The Democratic National Committee is holding its summer meeting in Minneapolis. There is a lot to talk about. The party, of course, is suffering through a major slide in popularity. A Wall Street Journal poll a few weeks ago found that voters’ approval of the party is its lowest in 35 years. A New York Times report this month found that, “Of the 30 states that track voter registration by political party, Democrats lost ground to Republicans in every single one between the 2020 and 2024 elections — and often by a lot.”

Democrats have also shown a knack for getting on the unpopular side of a number of issues, like the border and crime. They’re also deeply divided on Israel and Gaza. And they’re in a terrible money crunch; at the end of June, the Democratic National Committee reported about $15 million cash-on-hand, compared to $80 million reported by the Republican National Committee.

But even with all that, many Democrats believe the single greatest problem facing the party is that they are being too nice to President Donald Trump.

If you are a Republican, you will find that an astonishing statement. Hasn’t the Democratic Party been bashing Trump 24/7 for nearly the last decade? Yes, they have. But now many Democrats want their leaders to get really tough with the president.

“I’m sick and tired of this Democratic Party bringing a pencil to a knife fight,” party chairman Ken Martin said this week at the meeting in Minneapolis. “We cannot be the only party that plays by the rules any more. We’ve got to stand up and fight. We’re not going to have a hand tied behind our back any more.”

You might remember that in the course of a few months in 2023, Democratic prosecutors filed 91 felony charges against Trump. Other Democratic law enforcement officials sued him in an effort to destroy his business empire. Others went to court to use the 14th Amendment to declare him ineligible for office. And that was after Democrats impeached Trump twice.

Now, Democratic attorneys general and activist allies have launched an unprecedented wave of legal warfare to stop every Trump policy initiative. The anti-Trump website Lawfare is currently tracking 334 active suits challenging administration policies. “We’ve sued this dude 44 times, and we’ll sue him 44 more and 44 more after that,” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison told Democrats in Minneapolis.

Democrats want their leaders to fight, fight, fight, even if the cause is ill-advised. That’s why many are cheering California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s campaign to set aside state redistricting law to draw more likely Democratic House districts to answer Texas’s effort. Given the state of red and blue districts across the country, Newsom’s is probably not a good idea — if there is a redistricting war, Republicans have a lot more resources than Democrats do.

But Newsom is fighting! No more bringing a pencil to a knife fight! Democrats also like that Newsom has taken to posting strange Trump parodies on his and his office’s X sites. For example, Newsom recently criticized Fox News for its coverage of him by posting “THEY ARE VERY DISHONEST AND ALL THEY DO IS TRASH ME, GAVIN C. NEWSOM, AMERICA’S FAVORITE GOVERNOR (AND MANY SAY THE MOST HANDSOME IN HISTORY, THANK YOU!).” Newsom ended his post, of course, with “THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!”

Democrats also like another party governor, JB Pritzker of Illinois, who is fond of calling the president a Nazi. Back in February, Pritzker devoted much of an address to the state legislature to denouncing Trump. “If you think I’m overreacting, sounding the alarm too soon, consider this,” Pritzker said. “It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. I just have one question — what comes next?”

By Pritzker’s logic, the United States should have been a Nazi dictatorship for several months by now. Fortunately, he was wrong. But he’s fighting! No more bringing a pencil to a knife fight!

It’s entirely understandable that Democrats are frustrated. That happens to parties when they do not control the White House, House or Senate. Shut out of power, the Democrats have no leader — no president, no House speaker, no Senate leader. In the absence of leadership, the loudest voices in the party, those out on the fringes, receive the most attention. And that means more moderate Democrats, the ones who might lead their party out of its current mess, do not receive much notice.

This is probably not a permanent situation. Despite their multitude of problems, Democrats could be in a far better place by the end of next year. They might win control of one or both houses of Congress. After all, the Republican House majority is incredibly narrow, the president’s party often loses seats, and voters tend to like divided government. Having given the GOP control of everything in 2024, they might make a change in 2026.

So Democrats have a chance to improve their situation. But the answer is not filing one more lawsuit, or calling Trump a Nazi one more time, or posting one more faux-Trump tweet. The question is whether party leaders will realize that before they lose another election.