MSNBC's "Morning Joe" panel on Tuesday criticized congressional Democrats for not coming "to grips with the fact that they are in the extremely deep minority in the House and the minority in the Senate."
Co-host Mika Brzezinski started the segment by questioning the strategy behind Democrats in Congress protesting President Trump's executive orders halting immigration from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa and refugee admission into the U.S.
"I didn't feel like this was where we needed to be," Brzezinski said of Monday night's protest that featured House and Senate Minority Leaders Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) and Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), respectively.
"They are operating by an old playbook," Politico's Jake Sherman said. He suggested that Democrats have not come to grips with the notion that they are the minority party in both the House and the Senate.
"This party has not really moved on from 2006," Sherman continued. "I can't tell you how many Democrats that I talk to on Capitol Hill that want change and want it now in the leadership on Capitol Hill."
Co-host Joe Scarborough noted that Democratic leadership needs to evaluate why certain counties voted so heavily for former President Obama in 2008 and 2012 but swung over to supporting Trump this past presidential cycle.
"They have to figure out how to get out of the old mode and start speaking to some of these communities," Scarborough said.
"It would be a little harsh to say they haven't learned anything since 2006, but they are not where the base is," former Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean said of current party leadership. Dean added that the party leadership has not embraced the younger voters of its own party and that these supporters "can't stand the dialogue going on in Washington because it's always taking blowtorches to each other."
Referring back to the Monday night protest, Brzezinski asked Dean if he believes the future leaders of the Democratic Party were on that stage with Pelosi and Schumer. Dean initially paused when responding to Brzezinski's question before saying, "Yeah, I think there probably were." He then suggested that Democrats need a "whole new generation of leaders to come up."