Identity crisis

Resounding, historic, triumphant, vindicating, realigning. The list of adjectives to describe Donald Trump’s victory can go on. But one that doesn’t belong on the list is “surprising.”

For years now, three data points have been overwhelmingly clear: the Biden-Harris administration was deeply unpopular, the relationship between the Democratic Party and some of its core voters was in crisis, and more Americans than ever considered Donald Trump a mainstream and competent politician. In the end, the gravity of all three proved insurmountable for Kamala Harris — a result that, in retrospect, looks predictable, if no less gut-wrenching for Democrats. But among the party’s strategists, pollsters, analysts, and allies, there has not yet emerged a clear explanation for what amounts to a catastrophic political failure.

For some, the fault lies with the outgoing president and his choice to even run for reelection at all. “As far as I am concerned the original sin was the decision by President Biden,” said Jim Manley, former chief of staff to Senator Harry Reid. “In a shocking display of arrogance and hubris, they decided that Biden was the only person that could beat Trump — despite his obvious infirmaries — and now the rest of the country is going to pay the price.”

Alyssa Cass, a Democratic strategist at Blueprint Strategies, wondered how much Biden’s decision foreclosed the party’s ability to read the electorate's mood. “I think we might have seen the factors that ultimately doomed Democrats appear much earlier had Biden not ever been the nominee,” Cass said. But she also argued Democrats were battling headwinds that have been building for years. “Voters have been telling us for a long time that what you are offering isn't enough. There's no way to hide from that or pretend you weren't hearing that after last night.”

Danielle Deiseroth, executive director of the left-leaning polling outlet Data for Progress, attributed the results to the salience of inflation and the global anti-incumbent mood — but also joined a growing faction on the left that is increasingly critical of local Democratic governance. “The shift right in big blue states is an indictment of Democratic leaders who have not done nearly enough to deliver a working-class agenda, confront the housing crisis, and offer a vision for a progressive American future in contrast with growing red states like Florida and Texas,” Deiseroth said.

To Matt Bennett, executive director of Third Way, the results represented a “total shattering” of the party’s identity since Barack Obama’s 2008 victory. “Voters do not like what they see in Democrats,” Bennett said, citing lax immigration enforcement and perceptions of Democrats as the “language police.” He predicted a complex debate within the party over economic and cultural issues. “There are going to be elements of a populist economic agenda that moderates adopt and there are going to be elements of moderating on culture issues that the left probably adopts,” Bennett said. “Those things don’t move in tandem the way they used to.”

Mike Madrid, an anti-Trump Republican strategist who has spent years warning of Democratic peril with Latino voters called the results a “five-alarm fire” for the party. “Everything they have done has been categorically wrong,” said Madrid. “They need a complete revamp, from the way they think about Latino voters to the consultants that they have dealing with. They need to start all over.”

It will take weeks to fully count all the ballots, but savvy analysts estimate that Trump will ultimately carry the popular vote by about a point and a half — a slimmer national margin than any since 2004. It’s nonetheless a searing indictment of a party that has taken eight years of comfort in the president-elect’s inability to command a national majority. Now, that assumption, like so many that have been foundational to the party’s identity, is no more. In its place is a party fumbling in the dark.

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