Democrats Already Agree on How to Govern. Now We Have to Tell Voters.

A former senior Biden White House adviser argues that Democrats are far more united than voters realize

Guest article by John W. McCarthy

John W. McCarthy served as deputy assistant to the president and senior adviser for political engagement to President Joe Biden. He previously held senior roles on the Biden, Obama, and Clinton presidential campaigns and is now principal of Causeway Strategy Group.

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There is no Democratic civil war. I went looking for one, and I couldn’t find it.

I continually hear from voters that they cannot tell if the Democratic Party is fighting for them, or fighting amongst ourselves.

Tough, but fair.

The Democratic brand is sitting at some of its lowest favorability numbers on record, and that’s true even among Democrats.

Here’s my theory: we spend almost all our time talking about the ten percent of our agenda voters disagree with, or don’t understand. The other ninety percent, the stuff they’d sign up for in a heartbeat, barely gets any airtime from us.

The good news is there is actually tremendous unity on what Democrats want to do if we’re given a majority. The better news is that voters already support all of it. We just need to do a better job telling them.

We keep talking about this “civil war” in the Democratic Party, and I don’t buy it. In the House of Representatives, the more progressive members of Congress belong to the Progressive Caucus, and many of the more pragmatic centrist members belong to the New Dem Coalition. Though seemingly from different wings of the party, each of them put out its own affordability agenda this year. (Progressives Here and NewDems Here). I went through them both–so you don’t have to–and there’s a tremendous amount of overlap:

• Both want to lower prescription drug costs and go after PBM/pharma price-gouging.

• Both want to build significantly more housing and remove barriers to doing so.

• Both target grocery and food costs and corporate price-fixing or “unwarranted price hikes.”

• Both want expanded childcare/family support and paid leave.

• Both target utility costs driven by corporate practices.

Two wings of a party supposedly at war with each other over its direction sat down, independently, and wrote agendas that overlap on housing, health care, groceries, child care, and utilities. These are the five things that show up on every single voter’s monthly budget. And they’re top of mind heading into November.

That’s not a party in shambles. That’s a party that agrees on the diagnosis: costs are too high, and the system is tilted against ordinary families.

So let me be very clear: if Democrats spend every day between now and November talking about these five things, we win. Voters don’t want an esoteric argument about the direction of the party. They want a conversation about their lives.

None of this requires anyone to pretend the disagreements aren’t real. The Progressive Caucus’s agenda is a list of ten specific bills, each with a sponsor attached, built around the idea that entrenched corporate power is driving costs up and needs to be confronted directly. The New Dem Coalition’s agenda is a broader framework built around five pillars, groceries, health care, housing, energy, and families, organized around clearing away the obstacles standing between families and lower costs. Two different approaches to the same problem, and at some point, in government, we’ll have to pick.

That’s the ten percent: the mechanism fight, the “how.” It’s a real debate. But it’s not the debate voters are asking us to have. We need to start talking, loudly and constantly, about the ninety percent we already agree on: the housing, the drug prices, the groceries, the child care, the utility bills. Let every candidate in every district, from the safest blue seat to the reddest swing district, run on the same five things, because they can! We’ve already written it down (twice!)

So here’s our answer to every voter who tells us they can’t tell if we’re fighting for them or fighting each other: we are fighting for you, on prescription drugs, housing, groceries, child care, and utility bills.

We already agree on all five. We just have to start talking about it like we mean it.

About the author: John W. McCarthy served as deputy assistant to the president and senior adviser for political engagement to President Joe Biden. He previously held senior roles on the Biden, Obama, and Clinton presidential campaigns and is now principal of Causeway Strategy Group. He writes about campaigns, governing, and how Democrats can win.

Follow him on X at @JohnWMcCarthy