Now for the main event…

Much has changed in the week since Rep. Adam Smith, the vocal Washington State Democrat, professed to me that his party had moved too far left on issues of culture and inclusion. Smith, as you’ll recall, said that the Democrats had forgotten about personal accountability, and he called out the party for “framing everything as, It’s a human right—you know, healthcare, transportation, asylum, all of that—implying there’s no responsibility on the other side. I think that message cost us some support.” In recent days, however, previously bewildered Democrats have slowly been emerging from their post-election daze with a renewed sense of purpose, and maybe even rallying around a unified message. It’s a shift for those in the party who have spent the last three months finger-pointing and scapegoating each other for losing to a convicted felon. Furious and fearful voters have been channeling their rage through the Capitol switchboard, jamming phone lines, desperate to get the ear of their representatives to vent about being fired from their government job, or the slashing of federal agencies, or the prospect of losing federal benefits. Several members felt the heat in person during a week back home in their districts, where town hall venues struggled to contain the masses of constituents or their anger. To wit: Democratic Rep. Brad Schneider’s telephone town hall had 11,000 participants. Rep. Rich McCormick, a Republican from Georgia, was captured on video getting booed. The list of lawmakers being confronted by voters is long. I’ve been told by lawmakers, aides, and fundraisers that the grassroots fury from activists and donors, alike, has finally started to break through to Democrats on the Hill. Members, however, are still trying to keep their voters’ expectations at bay until government funding runs out in a few weeks—their first real legislative chance to force Trump’s and Republicans’ hands. Interestingly, however, the pressure still hasn’t led to unity, and mistrust between the ideological wings continues to simmer. Emblematic of the divide are two Washington State lawmakers who represent different parts of Seattle. Soon after I spoke with Smith, I heard from Rep. Pramila Jayapal, who took issue with the “Republican-light” perception of her party. Jayapal told me she adamantly disagrees with Smith’s theory about the roots of Democrats’ losses. “We lost people because we did not, as a party, focus on lifting up working people, on really speaking to people who felt like we weren’t fighting for them,” she said. “And a lot of that, frankly, came from centrist Democrats over the decades.” Jayapal pointed to moderate Democrats blocking Biden-era legislation such as housing assistance, which she says would have appealed to the Democratic voters who either stayed home or voted for Trump. “This is a difficult moment for us,” she told me, underscoring the obvious.

Yet there are indications that, for the first time in years, Democrats may at least be pulling together around a clear and concise economic message of the billionaires versus everyone else—the Bernie Sanders approach that has been shunned, and sometimes mocked, by the broader party in the past. That line of attack never gained much traction during the 2020 race, in part because Trump’s focus on cultural issues kept his opponents off-balance. But Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, firing tens of thousands of civil servants is a layup for Democrats. The left couldn’t have dreamt up a better bogeyman than a billionaire laying off veterans while wielding a gold chainsaw at CPAC. Sanders, the Vermont Independent who despises the Clinton wing of the party, has been preaching the same economic populist message since he ran for mayor of Burlington in 1981. “It’s no great secret that for the last many decades, Democrats have lost the support of working-class people,” he told me. “One of the reasons is that, in fact, the party has been increasingly captured by big money, by consultants and by policies that have not benefited ordinary people.” But, Sanders continued, Trump’s unabashed embrace of oligarchs—and, frankly, the oligarchy’s reciprocal wet kiss—has provided an opportunity for Democrats to reengage their core constituency. When I spoke with Rep. Greg Casar, the new head of the Progressive Caucus, he agreed that Musk’s ascension had created “a real opportunity” for Democrats to win back the “broad swath of working-class voters” that was once central to the Democratic coalition but has been inexorably moving away from the party. According to Faiz Shakir, who operated Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign and briefly ran for Democratic National Committee chair, early signals do suggest Democrats are embracing Sanders’ message of economic justice for the working class. Still, he warned that it’s way too early to determine whether Democrats can be trusted as the pro-worker party. There’s a lot of culture war baggage that needs to be tucked away. One Democratic strategist, who is still in the throes of conducting a review of the last election, said that the billionaires–versus–middle-class messaging is directionally right. I’m told, however, that Democrats still aren’t convening meetings between intraparty rivals, to talk and strategize, nor are those much-needed conversations happening in the weekly House Democratic Caucus meetings. Instead, the issues are broached in group texts, where a lot is left unsaid. “It’s easy to be in opposition to Trump and Musk, because it codes as partisan,” Shakir told me. “The real integrity is if you’re willing to take on the wealthy class, even if some of them might be supportive of you.”

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