This story presents a case for keeping our eye on the real prize: recapturing the White House in the 2020 general election by ensuring our positions will appeal to the broadest possible swatch of the electorate.
While arguments as to where the Democratic Party needs to head are appropriate in the primary, I keep reminding myself that everyone gets to vote in the general election. That should be our mantra.
So while we can argue among ourselves as to the party’s direction and position on major issues, we are making a mistake when we forget the above fact. (What fact? Say it with me: “Everyone gets to vote in the general election”.)
The American Electorate and Party Affiliation
This Gallup article describing how Democrats self-identified about a year ago shows that roughly half (51%) identified as liberal and roughly half (47%) identified as (what I’ll call) non-liberal (moderate or conservative).
Another Gallup article, shows that, particularly over the last 10 years or so, the percentages identifying as Democrats and Republicans have decreased, while the percentage identifying as Independent has increased. No surprise, we’ve known this has been the trend.
Per that Gallup result, at the end of 2017, 29 percent of voters identified as Democrats, 27 percent identified as Republicans, and 42 percent identified as Independents. Assuming no major viable third-party candidate is in the race, by simple math, a Democratic candidate cannot win the general election for US President without capturing a majority share of the Independent vote. (Yes, the election is decided state-by-state via the Electoral College, but I think one can think of those as 50 individual contests with the same dynamics at play.)
How Do Independent Positions Compare to Democrats and Republicans?
So let’s look at how liberal or conservative Independent voters are as a group. Every time I’ve watched the news or read the paper and they show a graphic with polling results broken down by Democrat, Republican, and Independent, the results for the Independents are always “in between” that of Democrats and Republicans.
I don’t recall ever seeing results that show, say, Independents holding a more progressive position than did the Democrats in the survey. If you have seen such results, please show me as I’d love to see them.
In case my explanation above isn’t clear, let me demonstrate. This article from PollingReport.com contains a Quinnipiac poll result asking whether the Mueller report cleared Trump:
- 76% of Republicans say the report cleared Trump
- 34% of Independents say the report cleared Trump
- 11% of Democrats say the report cleared Trump
This is what I mean by “in between” (e.g., 34% is in between the more conservative position of 76% and the more liberal position of 11%).
To look closer at the Independents, see this Pew Research article.
Similar to the Gallup results cited above, Pew (as of about the mid-2018 time frame) shows 31 percent identified as Democrat, 26 percent identified as Republican, and 38 percent identified as Independent.
But these Pew data further breakdown the 38 percent identifying as Independent (data shown only total 37 percent, difference presumably due to rounding) as:
- 17 percent “Lean Democrat”
- 13 percent “Lean Republican”
- 7 percent don’t lean Democrat or Republican
On the bright side, the total of Democrat + Lean Democrat = 48 percent, while the total of Republican + Lean Republican = 39 percent.
It’s beyond the scope of this story to closely examine the 17 percent of Independents who Lean Democrat to try to determine, for example, what portion don’t identify as Democrat because they think the Democratic Party is too liberal versus what portion don’t identify as Democrat because they think the Democratic Party is too conservative (or for whatever other reasons). However, in the cited Pew article, there is a link that does explore this point more fully and it provides this statement:
“On the left, Democratic leaners are somewhat less likely than Democratic identifiers to hold strongly negative views of Republicans (42% of Democrats and 30% of Democratic leaners have a very unfavorable opinion of the GOP).”
To me, that is in alignment with my thesis that, speaking generally, Independents are less liberal than Democrats and less conservative than Republicans. (Perhaps it’s mostly the 7 percent of “no leaners” that Democrats must capture to win the White House back?)
Part of the counterargument to this is the premise that what gets people to vote is excitement, and that there is a huge swatch of folks who don’t vote mostly because they aren’t excited about the candidates.
One could make the argument that people were excited during the 2018 mid-term elections which saw record turnout and which resulted in a blue wave. But, the majority of the 40-House seat pickups in 2018 were by candidates who appealed to the broader electorate (i.e., they were more moderate, and they won over Independents and even some Republicans).
Do you really think Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez would have been elected in Katie Hill’s California 25 District?
I don’t.
The facts show that older people vote more than younger people vote. This US Census Bureau article shows that in 2016, these percentages, by age group, voted:
- Age 65 and older 70.9%
- Age 45 to 64 66.6%
- Age 30 to 44 58.7%
- Age 18 to 29 46.1%
Unquestionably, younger people are more progressive than older people (and obviously younger people are the future of the party). But until the younger among us vote in significantly larger numbers, the less-progressive older voters will be the deciders. We need to focus on the current reality, and not on what we wish the current reality was.
So, if:
- There are more Independents than there are Democrats, and
- Democrats can’t win without capturing a larger share of the Independent vote than the Republicans capture, and
- As a group, Independents are not as progressive as Democrats are……
Tell me again why the Democratic Party needs to nominate a progressive candidate to regain the White House?
(Now, if item number 3 above is not the case, and in fact, as a group Independents are more progressive than Democrats, than I would be arguing the opposite of what I’m arguing here. But that doesn’t appear to be the reality. If you have data showing it is, please share it.)