The Democratic Party will change or die

Journalist and progressive media entrepreneur David Sirota on the role new and legacy media played the election, what the Democrats did wrong, and why the next DNC chair matters

When we last talked to David Sirota, the journalist, screenwriter, and editor-in-chief of The Lever had just launched “Master Plan,” a podcast exploring the legacy of the Powell Memo, the document that laid out the blueprint for the past 50 years of activism by right-wing foundations, lobbyists, and think tanks that would eventually lead to the takeover of the Republican Party and the institutions of American government by increasingly radical forces.

Continuing our series of conversations examining how the 2024 election upended priors and presuppositions about American politics, we checked back in with Sirota, and talked about the ways in which the Democratic Party failed to understand the changing media landscape, the legacy of Bernie Sanders, how both the Democrats and left media need to confront the uncomfortable questions they avoided during the Biden administration, and — as a range of leaders, some representing the status quo, others with visions for change vie for leadership of the Democratic Party — how left politicians need to rethink how they speak to the American people if there’s to be any hope for change.

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When we last checked in, we talked about how there's a big problem with a Democratic Party torn between — and not really wanting to think about balancing — the interests of the donor class and the voters. And now they're going to really have to confront that. Can they?

In theory, they're going to have to confront it. I mean, never underestimate the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party is terrible at most things. It's very good at one thing, which is crushing dissent, crushing any kind of push for change within its own midst. I would like to believe this is a moment for change. I just am old enough to remember how it typically goes. So I'm sort of toggling between optimism that this is a party that can finally allow for a real conversation about its problems. And then on the other side, this is a party whose motto is nothing will fundamentally change.

We don't have to be optimistic, though we could be hopeful. We draw that distinction a lot here. But given what happened in the election, do you feel like you want to reassess anything you’d thought in advance? Are there things you feel you didn't see coming in this?

At the very end of the election, I allowed myself to think that because Donald Trump is so singularly toxic the Democrats could eke out a victory.

That’s not because I thought the formula articulated so clearly by Chuck Schumer in that 2016 comment — about how we can lose working-class Democrats and we're just going to gain back disaffected Republicans — was right. I was thinking, "Well, maybe enough people can still remember what Trump’s first presidential term was like that the Democrats' failed theory will hold for one more election.” Basically I was gambling that it was going to be another 2020.

But I've always been afraid of what, potentially, comes after Trump. Trump's scary enough, but what comes after Trump is a much more “normal,” smarter form of right-wing authoritarianism. I'm not sure if Trump winning again accelerates that or not. It could make his party even more bizarre. Looking at the names that have been floated for the nominations for Cabinet positions, it's definitely the most Trumpy of the bunch. So I think I misjudged that in my own mind, although I wasn't out there saying that.

But I also think this whole notion that, "Oh, you know economic populism doesn't matter because voters don't really care about policy” —

Deliverism didn’t work, then? The Democrats had the good policy solutions, they built things, but it didn’t matter.