Neither Party Represents People Like Me

If you listen to Democrat politicians describe their opponents—whether Republicans in general or, more specifically, President Donald Trump, MAGA, or the America First coalition—one of their favorite terms is “extremist.” Yet voters don’t appear to perceive ideological extremism quite as the rhetoric would suggest.

A recent Rasmussen Reports national survey of likely U.S. voters found that more voters think the Democrat Party is too far left than believe Republicans are too far right.

Among all voters, 45% say the Democrat Party is too liberal, while 41% think the Republican Party is too conservative.

Interestingly, among unaffiliated voters – arguably those with the least partisan incentive to defend either party – 47% say Democrats are too liberal, compared with 43% who say Republicans are too conservative.

What has pushed the Democrat Party so far to the left in the public’s perception?

Consider the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). DSA co-chair Megan Romer was recently asked on national television about some of her organization’s positions. She affirmed proposals to abolish the Senate, replace the presidency and the Supreme Court as currently constituted, abolish ICE and ultimately borders, defund the Pentagon, largely eliminate prisons, and establish public ownership of large corporations.

DSA explicitly describes its criminal-justice objective as constraining, diminishing, and ultimately abolishing the state’s “carceral forces,” including prisons and police.

As DSA-backed candidates win more Democrat primaries and seek seats in Congress and in governors’ mansions, such ideas can no longer be dismissed as the musings of politically irrelevant fringe groups. They are increasingly part of the debate within the Democrat Party. Perhaps that helps explain the public perception that Democrats have shifted too far to the left.

To be fair, many Democrats do not embrace the DSA agenda. But the party has not broadly rejected the movement either. Instead, the familiar response is that Democrats are a “big tent,” with room for differing ideological factions. But how big can that tent become before it fundamentally changes the party beneath it?

Secure national borders, immigration enforcement, a strong military, prisons and policing, and the maintenance of the Senate, an independent Supreme Court, and the presidency are not novel inventions of Donald Trump or the America First movement. Democrat presidents and presidential nominees within living memory accepted all of these institutions.

When did enforcing the border become “extreme,” while abolishing the agency responsible for immigration enforcement became progressive? When did maintaining the Senate, Supreme Court, and presidency become radical, while abolishing or fundamentally restructuring them become enlightened reform?

It seems the Overton Window itself has shifted dramatically to the left. Yesterday’s mainstream or center-right positions can now be labeled “far-right extremism” even though the positions themselves haven’t changed.

John F. Kennedy championed tax cuts and a strong national defense, and he famously declared that Americans should “pay any price, bear any burden” in defense of liberty. On several major issues, Kennedy would sound remarkably out of place in today’s DSA wing of the Democrat Party.

Perhaps the most interesting finding in the Rasmussen Reports survey, however, has little to do with determining which party is more extreme.

Fifty-seven percent (57%) of voters agree with the statement, “Neither Democrats nor Republicans really represent people like me.” That includes 51% of Republicans and 49% of Democrats. Among unaffiliated voters, the share rises to a whopping 69%.

That is a massive indictment – not merely of one political party, but of the political system itself.

On the Democrat side, increasingly influential activists are pulling the party toward democratic socialism and structural transformation. On the Republican side, America First voters hear candidates campaign on border security, spending restraint, smaller government, and opposition to unnecessary foreign wars, only to watch many of those same Republicans arrive in Washington and join the very establishment consensus that voters elected them to disrupt.

Perhaps this explains why dissatisfaction transcends ideology. Voters on the left may believe Democrats aren’t progressive enough. Voters on the right may believe Republicans campaign as conservatives but govern as members of the Washington establishment. Independents may look at both parties and wonder who, exactly, is speaking for them.

Different parties. Different grievances. Same conclusion.

America’s political problem isn’t merely left versus right. There is an increasingly wide gap between the governed and those who govern.

No wonder so many Americans have reached the same conclusion: Neither party truly represents people like me.

Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a Colorado-based ophthalmologist who writes frequently about medicine, science, and public policy.

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