Is There a Fourth Way for the Democratic Party?
Third Way Democrats are right to obsess over the Democrats’ increasing troubles with working-class voters. But their solution is more of the Clintonian economic centrism that drove away working-class voters in the first place.
Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez speaking to supporters during the "Fighting Oligarchy: Where We Go From Here" rally at Civic Center Park in Denver, Colorado, on March 21, 2025. (Jason Connolly / AFP via Getty Images)
In early February, a group of Democrats came together under the aegis of the centrist think tank Third Way to debrief the party’s catastrophic loss in November and chart out a path forward. The gathering correctly identified some of the most important problems that are keeping Democrats from reaching working-class voters. But its conclusions fell woefully short on solutions that would help working-class communities recover from decades of relentless corporate attacks.
Third Way acolytes have helpfully cast a spotlight on a problem that was all too obvious throughout the presidential campaign: working-class voters feel the Democrats are increasingly out of step with ordinary Americans.
A postelection survey by YouGov and the centrist Progressive Policy Institute, for instance, showed that working-class Americans overwhelmingly viewed the Democratic Party as out of touch and not “on my side,” and trusted Donald Trump over Kamala Harris on immigration and the economy (“Renewing the Democratic Party”).
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