Socialists are doing a Trump to the Democrats. US politics is unlikely to return to normal

August 7, 2026 — 5:00am

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If you can tear your eyes away from the Trump administration for a moment, you’ll notice that an electric shock is running through the Democrats right now with the most unpredictable consequences.

A bit like the Republicans did in the early-mid 2010s, the Democrat establishment is now under a sustained insurgent attack. A bit like for the Republicans, that insurgency seemed like long odds to succeed. And a bit like the Republicans found, it has proceeded to make serious inroads. In the game of radically remaking the terms of American party politics, the progressive side of the coin has finally come up.

The big moment this week occurred in Michigan, where the insurgent, Abdul El-Sayed, vanquished the establishment’s Haley Stevens in a Senate primary. El-Sayed is not the first in this vein. The flagship case is, of course, Zohran Mamdani, who stormed the establishment to become New York City Mayor. Mamdani is a card-carrying democratic socialist – by which I mean he’s a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) – in a country where socialists are simply meant to be unable to win such a major political office.

Mamdani has since backed three other candidates to victory in Democratic Party primaries in New York, two of them fellow DSA members. Meanwhile, other DSA members won primaries in Denver and Philadelphia. But these are all victories in heavily progressive areas. None of these is a statewide vote in a swing state like Michigan. That’s why El-Sayed’s win is a........

© Brisbane Times