Despite what some eternally optimistic stalwarts will tell you, the Democratic Party took a real beating last year. While that loss has clearly put some Democrats, like embattled Democratic National Committee vice-chair David Hogg, in a fighting mood, millions more are still nursing their post-November political hangovers.
Democrats now face a challenging summer. The party is battling both an enthusiasm gap with Republicans and broad voter dissatisfaction within their own ranks. A new Associated Press-NORC poll found that six months on from their Election Day defeat, only about one-third of Democratic voters are optimistic about the party’s future. That’s down nearly 20 points from a year ago.
The Democratic Party isn’t experiencing some fleeting, post-defeat trauma dump. Instead, the party is finally facing the generational shift it spent a decade delaying. Frustrated Democrats want party leaders to meet their legitimate concerns with real, meaningful changes. Is anyone at the DNC actually listening?
If Democratic leaders aren’t willing to engage with their unhappy base, those voters are looking increasingly ready to create change on their own — including changing the Democrats they trust. Progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), once a marginalized figure in her own party, is now among Democrats’ most-recognized and most-trusted voices. That would have been unimaginable even a few years ago.
A Co/efficient poll released earlier this month found that over a quarter of Democrats (26 percent) consider Ocasio-Cortez to be their standard-bearer. Compare that to former Vice President Kamala Harris, cited by only 6 percent of Democrats, despite having served as their most recent presidential candidate. Democrats agree on little these days, but they are clearly in no mood to look backward.
Ocasio-Cortez is rapidly emerging as the leading reform voice, and a growing number of voters are rallying behind her. A recent Honan Strategy Group poll found that she led Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) by an eye-popping 21 points in a hypothetical Senate primary in the Empire State. That is a stunning number in a state where Schumer long ago became Democrats’ untouchable godfather — and where Ocasio-Cortez hasn’t even hinted at wanting a Senate job.
Part of Ocasio-Cortez’s appeal stems from her willingness to openly acknowledge her party’s shortcomings. Meeting frustrated voters at their emotional level was key to President Trump’s grievance-based takeover of the Republican Party — he did it with ruthless effectiveness, thanks to a digital operation that largely bypassed the Republican Party’s institutional machinery.
Like Trump, Ocasio-Cortez reaches voters where they are, thanks to what the New York Times dubbed her “digital juggernaut,” a vast online apparatus she’s spent much of the last five years perfecting. Ocasio-Cortez now enjoys a deeper reach into Democratic homes and minds than any other lawmaker, in large part because she is capturing the attention and interest of viewers in a way that message-tested, party-approved podcasts don’t. If the DNC were functional, it would invest resources in already thriving efforts like Ocasio-Cortez’s instead of dumping tens of millions of dollars into a futile quest to create the mythical “liberal Joe Rogan.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s sudden rise to the forefront of the party is just one visible sign of the generational and ideological tension Democrats are facing. Rising discontent with long-serving incumbents is reflected in a huge uptick in applications to candidate recruitment and training programs like Run for Something and Leaders We Deserve, an organization focused on recruiting young progressive candidates. That surge in first-time candidates also correlates with a steep drop in voter approval for the party’s oldest and longest-serving officials.
The shift in voter sentiment risks putting Democrats’ love of incumbent protection in conflict with what voters want, ultimately driving down voter enthusiasm and costing Democrats winnable swing races in 2026. If the party wants to be taken seriously by the voters it needs to win back, leaders need to acknowledge that voters want new, younger candidates, even if that means losing some long-time party players. The party must work for the membership — not the other way around.
Democrats don’t have the luxury of pretending that nothing changed after Harris’s disappointing loss last year. It is time for the Democratic Party to admit that the people are right and new faces are needed to address this critical time in our nation’s history.
Disaffected Democratic voters have spent six months telling party leaders what needs to happen in order to build a winning electoral coalition. The times are, as they say, a-changin’. It’s time for Democratic leaders to decide if they’re changing, too.
Max Burns is a veteran Democratic strategist and founder of Third Degree Strategies.
