On Monday night’s episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Karine Jean-Pierre, the former White House press secretary, sat across from the host and delivered a line that resonated far beyond the studio lights:
“Right now, the two-party system is not working.”
It was a calm but piercing statement; one that crystallized the theme of her newly released memoir, Independent, and her growing disillusionment with both major political parties.
Jean-Pierre, who stepped down from her role in the Biden administration in January, spoke with unusual candor about the exhaustion and frustration she’s witnessed among everyday Americans — and within the Democratic Party itself.
“A lot of people who identify as Democrats are dissatisfied,” she told Colbert. “There’s no fight. There’s no soul.”
A Departure Rooted in Disillusionment
Jean-Pierre said that after leaving government, she was struck by how many ordinary people approached her, at supermarkets, coffee shops, even on the street, expressing despair over the direction of the country and the apparent lack of passion in political leadership.
“They would come up to me in tears,” she recalled. “‘What’s happening? Why isn’t the Democratic leadership fighting?’ they’d ask. And that broke me.”
That human encounter, she explained, inspired her to write Independent, a book that offers what she calls a “roadmap” for re-engaging with civic life outside the constraints of traditional party politics.
Inside Independent: Politics Without a Party
The book, released Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025 doubles as a memoir and a reckoning. Jean-Pierre revisits the tumultuous end of President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, Vice President Kamala Harris’s failed presidential bid, and her own struggles navigating political loyalty versus moral conviction.
She insists she saw no evidence of Biden’s cognitive decline, pushing back against media narratives that painted him as diminished. Instead, she attributes his disastrous debate performance against Donald Trump to a cold and exhaustion, not incapacity.
But Jean-Pierre’s real shock came in July 2024, when Biden dropped out of the race.
“My heart began to pound,” she writes. “I was stunned, my feelings a blur.”
She describes the withdrawal as a devastating moment, one that left her “enraged and heartbroken” at how the party she once fiercely defended treated its leader.
I Never Believed Harris Could Win
Jean-Pierre also writes with painful honesty about her doubts that America was ready to elect a Black woman as president. Her skepticism, she insists, was born not of cynicism but of lived experience.
“I’d been in the body of a Black woman all my life,” she writes. “All my experiences of blistering stares and racist assumptions left me unable to see this country electing a president who looked like me.”
That reflection, shared on The Late Show with visible emotion, underscores the intersection of race, gender, and disillusionment that runs through her narrative. “It’s not about giving up,” she told Colbert. “It’s about finding a new way to fight.”
A System in Crisis
Jean-Pierre didn’t shy away from criticizing both major parties. While she labeled the MAGA movement “an extremist, authoritarian, right-wing force,” she also said Democrats had lost their spark — their “teeth,” as she put it.
Her broader point was one of systemic fatigue.
“The two-party system is not working,” she said again toward the end of the interview. “We need new energy, new imagination — and we can’t just keep doing politics by habit.”
A Moment of Political Honesty
For a country mired in polarization, Jean-Pierre’s remarks felt like a rare flash of authenticity. In an era of talking points and party scripts, her willingness to admit both personal disappointment and public hope landed with unusual power.
Her book Independent may not offer easy answers, but its message — that Americans must rediscover civic engagement beyond party lines — taps into a growing national mood. More voters today identify as independents than as Democrats or Republicans, and Jean-Pierre seems determined to give that silent middle a voice.
Her appearance on The Late Show wasn’t just a book promotion. It was a declaration; a call to citizens to reimagine their relationship with power and participation.
“We can’t wait for the system to fix itself,” she told Colbert. “We have to be the ones to move it forward.”
And with that, Jean-Pierre left viewers with a message that cuts through the noise of Washington: sometimes, stepping away from the party is the first step toward reclaiming democracy.
