2025. He has a whole playbook of what to shut down.”
Let that be another lesson about how the left’s lectures about the need for civility are empty statements.
King pointed out the obvious, suggesting he “should...have let people know your thinking ahead of time because really people thought” he would fight.
Schumer tacitly admitted his plan failed because House Republicans held together on the original bill. For good measure, he made sure to tell viewers without pushback that a shutdown would have “put the government in the sole hands of the evil, nasty, nihilistic people like Musk and Vought and Trump.”
Dokoupil shifted gears to “the Venezuelan deportations,” giving Schumer a chance to try and redeem himself for the liberal base. At one point, when Schumer said “democracy is over” if Trump and Republicans get their way in “get[ting] rid of rule of law,” Dokoupil wondered “how do Democrats” fight that (click “expand”):
DOKOUPIL: Senator, the leader in question, that is actually what people are debating right now. There are people in your party who don’t want you to be a leader in the party anymore, and it’s a question of, what is this moment and what does it require? I want to ask a question about that moment involving the Venezuelan deportations and the court hearings around it. Put the charges or lack of evidence or whatever against —
SCHUMER: Yeah.
DOKOUPIL: — these men aside for now, and let’s just talk about the interaction of the Trump administration and the court.
SCHUMER: Yes.
DOKOUPIL: They seem to take the position that this court doesn’t have jurisdiction over them, and you have Tom Homan saying he doesn’t care what the judge thinks. What did Democrats do —
SCHUMER: Okay.
DOKOUPIL: — even when the Trump administration defies a federal judge?
SCHUMER: Well, first of all, we have to have rule of law. People say, well, that’s not me. If we get rid of rule of law, the 248 year tradition in America, this democracy is over. Okay? So it’s vital to stop it.
DOKOUPIL: How? How do Democrats do that?
SCHUMER: There are two courts. There are two courts. One is the court of public opinion and the public has to make — if this happens, they have to make their voices known to Democrats, Republicans, everyone, in the strongest terms, because it’s ending our democracy. Now, first we — but we also have the courts, and so far, the lower courts have done a good job. We hope the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court will do the same job. When the lower courts — and I’m very proud that we put in all of those judges last year, many of whom are making these decisions — when the lower courts thus far have said to the Trump administration, you must stop, in most cases, they have.
DOKOUPIL: But if they don’t, that’s now my question.
KING: But the Trump administration is saying they are not going to pay attention to the courts.
SCHUMER: If they don’t —
KING: Yeah.
SCHUMER: And we go to the Supreme Court and it is defied, democracy is at real risk, and there will have to be — there will have to be extra — extraordinary action taken.
KING: Tony, touched on it, Senator —
SCHUMER: And that is by the people, by everybody.
King stepped in and channeled the anger from her fellow lefties: “But there are people in your own party they are saying, look, it’s time for you to go. They no longer trust your leadership. They want somebody else in there. What do you say about that? In your own party saying, he has to go.”
As an angered Schumer defended his record, King fretted “people don’t have faith in the Democrats” with Dokoupil added it’s “half of the Americans.”
The last few minutes were about anti-Semitism with little mentioned about the rampant anti-Semitism on the left and on college campuses, aside from a brief nod to the former by Schumer himself. However, Charlottesville and Trump were prominently mentioned (click “expand”):
KING: [Y]ou said you never thought you’d have to write this book, but you never thought antisemitism would be as bad as it is. You said, for many non-Jewish people, it’s alarming, but it’s not a real problem and not a priority and to that, you say?
SCHUMER: Yeah, Jewish people, we carry 5,000 years of history on our back. Conor Cruise O’Brien, the great Irish poet, said antisemitism is a light sleeper. When things get bad, often, almost in too many societies, it turns on the Jews. You know, I was brought up between 1950, I was born in 1950, for the first 50 years, the Jewish people, we call it the Golden Medina. Jews did great in America. Like everybody else, we were advancing up the ladder. There was very little antisemitism because the pall of the Holocaust hung over America, and people realized what could happen, but starting in 2000 with 9/11, a little worse in the financial crisis, where a lot of them accused Jewish financiers. But it got much worse in 2017, so that for the first time, Jewish Americans say, maybe it could happen here like it happened everywhere else. So I wrote this book —
KING: Yeah, that’s chilling, yes. That’s —
SCHUMER: — I wrote this book aimed at five audiences, and then I will add a sixth. First, my generation, so that we see — they see we’re not alone. My experience is often their experience.
KING: Mmhmm.
SCHUMER: Second to my generation’s children, they know what’s going on, but they didn’t know the struggles of Israel, the history of antisemitism. You know, they know our holidays. There’s a joke about the three words that describe every Jewish holiday. They tried to kill us, we survived, let’s eat. So they know that.
KING: Yes.
SCHUMER: But third is, it’s aimed at non-Jewish people who say, you know, it’s bad, but why are they so sensitive? You read this book, you’ll see it.
KING: Right.
SCHUMER: Finally, I’m aiming it at my left — my people on the left, my friends on the left, I’ve always been a progressive, but we’ve seen — we’ve always seen antisemitism on the right. You saw those people at 9/11 — I mean, at January 6 wearing shirts that’s more than six million, but now a lot of it has trickled over to the left, and that’s bad, too, and finally, I hope every student in every college — every school, makes this advisory or required reading. You know who else should read it? Donald Trump.
DOKOUPIL: I’m sure your publicist —
SCHUMER: He has shown — let me just say this. He’d do a lot to read it, because Donald Trump —
DOKOUPIL: — Senator —
SCHUMER: — let me just finish this quick point, Donald Trump has shown that he regards Jews as transactional. Oh, they’re good for votes. They’re good for money. He has no understanding of the Jewish people, and it leads him to do bad things, sitting down with that antisemite, Fuentes; when Charlottesville occurred, saying both sides are to blame, cutting off funds —
KING: Fine people on both sides.
DOKOUPIL: Senator —
SCHUMER: — cutting off funds to our synagogues that need protection from antisemitism.
On a constructive note, Dokoupil had Schumer close by explaining that one could criticize the Israeli government’s decision-making (like any other government), but “it goes over the line and you call someone an effing Zionist or effing Jew,” “the guy who went on the subway car and said, all Zionists, get out of the subway car,” the head of the Brooklyn Museum having their house “scarred in red paint,” or when people chant “from the rive to the sea.”
To see the relevant CBS transcript from March 18, click here.
