If you want to know where you’re going, you need to know how you got there. The Democratic Party is in a seeming civil war right now. This week it was Illinois, last week it was Texas. On one side, the Biden/Clinton coalition of voters from 2016/2020 and on the other, the Bernie Sanders/Elizabeth Warren wing. The actual policy differences in the two are only marginal, really. Both favor expanding health care access, fighting climate change, funding things like public education, and access to reproductive health care. The disagreement is largely based on details and how far to go, from a policy standpoint. Philosophically they are different though. The Bernie/Warren wing of the party wants to build a Democratic Party that resembles a European Green/Social Democratic Party, or British Labour under Corbyn. The Clinton/Biden voter wants a more center-left party. How did we get here and how do you square the two?

To understand the modern Democratic Party I think you need to go backwards and start at there different dates- 1966, 1992, and 2006. They are actually not similar elections at all. Two are midterms, one a Presidential. Democrats won in 2006, while 1966 and 1992 are a mixed bag in many ways. So why these years? I’ll start with 1966, because to me it’s the beginning of all modern politics (not that nothing mattered before that, but nothing should really be viewed as modern). 1966 was the first election after the passage of LBJ’s Civil Rights agenda in Congress. It was the beginning of Democrats decline among white voters that truly culminates in the Reagan years, then relatively stabilizes with Clinton. Democrats started to see some losses in 1966. Many folks like to attribute Johnson’s fall in popularity with Vietnam, but any honest analysis tells you it was mostly otherwise. In 1968 the nation would move to electing Nixon on such themes as “the silent majority,” “law and order,” and eventually “peace with honor.” White voters began their move in 1966, but accelerated it in 1968 and especially 1972. Watergate did interrupt Republican dominance in 1974 and 1976, but by 1980, 1984, and 1988 Republicans were carrying Catholics, running 60% neighborhood numbers with White voters, and carrying the Midwest. They also began eroding the “Solid South” Democrats had enjoyed since the Civil War, which ultimately culminated in the 1994 takeover of Congress, but really took hold under Reagan. In fact, 1966 was the “canary in the coal mine” that foreshadowed Republicans winning five of the next six Presidential elections. Obviously that takes me to 1992 and Clinton. Clinton was the first Democrat to truly reap the benefits of the growing support the party had from Black voters. He also made gains with “soccer moms” and other “normie” voters who were alarmed by the “Christian Coalition” and other culture warrior conservatives. Bill Clinton pulled in white moderate voters and majorities with most non-white groups. Clinton largely abandoned the ideological left of the 1960’s politically. Clinton’s White House was less progressive dogma than his Democratic predecessors, even if that is a bit embellished by some (see his 1993 budget). Sure, Clinton invested heavily in education, the environment, and “built a cabinet that looks like America,” but he also did welfare reform, balanced the budget, was a free trader, and had “Sista Soulja.” Clinton aimed for broad appeal that made him less popular with left-wing academics, ex-hippies, and ideological leftists. He was really popular too, sitting in the 60’s through the end of his term amidst an economic boom. Clinton was personally problematic though. He had the Lewinsky affair. His Vice-President ran for President and lost a very, very controversial election. And probably most importantly of all, his wife became the first ever First Lady to run for office herself after the White House, winning a U.S. Senate seat in New York, which was of course not Bill’s home state. Of course we know the early 2000’s after Clinton were a tumultuous time as well, with 9/11 and the Iraq War dominating much of the discourse through the 2004 Election. And that pretty much takes us up to modern times.

The third year I put in there was 2006, and 2006 is truly the beginning of what the Democratic Party is now. George W. Bush was deeply unpopular by 2006. Iraq, Katrina, a failed Supreme Court nomination, and an attempt to privatize Social Security had worn him down. The Democratic Party was almost identity-less at that point though. The party’s last two Presidents, Carter (defeated) and Clinton (problematic personally) were memories by then. The last two House Speakers who had been run out of office in defeat (Jim Wright of Texas had been forced to resign and Tom Foley of Washington was defeated in his re-election). Tom Daschle’s brief period as Majority Leader in the Senate was a bad memory (Iraq, the Patriot Act, his own defeat in 2004). The Supreme Court had been narrowly conservative since the Reagan-Bush period. The party had no recognizable national leader really. And yet, the party won, and won a lot. Democrats took both houses of Congress in a wave election. Nancy Pelosi became the first woman to lead Congress as Speaker. Moderate mormon Harry Reid, a marginally pro-life Nevada Senator took over the Senate. Democrats took the House winning in places like Suburban Pittsburgh, took the Senate by flipping states like Missouri, Montana, and Virginia, and won Governorships in places like Ohio. This wave in non-traditionally blue areas set the stage for 2008 and the birth of today’s Democratic divisions, in part because the Democrats basically won Congress without a real ideological direction. They ran talking about the minimum wage, the war, health care, and ending corruption. It wasn’t exactly a far left manifesto.

A lot of people have revised the history of the 2008 primaries to fit their narratives that emerged after 2016. First off, the race was essentially a one-on-one race from New Hampshire on. Barack Obama’s coalition was built largely on Black voters, young voters, and progressive white voters. Hillary Clinton dominated among rural voters, older voters, and Hispanic voters. These coalitions dramatically changed by 2016, and even again by 2020. While Clinton won women on the whole pretty solidly, she lost young women in her 2008 run, and Black women. Obviously that was different in 2016. Obama’s coalition didn’t really crack based on age at all. Hillary continuously won in primaries, Obama won caucuses. Opposition to the Iraq War was a huge selling point for Barack Obama, particularly with lefties and young people. Obama’s coalition more closely actually resembled Bernie Sanders campaigns, and yet he was able to win. That was largely a product of Black voters sticking by him loyally. That’s about the only theme from that primary that holds up moving forward though. The rest of his primary coalition essentially forms the backbone of today’s populist left.

I think it’s fascinating to guess as to why most of the groups in the Obama coalition moved from him in 2008 to a more combative populist by 2016. There’s not really an obvious reason. Barack Obama, even today, polls as the most popular Democratic politician in the country pretty easily, and across most ideological spectrums. Some surmise that he wasn’t tough enough on Wall Street after the 2008 crash, or that he didn’t deliver a “public option” in Obamacare, or that he didn’t get out of Afghanistan and close Guantanamo, or all kinds of other theories of his shortcomings, and yet there’s not an ounce of data in polling that suggests these voters soured on Obama even a bit in his Presidency. Interestingly it does seem that Clinton’s coalition did crack quite a bit on their support of her. The more rural Democratic voters who had supported her in places like West Virginia and South Dakota joined young voters and progressive white voters in backing Bernie Sanders in 2016, while Black voters joined older voters and Hispanic voters in backing Clinton’s 2016 primary campaign. While Obama’s poll numbers stayed strong, something clearly had moved within his original base by 2016. Not only did a lot of his coalition move to Bernie, a fatally sizable portion of progressive whites, young voters, and even Clinton’s 2008 rural base either moved to Donald Trump or didn’t vote for her. While she got virtually the same amount of votes as Obama got in 2012, and won the popular vote, Clinton lost the election. Florida, Ohio, and Iowa moved comfortably right into Trump’s coalition. Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin moved towards Trump by the skin of his teeth. Clinton narrowly hung onto Maine, New Hampshire, and Minnesota. Obama had won all nine of these states both times, and rather convincingly for the most part.

The thing I find interesting about 2016 is that it really wasn’t supposed to happen. The progressive champion of the moment in 2015 was Elizabeth Warren, and she simply missed her moment in time to try and run for President. Joe Biden was probably the most bullet proof candidate the Democrats would have had at that time, and most of official Washington dismissed him as a candidate. There were some dead-ender “normies” that thought Martin O’Malley was a real alternative to Hillary, but basically the Beltway was ready to hand her the nomination. Bernie Sanders had some real people in Iowa and New Hampshire, but his national campaign apparatus didn’t read like a powerhouse. Republican operatives thought they were going to get a battle between Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Chris Christie, almost all of them thought Trump was a joke. Bernie and Trump were literally no one’s idea in DC. Then our politics turned on it’s head.

Of course 2018 did happen, but it now looks more like an anomaly than a sea change in our politics. Democrats made a real pivot towards nominating women for Congress in the aftermath of Hillary’s defeat and managed to take the House this way. Of course, Democrats had cultivated no new leaders in the time from 2006 until 2018 though, and Pelosi was back in the Speaker’s office. Pelosi is probably the closest thing to middle ground between the left and center in the Democratic national leadership, but even that isn’t neutral. 2018 brought a new majority in the House of Obama/Clinton Democrats, but also brought about “The Squad,” and did little to assuage the oncoming 2020 nomination fight.

The early portion of the 2020 primaries was a mirage. Joe Biden eventually was nominated by dominating with a coalition of Black, Hispanic, rural, and older Democratic primary voters that was both more moderate and yet more broad than Clinton’s. In the early going states of Iowa and New Hampshire though, he struggled while splitting his electorate with Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar. Once he edged them out in Nevada for second though, he consolidated his electorate in South Carolina and ran away with the nomination by the widest margin since Kerry in 2004. Bernie Sanders had some early success before fading, building largely off of a coalition of younger Hispanics, younger voters in general, and progressive white voters. Bernie also faced problems early on with splitting his vote, particularly the progressive female portion of it, with Elizabeth Warren. The other obvious weird part was Covid essentially interrupting the primaries shortly after Super Tuesday and making the primary seem to be over. Even so, Biden had built a substantial lead after Super Tuesday and lead every poll at that point.

Biden went on to win the 2020 election with the broadest coalition in American history, getting 51%, over 81 million votes, and 306 electoral votes. Democrats won the Senate and made Chuck Schumer the Senate Majority Leader along with Pelosi still leading the House. From there, things sort of went down hill. In 2021, Roe v. Wade was overturned, setting off rage within the Democratic ranks. In 2022, despite rising inflation and Biden’s unpopularity, Democrats lost single digit seats in the House, despite losing the popular vote by over 2 million votes and ultimately narrowly losing the House. Frankly, the defeat looked way better than it actually was, and the loss was foreshadowing of what was to come. Biden’s popularity continued to drain over economic concerns and worries about his age. He ended up dropping out in the middle of the 2024 Presidential race, despite what was essentially a margin of error deficit in the polls. He was largely pushed out by major donors, many of whom had been fans of his as Vice-President and even as a Senator. He was replaced by his Vice-President Kamala Harris, who immediately attempted to moderate her image more towards that of what Biden’s had been in 2020. She talked about her time as a Prosecutor, talked about fighting inflation, attacked Trump as an unacceptable, authoritarian figure, and tried to appeal to moderate voters with endorsements from former Republican electeds like Liz Cheney. Harris leaned into the image of a tough prosecutor type, something she had leaned far away from in 2020 when supporters of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren called her a “cop.” Republicans pushed back, seeking to use her 2020 campaign statements to cast her as a far left liberal and continuation of Biden’s policies, which by then they had cast as more liberal than he ran as. They hammered her on support for transgender people, support for a liberal border policy, and support for Biden’s economic policies. Data says it worked. While Harris bled out less votes from her own base than Hillary had in 2016 (it’s true, the left really did vote for her), she lost a lot of moderate Biden voters. Some flipped. More didn’t show up.

All of this brings us to today. The Democratic Party’s “brain trusts” in DC seem to be moving the party in a very different direction suddenly. They seem to think the way to bring back the “missing” Biden voters is to move which voters they are prioritizing with their messaging. Most of the front-runners for the 2028 Presidential race that are being created by DC consultants and the media are white men, many of them Governors. So in this group, think Shapiro, Newsom, Pritzker, Beshear, Gallego, and Murphy. The other group getting attention are non-white populist progressives such Ro Khanna and AOC, and while he’s not a Presidential contender, Zohran Mamdani is a figure they are pushing. Then there is a whole other element of candidate rising amongst the consultant class- the “white masculine man” that is going to bring back appeal to white men. This is a solution in search of a problem. as Kamala Harris actually did better with white men than Biden, Clinton, or Obama, even winning the college educated white men. Even so, we’re seeing the rise of candidates like Graham Platner, Bob “Crooksy” Brooks, and James Talarico. Even worse, the white guy governors seem to be embracing this crap too. Newsom is going to go on human pile of dogshit Hasan Piker’s podcast to talk. Shapiro is endorsing Brooks. Senators such as Gallego, Murphy, Heinrich, and Whitehouse are embracing Platner. The fix is in. They want to go all in on “manly” white men as their path forward. What problem does it solve? I’m not sure. They’re doing it though.

I think the clear thing to understand is this isn’t the party’s top problem, but the party’s lack of appeal to white people is a problem. If states like Ohio, Iowa, and Florida are out of reach, and states like North Carolina, Georgia, Texas, Arizona, and Nevada aren’t firmly in the win column, the map tilts conservative. The reality is that further erosion could take Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin out of the Democratic column for good. Even more succinctly, while half the country is going to live in like 8 states that will be more diverse, the other 42 states are going to be decidedly white. The Democratic Party’s decline with white voters largely has stabilized for a quarter century though, and Kamala Harris did better with white guys than one might have guessed. I’m not sure what in our modern history suggests that we need to nominate Neo Nazis, crooked “every” men, and people who go on conspiracy podcasts in order to win? We got more votes than anyone in history in 2020 by running a moderate guy who had solid appeal to Black voters and didn’t seem like an extremist nut to white and rural voters. We’re risking our strongest bases of support- Black voters, Jewish voters, and educated White women to appeal to who exactly? The descendants of people who moved away from the party between 1966 and 1994? The last few Dixiecrats who ran away in 2010? People who came out of nowhere to vote for Donald Trump in 2016, 2020, or 2024? Do we really think going on Hasan Piker’s ridiculous podcast is going to make us look normal? Didn’t we learn our lesson from thinking normal people listened to Charlamagne? What in the last 60 years of the party makes us think we can get votes from people who don’t vote for us by being more like a New York City Mayor who won’t oppose saying “Globalize the Intifada?” Sure, I do think Democrats overreached with trying to normalize and formalize DEI, #MeToo, and other social movements that the country wasn’t ready for at this time, but are we now going to embrace terrorists and Nazis to chase mythical votes we haven’t received in decades? It should be worth noting that the only group to support eversuccessful Presidential candidate in recent times on the Democratic side are Black voters. Jewish voters are the only other group to support every Democratic Presidential nominee in recent history. Wouldn’t any modest gains made with guys with Nazi tattoos chopping wood in the rural South be offset with the losses we’d take with our base? Seems so to me.

Anyone to study recent American political history understands that the ideological left Democratic Party broke up as the electorate included more and more women, and Civil Rights finally let Black voters vote. Race and gender simply trump ideology in the American electorate. One that wants an ideological party could put in the time to organize and build support for their positions, maybe even try to pass some legislation that moves the ball forward towards their position. Instead, some think the right idea is to wholesale try to turn 60 years of political movement around by embracing lunatics and bigots. It’s a horrible strategy. It’s tone deaf. It’s historically ignorant. It’s a path to losing the 2028 Presidential election. Tread wisely, friends.