The Emerging Democratic Tea Party

Grassroots discontent brews.

Those who draw the ire of Nancy Pelosi usually find themselves out of a job. And one of the top stories of this week was the highest-level Senate Democrat, Chuck Schumer, finding himself in her crosshairs. "I…don't give away anything for nothing," said Ms Pelosi. "I think that's what happened the other day."

To say Mr Schumer has had a bad week would be an understatement—it's becoming abundantly clear that he, along with his party, are engaging in a fight over who shall hold the reins. The seeds of discontent were sown when, penning an opinion article for The New York Times, Mr Schumer explained his decision to support the Republican budget—declaring it to be better vis-à-vis an alternative hardline proposal. This is, in all essence, sensible politics. Mr Trump has been electrifying headlines and torching markets with his trade war, which could be a potential lifeline for the Democrats.

Expending political capital on a government shutdown, which Mr Trump would pounce on as a "far-left effort to wreck our big beautiful country", would be premature at this point. Mr Trump's approval rating, in spite of tariff mania, is holding strong. Opposition leaders should know when and how to pick their battles—it's clear that Mr Schumer is holding for the hook, likely closer to 2026 and the midterm elections.

But Democrats have not been persuaded. Democratic Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jasmine Crockett seized [the opportunity]. Ms Ocasio-Cortez critiqued Mr Schumer directly: "It is almost unthinkable why Senate Democrats would vote to hand the few pieces of leverage that we have away for free," describing the sentiment of her party as feeling "a wide sense of betrayal." Ms Crockett said it more bluntly, "I definitely think younger, fresher leadership may be something many Americans may be looking for, especially in the state of New York." Social media throughout the week, and the past few months, has been full of rage at Mr Schumer and the Democrats, viewing them as never bothering to fight—in spite of all the rhetoric about the "threat" Trump poses.

Discontent is brewing. And those of us who have occupied the right side of the spectrum know what it is. An establishment leader in the Senate not adhering to the wishes of an impassioned grassroots against an opposition president they despise—history has repeated itself.

Off the heels of Donald Trump's trouncing of Kamala Harris in November, Democrats are left scattered and disarrayed; the so-called "resistance" to Trump has been virtually non-existent, and the viability of their party is precarious. Demographic trends, which saw Hispanic voters, the nation's second-largest and fastest-growing ethnic group, shift to the right, from supporting the Democrats with 65 pct in 2016 to a mere 50 pct in 2024, [contributed to this]. Democrats faced a collapse with men of all races and lower-income voters. A diverse working-class coalition of old and young had prevailed.

It's exactly the same as what happened in 2008—when Republicans were trounced, written off for dead politically, amid the ascent of Barack Obama to the presidency, who, like Mr Trump, was a larger-than-life cultural force. John Judis and Ruy Teixeira's The Emerging Democratic Majority predicted that Democrats' strength with young voters, Hispanics, and college-educated voters would bring about a period of Democratic domination—after 2008, the book seemed prophetic.

And when one remembers 2008, one sees a high number of parallels between the campaigns of John McCain and Kamala Harris—both good and bad. A convention bounce, an 11th-hour polling lead that never was, solid debate performances, a gaffe-prone vice-presidential nominee, and activist discontent within the party. An unpopular president, Bush then and Biden now, sank their respective parties to the point where they lost the White House and the Senate simultaneously, and with the opposition possessing the House, ceded a trifecta. Post-Obama, the Republicans were left rudderless. Picture a civil war, in which a fragile government (that being the Bush administration) had collapsed, and the country (the GOP) had splintered into three factions: grassroots voters angered at the government spending and the Obama agenda, that being the Tea Party; Reaganites who would toe the party line; and the establishment wing typically found reading and writing for The Weekly Standard.

The Tea Party movement spawned with anger that was directed at Mr Obama but more so at their own party—the more activist wings were infuriated at Congressional Republican capitulation on expensive stimulus packages and a perceived lack of fight directed at the president. This climaxed in the 2010 midterms, which were dominated by primary challenges against "RINOs" (Republicans-in-name-only). In Pennsylvania, arch-conservative Pat Toomey ousted the "Rockefeller Republican" liberal Arlen Specter in the Senate race; in New York's gubernatorial primary, businessman Carl Paladino beat out the establishment favorite Rick Lazio; and in Delaware, activist Christine O'Donnell beat the centrist and longtime congressional incumbent Mike Castle in the Senate primary.

There were numerous other primary challenges, and of the aforementioned, excluding Mr Toomey, all would end up losing—many of the Tea Party backed candidates had serious personal detriments and were, bluntly, unelectable. In spite of this, Republicans netted a gain of 63 seats in the House and 6 in the Senate. Ultimately, the Tea Party movement had noble, sensible, and necessary policy intentions but ended up solely existing to obstruct Mr Obama—no one sensible will deny this—and failed to implement anything from a list of unachievable goals.

The Democrats are in a more precarious position. Republicans, shortcomings and all, still entered 2009 with a favorability of 40 pct; the Democrats today boast a 29 pct favorability rating, with 54 pct of Americans holding an unfavorable opinion of them—which is incredible given the smaller scale of Mr Trump's triumph when contrasted with Mr Obama's. The party boasts an identity problem; which way do they go? Mr Obama executed a left-leaning neoliberalism, President Joe Biden drew his inspiration from Keynes with a more progressive interventionist approach, and Bernie Sanders, whose 2016 campaign captivated many, preached pure socialism. All three adhered to the now unpopular intersectional identity politics.

The defeat of Ms Harris, in my view, is the defeat of Obamaism—the nation's repudiation of the socially progressive professional-managerial class, in the same way the electorate repudiated the social conservatism and neoconservative foreign policy of Bush in 2008. 2008 was, one could argue, even a rejection of Reaganism. The "shining city on a hill", smaller government, peace through strength, that preached "small-c conservatism" of personal responsibility, and free-trade agenda found its champion in Mitt Romney—whom Mr Obama would comfortably defeat in 2012, in spite of a dismal economy and low approval ratings.

And there lie the problems for the Democrats today. It is likely that, should they opt to nominate, say, Gavin Newsom, he would likely lose in 2028—be it to Vice President J.D. Vance or whomever. The Democratic establishment has yet to embrace the precariousness of the situation, much as the Republican establishment did not heed the warnings of the Tea Party movement's popularity when they opted for Mr Romney (Mr Romney was still a strong candidate, and it is likely that 2012 was unwinnable for the GOP regardless).

And it's likely that, given this dissatisfaction, the Democrats will face a grassroots left-wing reckoning that will manifest against their amicable and moderately inclined incumbents in the midterms. We've read this book before—only the jerseys have swapped. And it likely won’t end well. The Tea Party birthed obstruction, not solutions, and primaried its way to a cruder congressional GOP. While Mr Trump's MAGA movement clearly revitalized the party's national electoral prospects, Republicans have never equaled there pre-Tea Party seat total. Democrats elevating progressive firebrands and ousting their establishment will likely yield the same result. The party's misdirected wrath at Mr Schumer proves it is less ideological—it's style, a hunger for leaders who'll swing, not stutter.

Tea's brewing, and it's bitter.