While Washington is busy fighting, the rest of America is just asking for results

The Democratic Party is in the middle of a defining debate about its future. Recent elections and the coverage surrounding them have amplified the influence of the party’s progressive wing, fielding a broader conversation about the direction of American politics. Those developments matter, but they also encourage a tendency to view the party’s future through the lens of primary elections and activist politics. The question is whether that tells us the full story of where the broader American voter stands. 

The voters who show up in primaries are not the voters who decide general elections. And the broader American electorate is sending a different signal than the one in the headlines.

We’ve spent more than three decades representing working communities in Congress, and we’ve always shared a basic conviction that the job of a public servant is just that — to serve by delivering results for the people you represent, rather than winning an argument. That’s what brought us to Next American Era, and it’s why we partnered with Morning Consult to better understand what voters are looking for from their leaders at this moment. 

With the 2026 midterm elections approaching, voters are telling us that they are looking for something different than what they’re getting from Washington. Political leaders and commentators — on both sides of the aisle — frequently portray the country as deeply and irreparably divided. But our research suggests that beneath the noise, Americans want leaders who can solve problems. Rather than sweeping ideological change, most voters are looking for tangible, practical solutions. In fact, 60 percent of voters say they prefer targeted, commonsense solutions that address specific problems and can be implemented with minimal disruption.

That preference isn’t partisan. The desire to work together versus........

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