{"id":819,"date":"2026-08-11T17:30:27","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T17:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/atlaslivingmedia.com\/?p=819"},"modified":"2026-08-11T17:30:27","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T17:30:27","slug":"insurgents-are-revitalizing-the-democratic-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/atlaslivingmedia.com\/?p=819","title":{"rendered":"Insurgents Are Revitalizing the Democratic Party"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

To hear the DC insiders tell it, insurgent socialists and progressive firebrands are wrecking the Democratic Party. Don\u2019t believe it. The insurgency that swept across the United States during the spring and summer of 2026, with its spike in voter turnouts and headline-grabbing primary results for young candidates who are challenging entrenched incumbents, is not, as some would have you believe, undermining the world\u2019s oldest political party in this critical midterm-election year. The insurgency is revitalizing it. And if established party leaders don\u2019t screw things up\u2014by echoing Republican talking points about a \u201cdangerous\u201d left, or by opting for caution when the electorate is calling for action\u2014this revitalization has the potential to build a vibrant coalition of Democratic base voters and legions of younger, more diverse, and newly registered ones. If it is sufficiently bold and innovative, strategic and inclusive, this coalition can do more than simply check and balance Donald Trump, by giving Democratic candidates and economic-populist independents control of the House and the Senate and key governorships nationwide. In the run-up to the 2028 presidential election, it can merge Democratic candidacies and movement energy into a political force capable of finally realizing the deferred dreams of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt\u2019s Economic Bill of Rights and the Freedom Budget for All Americans that A. Philip Randolph and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. advanced as an essential extension of the civil-rights revolution of the 1960s.<\/p>\n

Read more The Right\u2019s New Inflation Message: Let Them Eat Ramen<\/a><\/p>\n

Too many Democratic Party leaders in recent years have complacently mounted campaigns that address legitimate fears of Republican hegemony, yet fail to offer a bolder vision that speaks to the most powerful of all incentives to vote: hope. We\u2019re not talking about vapid \u201cIt\u2019ll all work out in the end\u201d optimism or, worse yet, the dismissive \u201cJust trust us\u201d messaging of old-school politicians. We\u2019re talking about a radical hope that lives can be made dramatically better by movements that recognize and embrace Patti Smith\u2019s promise that \u201cpeople have the power\u2026to dream, to rule, to wrestle the earth from fools.\u201d This is the prospect that FDR entertained when he dramatically expanded the Democratic coalition by proposing a New Deal that pundits dismissed as extreme\u2014even socialistic\u2014but that the electorate embraced as essential. This is what Barack Obama understood when he had the audacity to call a divided nation to \u201ccome together as a single American family. \u2018E pluribus unum.\u2019 Out of many, one.\u201d And this is what the Rev. Jesse Jackson was talking about four decades ago when he pleaded for a new Democratic politics based on the idea that \u201cif you raise up truth, it\u2019s magnetic. It has a way of drawing people.\u201d<\/p>\n

The progressive gospel that Jackson preached in his Rainbow Coalition campaigns of the 1980s, and that Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders outlined in his 2016 and 2020 presidential bids, laid the groundwork for what a new generation of candidates and activists propose today. They are speaking confidently about enacting Medicare for All, taxing the rich, ending poverty, protecting immigrants, and changing our foreign policy. They are remaking American politics and policymaking\u2014as the July vote by 103 House Democrats (including former House speaker Nancy Pelosi) to end US aid to Israel demonstrated. What Politico<\/em> described as a \u201cseismic shift\u201d in the party and in Congress is taking place because voters all over the country are demanding a new politics.<\/p>\n

After a trio of insurgents\u2014Democratic Socialists of America members Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier and veteran progressive Brad Lander\u2014swept New York\u2019s Democratic primaries in June, Mayor Zohran Mamdani was mocked for his claim that democratic socialists with working-class economics and values-driven agendas \u201ccan get elected anywhere across this country for any position.\u201d Less than a week later, 29-year-old DSA member Melat Kiros defeated a 15-term incumbent in a Colorado House primary. That same day, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, who pledged to stand up to corporate monopolies on behalf of workers, farmers, and consumers, overcame a 30-point deficit in the polls to beat a sitting senator in the state\u2019s primary for governor. Weiser\u2019s win shocked the Democratic leadership and his own progressive supporters, whom he heard asking on primary night, \u201cCan I really believe again?\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just that Democrats can believe again. They must.<\/p>\n

The Democratic brand as it\u2019s been defined by its congressional leaders is unpopular, even among Democrats. It doesn\u2019t have to be that way. The party can become every bit as appealing, and electable, as it has ever been. But that won\u2019t happen if control over its future remains in the hands of the people who spoiled the brand in the first place.<\/p>\n

Democratic voters know that the party needs a new direction, and they are forging it by nominating candidates such as US Representative Analilia Mejia, a key aide to Sanders during his 2020 presidential bid whose February special-election victory in a suburban New Jersey district shocked commentators. \u201cPeople will say that this district is not the kind of district in which a progressive or a lefty could win. But it\u2019s not about left\/right,\u201d Mejia, the sole candidate in a crowded Democratic-primary field to call Israel\u2019s assault on Gaza a genocide, said on election night. \u201cIt\u2019s about right and wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

By choosing candidates like Mejia, who easily won her general election, Democratic-primary voters are charting a new course. They know\u2014better than many party leaders, it seems\u2014that it is necessary to remake the party as a popular movement for economic, social, and racial justice, for saving the planet, and for a foreign policy that chooses human rights and diplomacy over bloated Pentagon budgets and forever wars.<\/p>\n

Read more Centrist Democrats Are Rolling Up Their Sleeves and Punching Left<\/a><\/p>\n

That gap between the electorate and party leaders has led to this dynamic and sometimes contentious moment. Media outlets are paying attention to Democratic primaries and scrutinizing the results from Maine to California, Pennsylvania to Texas. Right-wing publications like the New York Post<\/em> run articles warning about dire consequences for Democrats as a result of a \u201csocialist takeover.\u201d Former Clinton-administration commerce secretary William Daley\u2014whose centrist choice for Illinois\u2019s March Senate primary got crushed by a progressive contender\u2014complained that \u201cthis far-left socialist, some call \u2018progressive,\u2019 part of society [is] basically trying to take over the Democratic Party.\u201d Leaders of Third Way, the DC think tank that puts a contemporary spin on the neoliberal agenda of the old Democratic Leadership Council (DLC)\u2014which Jackson called \u201cDemocrats for the Leisure Class\u201d\u2014warn that \u201cthe DSA\u2019s radicalism makes it not a faction to be appeased; it is a movement to be opposed.\u201d<\/p>\n

But voters don\u2019t see it that way. They are open to candidates\u2014be they democratic socialists such as Pennsylvania House nominee Chris Rabb, or progressives like Minnesota Senate candidate Peggy Flanagan, or old-school economic populists like Troy Jackson in Maine and Sherrod Brown in Ohio\u2014who break with status quo politics. That\u2019s not surprising. Remember: Bernie Sanders represents a rural state and was the first non-Republican to win his Vermont Senate seat since the 1850s; and some of the most progressive members of Congress, such as Wisconsin\u2019s Mark Pocan, represent urban, suburban, and rural districts. And look at the polling analyses from groups like the Center for Working-Class Politics, which remind us that \u201cchampioning progressive economic policies can reverse the exodus of blue-collar voters from the party\u201d and that \u201ccontrary to what many might expect, the working class has become both more progressive on economic issues and less conservative on social issues in recent decades.\u201d<\/p>\n

Instead of getting distracted by the establishment\u2019s hand-wringing, Democrats should recognize a moment of renewal and potential. The party suffered devastating defeats in 2024, in part because of an enthusiasm gap among its core constituencies, and in greater part because of its failure to engage with the disaffected potential voters who will be essential to a robust governing coalition. Yet now it is suddenly experiencing what the CNN data analyst Harry Enten describes as a \u201csupercharging\u201d moment. A July Washington Post<\/em>\/Ipsos poll, conducted amid the hype about upheaval in the party, found that Democrats had a 10-point advantage over Republicans when it came to voter enthusiasm. That was eight points better than in 2018\u2014the \u201cblue wave\u201d midterm-election year that saw seven governorships and at least 40 House seats flip to the Democrats. \u201cAnd,\u201d the Post <\/em>noted, \u201cmore than seven in 10 Democrats say it is \u2018more important\u2019 to vote in 2026 than in previous midterm elections, compared with just over half of Republicans.\u201d Of course, voters are eager to cast ballots against Republicans who back Trump, but they\u2019re also eager to cast them for a bolder, better Democratic Party.<\/p>\n

Jesse Jackson saw this moment coming. \u201cIf we lift up a program to feed the hungry, they\u2019ll come running. If we lift up a program to study war no more, our youth will come running,\u201d he declared as he sought to forge a new Democratic politics. \u201cIf we lift up a program to put America back to work, and an alternative to welfare and despair, they will come working.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1984, Jackson surmised that the people have the power to change a party and a nation. In 2026, a new Democratic coalition\u2014fueled by the energy of a dynamic multiracial, multiethnic progressive insurgency\u2014can prove him right.<\/p>\n

Read more David Ellison\u2019s Delusional Stab at Self-Justification<\/a><\/p>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Nation Magazine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nInsurgents Are Revitalizing the Democratic Party - Atlas Living Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/atlaslivingmedia.com\/?p=819\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Insurgents Are Revitalizing the Democratic Party - Atlas Living Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Nation Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/atlaslivingmedia.com\/?p=819\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Atlas Living Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-11T17:30:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"8 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/f6233854b1f92a6d21147fe5d5e58abc\"},\"headline\":\"Insurgents Are Revitalizing the Democratic Party\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-11T17:30:27+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819\"},\"wordCount\":1592,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/32fd5043b0660c600448b34b35c0954e.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Editorial\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/atlaslivingmedia.com\\\/?p=819\",\"name\":\"Insurgents Are Revitalizing the Democratic Party - 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