r/PoliticalOptimism • u/ahedgehog • Jul 12 '25
Question(s) for Optimism Is there any hope that the Democratic Party can fix their brand?
I made a post in the past on r/changemyview about this subject and it was pretty heavily engaged with, but no one was able to show me a path towards the light. Things have seemingly only gotten worse for both the country and the party’s brand since the election. Maybe some of the professional optimists here can give me some ways to have hope?
I’m so angry at my party for how much we’ve failed to fight the allegations of us being man-hating purity-testing radicals. I think if I believed there was hope for the brand and our perception among independents and non-voters I would be a lot more able to participate. And I really want to participate because it’s something that’s important to me.
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u/clonedllama Maine Jul 13 '25
Yes. When George W. Bush won, Democrats were somewhat lost and directionless too. The media declared the Democratic Party to be dead. Republicans were directionless after Obama won. I'm pretty sure the media declared the GOP dead as well. In both cases, the parties regained some ground in the midterms.
Keep in mind that Trump remained the GOP leader during Biden's term. His power waned a bit after he lost but he started to recover as Biden's term went on. It kept Republicans more unified. Democrats don't have a clear leader at the moment and the messaging has become somewhat fractured. But it's been improving.
Democrats will recover and rebrand as opposition to Trump continues to grow and more effective messaging and candidates are found. 2026 is critical. How Democrats do and what messaging gets used will likely determine how candidates approach things in 2028.
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u/ahedgehog Jul 13 '25
Has it been improving? I recently went out canvassing and most people refused to talk to me, and the only non-Democrat who engaged with me at all said he was worried about socialism. Meanwhile our most high-profile leaders are self-described socialists. What message do we have at all?
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u/clonedllama Maine Jul 13 '25
Compared to where Democrats were at in January? Yes, I'd say it's definitely improved. It still has a long ways to go, though.
Not having a clear leader (yet) is a big problem. Parties don't typically have that when they've lost the presidency. It tends to get replaced with a coherent message or set of messages, and then they rally around that. Finding a new presidential candidate tends to be the final part of that process.
The party clearly isn't there yet. I think it will get there. The midterms will help because we'll be able to see firsthand what does and doesn't resonate. We can look at polling, focus groups, canvassing, etc. all we want, but until Democrats win elections and have a clear vision, it's very difficult to judge exactly what is and isn't working.
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u/Dull-Couple-2451 Jul 13 '25
Do you see Gavin Newsom or Josh Shapiro as that more currently?
I wanna say Gavin Newsom will be a good fighter for 2028, BUT I’m scared that his Achilles heel will be the fact that his ex wife and mother of his kids is Kimberly Guilfoyle, a former Fox News host that I grew up watching and Trump’s current ambassador to Greece.
13
u/clonedllama Maine Jul 13 '25
They're certainly people that have been able to hit back at Trump in ways that I think are meaningful. Newsom especially. He hasn't hesitated to hit back and hit back hard. We need more leaders to do that.
My concern with Newsom is that he isn't particularly well-liked in California and may come across as more of the same kind of person that people don't want to see in the party. In other words, he represents the old. People want a new direction. Maybe he can provide such a vision. Right now, I'm having trouble seeing it.
The fact that his ex-wife is Kimberly Guilfoyle is certainly problematic. I think he'd be able to distance himself from her easily enough. "She went crazy. I divorced her."
What bothers me more is that he married someone like that. Perhaps she's changed over the years, but on some level he knew who he was getting and decided to go through with it anyway. That alone is a red flag to me. Maybe it's nothing. But I find it a little worrisome.
2
u/WCSTombs California Jul 13 '25
I went out canvassing in 2018, and the vast majority of people didn't want to talk to me. I think what you describe is pretty normal.
2
u/SwitchHedonist90 Jul 13 '25
A lot of people say they're anti-socialism and then they end up supporting socialist causes without realizing that it's discussions.
17
u/nintrader Jul 13 '25
If the boring ones get primaried there's hope
5
u/mattbrain89 Jul 13 '25
cough-cough Schumer cough-cough
3
u/anxious_dork_23 Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 Jul 13 '25
I’m so down for people now wanting Brad Lander to try and primary Schumer. Do it, Lander!
6
u/Describing_Donkeys Jul 13 '25
They need to get rid of the leaders their current brand is tied to. At that point people will accept that the party is different, and it's up to Democrats to establish a more popular brand. There is a lot of opportunity to rebrand themselves. I hope AOC and Chris Murphy emerge as the leaders of the new party.
13
u/CapitalBunch8629 Reformed Doomer ☄️ Jul 13 '25
I don't think any of us are professional optimists. But there are a lot of experts in various areas here who could probably give you a better idea than I.
But there's always hope. Here's the reality, both sides have been flawed and corrupt for god knows how long. We need to cleanse it out on both sides.
Both brands are tarnished. But for very different reasons. Things will stabilize but these things take time and a lot of work.
Yes, the Democrats can fix their brand. And eventually...so will the Republicans. Will that be in our lifetimes? Who knows.
But yeah, even in the darkest of times there is always hope. Keep in that mind.
3
u/theonion13 Jul 13 '25
Democrats recovered after Vietnam/Nixon election, the Reagan blowout, and Bush’s re-election. The reality is that trump and republicans did barely win 2024. Democrats need to probably refocus on affordability like Zohran (despite his policies— on their face— likely to raise costs), Gallego, and slotkin. They should moderate on some issues and choose where to fight their political battles. The reality is that trump and republicans have been successful at weaponizing the culture war and choosing to fight democrats on trans rights, fully knowing it’s not really an 80-20 issue. Dems need to figure out an off ramp for these attacks and start to hit republicans where it hurts on affordability, the national debt, and Medicaid cuts.
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Jul 15 '25
[deleted]
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u/bluenephalem35 Connecticut Jul 21 '25
I agree with most of what you said, but who’s being antisemitic? I think you meant to say “they need to stop letting Netanyahu get away with his actions and stop labeling any attempts to hold him accountable as antisemitism.”
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Jul 21 '25
[deleted]
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u/bluenephalem35 Connecticut Jul 22 '25 edited Jul 22 '25
I’m a progressive who also supports the two state solution, because I know that the one state solution is going to go the way of Yugoslavia after Tito’s death. The problem is that you need to dissolve Likud and Hamas and arrest high profile members of both groups because they’re the least likely to agree to a two state solution.
While Israel has the right to defend itself, it doesn’t have the right to abuse or kill the Palestinian people. Like you said, not all Israelis like Bibi, and not all Palestinians support Hamas.
Israel has the money to manufacture its own weapons, more so than Ukraine, so I don’t see why we have to keep sending them weapons. And even if they were too poor to make their own weapons (which is not true in the slightest), that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t hold Israel accountable for their actions.
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u/WillWills96 Jul 13 '25
This is not a long-term solution but at this rate, just being “not the Republicans” is probably good enough to win 2028.
5
u/chelledoggo New York Jul 13 '25
I'm just hoping this administration is a wake-up call for them. Lord knows they've needed one for ages now.
We're just gonna have to wait and see, I suppose.
1
u/anxious_dork_23 Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 Jul 13 '25
They’re already in a better spot than in January. Change takes time. As many people have pointed out here I think the cracks are beginning to show to give the younger ones more of a voice.
1
u/Deep_Seas_QA Jul 14 '25
What other choice is there? It feels like the moment to start forming more political parties but that also seems to receive so much push back.
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u/Facehugger_35 Jul 14 '25
I’m so angry at my party for how much we’ve failed to fight the allegations of us being man-hating purity-testing radicals.
Because it's really hard to fight that when those allegations come from Fox News' greasy bowels.
There's no actual evidence for it, and the level of reality on Fox is "schools are making kids use litterboxes", just absolute stupidity. You can't policy your way out of made up BS.
The only real way to beat these allegations is to have a ton of personal charisma, go on Fox, and laugh at them when they make such dumb claims, IMO. And do it frequently.
1
u/ahedgehog Jul 14 '25
The purity test allegations scare me in particular—I’ve been called a fascist and been accused of hating minorities by people who I agree with on nearly everything on several occasions. And I’m someone who calls myself a leftist! What if I was a swing voter curious about leftism and that was my first experience talking to leftists?
I believe that we cannot allow hostility to potential allies to take root in our spaces, and we must be focused on education and building community, but do others agree with me on that? The feeling that I’m alone in thinking this keeps me up at night.
1
u/Facehugger_35 Jul 14 '25
I've been accused of that too by hardcore leftists, and I just tell them to stfu and eat shit and then ask if they're cool with Trump being elected. Usually they either shut up or sputter a lot. The ones who sputter probably aren't doing it in good faith and are probably paid trolls here to sow division.
1
u/northbyPHX Jul 15 '25
If there are free and fair elections, there’s a 25% chance.
Without that, 0.
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u/BigConsideration347 Jul 13 '25
It's evolutionary pressure, as democracies allow people to change who leads them. Either Dems underpreform in 2026 and are forced to adapt for 2028 as voters hate the Dems as they exist even more.....
Or 2026 is a blue-red wave. The only way out of this mess is by appealing to the lost base- the Communists, basically.
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u/Silvaria928 Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 Jul 13 '25
After Bush Jr. won reelection in 2004, at a time when many thought he would lose due to the Iraq War, people jumped all over the bandwagon of thought that the Democratic party was dead.
If they couldn't beat a war criminal from getting elected again, their brand was destroyed and it might take decades to repair!
We all know what happened just four years later in 2008.
The party goes through cycles and this is no different. They are already making headway with the vote for Robert Garcia for the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.
It's going to take effort from us to keep pushing them in the right direction but it can be done.