How Moderates Are Seizing the Moment in the Democratic Primary
Presidential Elections,Moderate Democrats,Elections
New entrants into the race. A nod from Barack Obama. Centrist victories in governor’s contests. Moderates sense a favorable shift.
After spending months in anxious passivity, staking their hopes on Joseph R. Biden Jr. and little else, moderate Democrats appear suddenly determined to fight for control of their party in the 2020 elections.
The shift in attitude has come in fits and starts over the last few weeks, seemingly more as an organic turn in the political season than as a product of coordinated action by party leaders. But each assertive act has seemed to build on the one before, starting with a debate-stage clash last month over “Medicare for all” and culminating in recent days with the entry of two new moderate candidates into the primary, Michael R. Bloomberg and Deval Patrick, and a gentle warning from former President Barack Obama that Democrats should not overestimate voters’ appetite for drastic change.
Most convincing to some Democrats may be the off-year elections this month in Kentucky and Louisiana, where moderate-to-conservative Democrats prevailed in governors’ races that President Trump worked strenuously to win for his party. The victories bolstered the argument, advanced by some leading Democrats, that the party could peel away some of Mr. Trump’s supporters in 2020 by avoiding “litmus test” battles and courting the political middle.
“Clearly, factually, people who voted for Trump voted for our Democratic gubernatorial candidates,” said Gov. Gina Raimondo of Rhode Island, a moderate who leads the Democratic Governors Association. She said Democrats could win those voters in 2020 with a “message of unity” and pragmatic promises on issues like health care and student debt.
For months the Democratic race was defined in terms of which candidate could promise the most daring policy reforms — a contest in which Mr. Biden, the former vice president, was struggling to keep pace with Senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Bernie Sanders of Vermont. As the most liberal candidates set the agenda, many in the party establishment squirmed, anxious about alienating moderate voters.
