Why is it that whenever I see some piece that either explicitly or implicitly is dinging Democrats it is always Lauren? Should have known. On the merits, yes, I have never bought this nonsense that there is some huge silent majority of Democratic voters out there. Bernie just lost. At the same time, the drip, drip, drip of criticisms about who is a “real” Democrat, the virulence of the message that encourages people who might otherwise vote for a Democrat that unless that Democrat is the right kind they must be “corporate sell-outs” , “corrupt”, “war mongers” etc does incalculable damage, especially as to young voters. Millions of young voters have been poisoned on this kind of message from intra-party fighting and from so much of the media narrative arranged around the “Democrats in disarray” framework, so much so that even when it is NOT true (and sadly, it is too often true) there is this message that is basically: “Democrats are hopeless losers who are out-of-touch with their voters because they hope voters will read instead of respond to vibes. How elitist of them!” There was a faint nod in this piece toward the degree to which the same failure to understand whether voter turnout helps or hurts them, but somehow that comes off as less significant. I guess that is because they win? But they are earnestly trying more voter suppression with the SAV Act. Why would they do that if they thought turn out would help them? Well, they know (correctly) that CERTAIN turn out would NOT help them. I suspect the Democrats don’t really mean overall turnout; they mean people who lean Democratic or align with their political aims but haven’t been voting that way. And that is not insane. But I think it is a propaganda problem. It is hard to understand otherwise how you could get a bunch of poor people to think rich guys like Trump really care about them. But the propaganda exploits racism, sexism, and xenophobia to motivate these voters. Back in the 60s when that median voter was a Democrat white guys were almost exclusively in charge. They are less so now. I think there are about 20-30 % of the American populace who are racists to some degree and about 60% who are sexist to some degree (it is still more socially acceptable to be nakedly misogynistic than it is to be openly racist). For the Democrats there is no “moderating” on that. You can NOT pander to people who have these views. There is nothing moderate about that.
I think, without reading any of the other comments, that the Democratic Party would be better served by moving closer to the center. Americans in general are probably not ready for a move to the left, which seems radical left to many, even if Democratic candidates aren’t radically leftist. It’s a matter of perception. I don’t think the working class is very far left of center.The progressive agenda just doesn’t appeal to them as much as candidates think. I am educated, “woke” by my understanding of the term, and lean toward more progressive politics, but I lean left of center, but not far. I do accept transgender and gay rights and even a reasonable path to citizenship, however, I do appreciate the concerns of teachers who have to understand how to deal with largely non-English speaking children in lower (elementary) grades. I think Trump’s immigration policy is far too unforgiving. If someone has been in the country for years, has a job, pays taxes, and is involved in the community is different from those newly arrived by porous borders. We need them to do the jobs Americans won’t do, but we also need for them to pursue citizenship. Employers benefit from immigrants they can pay low wages “under the table “ and avoid paying into payroll taxes themselves. I understand that by being a corporation even as a self employed professional and paying Social Security for myself and for my LLC. I once saw a peach farmer who went by the rules. He housed his migrant workers and paid them a fair wage. I can’t remember if he was required to collect taxes. Other peach farmers in the area didn’t do that, and his resentment of them was warranted. He didn’t report them because he lived there and owned property. He didn’t want to have fellow peach farmers wanting to run him out of town. I may be off a bit on the laws he followed, but employers who take advantage of cheap labor are part of the problem. Correct me where I’m wrong, but I stand by my belief that Democrats would do better by moving closer to the center than by getting out the vote.
I don’t have an answer for you on that. It’s a fair question, but I can’t answer off the top of my head. Maybe it’s not so much different policies as it is less emphasis on the more progressive policies in their campaigns.
I can answer that. Very few D candidates emphasize the more progressive policies of the party. Trans athletes, defunding the police, open borders, cancel culture, socialism, etc...these are all mostly figments of right wing messaging. Not actual policy positions.
A more honest analysis would be "How do centrist Democrats actually convince swing (or disconnected) voters that they don't resemble the caricature that Fox News and social media fabricate."
Now that’s a better answer than mine. Republicans do misrepresent Democratic policies. Saying that the Democrats want to protect criminals is so incredibly wrong, and that’s just an extreme example. Little Jimmy goes off to school a boy and comes home a girl was one of Trump’s favorites in earlier campaigns. He’s put that one aside this time. You’ve been right in both responses. I gave up on Social Media because it’s been so perverted. Even YouTube is is being invaded with AI and lies. Three Substacks are my social media now.
If Democrats are the the party of the educated elites, then shouldn't D's favor the SAVE Act? All the D's will have the documents needed for their elite votes. The R's won't, and it will be too late to get them when they start only 6 months before the election.
Because (by and large) Democrats believe in electoral rules that protect the franchise and electoral fairness even if it disadvantages them.
Theres a reason that Democratic leaning states have (or had) far more anti-gerrymandering laws on the books. I don't think ANY red states (maybe Idaho) have anti-gerrymandering laws, but blue and bluish states (AZ, CA, MI, MT, VA) use independent commissions. RIP CA, but only for the next 2 cycles.
Its even more pronounced at the state legislature level.
I have never seen the point of driving out the“disinterested“ vote, regardless of one’s party. If these people don’t care enough to educate themselves on the state of our government, why should we want them to choose our leaders?
Exactly. The truth is that Joe Biden won to a great extent as a veto on Trump. I'm sorry, but this is the obvious truth. And here we are again. IMO, Lauren is correct: anti-Trumpism is not good enough, to prevent dangerous reversions to it, such as we saw in 2024. Dem's have a lot more work to do beyond simple anti-Trumpism to create an enduring lead over him and his ilk. IOW, old fashioned politicking starting right now.
I live in Jasmine Crockett’s district. Since I moved here (2022), I have voted for her every cycle. But I genuinely believe she can’t win statewide in Texas (where I have lived for 13 of my 34 years on earth).
James Carville is an idiot who makes centrists & non-confrontational people feel good. He's unserious & only plays into confirmation bias. But if it makes people stay involved over checking out, that's chill. The only times turnout for Presidential elections were over 65% & led to the less progressive candidate winning are William Henry Harrison, Buchanan, & Cleveland. The first two won with grievance politics, Cleveland with the "mugwumps" strategy of reaching across the aisle (the only time it has worked; also grievance politics). Biden, Taft, Teddy, McKinley, Benjamin Harrison, Garfield, Hayes, Grant, Lincoln, Pierce, Taylor, & Polk all won with over 65% turnout as the more "progressive" candidate(yes, even Polk & Taylor; Clay & Cass were insane). So that is 13 times an educated & engaged populace voted more progressive, versus one time where Teddy Roosevelt helped Grover Cleveland cleave off voters to punish his own party for being dumb.
David Shor did a good data analysis, but it's insufficient evidence to support your claim. The analysis is ONLY based on registered voters. There were 156,766,239 votes cast; 27,647,358 registered non-voters(what the extrapolation is based on); which leaves 60,253,293 unregistered but eligible non-voters out of 244,666,890 eligible voters in the US. With the GOP having a much stronger grassroots registration campaign after the Tea Party movement & with TPUSA, more right-leaning registered non-voters being observed isn't surprising. The question this raises is if it takes less than 2 times as much effort to convince a right-leaning voter to switch than it does to activate 2 different eligible unregistered apolitical non-voters. This extrapolated data is moot to the argument.
Wasserman is correct that low information voters prefer Trump. This does not prove a correlation of newly engaged/activated voters are low info. Across races in 2025 new voters went with the Democratic candidate ~70% of the time in contrast to 48.5% in '24. The issue in '24 was 107 days to educate the populace on Harris' position, not a trend shift in new voter tendencies. Talking about low-propensity voters without mentioning "churn" voters or the huge impact drop-off voters had to Dems in '24 is disingenuous.
JVL gets mad if commenters are mean, so you are great, but the claim isn't substantiated. Like at all, even from a centrist/moderate perspective--VA/NJ increased turnout helped Dems. Again, you're great Lauren, but Carville needs to retire or at least everyone treat him like a deranged old man with a one-hit-wonder. He can keep playing possum yelling at Tankies, though...I support that...nothing else.
Dems win new voters becasue most new voters are just aging into politics and young people lean D. Not because low propensity voters suddenly register & vote D. Except in 2024 where there was a massive rightward shift in young male voters.
I respectfully disagree I think. I didn’t read your comment carefully. I do think Carville is abrasive, but I think the Democratic Party needs to move a tad toward the center until the population is more accepting of more progressive policies. It’s also true that many of us don’t educate ourselves enough about the candidates. I’m guilty of that in local politics. My excuse is that Alabama votes Republican because they don’t educate themselves and the Democrats don’t don’t provide strong candidates in many offices. I think I will get some flack on my previous comment and maybe on this one too.
And Jamie Harrison is a joke who decimated the DNC. He has no idea about politics and no history of winning. Please don’t insult our intelligence by interviewing him.
IMHO, James Carville is a genius. He was right about how to achieve Bill Clinton's path to victory in 1992 and he was very right about Biden's inability to win re-election in 2024. Sometimes, it's good to listen to the proven continuing wisdom of elders.
No, Democratic voters are not the elite and Republican voters are not working class. Based on national representative surveys of American voters, there was no correlation between income and the vote in the last 3 US elections (Buyuker et al., 2021; Hartig et al, 2025; Jones et al, 2017; Womick et al. 2019). The polls showed very small effects of education, accounting for about 1 to 4% of the variance in voting for Trump. Strong predictors of voting for Trump are hostile sexism, homophobia, racism, & xenophobia, which individually account for between 25% & 40% of the variance; opposition to universal equality & endorsement of autocratic violence, male dominance also individually predict more strongly than education (Buyuker et al., 2021; Doherty et al, 2024; Vescio et al. 2020; Watson et al. 2022; Winter, 2023; Womick et al. 2019). Not all Trump voters are bigots because the predictors aren't perfectly correlated with voting, but in total they account for over 60% and swamp any demographic variable, including the Black-White difference in voting. Few Trump voters are going to overtly express their dislike of out-groups, even if that is an underlying motive for their vote. And just because someone is Latin American or a woman does not mean they are free of ethnic or gender bias. Indeed, female Trump voters showed the same level of hostile sexism as their male counterparts. The critical thing is that these voters endorse a social hierarchy where they are elevated above some out-groups who are different from themselves in some way. This is also not unique to the US. Based on a large meta-analysis of studies around the world, the strongest predictors of voting conservative are authoritarianism, fascism, dogmatism, intolerance, cognitive inflexibility, less openness to new ideas, and social dominance--the need to establish a hierarchy where you can feel superior to someone else and treat them less favorably (Jost et al., 2003).
There's real truth to this article but all of the authorities cited seem to have missed a few key points.
Evaluating serious policy ideas takes time and requires real effort on the part of voters. It's an effort demonstrably few voters make.
A major obstacle the Dems face is that demagoguery works. How can a responsible, well-intentioned politician compete with an opponent who never stops lying and misleading?
It's fundamentally appealing to be reassured that climate change is a hoax. Or that spiraling, ill-directed debt isn't a big deal.
During the course of the last campaign, Trump offered few concrete policies. The ones he did offer were glaringly dumb and/or nakedly zenophobic. They proved to be popular (or misunderstood).
In a Nation where reality is routinely denied, there is no such thing as public discourse. There is only delusion.
The Dems big problem is that 35-45% of eligible voters either want democracy to end or are so benighted they vote for that unintentionally.
Handwringing about what policies the Dems should tout is a waste of time. Screw measured policies! Many -- many! -- American voter wants easy answers, empty promises, and a White Christian country without a trace of Christian mercy.
Is this misapprehension limited to Dem leadership? If low-propensity and less engaged voters go Republican, then why aren’t R’s in Congress instituting mandatory vote-by-mail option to sweep in every rancher in Idaho and Wyoming, motor-voter registration for all under-30s, voter-registration drives next to supermarket checkouts? Oh wait, maybe Dear Leader is against all that.
I thought there'd already been enough "Republicans in the Mist" safaris to MAGA land.
Anyway, a lot of voters seem to favor progressive ideas in splendid isolation, but still hate Democrats - presumably for cultural reasons.
It's worth recalling that the Old South was politically progressive. Woodrow Wilson, who screened "Birth of a Nation" at the White House, was a progressive. Huey "Every Man a King" Long was a progressive. The KKK was economically and socially progressive. George Wallace began his own career as a progressive.
But obviously progressivism couldn't trump white racism, which is to say, white Southern identity. So Dixiecrats often chose to be progressives and segregationists at the same time. Indeed, their brand of progressivism reinforced their white identity politics.
When progressive politics conflicted with that identity, progressivism deferred and adapted to the latter.
Turning to the present, something about Trump's identity and persona has resonated with (primarily) white identity for almost forty years.
And young whites are now a minority of Americans in their age group. As older, whiter cohorts die off, that will become the norm. Will whites behave more like other, competing minorities? If so, that doesn't augur well for genteel liberalism.
People sometimes forget that in much of the Old South, whites were also a racial minority. They were a minority for literally centuries in South Carolina - probably the most hyperbolically Confederate state of all, and probably not by coincidence.
The logical question is whether Democrats can manage a balkanized electorate as well as Republicans who take their cue from Archie Bunker and his gang on steroids.
In the last few cycles, Montana has voted for a whole host of progressive ballot initiatives: Codifying reproductive rights, severe restrictions on dangerous mining methods, anti-gerrymandering language, minimum wage increases, marijuana legalization.
(In fairness, as recently as 2012, MT had 2 D senators and a D governor).
In 2024, the reproductive rights initiative to enshrine abortion as a right in the Montana Constitution passed by 14% points...in a year when DJT won by 20, and vehemently anti-choice lawmakers swept the Senate & House by 10%.
The idea that being too far left on culture war issues is pretty amusing. The issue at hand is that 20-25% of the electorate votes for politicians who explicitly promise policies that voters dislike. They just dislike Democrats even more.
Eh, I think that Carville is making a pragmatic and grounded, but unimaginative argument. Carville's bread and butter is studying the chess board and then pitching what the next move ought to be to a candidate playing that game.
I think one lesson from both Trump and Mamdani is that there are folks who you can activate, but it takes something special to activate them. The Trump/Mamdani argument is that the game is not like chess where we have to work with the pieces we have got, there's an ability to bring pieces onto the board or cause pieces to swap colors that relies on charisma and authenticity, or invent new pieces that change the nature of the game.
(And yeah, I know saying Trump effectively leverages authenticity and charisma sounds bonkers to Bulwarkians. But if you talk to Trump voters they will cite a belief that he says it like it is and that he amuses them. We might not like it, but he could not inspire a cult of personality without that rizz. And arguably, he wouldn't have inspired a cult of personality doing a Carville-esque median voter play.)
Carville and Crockett are not only using different strategies but playing different games. I think which one is right is contextual and relative, the candidate should use the strategy that fits for them. I don't think, for example, that Shumer is going to be able to pack arena style rallies and nor do I think Shumer is going to go viral online (for the right reasons, at least). So Shumer should be doing more of a Carville than a Crockett.
Part of the lack of imagination I think the Dem's struggle with is that by focusing on voting trends in past elections, they're always fighting the last battle, whether they're doing Carville or Crockett. The Dems need a new message because their own favorability is in the tank, they need to recover from a trust deficit after years of Biden administration gas lighting, and they need a play in rural counties or else they will be looking at a rocky road any year in the senate or vulnerable to redistricting in the house.
I think you miss the point here. 10% of Trump voters in NYC voted for Mamdani. (or maybe it was 10% of Mamdani voters had been Trump voters. Doesn't matter. 800,000 fewer voters voted in the mayoral campaign...Mamdani clearly didn't generate boatloads of new voters).
Point being, NYC kinda proves Carvilles point. Personalities win elections, not progressive policies that turn out new voters.
Based on the headline, I was deeply concerned that this entire article was going to be BS, but after reading it, I can say that I mostly agree with the analysis even if I think the case you make is far too confident and definitive.
I'm the first to admit that there's no leftwing popular majority in this country. At the same time, the ***LAST*** people I want to hear tell me or anyone else that we need to "moderate" to win elections are everyone at The Bulwark - including you Lauren. Your own boss - your CEO - spent a month prancing around the stage with Liz Cheney (who had a 17% national approval rating at the time) while promising to pointlessly bomb more Middle Eastern countries in the middle of a highly unpopular genocide that the Democratic base revolted over, and the only thing your CEO has to show for running the "moderate" campaign messaging of Harris is having lost every single swing state and turning half of the safe blue states into lean, likely, or even swing states.
I'm ready to acknowledge that Democrats running in the South should probably cite different political positions that will infuriate me. However, given that your theory of the case of how to win elections failed ***SPECTACULARLY*** in 2024 (and many other elections), I have exactly ***ZERO*** interest in anyone at The Bulwark trying to tell me what is and isn't "electable". If any of you at The Bulwark knew what was "electable", that exercise in political embarrassment by your highest ranking boss would have yielded a Democratic win - but it didn't. Your boss - and your institution, The Bulwark - has completely, utterly, totally failed to take responsibility for ***YOUR*** theory of the case FAILING in 2024.
I agree that Talarico is the better candidate in Texas. I agree that a Democrat running statewide in Louisiana probably has to be anti-abortion. I have *****EXACTLY ZERO***** interest in hearing from ***ANYONE*** at The Bulwark - including you Lauren - about the need for "moderation" to be "electable". After all, if you guys knew how to win elections, your CEO wouldn't have overseen the messaging loss of every single swing state - but you did. Until The Bulwark takes responsibility for that catastrophic decision, there are ZERO reasons to listen to what ***ANY*** of you have to say about "electability".
Also, what qualifications does Lakshya Jain have to be commentating on politics? He has never run for office, never worked on a campaign, never managed a campaign, never ran a polling data *collection* agency (his data collection is conducted by Verasight), and he has never even once set foot inside a campaign strategy meeting. Why, exactly, does anything he say merit any utility at all? The only thing Jain ever did for politics is build a computer model that yields results which every single one of his donors already believe; the only reason Jain is known at all is because he is using his reputation as a "Silicon Valley data scientist" to build a "fancy computer model" that says "moderate Democrats are the only ones who win elections", which is exactly what all his donors and buddies want to hear. Literally, the only reason he is known at all is that he is using his Berkeley CS degrees and public reputation as an "artificial intelligence developer" to launder the exact same bullshit talking points that you hear from every useless, spineless, supine centrist buffoon through his computer program to make it seem more "official". Lakshya Jain is literally nothing more than a cosplayer who has never set foot inside a campaign office. It is just such a fundamental joke to reference this amateur member of political Twitter for *any* electoral analysis, but of course, that's the whole point of citing him to begin with: To launder the same bullshit talking points about "electability" that you hear on CNN every night.
But again, after your own CEO FAILED to win even a *single* swing state for Kamala Harris in 2024, there are literally *****ZERO***** reasons to listen to ***ANYONE*** at The Bulwark about what is and isn't "electable" because after all, if you guys knew what was "electable", we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with.
Excellent newsletter tackling difficult questions over urgent moment. Well done! This is the kind of newsletter Journalism that I want to see. It's partly update and it's partly educational, both of which I need. Thank you
Laura - I am interested in what might be the possible fallout from TN GOP’s recent decision to eliminate candidates from running on the Republican ballot if they do not qualify as “bona fide” Republican. With the eminent filing deadline looming, here in the county I live in, a number of Republican candidates (even incumbents running for reelection) are scrambling to file as Independents. The local newspaper report 56 candidates in our Senatorial District will have to file as Independent to stay in the race. If they stay in as Independent candidates they bypass the primary and only run in the General election. This is happening across the state! It seems to me that the R’s have set themselves up for potential split tickets in at least some races. Am I missing something or is this an incredibly dumb move by the GOP?
According to bylaws “ a ‘bona fide Republican’…is an individual who is actively involved in the Tennessee Republican Party, the county Republican Party of the county in which the individual resides,or a TRP-recognized auxiliary organization, is registered to vote in the above-noted county; and who has voted in at least three (3) of the four (4) most recent statewide Republican primary elections in which he is eligible to vote.”
There are other qualifications (fees and such) but the voting requirements seem to be tripping candidates up, and because of the filing deadline there’s not enough time to appeal.
Oh yes! Exactly! The current (Republican) Road Superintendent who is running for reelection has been a Repub forever. He missed a voting in the primary 2022 "because of illness." So he now has to refile as an Independent. He says it doesn't make sense. This is affecting a lot of Republicans in a lot of races - local, county and state offices. The paper noted 56 just in this district.
Why is it that whenever I see some piece that either explicitly or implicitly is dinging Democrats it is always Lauren? Should have known. On the merits, yes, I have never bought this nonsense that there is some huge silent majority of Democratic voters out there. Bernie just lost. At the same time, the drip, drip, drip of criticisms about who is a “real” Democrat, the virulence of the message that encourages people who might otherwise vote for a Democrat that unless that Democrat is the right kind they must be “corporate sell-outs” , “corrupt”, “war mongers” etc does incalculable damage, especially as to young voters. Millions of young voters have been poisoned on this kind of message from intra-party fighting and from so much of the media narrative arranged around the “Democrats in disarray” framework, so much so that even when it is NOT true (and sadly, it is too often true) there is this message that is basically: “Democrats are hopeless losers who are out-of-touch with their voters because they hope voters will read instead of respond to vibes. How elitist of them!” There was a faint nod in this piece toward the degree to which the same failure to understand whether voter turnout helps or hurts them, but somehow that comes off as less significant. I guess that is because they win? But they are earnestly trying more voter suppression with the SAV Act. Why would they do that if they thought turn out would help them? Well, they know (correctly) that CERTAIN turn out would NOT help them. I suspect the Democrats don’t really mean overall turnout; they mean people who lean Democratic or align with their political aims but haven’t been voting that way. And that is not insane. But I think it is a propaganda problem. It is hard to understand otherwise how you could get a bunch of poor people to think rich guys like Trump really care about them. But the propaganda exploits racism, sexism, and xenophobia to motivate these voters. Back in the 60s when that median voter was a Democrat white guys were almost exclusively in charge. They are less so now. I think there are about 20-30 % of the American populace who are racists to some degree and about 60% who are sexist to some degree (it is still more socially acceptable to be nakedly misogynistic than it is to be openly racist). For the Democrats there is no “moderating” on that. You can NOT pander to people who have these views. There is nothing moderate about that.
I think, without reading any of the other comments, that the Democratic Party would be better served by moving closer to the center. Americans in general are probably not ready for a move to the left, which seems radical left to many, even if Democratic candidates aren’t radically leftist. It’s a matter of perception. I don’t think the working class is very far left of center.The progressive agenda just doesn’t appeal to them as much as candidates think. I am educated, “woke” by my understanding of the term, and lean toward more progressive politics, but I lean left of center, but not far. I do accept transgender and gay rights and even a reasonable path to citizenship, however, I do appreciate the concerns of teachers who have to understand how to deal with largely non-English speaking children in lower (elementary) grades. I think Trump’s immigration policy is far too unforgiving. If someone has been in the country for years, has a job, pays taxes, and is involved in the community is different from those newly arrived by porous borders. We need them to do the jobs Americans won’t do, but we also need for them to pursue citizenship. Employers benefit from immigrants they can pay low wages “under the table “ and avoid paying into payroll taxes themselves. I understand that by being a corporation even as a self employed professional and paying Social Security for myself and for my LLC. I once saw a peach farmer who went by the rules. He housed his migrant workers and paid them a fair wage. I can’t remember if he was required to collect taxes. Other peach farmers in the area didn’t do that, and his resentment of them was warranted. He didn’t report them because he lived there and owned property. He didn’t want to have fellow peach farmers wanting to run him out of town. I may be off a bit on the laws he followed, but employers who take advantage of cheap labor are part of the problem. Correct me where I’m wrong, but I stand by my belief that Democrats would do better by moving closer to the center than by getting out the vote.
What policies do you think would move the needle for less 'woke' voters without causing damage?
I don’t have an answer for you on that. It’s a fair question, but I can’t answer off the top of my head. Maybe it’s not so much different policies as it is less emphasis on the more progressive policies in their campaigns.
I can answer that. Very few D candidates emphasize the more progressive policies of the party. Trans athletes, defunding the police, open borders, cancel culture, socialism, etc...these are all mostly figments of right wing messaging. Not actual policy positions.
A more honest analysis would be "How do centrist Democrats actually convince swing (or disconnected) voters that they don't resemble the caricature that Fox News and social media fabricate."
Now that’s a better answer than mine. Republicans do misrepresent Democratic policies. Saying that the Democrats want to protect criminals is so incredibly wrong, and that’s just an extreme example. Little Jimmy goes off to school a boy and comes home a girl was one of Trump’s favorites in earlier campaigns. He’s put that one aside this time. You’ve been right in both responses. I gave up on Social Media because it’s been so perverted. Even YouTube is is being invaded with AI and lies. Three Substacks are my social media now.
James Carville is 100% correct.
If Democrats are the the party of the educated elites, then shouldn't D's favor the SAVE Act? All the D's will have the documents needed for their elite votes. The R's won't, and it will be too late to get them when they start only 6 months before the election.
Because (by and large) Democrats believe in electoral rules that protect the franchise and electoral fairness even if it disadvantages them.
Theres a reason that Democratic leaning states have (or had) far more anti-gerrymandering laws on the books. I don't think ANY red states (maybe Idaho) have anti-gerrymandering laws, but blue and bluish states (AZ, CA, MI, MT, VA) use independent commissions. RIP CA, but only for the next 2 cycles.
Its even more pronounced at the state legislature level.
I have never seen the point of driving out the“disinterested“ vote, regardless of one’s party. If these people don’t care enough to educate themselves on the state of our government, why should we want them to choose our leaders?
Exactly. The truth is that Joe Biden won to a great extent as a veto on Trump. I'm sorry, but this is the obvious truth. And here we are again. IMO, Lauren is correct: anti-Trumpism is not good enough, to prevent dangerous reversions to it, such as we saw in 2024. Dem's have a lot more work to do beyond simple anti-Trumpism to create an enduring lead over him and his ilk. IOW, old fashioned politicking starting right now.
I live in Jasmine Crockett’s district. Since I moved here (2022), I have voted for her every cycle. But I genuinely believe she can’t win statewide in Texas (where I have lived for 13 of my 34 years on earth).
😐
"The facts say otherwise."
I don't think this lede is appropriate.
James Carville is an idiot who makes centrists & non-confrontational people feel good. He's unserious & only plays into confirmation bias. But if it makes people stay involved over checking out, that's chill. The only times turnout for Presidential elections were over 65% & led to the less progressive candidate winning are William Henry Harrison, Buchanan, & Cleveland. The first two won with grievance politics, Cleveland with the "mugwumps" strategy of reaching across the aisle (the only time it has worked; also grievance politics). Biden, Taft, Teddy, McKinley, Benjamin Harrison, Garfield, Hayes, Grant, Lincoln, Pierce, Taylor, & Polk all won with over 65% turnout as the more "progressive" candidate(yes, even Polk & Taylor; Clay & Cass were insane). So that is 13 times an educated & engaged populace voted more progressive, versus one time where Teddy Roosevelt helped Grover Cleveland cleave off voters to punish his own party for being dumb.
David Shor did a good data analysis, but it's insufficient evidence to support your claim. The analysis is ONLY based on registered voters. There were 156,766,239 votes cast; 27,647,358 registered non-voters(what the extrapolation is based on); which leaves 60,253,293 unregistered but eligible non-voters out of 244,666,890 eligible voters in the US. With the GOP having a much stronger grassroots registration campaign after the Tea Party movement & with TPUSA, more right-leaning registered non-voters being observed isn't surprising. The question this raises is if it takes less than 2 times as much effort to convince a right-leaning voter to switch than it does to activate 2 different eligible unregistered apolitical non-voters. This extrapolated data is moot to the argument.
Wasserman is correct that low information voters prefer Trump. This does not prove a correlation of newly engaged/activated voters are low info. Across races in 2025 new voters went with the Democratic candidate ~70% of the time in contrast to 48.5% in '24. The issue in '24 was 107 days to educate the populace on Harris' position, not a trend shift in new voter tendencies. Talking about low-propensity voters without mentioning "churn" voters or the huge impact drop-off voters had to Dems in '24 is disingenuous.
JVL gets mad if commenters are mean, so you are great, but the claim isn't substantiated. Like at all, even from a centrist/moderate perspective--VA/NJ increased turnout helped Dems. Again, you're great Lauren, but Carville needs to retire or at least everyone treat him like a deranged old man with a one-hit-wonder. He can keep playing possum yelling at Tankies, though...I support that...nothing else.
Lots of factual issues here
There wasn't 65% turnout 2020.
Turnout in NJ/VA was substantially lower in 2025.
Dems win new voters becasue most new voters are just aging into politics and young people lean D. Not because low propensity voters suddenly register & vote D. Except in 2024 where there was a massive rightward shift in young male voters.
Lots wrong here.
I respectfully disagree I think. I didn’t read your comment carefully. I do think Carville is abrasive, but I think the Democratic Party needs to move a tad toward the center until the population is more accepting of more progressive policies. It’s also true that many of us don’t educate ourselves enough about the candidates. I’m guilty of that in local politics. My excuse is that Alabama votes Republican because they don’t educate themselves and the Democrats don’t don’t provide strong candidates in many offices. I think I will get some flack on my previous comment and maybe on this one too.
And Jamie Harrison is a joke who decimated the DNC. He has no idea about politics and no history of winning. Please don’t insult our intelligence by interviewing him.
IMHO, James Carville is a genius. He was right about how to achieve Bill Clinton's path to victory in 1992 and he was very right about Biden's inability to win re-election in 2024. Sometimes, it's good to listen to the proven continuing wisdom of elders.
No, Democratic voters are not the elite and Republican voters are not working class. Based on national representative surveys of American voters, there was no correlation between income and the vote in the last 3 US elections (Buyuker et al., 2021; Hartig et al, 2025; Jones et al, 2017; Womick et al. 2019). The polls showed very small effects of education, accounting for about 1 to 4% of the variance in voting for Trump. Strong predictors of voting for Trump are hostile sexism, homophobia, racism, & xenophobia, which individually account for between 25% & 40% of the variance; opposition to universal equality & endorsement of autocratic violence, male dominance also individually predict more strongly than education (Buyuker et al., 2021; Doherty et al, 2024; Vescio et al. 2020; Watson et al. 2022; Winter, 2023; Womick et al. 2019). Not all Trump voters are bigots because the predictors aren't perfectly correlated with voting, but in total they account for over 60% and swamp any demographic variable, including the Black-White difference in voting. Few Trump voters are going to overtly express their dislike of out-groups, even if that is an underlying motive for their vote. And just because someone is Latin American or a woman does not mean they are free of ethnic or gender bias. Indeed, female Trump voters showed the same level of hostile sexism as their male counterparts. The critical thing is that these voters endorse a social hierarchy where they are elevated above some out-groups who are different from themselves in some way. This is also not unique to the US. Based on a large meta-analysis of studies around the world, the strongest predictors of voting conservative are authoritarianism, fascism, dogmatism, intolerance, cognitive inflexibility, less openness to new ideas, and social dominance--the need to establish a hierarchy where you can feel superior to someone else and treat them less favorably (Jost et al., 2003).
There's real truth to this article but all of the authorities cited seem to have missed a few key points.
Evaluating serious policy ideas takes time and requires real effort on the part of voters. It's an effort demonstrably few voters make.
A major obstacle the Dems face is that demagoguery works. How can a responsible, well-intentioned politician compete with an opponent who never stops lying and misleading?
It's fundamentally appealing to be reassured that climate change is a hoax. Or that spiraling, ill-directed debt isn't a big deal.
During the course of the last campaign, Trump offered few concrete policies. The ones he did offer were glaringly dumb and/or nakedly zenophobic. They proved to be popular (or misunderstood).
In a Nation where reality is routinely denied, there is no such thing as public discourse. There is only delusion.
The Dems big problem is that 35-45% of eligible voters either want democracy to end or are so benighted they vote for that unintentionally.
Handwringing about what policies the Dems should tout is a waste of time. Screw measured policies! Many -- many! -- American voter wants easy answers, empty promises, and a White Christian country without a trace of Christian mercy.
Is this misapprehension limited to Dem leadership? If low-propensity and less engaged voters go Republican, then why aren’t R’s in Congress instituting mandatory vote-by-mail option to sweep in every rancher in Idaho and Wyoming, motor-voter registration for all under-30s, voter-registration drives next to supermarket checkouts? Oh wait, maybe Dear Leader is against all that.
I thought there'd already been enough "Republicans in the Mist" safaris to MAGA land.
Anyway, a lot of voters seem to favor progressive ideas in splendid isolation, but still hate Democrats - presumably for cultural reasons.
It's worth recalling that the Old South was politically progressive. Woodrow Wilson, who screened "Birth of a Nation" at the White House, was a progressive. Huey "Every Man a King" Long was a progressive. The KKK was economically and socially progressive. George Wallace began his own career as a progressive.
But obviously progressivism couldn't trump white racism, which is to say, white Southern identity. So Dixiecrats often chose to be progressives and segregationists at the same time. Indeed, their brand of progressivism reinforced their white identity politics.
When progressive politics conflicted with that identity, progressivism deferred and adapted to the latter.
Turning to the present, something about Trump's identity and persona has resonated with (primarily) white identity for almost forty years.
And young whites are now a minority of Americans in their age group. As older, whiter cohorts die off, that will become the norm. Will whites behave more like other, competing minorities? If so, that doesn't augur well for genteel liberalism.
People sometimes forget that in much of the Old South, whites were also a racial minority. They were a minority for literally centuries in South Carolina - probably the most hyperbolically Confederate state of all, and probably not by coincidence.
The logical question is whether Democrats can manage a balkanized electorate as well as Republicans who take their cue from Archie Bunker and his gang on steroids.
In the last few cycles, Montana has voted for a whole host of progressive ballot initiatives: Codifying reproductive rights, severe restrictions on dangerous mining methods, anti-gerrymandering language, minimum wage increases, marijuana legalization.
(In fairness, as recently as 2012, MT had 2 D senators and a D governor).
In 2024, the reproductive rights initiative to enshrine abortion as a right in the Montana Constitution passed by 14% points...in a year when DJT won by 20, and vehemently anti-choice lawmakers swept the Senate & House by 10%.
The idea that being too far left on culture war issues is pretty amusing. The issue at hand is that 20-25% of the electorate votes for politicians who explicitly promise policies that voters dislike. They just dislike Democrats even more.
Its personality, not policy.
Eh, I think that Carville is making a pragmatic and grounded, but unimaginative argument. Carville's bread and butter is studying the chess board and then pitching what the next move ought to be to a candidate playing that game.
I think one lesson from both Trump and Mamdani is that there are folks who you can activate, but it takes something special to activate them. The Trump/Mamdani argument is that the game is not like chess where we have to work with the pieces we have got, there's an ability to bring pieces onto the board or cause pieces to swap colors that relies on charisma and authenticity, or invent new pieces that change the nature of the game.
(And yeah, I know saying Trump effectively leverages authenticity and charisma sounds bonkers to Bulwarkians. But if you talk to Trump voters they will cite a belief that he says it like it is and that he amuses them. We might not like it, but he could not inspire a cult of personality without that rizz. And arguably, he wouldn't have inspired a cult of personality doing a Carville-esque median voter play.)
Carville and Crockett are not only using different strategies but playing different games. I think which one is right is contextual and relative, the candidate should use the strategy that fits for them. I don't think, for example, that Shumer is going to be able to pack arena style rallies and nor do I think Shumer is going to go viral online (for the right reasons, at least). So Shumer should be doing more of a Carville than a Crockett.
Part of the lack of imagination I think the Dem's struggle with is that by focusing on voting trends in past elections, they're always fighting the last battle, whether they're doing Carville or Crockett. The Dems need a new message because their own favorability is in the tank, they need to recover from a trust deficit after years of Biden administration gas lighting, and they need a play in rural counties or else they will be looking at a rocky road any year in the senate or vulnerable to redistricting in the house.
I think you miss the point here. 10% of Trump voters in NYC voted for Mamdani. (or maybe it was 10% of Mamdani voters had been Trump voters. Doesn't matter. 800,000 fewer voters voted in the mayoral campaign...Mamdani clearly didn't generate boatloads of new voters).
Point being, NYC kinda proves Carvilles point. Personalities win elections, not progressive policies that turn out new voters.
Based on the headline, I was deeply concerned that this entire article was going to be BS, but after reading it, I can say that I mostly agree with the analysis even if I think the case you make is far too confident and definitive.
I'm the first to admit that there's no leftwing popular majority in this country. At the same time, the ***LAST*** people I want to hear tell me or anyone else that we need to "moderate" to win elections are everyone at The Bulwark - including you Lauren. Your own boss - your CEO - spent a month prancing around the stage with Liz Cheney (who had a 17% national approval rating at the time) while promising to pointlessly bomb more Middle Eastern countries in the middle of a highly unpopular genocide that the Democratic base revolted over, and the only thing your CEO has to show for running the "moderate" campaign messaging of Harris is having lost every single swing state and turning half of the safe blue states into lean, likely, or even swing states.
I'm ready to acknowledge that Democrats running in the South should probably cite different political positions that will infuriate me. However, given that your theory of the case of how to win elections failed ***SPECTACULARLY*** in 2024 (and many other elections), I have exactly ***ZERO*** interest in anyone at The Bulwark trying to tell me what is and isn't "electable". If any of you at The Bulwark knew what was "electable", that exercise in political embarrassment by your highest ranking boss would have yielded a Democratic win - but it didn't. Your boss - and your institution, The Bulwark - has completely, utterly, totally failed to take responsibility for ***YOUR*** theory of the case FAILING in 2024.
I agree that Talarico is the better candidate in Texas. I agree that a Democrat running statewide in Louisiana probably has to be anti-abortion. I have *****EXACTLY ZERO***** interest in hearing from ***ANYONE*** at The Bulwark - including you Lauren - about the need for "moderation" to be "electable". After all, if you guys knew how to win elections, your CEO wouldn't have overseen the messaging loss of every single swing state - but you did. Until The Bulwark takes responsibility for that catastrophic decision, there are ZERO reasons to listen to what ***ANY*** of you have to say about "electability".
Also, what qualifications does Lakshya Jain have to be commentating on politics? He has never run for office, never worked on a campaign, never managed a campaign, never ran a polling data *collection* agency (his data collection is conducted by Verasight), and he has never even once set foot inside a campaign strategy meeting. Why, exactly, does anything he say merit any utility at all? The only thing Jain ever did for politics is build a computer model that yields results which every single one of his donors already believe; the only reason Jain is known at all is because he is using his reputation as a "Silicon Valley data scientist" to build a "fancy computer model" that says "moderate Democrats are the only ones who win elections", which is exactly what all his donors and buddies want to hear. Literally, the only reason he is known at all is that he is using his Berkeley CS degrees and public reputation as an "artificial intelligence developer" to launder the exact same bullshit talking points that you hear from every useless, spineless, supine centrist buffoon through his computer program to make it seem more "official". Lakshya Jain is literally nothing more than a cosplayer who has never set foot inside a campaign office. It is just such a fundamental joke to reference this amateur member of political Twitter for *any* electoral analysis, but of course, that's the whole point of citing him to begin with: To launder the same bullshit talking points about "electability" that you hear on CNN every night.
But again, after your own CEO FAILED to win even a *single* swing state for Kamala Harris in 2024, there are literally *****ZERO***** reasons to listen to ***ANYONE*** at The Bulwark about what is and isn't "electable" because after all, if you guys knew what was "electable", we wouldn't be in this mess to begin with.
How many progressives pulled out great victories in 2024?
Excellent newsletter tackling difficult questions over urgent moment. Well done! This is the kind of newsletter Journalism that I want to see. It's partly update and it's partly educational, both of which I need. Thank you
Laura - I am interested in what might be the possible fallout from TN GOP’s recent decision to eliminate candidates from running on the Republican ballot if they do not qualify as “bona fide” Republican. With the eminent filing deadline looming, here in the county I live in, a number of Republican candidates (even incumbents running for reelection) are scrambling to file as Independents. The local newspaper report 56 candidates in our Senatorial District will have to file as Independent to stay in the race. If they stay in as Independent candidates they bypass the primary and only run in the General election. This is happening across the state! It seems to me that the R’s have set themselves up for potential split tickets in at least some races. Am I missing something or is this an incredibly dumb move by the GOP?
What’s a bona fide Republican in TN?
According to bylaws “ a ‘bona fide Republican’…is an individual who is actively involved in the Tennessee Republican Party, the county Republican Party of the county in which the individual resides,or a TRP-recognized auxiliary organization, is registered to vote in the above-noted county; and who has voted in at least three (3) of the four (4) most recent statewide Republican primary elections in which he is eligible to vote.”
There are other qualifications (fees and such) but the voting requirements seem to be tripping candidates up, and because of the filing deadline there’s not enough time to appeal.
Even the ones who fail that test are probably right leaning. It that what’s being reported?
Oh yes! Exactly! The current (Republican) Road Superintendent who is running for reelection has been a Repub forever. He missed a voting in the primary 2022 "because of illness." So he now has to refile as an Independent. He says it doesn't make sense. This is affecting a lot of Republicans in a lot of races - local, county and state offices. The paper noted 56 just in this district.
Weird. The party must be very confident. Or perhaps it’s a test of loyalty to MAGA? Wouldn’t want any never-Trumpers sneaking in.