Opinion | This Is What the Future of the Democratic Party Should Be

Democrats are close to a year into a fight over the future of the party. “The outcome of this election is not what we wanted ——” and there’s still no consensus on an answer. The longer-term problem that Democrats are facing is that for close to 60 years now, the party has been losing ground with working-class voters who were once the base of the Democratic coalition. It raises a basic question: What is the Democratic Party for if it’s not standing up for working people? So what’s happening in the country right now is a kind of broad-based rebellion against the Democratic establishment from within the Democratic Party. Two very different wings of this rebellion so far apart that some of them don’t even think of themselves as Democrats: Dan Osborn and Zohran Mamdani. What sets Dan Osborn apart from a lot of other Democrats? A lot of things. One of them: He’s not actually a Democrat. He’s running as an independent. He says that he welcomes the support of the Democratic Party, which is backing him in 2026. But even if he wins, he’s not going to caucus with the Democrats. And here’s what’s really important about Osborne. He’s a candidate who’s running on a message that combines a blistering economic populism with cultural moderation, delivered by an authentic outsider to the political status quo. He’s a college dropout turned labor leader —— “A company called Grunwald Mechanical, they contract out of Local 464 ——” who means it when he says that his top priority in Washington, D.C., is going to be taking on a billionaire economy. I want to challenge the system because the system needs to be challenged. Way on the other side is Zohran Mamdani. Mamdani, an unapologetic cultural progressive. “I have purchased marijuana at a legal cannabis shop.” But someone who says that the most important issue in his campaign is making a New York City that’s “More affordable for the people who build it every day.” “It’s time for those tenants to have a rent freeze.” And who isn’t just running against Republicans. He’s running against a broken establishment that includes a lot of elite Democrats. What makes Dan Osborn on one side and Zohran Mamdani on the other so exciting as a potential for a new Democratic majority is that they point the way toward an alliance between populists and thoroughgoing progressives like Mamdani. If you get a Democratic candidate that is able to build a bridge between those candidates, that’s a candidate that could rebuild the Democratic coalition and transform American politics.