Democrats are lost and are the first to acknowledge they’re having an identity crisis.

Do they lean to the left like Zohran Mamdani, the New York City mayoral candidate and self-proclaimed democratic socialist? Or do they tack more to the center like Arizona’s Sen. Ruben Gallego, who last year was able to win not just Democrats but supporters of President Trump when he won a seat in the U.S. Senate?

There are Democrats who believe the answer is to lean left, who point to the energy reflected in the progressive rallies held earlier this year by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).

And then there are others who argue winning the 2028 presidential election will require moving back to the center to appeal to not only their base but to moderate voters who might otherwise stay home or vote Republican.

It’s unclear that either side is winning this internal battle a little more than a year before the midterm elections, nearly 12 months after the devastating defeat the party felt in the presidential election.

“Fundamentally politics is very simple. It’s a math question,” said Steve Schale, the Democratic strategist who ran former President Obama’s successful Florida operation during the 2008 presidential campaign. “To win, you’ve got to get to 50 percent plus 1. And if we’re going to win places where we have to win, you have to get a base excited to show up and give a s---, but you also have to frame your........

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