Democrats consider new ideas, big changes in its bid to win the next US Election in 2028

The Democrats have already switched their focus to the next election and are considering some big changes to defeat the Republicans at the polls in 2028.

Once they move past the denial, anger, bargaining, and depression of their election defeat grief, the Democratic Party will set about regrouping and restructuring ahead of the next presidential race in 2028.

First it will have to accept the political realignment that led to the landslide victory of Donald Trump, its loss of the Senate, and the irreparable damage to its brand as a party of elite woke scolds.

Amid the blame game playing out between the camps of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, a scant few insiders have begun looking to reshape its policies and the people to pitch them.

Californian House representative Ro Khanna said the current establishment produced a disaster, and there needed to be “new thinking, new ideas and a new direction”.

Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro. Picture: AFP

Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer. Picture: AFP

That included minting a new generation of leaders beyond the current crop of ambitious establishment governors like California’s Gavin Newsom, Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro, or Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer.

Former presidential Candidate Andrew Yang said the party should drop the identity politics and abandon policing cultural behaviours, while also creating solutions for struggling men and boys – who overwhelmingly supported Mr Trump after years of being branded “toxic”.

New York House representative Ritchie Torres said they had to end the outsized influence of the far left, like the “Squads” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and their embrace of unpopular positions like “Defund the Police”.

Senator Bernie Sanders said the “big money interests and well-paid consultants” who control the Democratic Party probably wouldn’t “learn any real lessons”.

“In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions,” he said.

Democrat Andrew Yang. Picture: AFP

Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer. Picture: Getty Images

Whether they consider it an autopsy or soul searching, the party’s corpse will be poked and prodded before it finds a winning strategy for 2028.

The Republicans famously conducted a post-mortem after Mitt Romney’s loss to Barack Obama in 2012, euphemistically dubbed the “Growth and Opportunity Project”.

Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer, who released the post-mortem when he was at the Republican National Committee, said most people took the wrong lessons from its forensic assessment of the 2012 loss.

“There were a lot of mechanical things in there but it was not just what the RNC should do, it was what the party needed to do writ large. And the party’s not necessarily the buildings and the 200 people that work in DC,” Mr Spicer said on his morning show.

“People asked, ‘Why are you airing your dirty laundry publicly’ … you have to be willing to have those conversations, with yourselves, with your family, if you’re going to fix yourselves. So how soon you come to that realisation is important, because you’ve got a midterm (election) in two years.”

Well before considering a candidate in the 2028 primaries, the party will first need leadership figures to fill the gaping hole soon to be left by Mr Biden and Ms Harris.

It’s first opportunity will come when the Democratic National Committee elects a new chair in early 2025, after incumbent Jamie Harrison – heavily criticised for backing Mr Biden’s re-election campaign – signalled he wouldn’t run again.

There are its leaders in Congress, the soon-to-be Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and likely House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries.

And then those thinking of running in 2028, like the aforementioned governors, as well as anointed party figures like Transport Secretary Pete Buttigieg or Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock.

The Democratic Party didn’t take any lessons or make any changes after its first loss to Mr Trump in 2016.

If it’s to rebuild from its 2024 loss the party may be served to learn from its last successful reconstruction era after its 2004 loss to George W Bush, when a little known Senator from Illinois burst onto the scene to win the nomination from Hillary Clinton.

Originally published as Democrats consider new ideas, big changes in its bid to win the next US Election in 2028