Politics & Power Quote by David Plouffe

Plouffe’s line is a lesson in Washington’s favorite rhetorical trick: framing a choice as mere maintenance. Calling disaster relief a “basic function of Congress” sounds like civics-class common sense, which is exactly the point. If the job is basic, then refusal isn’t a policy disagreement; it’s sabotage. He’s not arguing the details of a bill so much as policing the boundaries of acceptable conduct.

The second sentence sharpens the blade. “What we ought not to do” is moral language dressed as procedural advice, and “play politics” is the beltway’s most damning soft accusation: it implies cynicism without naming culprits. Plouffe invites listeners to supply their own villain, which makes the critique portable across news cycles. The real leverage comes from the phrase “those who have been affected by disasters.” It shifts the subject from budgets and bargaining chips to people in distress, making obstruction feel less like strategy and more like cruelty.

Context matters here: Plouffe is a Democratic strategist-turned-public servant figure, speaking from inside a governing coalition that regularly faced hostage-taking around must-pass funding and emergency aid. The intent is to delegitimize the tactic of attaching unrelated demands to relief or shutdown deadlines. Subtext: disasters are politically useful, yes, but they shouldn’t be politically usable. By insisting on “keeping the government running,” he’s also drawing a bright line between governance as duty and governance as theater, daring Congress to choose which one it wants to be seen doing.