“Drain The Swamp” is a phrase most commonly associated with the 2016 presidential campaign of the Republican candidate. Many of us were fooled into thinking he was referring to the network of highly paid lobbyists who infest Washington, DC. Their primary job is to subvert the will of the people in order to gain an advantage for their private clients. William Greider, a long-time journalist in Washington, DC, laid it all out in exquisite detail in his 1992 book Who Will Tell The People? in which he detailed how special interests have hollowed out the federal government, leaving nothing but a shell.
As it turns out, for Republicans, “the swamp” was the federal government itself, which anarchists like Grover Norquist said they wanted to shrink until it was small enough to drown in the bathtub. That is exactly what the current occupant of the Offal Office is doing, as he carries out the nefarious Project 2025 plot created by Russell Vought, the most powerful person in the government most people have never heard of. It is clear that the US government today is the most corrupt it has ever been in the history of the nation. Those who oppose the blatant shoveling of money into the pockets of a favored few are derided as communists who hate America.
The Democratic Party, led by Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, is in a tizzy because voters are suddenly embracing communists, socialists, and other dangerous radicals in elections and primaries. The powers that be want to be plodding middle-of-the-roaders who are afraid to upset the apple cart. They fear such rabble rousers will turn off voters in the next general election, handing victories at the polls to Republicans.
Out Of Touch
What seems clear is that the Democratic Party has lost touch with America. Gone is the fervor of the New Deal, the signature package of legislation that brought economic benefits to all Americans, even those who did not own railroads and oil companies. Reactionaries like Charles Koch have been desperate to dismantle the New Deal since the day it was enacted, and now it seems they are on the brink of achieving their goal. It is no coincidence that Russell Vought is an acolyte of Charles Koch.
In a recent Substack post, historian Heather Cox Richardson described how Ronald Reagan once nominated Robert Bork for a seat on the Supreme Court. Bork was one of the most vocal supporters of the “originalism” theory of Constitutional law, which holds that the document means only what those who wrote it intended it to mean and nothing more. Originalism would annul such liberal claptrap as Brown vs. Board of Education and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Readers may note the recent rulings by the Supreme Court have eviscerated the Civil Rights Act in the name of originalism.
And yet this court has decreed that corporations are “people” who are entitled to free speech in the form of unlimited campaign donations, despite the fact that the word “corporation” does not appear anywhere in the Constitution. One can only conclude that originalism is little more than a convenient fiction that allows the court to favor those whose politics it approves of and punish those it does not. During Bork’s confirmation hearing, Senator Ted Kennedy said:
“Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, Blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists could be censored at the whim of the Government, and the doors of the Federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is — and is often the only — protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy.”
Richardson wrote, “At the time, Bork’s supporters expressed outrage at what they insisted was Kennedy’s smear campaign, for surely the right-wing attack on the protections of the Fourteenth Amendment would never so completely undermine modern society. And yet in 2026, here we are.”
The Drain The Swamp Anti-Corruption Legislation
Two members of Congress, Greg Landsman of Ohio and Josh Riley of New York, have filed a bill in the House of Representatives they call the Drain The Swamp Act. Might it serve as a blueprint for how the Democratic Party could end its long journey through the political wilderness and find a set of principles it can offer voters without apology? Below is a synopsis of the 250 page proposed legislation. The full text of the proposed legislation is available here.
In response to unprecedented, blatant corruption and increasing attacks on our democracy, Congressman Landsman and Congressman Riley introduced the Drain the Swamp Act — a package of reforms to take on our rigged system, strengthen democracy, and restore trust in government.
The Drain the Swamp Act would return power to the American people by:
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- Banning the President, Vice President, members of Congress, and their immediate families from owning or trading stocks.
- Banning Supreme Court justices and their immediate families from owning or trading stocks.
- Banning betting on political events and other government actions in prediction markets for members of Congress and their immediate families, the President and Vice President, political appointees, judicial officials, high-ranking military personnel, and other government officials.
- Prohibiting presidents, their immediate families, and their businesses from suing the federal government without bipartisan approval from Congress.
- Strengthening the emoluments clauses of the Constitution to stop presidents and federal officials from illegally accepting bribes and gifts.
- Establishing 18 year term limits for the Supreme Court and Congress.
- Suspending pay for members of Congress during government shutdowns or if the public debt limit is reached.
- Revoking pensions for Congress, cabinet officials, and former presidents convicted of felonies.
- Establishing ethics rules for the Supreme Court.
- Preventing abuse of the presidential pardon power.
- Removing the statute of limitations for crimes committed by the President or Vice President.
- Overturning Citizens United.
- Banning partisan gerrymandering.
- Banning corporate PACs.
- Banning untraceable “dark” money in politics.
- Ending voter suppression by enacting the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.
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Is this legislative package a platform the Democratic Party could use to build a winning election strategy in 2026? It certainly seems to address many areas that concern today’s voters without reading like the Communist Manifesto. Is it too radical or just radical enough?
Would you vote for a candidate who ran on the ideas proposed by the Drain The Swamp Act? I know I would. It will be interesting to see who signs on as co-sponsors for this legislation — and who does not.