Democrats in competitive races fight back against GOP’s communist labels

Democrats in tight Senate and House contests are fighting back against efforts to brand their party as communists, an effort they say has taken on new urgency in a midterm cycle that has seen candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) dominate in high-profile primary races.

At the Republican midterm convention this month, GOP leaders warned of the dangers of a blue wave in November. President Trump said, “It’s going to be a communist country if they win,” while House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) claimed there was a “Bolshevik Revolution” going on in the Democratic Party. 

“Next year the communists will be in Congress,” Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said at the convention. “That’s what’s so frightening.” 

There are no known congressional candidates who identify as communists, according to co-chair Joe Sims of the Communist Party USA, but the recent wave of leftist primary wins has forced Democrats in competitive races to navigate efforts to tie them to the socialist wing of their party. 

“The left says — not without reason — ‘They’re going to call us socialists no matter what,’” Matt Bennett, co-founder of centrist think tank Third Way, told The Hill. “That’s true.”

“The problem is, you provide them with a lot more ammunition if you’ve got people who are actually socialists running and winning seats in Congress, and members of the DSA who are not just socialists but are supporting a platform that is completely bonkers,” Bennett continued. 

Some Democrats in increasingly fierce contests are responding by drawing an explicit line between themselves and socialism. 

In a recent ad in Kansas, Democratic Senate nominee Adam Hamilton took aim at the far-left and his opponent, Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas), saying, “Both extremes just don’t get it” and “we have to fix our broken politics by meeting in the middle.”

“On one side, the far-left pushes socialism and open borders,” Hamilton said in the ad. “On the other side, Roger Marshall gives us higher gas and grocery prices while slashing our health care. What’s going on in Washington? It’s just not who we are.”

In South Carolina,........

© The Hill