The Democratic Party might have endangered 2028 for 2026. By not excising democratic socialists in their ranks now, Democrats are likely to find the movement even more potent in two years. If so, they will have risked the more important presidential election for the transient reward of a few more congressional seats.
History told us Democrats were likely to win Congress in 2026. Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama both took a beating in their second midterms: Bush's party lost 30 House seats and six Senate seats; Obama's lost 13 House seats and nine Senate seats.
President Donald Trump's job approval is right in line with theirs. As of Oct. 25, it stood at 38.2% in the RealClearPolitics average of national polls. At the same point in their presidencies,
Bush was at 38% and Obama at 42%.
Midterm losses for the party in the White House have been the rule for decades. And this January, Democrats led the generic congressional ballot by 4 percentage points in the RealClearPolitics average – and that was before the war with Iran began in late February.
Yes, Republicans’ mid-decade redistricting, which could net the GOP about 10 House seats, cuts into that advantage, but nowhere near enough to offset historical trends. And it does nothing for Republicans in the Senate.
With strong precedent and current conditions at their backs, now was the time for Democrats to excise the socialists making steady inroads into their party. Prominent Democratic strategists Rahm Emanuel and James Carville, both of whom know a thing or two about presidential politics, have urged just that.
Democratic leaders have gone quiet on socialists
But noticeably absent has been any such call from Democratic leaders about the Democratic Socialists of America. Bill and Hillary Clinton, Obama, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries have all been MIA on the DSA.
They are not calling for democratic socialists to be denied committee assignments if elected. They are not threatening to bar them from the party’s caucuses. They are not renouncing them. Schumer dodged when asked whether the DSA’s platform has a place in the party. Jeffries said he doesn’t support the DSA agenda, then promised that its candidates who win in November would be welcome in his caucus. Instead of a "Sister Souljah moment," Democratic leaders are giving us “The Sound of Silence.”
Excising democratic socialists now would not have endangered Democratic victories in the deep-blue jurisdictions where they run strongest. And it would have confronted the movement’s long-term threat, personified by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson and Florida legislator Angie Nixon, now the party’s U.S. Senate nominee.
Instead, Democrats chose containment and appeasement: trying to confine democratic socialists to the bluest areas while alienating them nowhere.
It’s the path of least resistance, but it leaves the long-term socialist problem unresolved. Fixated on maximizing their congressional gains, Democrats lost sight of the real prize: the presidency in 2028 and beyond.
Winning Congress won't buy Democrats much
Even full control of Congress, which Democrats had a good shot at anyway, offers a limited return. They can stop Trump’s legislative agenda, but control of one chamber does that. They can pass their own bills, but Trump can veto them, and Republicans would have more than enough votes to sustain those vetoes.
A Democratic Senate can block his judicial picks, but it can’t confirm its own. Congressional Democrats can investigate Trump, but investigations haven’t derailed him before.
House Democrats could even impeach Trump a third time, or more. But they won’t have the two-thirds Senate majority needed to convict him, and two impeachments didn’t stop him. Would Democrats even want to remove their favorite foil and hand Vice President JD Vance the presidency and a two-year head start on 2028?
Meanwhile, Trump’s biggest moves have routinely come through executive orders, and his ability to keep issuing them would remain undiminished.
Full congressional control would also bring infighting over their socialists’ extreme demands. Democrats would face their base’s heightened expectations – and have to explain why they accomplished so little despite controlling Congress. That control is guaranteed for only two years, after which Trump will be gone anyway.
The presidency is the far bigger prize. It has been since Franklin Roosevelt’s election in 1932. Because Democrats didn’t confront their democratic socialist problem in 2026, when it would have been comparatively easy, they may have to contend with a bigger one in 2028, at a far higher cost. There will be more democratic socialists, and they will be emboldened, because Democrats refuse to impose consequences for socialist allegiance.
Democrats know well how costly a socialist-influenced ticket would be. That’s why the party establishment worked so hard to keep democratic socialists off the ballot in swing states, as it did when Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley edged out democratic socialist Francesca Hong in Wisconsin’s gubernatorial primary. If Democrats have forgotten, they need only recall presidential nominee George McGovern’s 1972 debacle, when he carried just one state and Washington, DC.
And presidential-year turnout is consistently far higher than midterm turnout. A 2028 wipeout at the top of the ticket would likely wash away Democrats’ 2026 House gains and imperil the Senate seats they’re defending.
The final chapter of this midterm’s story could well be written in 2028. It may be the story of how Democrats, eager to avoid a fight with the democratic socialists invading their party and to maximize gains history had all but handed them, endangered their far more important presidential prospects. And all for just a two-year return.
J.T. Young is the author of “Unprecedented Assault: How Big Government Unleashed America’s Socialist Left.” Follow him on Substack.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Democrats just cost themselves a win in 2028 | Opinion
