The Varied Strains of Democrats - The American Prospect [View all]

[justaprogressive]

The most useful way to think of the range of Democratic strategies today is to envision a square. The x axis represents ideology, with the centrism of, say, Joe Manchin on the left-hand side of the square and the social democracy of, say, Bernie Sanders on the right-hand side. The y axis represents the degree of anti-Trump activism, with what we might call the “respond as if things were normal” semi-passivity at the bottom of the square and the “respond as if we’re in a constitutional crisis threatening democracy” activism at the top.

The alignments along the x axis haven’t changed that much since January 20th, but neither have they gone away. Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, for instance, voted against the Republican bill to keep the government open until September, but he also was the sole Senate Democrat not to co-sponsor a bill introduced earlier this month that is this year’s version of the PRO Act, which would enable workers to join unions without fear of being fired. As Warner’s Virginia colleague Tim Kaine, not to mention the two Democratic senators from Georgia, were among the bill’s 46 co-sponsors, Warner can’t credibly claim that his decision not to sign was an act of realpolitik deference to Southern anti-unionism, at a time when unions’ approval rating exceeds 70 percent. Rather, it was simply a manifestation of Warner’s anti-unionism.

By the same token, many view the Democrats who joined Chuck Schumer in voting for that Republican bill averting a government shutdown as deficient in meeting the challenges of the moment, though all are stronger proponents of workers’ rights than Warner, which, to be sure, is an absurdly low bar to clear.

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Some mainstream journalists looking at the Democrats’ varying responses to Trump and Musk argue that a generational fault line explains the differences. Older Democrats, it’s said, are still in the thrall of pre-Trump politics, when traces of bipartisanship still could be found and even enjoyed. This theory fails to explain anomalies like Sanders, who’s been drawing large crowds across the Midwest for his anti-Trump speeches. The real fault line—certainly, the one that explains Sanders—is the one dividing those Democrats accustomed to being part of a somewhat consensual establishment (however much that establishment has all but vanished) and those who are not so accustomed, and are happily accustomed to locating themselves outside that establishment (or the illusion of that establishment).

https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2025-03-20-varied-strains-of-democrats/