1 week Ago
Ron Faucheux Facebook Twitter WhatsApp SMS Email Print Copy article link Save Who speaks for the Democratic Party? Is it Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Bill or Hillary Clinton? Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi or Hakeem Jeffries? Is it an ambitious governor, senator or House member? Or, perhaps, it’s the party’s actual chair, Ken Martin? The answer, of course, is all of the above. They all speak for the party — and that upsets a lot of Democrats. They want one voice to take the fight to Donald Trump.
But, realistically, that won’t happen until the summer of 2028, when they nominate a presidential candidate. Parties out of power rarely have leaders who can represent them wholly and authoritatively. Democrats faced that reality during Ronald Reagan’s two terms, the three Bush terms and Trump’s first term.
Republicans faced it during the Clinton and Obama administrations. Former presidents won’t fill the void. They can give great convention speeches — as Obama and Clinton have done.
But too much attention on an ex-president risks confining a party’s future to its past. An exception, of course, has been Trump. He’s the undeniable voice and leader of the Republican Party and has been since 2016.
He’s dictated just about everything the party has done and fights all its fights, even when out of office. Trump is unique. Even Lyndon Johnson, a domineering politician who loved the exercise of power, didn’t control every fragment of the Democratic Party.
Remember when Senate Democrats fiercely opposed his Vietnam policies? Ronald Reagan was beloved by his party. Republican candidates happily identified with his sunny conservativism for 35 years. But he never tried to rule his party as if it were personal property or to speak for it on every issue.
For now, Democrats need to focus on their message and agenda, not who will sell it. They may get by for a while as the anti-Trump party, but that’s a shaky foundation on which to build an enduring governing majority. They need to stand for something that appeals to the full electorate, and not just targeted constituencies.
This column, you may recall, recommended that Democrats should take a page from former British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s playbook and move their party to the center. That strategy worked for Blair; his New Labour Party won three straight national elections. Democratic presidential prospects for 2028 have made a few moves in this direction, notably California Gov.
Gavin Newsom, who has made comments about spooling back progressive rhetoric, especially on divisive social issues. But reshaping the party into a less edgy and more centrist force has yet to be embraced by its major power centers. Moving in the opposite direction was the recent “Fighting Oligarchy” tour that featured Vermont Sen.
Bernie Sanders and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. These two “democratic socialists” drew big crowds and raised big bucks.
Merchandise sold on the tour’s website brandished slogans such as “Green New Deal for the future,” “Cancel all student debt,” “Tax the rich,” “Build the union movement” and “Fight the power.” Paradoxically, the limits of progressive politics were also in evidence on the tour’s website. Merchandise included baseball cards featuring Chicago’s progressive mayor Brandon Johnson — who won with Sanders’ endorsement and now, on the job, has a dismal 7% approval rating in his city.
Democrats and Republicans have a right to fight for what they believe. But they also have a need to win national elections and the chance to govern. They can’t fall into ideological traps that push away voters they need.
The recent Harvard CAPS-Harris poll demonstrates this reality. It finds that 74% of voters favor deporting illegal immigrants who have committed crimes; 70% want to close the border and strengthen security; 69% favor a full-scale effort to root out fraud and waste from government; 65% don’t want males who have undergone procedures to become women participating in girls’ sports; and 57% want to freeze foreign aid. Many Democrats say they agree, at least partly, with some of these poll-tested policies.
But do you think the national electorate associates these policies with the Democratic Party? I didn’t think so. You see, there are more important things for Democrats to fret about than who will speak for them on CNN tonight. Ron Faucheux is a nonpartisan political analyst, pollster and writer based in Louisiana.
He authored Running for Office and publishes LunchtimePolitics.com , a national newsletter on polls..
