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They just don't get it nor do they understand that it is possible and desirable for some residents to ditch the car note and expensive maintenance to live car-free in select cities where this is possible.
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Most American cities which aren't on the coasts don't have sufficient job density to make total car free living realistic, but they do have areas of moderate residential density where conflict over parking is an issue. This issue will remain until autonomous cars completely take over. If a city like Phoenix eliminated parking minimums, it probably wouldn't result in market driven density increases and greater transit usage. Instead developers would still add parking to new construction.
The exception to the rule would be downtowns, though. Most sunbelt downtowns still have paid parking, and there's and expectation that you have to pay for parking. They have the highest concentration of transit. Few residents, its mostly people in huge corporate office towers that have parking garages. So I would agree that if we wanted to eliminate parking minimums, that downtowns are the place to start. You'd see fewer podium towers as developers could build or buy a garage a few blocks away instead.