Fernando Fernández/Contributing Writer
As of today, there are exactly 145 days left until the nation’s first Iowa caucus.
It’s an event that will provide many political enthusiasts, such as myself, with a definitive answer to one of the most pressing questions defining the 2020 Democratic Party: does its future lie at the center of the U.S. political spectrum, or at the infamous “far-left” side?
While the results of the 2020 Democratic Iowa caucus will provide some clarity and either confirm or debunk many of our theories and assumptions, we can already make a guess about what the future of the party looks like.
Of the candidates whom crack double digits, former Vice-President Joe Biden leads the pack with 30.4%, according to a RealClearPolitics poll average. Immediately following him are Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, whom are virtually tied at 16.3% and 17.1% respectively.
If you were to take those numbers at face value, it would seem as though the classic Democratic Party playbook of “centrist pragmatism,” perfectly embodied by Biden, is prevailing over the left flank of the party, embodied by Sanders and Warren.
At a closer look, however, the numbers tell a very different story.
By adding Sanders and Warren’s percentages, their combined support would amount to 33.4% of the Democratic Party electorate, which is 3.0% more than Biden’s 30.4%.
And, according to a recent survey by Morning Consult and a poll by SurveyMonkey for the New York Times, a majority (77% and 86% respectively) of all Democratic voters are in favor of a “Medicare for all” healthcare system — a pillar of leftist ideals.
Furthermore, that same SurveyMonkey poll found that, not only does 82% of the Democratic electorate support free tuition for public colleges & universities, but that 81% of said electorate supports a 2% wealth tax on households with a net worth over $50 million — two additional policies often touted by the left flank.
In other words, the left-wing takeover of the Democratic Party has officially begun, and the established “centrist-wing” of the Democratic Party has been put on notice.
But if that’s the case, why has Joe Biden received so much support from that very same electorate?
It’s simple: electability.
A large swath of the Democratic Party electorate, including many of the former Vice President’s supporters, find him to be the most electable candidate of the bunch, with the strongest chance of defeating President Trump in a general election, as shown in a recent New York Times article.
Even the former Vice President’s own wife seems aware that her husband’s electability is his only hope to keep his campaign afloat. Jill Biden recently said on NBC News that while other candidates might be more favorable, the party should focus on the bottom line: “we have to beat Trump.”
What is obvious to us is also obvious to the “centrist” establishment of the Democratic Party — the future of the Demcoratic Party lies at the left-wing of the U.S. political spectrum.
The only thing currently taming the inevitable is the fear of risking “electability,” but it’s only a matter of time.
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