Opinion - Jasmine Crockett can bring the Democratic Party back from the brink

Yahoo

2 days ago

It's hard to walk a mile in America's political-media industrial complex these days without someone asking me about Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett. Whenever I write about the future of the Democratic Party (often), my inbox inevitably fills with enthusiastic Democrats urging me to watch compilations of Crockett's most viral comments, some of which boast view counts in the millions.
The TV-ready former public defender exploded onto the national scene this year as one of Democrats' rawest and most watchable communicators. Democratic National Committee Vice Chair David Hogg went so far as to declare her the future of the Democratic Party. On Sunday, Fox News anchor Trey Gowdy devoted an entire segment to denouncing her rise to prominence. At a moment when voters are increasingly tuning out politicians, Crockett is still breaking through.
Democrats are about to blow millions of dollars on an almost certainly futile effort to build a 'liberal Joe Rogan' when they should be studying how Crockett's unlikely path to Washington shaped her hugely popular message. As one of the few party figures who can speak with authenticity to the millions of voters who lost faith in the Democratic Party after 2024, Crockett should be playing a lead role in reshaping the party's 2026 message. Do Democrats see what they have?
Crockett's brashness may strike some Beltway stiffs as rude or disrespectful, but it's actually a powerful reflection of the alienation millions of Democratic voters feel, including the 7 percent of Black men and nearly 10 percent of nonwhite young people who gave up on the party after the last election. To those voters, Crockett's passion doesn't look disrespectful — it looks appropriate to a moment where most Americans are paying more for everything from groceries to medicine while Donald Trump's Department of Justice tears away civil rights protections root and branch.
'We have transitioned into a space where authenticity is valued so much more than people being proper or polite,' Crockett told Roll Call in January. 'If my raw emotions get the better of me, most people take it just as that, and are happy to know there's somebody who's here because she is very passionate about the work and really believes in it.'
One reason institutional Democrats struggle to understand Crockett is because she came to politics not through political triangulation but by channeling the party's simmering grassroots discontent. Instead of traditional party channels, Crockett partnered with candidate recruitment organization Run for Something for her first state political campaign in 2020. That her campaign evolved outside the Texas Democratic Party's political ecosystem still rankles some Texas Democrats. When I tweeted about working on this article, two state party insiders reached out to share their concerns about Crockett's effectiveness.
If recent candidate recruitment data from Run for Something is any indication, rank-and-file Democrats don't share those insiders' concerns. Amanda Litman, founder and president of Run For Something, tells me that 'Crockett's name has come up organically in conversation with candidates and potential candidates,' adding that Crockett's 'energy for the work' has played a role in convincing more political novices to run for office in their communities.
After months honing her populist message, Crockett is riding high on a political moment she helped mainstream. A new Demand Progress survey found that nearly six in 10 Democrats preferred populist economic arguments over more traditional centrist proposals. That's obvious enough on the ground, where over 30,000 Coloradans packed a populist rally earlier this year hosted by Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Even moderate Democrats are trying out their own economic populist talking points.
Crockett's fluency in the language of populist frustration allows her voice to carry in spaces and among communities where conventional Democratic talking points are normally filtered out. For Litman, the perfect candidate for our modern political era is one who isn't so concerned about being perfect.
'Voters are no longer looking for candidates who embody the perfect politician or those who play with the same old political playbook — they want someone who understands the stakes through lived experience,' Litman said. 'Crockett embodies all of this. She clearly knows who she is and what she believes.'
Now Crockett and the Democrats who have rallied around her have an even more challenging goal: reminding go-along, get-along Democrats that they used to believe in things, too. Crockett has built a powerful national brand by telling Democrats that it's OK to pick a fight when that fight is worth having. Millions of voters agree.
Max Burns is a veteran Democratic strategist and founder of Third Degree Strategies.
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