Democrats Seem to Be Trying to Lose

If you want to understand political self-destruction in real time, just watch the Democratic Party in action. Five months into Trump's second presidency, the evidence is overwhelming. Democrats haven’t learned a thing since they lose the 2024 elections, and they aren't just losing key voter groups—they're actively driving them away with policies and rhetoric that defy basic political logic.

Take Hispanic voters, the supposed cornerstone of the Democrats' future coalition. Trump just hit nearly 60% approval among Hispanic voters according to an InsiderAdvantage poll, a staggering 22-point jump from April. Even the left-leaning Civiqs/Daily Kos poll shows Trump at 57% approval with Hispanics, with 53% supporting his immigration enforcement policies. These aren't minor shifts—they're seismic movements that should have Democrats in full panic mode.

But here's the thing: Democrats created this disaster themselves. While lecturing Hispanic communities about what they should think and feel, party leaders simultaneously pushed policies that flooded the country with illegal immigrants who undercut wages and strained resources in those very same Hispanic neighborhoods. They assumed they could take these voters for granted while prioritizing illegal immigrants over American citizens and legal residents. That's not just bad politics—it's political malpractice.

The pattern repeats with Jewish voters, another traditionally Democratic constituency that's abandoning ship. Trump captured 32% of the Jewish vote in 2024, the highest Republican showing since 1988, and for obvious reasons. As Alan Dershowitz pointed out, "the left has turned against Israel and against its supporters." When your own party harbors voices that celebrate terrorist attacks and march under banners demonizing the Jewish state, why would any rational Jewish voter stick around?

Democrats had decades to build these relationships, yet they've managed to alienate both groups through sheer ideological stubbornness. They've chosen radical activism over pragmatic coalition-building, and the results speak for themselves.

The scope of Democratic decline becomes even clearer when you examine the county-level data. The New York Times—hardly a conservative outlet—recently published a devastating analysis showing Trump increased the Republican vote share in 1,433 counties across his three campaigns. Democrats? They expanded their reach in just 57 counties. In 2024 alone, six times as many counties shifted toward the GOP as toward the Democrats.

Obviously, this represents more than typical electoral swings. Counties in deep-blue strongholds are trending Republican. When you're losing ground in your own backyard, that's not a temporary setback; that's a fundamental realignment.

What's particularly damaging is that Democrats seem incapable of course-correcting. Instead of moderating their positions or addressing working-class concerns, they've doubled down on the very policies driving voters away. They've become the party of coastal elites and college-educated progressives, completely disconnected from the economic realities facing ordinary Americans.

And it’s not just minorities they’re struggling to retain or connect with. They have no idea how to talk to white men, either. They're burning $20 million on something called "Speaking with American Men"—or "SAM" for short. Yes, that's real. Democratic donors and strategists have been gathering at luxury hotels to discuss how to win back working-class voters, commissioning projects that read like anthropological studies of people from faraway places.

The SAM prospectus promises to "study the syntax, language and content that gains attention and virality in these spaces" and recommends buying advertisements in video games. One such event was hosted by Future Forward at the upscale Ritz-Carlton in Half Moon Bay, complete with lobster rolls and beef tenderloin, while party elites like Gavin Newsom and Andy Beshear brainstormed how to connect with truck-fixing, football-watching men.

Here’s some free advice: if Democrats want to win back working-class men, they might start by not demonizing them as the root of the country’s problems. Respect would go a lot further than research grants and resort retreats.

The irony is devastating. Democrats have transformed from a big-tent party into an exclusive club for the privileged and the radical, alienating the very voters they need to remain competitive.

Trump's MAGA movement isn't just winning—it's building a durable coalition that crosses traditional demographic lines. While Democrats obsess over identity politics and coastal sensibilities, Republicans are attracting working-class voters of all backgrounds who want secure borders, economic opportunity, and leaders who put America first.

Make no mistake about it: this isn't an accident. Democrats have made conscious choices that led to this electoral wilderness, and until they acknowledge that reality, their decline will only accelerate.