Saxapahaw, NC (AP) – The Senator of Connecticut Chris Murphy did not draw the stadium size crowds as The Senator of Vermont Bernie Sanders and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are then that he turns the country talking to voters. But in a crowded concert hall of Rural North Carolina, people are starting to consider the Democrat as worthy of national spotlights.
Murphy and the representative Maxwell Frost, d-Fla., Have organized events in the districts of the republican congress in recent weeks, dragging GOP legislators such as representative Richard Hudson, who represents the region they visited on Thursday. Hudson, the president of the GOP House campaign campaign, Discouraged the republicans of the outfit of the town hallsSo Murphy and Frost decided to hold one on his lawn at home in North Carolina.
“We do the work that these members of the Congress and the Republican Senators will not do,” Murphy said to the crowd in force of the voters mostly older during the event, while recognizing that Democrats must do more to appease their anxiety and their counter President Donald Trump. “I want to make sure that everywhere, in all corners of this country, people are ready to get up and fight.”
As other democrats answer In Trump's elections, without knowing how to confront it, Murphy channels his own frustration and his anger in a supported blitz on television appearances, fundraising calls, speeches and events of the Senate like that of North Carolina. He also speaks directly to voters on social networks, including through Long live videos on Instagram Where he sits in his kitchen with a cocktail and tries to explain what he considers “the central history” of the presidency of Trump – “the billionaire takeover of our government made possible by the destruction of our democracy”.
It is a methodical approach to Murphy, 51, a serious legislator who was best known for his fight for several years to stem armed violence following 2012 filming to Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 first -year students and six educators.
While discussions on the kitchen on Instagram seem to come more naturally to Murphy than to go up a crowd, his message clearly resonates with the basis of voters of his party, many of which are Angry to the Democrats in Washington for inaction. He collected about $ 8 million in the first quarter of the year, a significant sum that could compete with the Totals of Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, which attracted a much larger crowd together during a tour.
“I mean, I am not Bernie Sanders,” Murphy said in an interview after the event in Saxapahaw. “I'm not going to draw 70,000 people. But that does not mean that I do not yet have the obligation to try to go out and support a national mobilization. ”
The frustration towards the leaders of the Democratic Party has passed last month, most of the anger focused on the Democratic leader of the Senate, Chuck Schumer of New York, which voted for a republican bill to keep the government open when the base hoped to see more fight of their elected officials. Murphy was firmly against the bill, even if it was opposed, it meant that the Democrats would trigger the government.
“I think that when people see us engaged in an unfavorable behavior at risk, they are much less likely to run for the rallies to finally engage in the type of civil disobedience that we could need to save democracy,” said Murphy.
Its fundraising transport and media and event dam raised questions about its future ambitions. But we don't know where Murphy's moment could drive. He insists that he does not think of a presidential offer or a future in the direction of the Senate after the Democrat No. 2, Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, announced this week That he will retire next year.
“I think it is probably not a coincidence that my content will lose and that more and more people are listening to me at a time when I do not get up every day to think of my personal political future,” said Murphy, who was re -elected to the Senate last year.
“There will be no elections in 2028 if we do not win this fight for the moment. It therefore seems a little silly to think of something other than the urgency that exists today. I am not trying to avoid the question. It is not a cop. It is legitimately what motivates me.”
Ron Osborne, the president of the Alamance County Democratic Party, where Thursday's event was located, said that he had not already considered Murphy as a major competitor for the presidency in 2028. But “he does the right things,” said Osborne.
“He speaks where the others could do the same thing and did not do it,” said Osborne, and “it takes courage”.
Terry Greenlund, a 78 -year -old democrat who was also in the audience, said he thought Murphy “had a way of speaking with people.”
“I think it's time for a new generation to settle with new views, ideas and energy,” said Greenlund, echoing many others in the room.
Murphy, 51 and the father of two teenagers, seems to enjoy attention. He joked during the event that he may not be as “cool” as Frost, who is the youngest member of the congress at 28 years old. But Murphy is still decades less than many of his colleagues, who have checked the party for years.
“I try to be a cool dad,” said Murphy.
Murphy was in Missouri on Friday after visiting a republican district of Michigan with Frost last month. And they are not the only democrats venturing into the red states. In addition to Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, the Governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz, the vice-presidential candidate in 2024, and the California Ro Khanna representative also recently traveled to speak to voters in republican regions.
Murphy said he didn't want to “reinvent the wheel” with his fundraising transport, but he doesn't want to sit on it either. He said he planned to help organizations mobilize voters before the mid-term elections in 2026 and also put pressure on the Republicans while they are trying to push the tax and spend the reductions in the congress.
“The only way in which history tells us that you prevent an elected leader from converting a country far from democracy is mass mobilization,” he said.
“Our party has made mistakes, and if we don't learn these mistakes,” said Murphy, “we are cooked.”
