One year ago, I wrote an article titled “The Historic Blunder of the Kamala Harris Campaign,” detailing the shortcomings that led to Donald Trump’s reelection.
Over the course of the following year, despite the facts presented in the Op-Ed and by many leftists immediately after the loss, many Democratic Party loyalists just wanted to cover their ears. They boiled the result down to Harris’ identity as a woman, much like Hilary Clinton’s defeat in 2016.
If that reality ever had any ground to stand on, it’s gone now.
Not only did women such as Mikie Sherrill, the current U.S. representative and now governor-elect of New Jersey, do better than Kamala Harris, but Abigail Spanberger, the former representative who won the gubernatorial race in Virginia, outperformed the former vice president as well.
For how impressive those victories were, the most improbable campaign came from the most high-profile race. Verifying the largest issue the democrats have faced electorally.
New York Democratic Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani’s surge from two percent in primary polls to comfortably winning New York City’s mayoral race proved why centrism needs to be cast out of the Democratic Party for its long-term future.
It can’t be denied that the man has rare charisma and a social media presence superior to almost any mainstream political candidate. But the primary reasons for his unprecedented popularity are his leftism.
Instead of focusing on how he’s the lesser of two evils, he spent the majority of his campaign identifying the biggest problems New Yorkers were facing, and presented widespread, tested and popular solutions to those issues.
Regardless of whether someone is racist, misogynistic, Islamophobic or bigoted in any way, if someone offers an objective improvement in their lives and clearly identifies how they will do so, they will more often than not vote for that person.
This is what the Kamala Harris campaign either didn’t understand or was too beholden to funding from billionaires to implement.
Fast and free buses could’ve been universal health care, universal childcare could’ve been student loan debt forgiveness, or free public college.
He also presented a perspective on Israel that was more representative of the broader population than any other candidate in the field. New York City voters viewed his condemnation of Israel’s genocide in Gaza as sincere and another indicator that he wasn’t beholden to the same corporate interests Kamala Harris was.
Democrats did well across the board on Election Day, whether the candidates were centrist or not. But not every election will be a referendum on what Trump is currently doing. The 2016 and 2024 democratic losses certainly weren’t.
Mamdani won the only major race where the majority of votes weren’t referendums on Donald Trump, beating out the more centrist Andrew Cuomo in demographics Kamala Harris lost ground in, such as Latino voters, and in districts she did worse than Joe Biden in, such as the Bronx.
For long-term success, and to ensure a 2024-style loss will never happen again, campaigns with platforms similar to Zohran’s are essential for the Democratic Party.
