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\n In this file photo from Nov. 4, 2025, people vote at a polling location in New York City.<\/p>\n
Leonardo Munoz\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
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Leonardo Munoz\/AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
There’s an active debate in Democratic politics between progressives and moderates about how to build a winning coalition.<\/p>\n
A new report from a pair of California researchers, shared exclusively with NPR, argues that debate misses the point. The answer isn’t centrism, they write, it’s respect for where working-class voters are coming from.<\/p>\n
“It’s about understanding that people need a sense of personal and economic security before they will support the changes progressives are calling for,” the authors write.<\/p>\n
The report’s authors are, to put a label on it, college-educated coastal elites. Joan C. Williams is a law professor from San Francisco who is known for her work in diversity equity and inclusion. Jared Abbott leads the Center for Working Class Politics and has a PhD from Harvard. Their intended audience is people who share their progressive politics.<\/p>\n
Their message is that the Democratic Party would be making a huge mistake if it keeps catering to social justice warriors and fails to understand, respect and appeal to working-class voters. “The path heavily favors the party that wins working-class voters,” the report explains.<\/p>\n
“I am tired of losing,” Williams said in an interview. “I want to build a sustained progressive coalition capable of delivering on progressive goals. And that’s not what we have now and that’s not what we’ve had for decades.”<\/p>\n
Titled “The Left’s Coalition Crisis: Understanding the Massive Divide Between Working Class and College Educated Voters, and How to Bridge It,” the report argues Democrats have lost support from working-class voters of all races because the party’s base is out of touch with the priorities and values of those Americans.<\/p>\n
“Until Democrats understand the importance of really respecting, listening to and taking seriously the values of self-reliance, the values of patriotism and tradition and personal security,” Abbott said, “they’re going to have a major messaging and a major electoral problem.”<\/p>\n
Abbott and Williams define the working class as people without a four year college degree, earning from $40,000 to $100,000 a year \u2014 the middle 50% of American incomes.<\/p>\n
“If progressives want to build working-class support, they need to connect with people whose top priorities are paychecks, prices and personal safety,” the report states.<\/p>\n
The authors offer a two-part prescription to “develop the cultural competence to bridge the diploma divide.”<\/p>\n
“First, consistently embrace a populism that decries a rigged economy where hard work fails to yield a stable middle class life,” it states.<\/p>\n
Then, “rigorously avoid reinforcing right populism’s narrative that liberal college grads look down on Americans without college degrees.”<\/p>\n