Trump's Speech Sends Democrats Spiraling Into Behind-the-Scenes Chaos: 'Everyone Is Mad at Everyone'

If ever a moment called for legendary Christian author C.S. Lewis’ satirical demon Screwtape, surely this is it.

According to Axios, Democratic lawmakers have begun turning on one another in the wake of their appalling and borderline inhuman antics during President Donald Trump’s joint address to Congress on Tuesday evening.

“Everyone is mad at everyone,” a senior House Democrat told Axios.

Even those of us who have the lowest possible expectations of Democrats could scarcely believe the spectacle as it unfolded.

Democratic Rep. Al Green of Texas set the tone for the evening near the beginning of the speech when he refused to sit down and stop heckling the president. House Speaker Mike Johnson ordered the House sergeant at arms to escort Green out of the chamber.

Other Democrats followed Green’s lead and simply walked out of the chamber throughout the speech.

That, in truth, might have constituted the high point of the night for the opposition party.

On multiple occasions, Democratic lawmakers had opportunities to applaud heartbroken and courageous Americans.

Instead, they sat stone-faced as Trump honored an American prisoner liberated from Russia, the families of two young American females murdered by illegal immigrants, and a 13-year-old brain cancer survivor with a passion for law enforcement.

Democrats applauded only when Trump mentioned the war in Ukraine.

Afterward, a handful of congressional Democrats, perhaps cognizant that Americans overwhelmingly approved of Trump’s speech, chastised their colleagues.

For instance, Democratic Reps. George Latimer and Tom Suozzi, both of New York, denounced the Green-led disruptions as “inappropriate.”

“I think it was a big mistake. … I’m an old school traditional type guy, I think we should be treating the president with deference. So I think it was inappropriate,” Suozzi said.

Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania went further, calling the antics “unhinged petulance.”

So why do we need Lewis’ Screwtape for this moment?

For one thing, Democrats’ refusal to acknowledge the families of murder victims and a child survivor of brain cancer proved beyond all doubt that their anti-Trump hatred, which has festered inside them for nearly a decade, has finally and totally consumed them. They now personify malice to a degree seldom observed except in psychopaths.

Thus, Democrats bickering among themselves should remind us of Lewis’ satirical classic, “The Screwtape Letters.”

That novel consists of a series of imagined letters written by Screwtape, a demon who held a senior administrative position in Hell, addressed to his nephew Wormwood, a novice tempter assigned the task of securing one young Englishman’s soul during World War II.

Screwtape constantly instructed his nephew in the best strategies for gathering human souls, which admittedly sounds rather dark.

Lewis, however, also infused those imagined letters with moments of humor. Screwtape, for instance, often marveled at Wormwood’s ineptitude. When his nephew reported that the Englishman had fallen in love with a lighthearted, devout, and chaste young woman, the demon uncle grew so agitated that he was involuntarily transmogrified into a giant centipede.

In short, Lewis added humor in order to diminish the demons, who have no power when humans choose God.

And that brings us back to the Democrats.

Latimer, Suozzi, Fetterman, and others might indeed have objected to their colleagues’ antics on principled moral grounds. But actions speak louder than words.

On Thursday morning 10 Democratic representative voted with Republicans to censure Green, which two Democrats had told Axios they might do.

Most Democrats, however, had other priorities.

The majority of those quoted by Axios, in fact, complained about poor “strategy” or lack of “direction” from leadership.

“If anyone is thinking that it was an effective strategy, they’re probably in an echo chamber. My take is that the average American thought the optics were pretty bad,” Democratic Rep. Jared Golden of Maine said.

“Not standing for Trump would have been a fine strategy, but you need to separate him from the kid with cancer,” one centrist House Democrat said.

Meanwhile, one progressive lawmaker expressed “frustration about lack of guidance [or a] plan.”

Another progressive described colleagues as “super pissed that we didn’t get more direction from leadership.”

How much “direction” do Democrats need in order to recognize that they should pay respect to families of murder victims? Does acknowledging a 13-year-old brain cancer survivor require “guidance”?

Moreover, why did Golden, who disapproved of the antics, nonetheless talk of “strategy” and “optics”?

In short, the whole thing looked and sounded too farcical to believe. Any rational person could see that Democratic lawmakers, like Screwtape, had extreme malice in their hearts. And yet, like Screwtape forever chastising Wormwood for the young tempter’s incompetence, Democrats now look for all the world like a mildly comic collection of fools best ignored.

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