In the wake of a historic red wave that saw the Grand Old Party clench its first popular vote win since George W. Bush defeated John Kerry in 2004, heads are understandably rolling in all corners of the Democratic establishment as entrenched Party leaders, generously remunerated campaign consultants, and pissed off political donors grapple with the reality of four more years of Donald Trump.
And yet, despite this historic blow that will hand the keys of a (likely) governing trifecta to a would-be authoritarian demagogue, Democratic Party Chair Jaime Harrison has put the self-reflection on pause long enough to log onto Elon Musk’s X to dunk on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the most popular politician in America with young voters — a demographic, mind you, that Democrats have hemorrhaged under Harrison’s watch.
For those who wisely skipped the post-election social media doomscroll, here’s the rundown: Sanders released a pointed statement, assigning blame for last Tuesday’s loss to “big money interests and well-paid consultants” in the Democratic Party, who, he argues, have turned away from working-class voters. “While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo,” he said, “the American people are angry and want change.”
Harrison quickly responded on social media, calling Sanders’s critique “straight up BS.” It’s worth noting, though, that before leading the Democratic Party, Harrison spent nearly a decade as a corporate lobbyist with the now-defunct Podesta Group, one of Washington’s top-grossing firms at the time. Harrison represented clients like defense giants Boeing and Lockheed Martin, financial giants Wells Fargo and Bank of America, and corporate powerhouses like Walmart and Google.
Sanders’s critique of the Democratic Party’s ties to corporate interests seemed to strike a nerve with Harrison, who spent years boosting the profits of some of America’s most notorious corporations. While Harrison may embody part of the problem, the Democratic Party’s shift from the working class began long ago.
Look to Bill Clinton’s NAFTA-driven free trade policies that sent millions of jobs overseas, or Barack Obama’s support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership and his failure to pass the “card check” legislation championed by labor leaders despite having a filibuster-proof Senate supermajority and a Democratic-controlled House.
Despite a sense of amnesia with this history, however, Harrison did accurately reflect on some of President Joe Biden’s pro-worker achievements. Under Biden, predatory noncompete clauses were abolished, overtime pay eligibility was expanded, and a strengthened National Labor Relations Board has investigated anti-union corporations like Starbucks. Biden also became the first president to walk a picket line during the United Auto Workers’ strike last year.
Shockingly, Vice President Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party largely distanced themselves from this working-class agenda during the 2024 campaign. From the start, Our Revolution warned about the need to reach progressive and working-class swing state voters with a clear economic message.
We launched a robust Get Out The Vote effort targeting over a million 2020 Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Miss.) supporters. When we saw that 1 in 10 of these voters planned to skip voting for Harris, we sounded the alarm in legacy outlets like the New York Times, NPR and the Associated Press to get the attention of the consultant class.
Harris might have seized the moment with a powerful populist economic message, naming real corporate adversaries like the world’s wealthiest man (and Trump’s top donor) Elon Musk. Instead, she courted her own billionaire surrogate Mark Cuban as well as war hawk Liz Cheney, hoping to woo wealthy donors and Republicans nostalgic for the Bush years.
Absent from the campaign trail was any real commitment to adequately boosting the federal minimum wage, meaningfully expanding Medicare and taking on pharmaceutical giants, or blunting private equity’s property grab and soaring rents that are fueling the national housing crisis.
In short, her team of veteran campaign strategists and consultants misjudged the electorate. They assumed, as they did in 2016, that this election would be a referendum on Donald Trump, when it was actually a referendum on the Democratic Party’s shift from the needs of ordinary Americans.
It’s an understatement to say there’s work to be done to rebuild a Democratic coalition that can counter the MAGA agenda and hold Republicans accountable for their broken promises and continued attacks on women, immigrants, and working-class Americans. But now is not the time to blindly march forward without deep reflection on the failures of a political party increasingly seen as serving wealth and privilege.
Now, more than ever is the time for principled critique, tough conversations, and accountability for the strategic missteps that have allowed Trump to return to the White House. Failed Democratic Party leadership must face the consequences. Let the heads roll.
Joseph Geevarghese is the executive director of Our Revolution, the nation’s largest progressive political organizing group born out of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign.
