When I saw Elon Musk wielding a chainsaw at CPAC I knew it would be shared everywhere. MAGA people LOVE that image, “He’s owning the libs! AWESOME! An Alpha male cutting Federal Government waste!” But what they won’t see are the lives destroyed by the illegal and reckless cuts.
The pattern we are seeing is a massive sweeping cut, then outrage. If it is so egregious or outrageous like Nuclear Security it’s “an accident” and they try to rehire the people fired. Now you would THINK that if it hits a program or constituent base that Republican politicians care about, they would stand up for their own people. But that hasn’t happened. We see them go on TV and say, the cuts are a good thing.
She needs to be on Fox “News” so people can connect Musk’s cuts & the betrayal of vets to GOP senators who aren’t helping her, but praising Musk. But that is not going to happen because Fox is busy talking about how the cuts are justified. They have “experts” from the Heritage Foundation on talking about the benefits of massive cuts. Like this story in Iowa Public Radio Universities dodge major NIH funding cuts, for now. Here’s what you need to know
When I read about Trump/Musk/DOGE atrocities I wonder, “Why aren’t the dem consultants telling the congress people to get out there & fight?” Someone said, “They aren’t getting paid for that. They are doing focus groups on what messages are safe like ‘Boy are Republicans embarrassed by the price of eggs!'”
I don’t know, but I suspect that the Jefferies “we have no power” strategy is designed to force the GOP politicians to act. I’m not a highly paid consultant, just a Dirty Funny Hippie and have a history of being right, but if I was involved in the strategy, I’d be helping develop stories like Chelsea Milburn, a disabled Navy vet, who got fired. I’d link them to Musk’s reckless cuts like in this photo, showing who was hurt by the cuts.
I’d be pushing them into Fox “News” & social media about how cuts are hurting MAGA. But stories that play on Fox & RW social media need to be different that ours. We want to see stories about MAGA people who voted for Trump, realized now they aren’t exempt from his cuts and regret it. Then in the comments you will see people on the left write, “I have no sympathy for people who voted for the leopards eating my ate my face party who are now having their faces eaten.”
Now WE can share Chelsea’s story to our networks, but it won’t play on Fox because she was in the Department of Education, which they are eliminating. They will say, “Yes, it’s bad she is a disabled vet.” But they won’t really defend her because she is a FEMALE veteran, and think she was probably hired because of DEI.
If a story about a MAGA voter being impacted by stupid cuts runs on RW media it needs to be about a white male who was “accidently” laid off, like the Nuclear Security people. If the story runs on Fox, the MAGA voter needs to save face by also saying something like, “I think that there is too much Waste, Fraud and Abuse, just not in my department, or by me. And I still think what Trump and Musk are doing is good.” (We saw this with the MAGA farmer whose USAID /USDA program was cut. He didn’t want to blame Musk/Trump, he figured it was a mistake and his GOP rep would help him out.)
Communicating in an era of siloed information is hard, but when there is no pushback to a certain narrative on the right, people who only consume that media will believe what they see on Fox and read on social media.
Also when EVERYONE is confused about if funding for a program is frozen or unfrozen, it becomes hard to advocate for it. “Hey I heard the NIH funding was restored! We can relax.” BUT NOTHING is SAFE with this administration. When I first contacted my alma mater about NIH funding cuts, they didn’t respond, since it looked like they were back on. Then it falls off the list of things people worry about. But with RFK Jr. in place, new cuts are coming.
The democrats need professionals to turn the story back around to show what Musk/Trump are doing, why they are doing it this way and how to fight back.
For example, science communication professionals need to explain what’s happening with medical research funding cuts and get people to talk about how their lives were saved by the research that was just cut by Musk / RFK Jr. The universities need to tell their rich, politically-connected alumni what’s really happening. They can make the calls to GOP Senators and demand they stand up for the people in their state and their medical research institutions. If they go on RW media to talk about it, they need to be prepared to stand up against the Heritage Foundation experts. When they call Senator Ricketts or Deb Fischer in Nebraska they can ask why they voted to confirm RFK Jr. and why aren’t they protecting their institutions of higher learning?
(BTW for great info about what is happening in medical funding cuts I turn to Judd Legum at Popular Information and The Center for American Progress. )
Stories like CAP’s How Cuts to NIH Research Funding Would Hurt States”can be minded to find individuals who are hurt, THOSE stories can play on RW media and mainstream media.
We can reach our audience with these stories, but we need some savvy communicators who understand we have to blow up the talking points about “waste, fraud and abuse” and who can also explain to RW media how sad it is that GOP politicians aren’t helping the poor MAGA voters in their own state.
