The Democratic Party is Its Voters And They’re Doing Just Fine talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/the-d…
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) June 30, 2025 at 4:00 PM
Gotta (mostly) agree with Josh Marshall here — “The Democratic Party is Its Voters and They’re Doing Just Fine”:
… On the one hand, the Democratic Party is “floundering,” “directionless,” “lost.” It’s approval numbers are bleak. And then, often in the same articles, you have all this evidence of voter intensity. Turnout. New activism. Lots of new people running for office. What seems like an apparent contradiction resolves itself if you get your terms right. I don’t think the Democratic Party is in a tailspin or floundering at all. In many cases, the elected leadership of the party is. But the elected leadership is not the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party is its voters. Especially it’s primary voters. This is just a signal understanding of what a party is and what constitutes its health or disfunction. I saw a headline a few days ago that was roughly, The Dems’ Latest Nightmare: Primaries As Far As The Eye Can See.
But that’s not a nightmare. Certainly not for the party. It may be a nightmare for some incumbents. But again, they are not the party, not in the most meaningful sense. They are most properly seen as the employees of the party. Or perhaps the executive leadership, which is accountable to a board. And the raft of primaries and threats of primaries show clearly that the bosses have, in that icily awkward phrase, decided to go in another direction.
As far as I’m concerned, the more primaries the better. A primary against a presidential incumbent can be damaging. The idea that it strengthens that candidate is, empirically speaking, nonsense. But the dynamics are different with congressional primaries, especially when it’s a general election in which the party will almost certainly have a strong electoral environment.
Of course, the danger with primaries is that you can end up saddled with candidates who are too extreme or ideological to win. But I don’t see a lot of evidence of that in the primaries that are coming into view or the candidates who are gaining momentum in fights for open seats. Voters in New Jersey and Virginia just chose two strong and electable candidates for governor. As I and many others have expressed in recent months, the hunger is not primarily for more ideological or left-wing candidates but for those who are willing to fight Trumpism and have the creativity to come up with novel ways to do that — fight! — in the current environment. That’s the anger in the Democratic Party. What are you doing? Why aren’t you fighting? Why aren’t you thinking outside the box more? Why are you overthinking norms and institutionalisms that have been yesterday’s news for a decade or maybe 25 years?…
When things aren’t working right, you need tumult, even if it comes with some messiness. A lot of the weirdness of press coverage of the current Democratic Party, its goals, its abilities and its future get resolved if you have a clear set of definitions about who and what the Democratic Party actually is. The more primaries, the better. Basically every poll you see with the public standing of the Democratic Party at an historic low is based on Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents who are fed up with the party because they see it as ineffective and weak. That is about the elected leadership. And that anger and realization is a good thing, not a bad thing, because it shows that voters aren’t satisfied with the current party, the current elected leadership. They are, as they say, looking to go in another direction. And that’s great.
Baud
Le parti, c’est moi.
Glory b
I recall reading that, in spite of weeping and gnashing of teeth in the media, regular, standard issue normie Dems are doing very well in special elections since the last election.
I feel like lots of DSA folks, who promised a hostile takeover of the party (like my rep, who called Biden “a ghat damn Republican”), are actually riding a bandwagon that was already moving in the right direction.
Baud
What’s happening in the real world while we debate among ourselves whether we’re good enough.
cain
I look forward to an energized Democratic base and a dribbing for folks like Gillibrand.
Baud
@cain:
She doesn’t face voters again until 2030.
cain
@Baud:
We are excellent to the voters and to each other.
Now, we just need to get a hold of one house and then we’ll take the fight to Trump’s DOJ.
cain
@Baud:
Plenty of other targets. She better hope people have forgotten her shtick by then.
UncleEbeneezer
Or it’s because they are scared and frustrated and their knee-jerk response is to always blame/punish Dems for it. And that’s NOT great. He’s also assuming that unhappiness with Dems is for the reasons he imagines/feels and not say people who feel Dems are still too woke/committed to ID politics etc.
Baud
chemiclord
Even among the “leadership,” what they are describing is nothing particularly new with the Democratic Party or even the coalition.
What? Some monied moderates are all up in their feelings and crying about antisemitism now that some young progressive is rising? AOC says hello. Jasmine Crockett says hello. Over there you see Ilhan Omar waving. Yeah, this isn’t new. Hard to believe this is your first time, pundits.
Oh? David Sirota is bitching and just being his usual gatekeeping ass self? Briana Joy Gray is running her mouth about how moderates are trying to ruin everything? Oh… wait… hold up. I got a phone call. Oh. It’s 2016. It’s asking where the hell you’ve been. 2020 just left a text wondering the same thing. And 2000 just sent a letter. Old ass dude doesn’t know how a phone works I guess.
Pundits and the MSM are just so desperate to make the Democrats look as out of sorts as the Republicans, because both-siderism is the only thing they know. But it’s just us. It’s how we’ve pretty much always been. It’s part of our charm, I’m told.
BlueGuitarist
Speaking of being proud to be a Democrat:
Zohran Mamdani emphasized ““what made so many of us proud to be Democrats”
EarthWindFire
@chemiclord: This. Every time I hear some pundit or some Democrat tell the world that Mamdani is the death of the Democratic Party, I remember not at all fondly that they told me the same thing about that upstart AOC. They’re the boy who cried wolf at this point.
Baud
@BlueGuitarist:
Don’t leave us hanging. What was it that made us proud?
David Collier-Brown
We see the same thing in Canada. The Liberal party was slowly dying, often of old age. The Conservatives had been taken over by the Trumpist really-far-right but still were headed toward a majority.
Then Mr Trump started a trade war, and the former governor of Bank of Canada and Bank of England (think Chair of the Federal Reserve) was horrified, and agreed to run for Prime Minister.
The Conservatives did terribly. Their party-head lost his seat, which usually means the’re cordially hated (:-)) The liberals are still in a terrible state as a party, but their MPs have perked up wonderfully under the new PM.
Elbows up! We’re playing hockey now, not lawn bowling!
Jay
@Baud:
Simple answer.
Baud
@Jay:
Ok. That’s fine. I thought he was talking about something current. I’m not a huge fan of nostalgia.
ETA: Thanks.
JoeyJoeJoe
@EarthWindFire: people said the same thing when Nancy Pelosi succeeded Dick Gephardt as leader of the House democrats in 2004. They probably said the same thing when Tip O’Neill became Speaker of the House in 1976. Nothing new at all
cmorenc
@cain: Not to be pedantic, but you wished Gillibrand a “dribbing” , which means manipulating a ball by bouncing it with hand or foot – and therefore that word sounds like you are wishing Gillibrand to have political skill and success the way Kaitlin Clark does with basketball. I think you meant you wished Gillibrand a “drubbing” in the next election. As some unsuccessful, unloved pro sports teams suffer.
:=)
Jay
@David Collier-Brown:
I was disheartened when Prime Minister Mark Carney caved on the DST and would be introducing legislation to repeal it.
Then I did a bit of research.
The fastest record for a bill to be written is 21 days, to go through the House, from first reading, is 42 days, the Senate, from first reading to passing, is 31 days.
So 94 days would be a record.
Prime Minister Mark Carney is just stringing Taco Don along until he Taco’s out.
Omnes Omnibus
@cmorenc: Or it might just have been a typo.
Jay
@Baud:
He’s not talking about nostalgia for days gone by. He’s talking about fighting to make peoples lives better.
Steve LaBonne
@Jay: Carney vs TACO is truly a duel of wits with an unarmed TACO. And as an Irish-American with Canadian ancestry on both sides I am proud of Mr. Carney.
Baud
@Jay:
That sounds like nostalgia to me.
ETA: It’s fine. It just wasn’t what I was expecting after the original comment.
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
Baud got there first.
Captain C
@Baud: Given the people behind this administration I’d say that’s a goal on their part.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
But just remember, the GOP is “pro-life.”
Bupalos
The Democratic party is as dead as the Republican party was in 2013.
You can do really “objective” measures where you poll a policy, and it gets a score, and then you attach “Democratic Party” to it, and its -25%.
That is as toxic as toxic as you can get.
I hope to god The Party just ends… and 80% of it’s voters and 27% of former Republicans land on whatever new thing shows up. Working Families… or whatever.
Captain C
@Baud: Eau de Rolling Coal
no body no name
@Glory b:
Most DSA types come home at the end of the day. The attacks on Democrats by Sanders, AOC, Omar, and NYC’s next mayor! create a permission structure for them to do so. They get to place themselves outside of the party as an opponent of it and rant their complaints to each other. Then they vote Democratic and claim not to have online.
They are a pressure release valve that probably gets more votes than it loses. The left side of politics does not march in lock step and we bicker constantly. I’d rather be that way than a cult.
Bupalos
@Jay: I love that.
As a person that spent half my career in advertising, I think there has to be some change to the name. The Republicans went fash and had a full realignment without changing the name… I think we should go one better, since we got a later start
zhena gogolia
@Bupalos: This is the most authentic frontier gibberish I have ever seen.
zhena gogolia
@Jay: White working people?
Bupalos
Wow. Way to accomplish your goals here!!!
You are aware that you’re “online” right now, yeah?!!! An online “interaction” just like 94.2% of interactions.
Bupalos
@zhena gogolia: You forgot “cis” and “heteronormative”
Except wait, you’re “cis” and “heteronormative.” So… I see where you would leave that out.
I am interested in what your history is. I know you’ve managed to find your way to the right s, ide on Ukraine. I assume that’s an actual birth commitment. Like, why is it that you are on the right side in that conflict?
Miss Bianca
@Baud: Damn. Even with a grift, women’s shit still more expensive than men’s shit.
(That’s with the accent on the “shit”.)
japa21
@zhena gogolia: You haven’t read many of that individual’s comments, then. That would only rank 5th or 6th.
Ishiyama
Mr. Dooley said: Man an’ boy I’ve seen th’ dimmycratic party hangin’ to th’ ropes a score iv times. I ‘ve seen it dead an’ burrid an’ th’ raypublicans kindly buildin’ a monymint f r it an’ preparin’ to spind their declinin’ days in th’ custom house. I ‘ve gone to sleep nights wondhrin’ where I ‘d throw away me vote affcher this an’ whin I woke up there was that crazyheaded ol’ loon iv a party with its hair sthreamin’ in its eyes, an’ an axe in its hand, chasin’ raypublicans into th’ taJl grass.
no body no name
@Bupalos:
I vote Democratic and make no bones about that the other party wants to kill me. I don’t have a choice here.
Yet the DSA and Democrats who attack Democrats do create a space to draw in those who otherwise would not vote for a Democrat. The right has their cranks, much worse than our left flank, who also create the same permission structure.
I’m glad that a DSA member can win a Democratic primary. Cuomo winning would have proved all the bad things about the party being correct once again. A DSA win convinces them they have a shot in the Democratic party. That’s a victory. Just as I’m fine with Sanders running for president and slagging people to release the frustration. It gets votes and releases frustration. The ones that don’t vote never would.
We are stuck with Trump now because he was crazy enough to go up on stage and slag his own party and it’s economic elite voters and call them all out. There’s a lesson in that.
Bupalos
@zhena gogolia: I’m well aware this isn’t going to be received well here.
And that the stuff you either care about or pretend to care about (no one can tell) is going to keep losing.
Josie
@Bupalos: I’m beginning to have some sympathy for Omnes’ attitude toward you.
Bupalos
Yes there is.
We’re in a different political era. Our opponents beat us to it, mostly by bottoming out first with Mitt Romney. Now they have the advantage.
Bupalos
@Josie: I appreciate that.
I have some appreciation for his position.
You know. Eating steak in Paris is one priority that you can have. I encourage you to have that sympathy. There is literally no personal advantage to caring about this stuff. Just find someone else to target who is the Real Problem and let it roll!
Honestly, that’s the healthier thing to do!
Shakti
@UncleEbeneezer:
After a certain point, if an opposition party when it’s out of power is consistently ineffectual, weak, and supine, it’s not really opposition, it’s enabling. It’s kayfabe. You know, in your heart of hearts, Mitch McConnell in a brain dead coma would put up more effective opposition than Jeffries or Schumer. You’ve seen it.
Saying shit like “It’s the Republicans’ fault!” and then doing shit voting unanimously to confirm Marco Rubio, says it all, really. [I don’t feel like listing all the bullshit, but if you can’t be bothered to unanimously vote against making it hard to impossible for people with name changes to vote, a large part of your supposed base, you obviously aren’t interested in winning or opposing anything.]
Jay
@zhena gogolia:
Working People. He’s a New Yorker.
NYC has the most Billionaires and multi-Millionaires in the world.
NYC encompasses basically two different worlds. Theirs and people who have to work for a living. One group lives lives that Kings and Princes could only dream of, all that wealth, power and no responsibility.
There is a huge resentment of that in NYC, and it doesn’t help that life has gotten more and more expensive for the working classes, (people who have actual jobs, from Garbage person to Store Manager and up), while life has gotten more luxurious for the others, and they flaunt it.
Eg. the National Science Foundation getting kicked out of their Headquarters in Virginia, and HUD taking the building over, with Eric Scott Turner, ex Concussion Ball Sport Player, Politician, Taco Don flunky, multimillionaire remodeling the top floor, for personal accommodations, (Penthouse) at the new headquarters, including 5 reserved parking spaces for his exotic cars, an executive suite and dining area, a restricted elevator, and a restricted gym.
They are not like you or I, and this story is not a surprise in NYC.
no body no name
@Shakti:
Rubio was the best they were going to be offered. The job also kills his future senate and presidential prospects.
Bupalos
@Jay: Honestly, fighting this out in NYC is probably a good idea.
Yeah, this is the epicenter of inequality… an epicenter of epicenters.
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
@Shakti:
I don’t know any such thing.
billcinsd
@cmorenc: Technically a dribbing is not dribbling
Jackie
@Baud: You’d think FFOTUS’s MAGAts would be broke by now financing all his grifts.
Another Scott
@David Collier-Brown: Elbows Up indeed!
(repost) PewResearch.org:
Emphasis added.
If the party was objectively more popular among non-voters than the party’s candidate, and more popular that the other party, then the proposition that “everyone hates the Democratic party these days” is objectively propaganda.
And it’s unsurprising that the usual suspects are pushing such a line. Either they’re mostly Lefty McLeftish types who want to take over the party (but cannot get enough actual support to do so), or they’re mostly GQPers who are desperate to Both Sides their own historically low popularity.
FWIW.
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
billcinsd
@Bupalos:You can do really “objective” measures where you poll a policy, and it gets a score, and then you attach “Democratic Party” to it, and its -25%.
This was true back in 1993 for Clinton’s health care bill. In focus groups when just the facts of the bill were described the group members liked it about 3:1. When those same facts were described as being part of the Clinton health care bill, the group members disliked it 3:1
Josie
@Bupalos:
In all my years commenting here, I don’t think I have ever targeted anyone, even people I have strongly disagreed with, but your sanctimonious bullshit is getting on my last nerve.
BlueGuitarist
@Baud:
Sorry
@Jay:
Thanks
Jay
@Another Scott:
You forgot the F’n MSM and the Puditocracy.
Another Scott
@Jay: Them too!
Best wishes,
Scott.
Glory b
@EarthWindFire: To be fair (or unfair as the case may be), a fair number of online lefties are now saying AOC has gone “normie” and is now on their enemies list.
Shakti
@no body no name: I have been repeatedly told that the sky was going to fall down over and over again for multiple elections.
Rightly or wrongly, and whatever you think are the merits of that decision, this is not the behavior of a party that believed any of that. A party that believed any of that would’ve come together to make McConnell looks sweet, reasonable and accommodating. No Republican legislative leader should be able to peel off votes for anything across the aisle for the last 7 months, especially since they broke the compact of what’s in the budget gets enacted and they showed no interest in checking Trump whatsoever.
Maybe this time flipping the House or Senate will result in effective opposition. But, I have no reason to believe this based on past behavior.
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain:
@no body no name: Regardless of the supposed merits, and accuracy, this is not consistent with a party that has been screaming about the sky falling down and democracy’s last stand to me for how many elections now?
If that was really so they should’ve been doing their damnedest to make sure the Republicans couldn’t govern.
It’s just one of several actions that tell me they don’t believe any of what they’re saying whether it was fear spaghetti to drive turnout, or just it was a real threat and they don’t care to do much about it, just enough so I can say “oh they’re better than the other guy” while my life just gets progressively worse and horrible.
My word, maybe one day I’ll be able to wear real shoes to the airport again and fly the safe friendly skies with people who know not to bring guns on trips or through security!</snark>
Glory b
@Bupalos: Of course. It’s been like this a long time. It’s not new.
People like the policies we propose implementing.
They just don’t want to vote for the party with the black people in it.
Although, as I said in a previous thread, normie Dems have done very well in special elections this year, so maybe that conventional wisdom is wrong.
no body no name
@Shakti:
Rubio ain’t perfect but he’s the lesser evil which is exactly what people here constantly state is the passing grade.
Bill Arnold
@Jay:
He + Trump did make it clear that services are to be included in trade deficit determinations, not just goods.
Glory b
@Shakti: When Republicans were in the minority, McConnell did nothing, because Republicans were in the minority.
People say that but when asked what McConnell did and when he did it, it turns out that those were times Republicans had the majority.
The House operates under an entirely different set of rules.
Comparing Jeffries to McConnell is apples and oranges.
Glory b
@no body no name: We are stuck with Trump because he shot to number one in the primary when he descended that elevator and called Mexicans a bunch of rapists and drug dealers.
He hasn’t budged from number one since then.
It has nothing to do with the rest of his party.
Jay
@Bill Arnold:
Then you owe us $278 billion dollars for 2024,
You buy more “products and raw materials” from us, we buy way more “services” from you.
17 other countries have a DST for US services, Taco Don doesn’t have a problem with that.
We passed the DST three years ago, and gave the Digital Services 3 years to contest it and prepare for it, it was only when the bill came due for the Tech Companies, that Taco Don had a hissy fit.
no body no name
@Glory b:
That’s part of the story. He also called out NAFTA, pointed out all politicians were bribed and how he paid the Clintons, called out the GOP on the Iraq War, promised to defend Medicare and Social Security, and admitted most Americans were getting schlonged.
He was entirely correct on that. Of course he was the worst possible person to fix it but that part is constantly papered over by Democrats. The most popular Democrats now from AOC to Sanders sing the same song. There’s something going on here that those of us floating in the comfortable but not super rich range do not want to admit.
We are now bleeding working class racial minorities as well. We have a real problem.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@cain:
And when we bring up things like primarying her (in some abstract sense since as has been pointed out, that won’t happen for forever) we’re called purity ponies. BlueMAGA rears it’s head here daily, deliberately as it helps direct the Party’s message and direction to a place where the political spectrum is basically Never Trump “moderate” Republicans and Nazis.
Republicans are so so so much worse, so why do I continue to criticize Democrats like Gillibrand and ones to the right of her?
Because I’m a loyal Democrat.
RevRick
@zhena gogolia: Having served a white, working class church from 1975-1988, I know a lot about their tendency towards social conservatism. They very much strive for well-kept homes, well-managed families, and well-ordered communities. An unmowed lawn, a kid acting out, the collapse of the volunteer fire department are things that fill them with horror.
Yes, racism plays a big part, but their worldview is often surprisingly insular. Anything that upsets the social applecart, anything that threatens to unravel the glue that holds their own community together is an existential crisis. When I served this church in Westmoreland county in western Pennsylvania, it was solid Democratic territory. But with deindustrialization came social chaos. So now, Westmoreland county is one of the greatest sources of net Republican votes in Pennsylvania.
Jay
@no body no name:
Fact checking is your friend.
DJTdiot was all in on WMD, Regime Change, Take the Oil from Day One. He was for it long before he was aginst it.
When President Obama did the last draw down, and it became clear that the whole war was an utter waste, with the US achieving none of the WW-Me-Too goals, DJTdiot retconned his whole 8 year history of being a cheerleader.
And I won’t bother fact checking the rest of his claims because DJTdiot always lies and the Gullibillies always believe him
Ditto NAFTA. He thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread, until he didn’t during the President Obama Administration.
Glory b
@no body no name: His trailer dwelling voters didnt hear any of that and he did t cover all of that in that speech.
He couldn’t even spell NAFTA.
Shakti
@Glory b: He somehow managed to block Obama’s Supreme Court Justice. This shouldn’t be a 6-3 court. And then somehow they managed to speed run covid barrett through? Whatever.
So either he used his power in the majority at the time to push the envelope or he managed to brick that as a minority leader. Do you see Schumer managing such a feat with a majority in the past or future? I do not.
They don’t use power when they have it; and when they’re in the minority they cede what little power they have. Blue No Matter who only works if you can rely on the party to vote a certain way. If it all depends on which wing and not even then — it barely matters.
However, to your point, comparing Schumer to McConnell is not apples to oranges though. What has Schumer been doing? Gearing up for his book tour to warn everyone about anti-Semitism. It’s…late.
Super love that the priority of the US budget is going to be letting Israel have a blank check for genocide and for a middle east front to hot world war III, and ICE having more funding than the FBI or idk actual normal law enforcement. Y’know the people who’ve demonstrated they’re operating like the thugs in Taken right now. The House and Senate democrats will do nothing.
@no body no name: The lesser evil is increasingly horrible and beyond what would’ve been the lesser evil 5 or 10 or 15 years ago.
This is what I mean about ineffective sad opposition. I’ve seen this over time. They do nothing.
MobiusKlein
@Shakti: McConnell had the Senate Majority R on both those Scotus Nominations.
Not sure what you expect to happen.
MobiusKlein
Dup
H-Bob
@Baud: Once they go into the bargain bin, they will provide a source of statues to desecrate!
chemiclord
@Shakti: Psst. McConnell was the majority leader both times a Supreme Court seat came up. That’s why he was able to block Obama’s nomination, and push Trump’s through on a rocket sled.