Latest news with #LakshyaJain
Fox News
04-08-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Declining Democratic pride in America is troubling trend for party, analysts warn
Democrats in America are less proud of their country than they have ever been in recent years and that's a distressing trend for the party, an opinion piece in the Washington Post noted. In a Monday opinion article from the Washington Post titled, "This isn't the same Democratic Party as Trump's first term," the piece noted Democrats are "significantly less likely to report being proud of America now than at any other time in recent history." The article noted that in 2017, 67 percent of Democrats reported being "extremely proud" or "very proud" of their country, according to Gallup polling. But in 2025, only 36 percent of Democrats are reportedly proud of their country. President Donald Trump, whose first term began in 2017, is the reason for the drop in national pride among Democrats, according to the Washington Post. "For Democrats, Trump seems to be driving the phenomenon — there were rapid dips in self-described national pride after both his election victories, with a modest rebound after his loss in between," the article, written by election data analysts Lakshya Jain and Harrison Lavelle, reads. The analysis comes amid the rise nationally of far-left candidates like New York City mayoral contender Zohran Mamdani, a self-avowed democratic socialist. "All in all, the data shows that Democrats simply aren't dealing with the same voter base they dealt with eight years ago," the piece reads. "On multiple policy fronts, from immigration to foreign policy, Democrats have steadily moved left — a reality that lines up closely with the party's changing preferences on the approach to the Trump administration. The attitudinal shift might also explain why the Democratic base is receptive to politicians like Zohran Mamdani, a self-identified Democratic socialist." Jain and Lavelle said the shift could be "ominous" for establishment Democrats, who are desperate to win Congress in 2026 to neutralize Trump's White House agenda. "This shift may prove an ominous one for establishment Democrats, particularly as concerns about the overall age of the party's congressional leaders grow among base voters. Observers and pundits alike will be wise to remember that the Democratic Party of 2026 is not the Democratic Party of 2018, even if the midterm dynamics seem similar."
Washington Post
04-08-2025
- Business
- Washington Post
This isn't the same Democratic Party as Trump's first term
Lakshya Jain and Harrison Lavelle are partners at Split Ticket, an election data analysis firm. President Donald Trump's rise has generated much commentary on the evolving nature of the Republican base. Less discussed are the dramatic ways that the Democratic Party has changed over the same period, partly in response.
Washington Post
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
How Zohran Mamdani smashed through the left's ceiling in New York
Armin Thomas and Lakshya Jain are partners at Split Ticket, an election data analysis firm. Zohran Mamdani pulled off a historic win in New York City by surging with groups that Democrats have been sliding with in recent years: infrequent, young, Hispanic and Asian voters. Last year, majority-minority neighborhoods in New York swung strongly toward Donald Trump. And while the 2025 Democratic primary electorate was bluer by definition, it's likely that Mamdani won nontrivial amounts of voters who are still registered Democrats and supported Trump less than a year earlier.
Washington Post
19-06-2025
- Business
- Washington Post
The Trump coalition is especially vulnerable to Medicaid cuts
Lakshya Jain and Harrison Lavelle are partners at Split Ticket, an election data analysis firm. As Republicans crafted their One Big Beautiful Bill, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) offered a warning: 'Our voters support social insurance programs. More than that, our voters depend on those programs.' While House Republicans ignored his pleas, opting to pass a bill with cuts to Medicaid that the Congressional Budget Office estimates would lead to 7.8 million fewer people with coverage, Hawley was onto something. There's strong evidence that voters whom President Donald Trump brought into the Republican Party over his three presidential runs will be especially affected by the proposed funding changes to health care. A quick glance at the counties with the biggest Republican swings in the Trump era bears this out: In county after county and state after state, Trump made disproportionate gains among lower-income voters, many of whom rely on Medicaid — a program that covers nearly 80 million Americans nationwide. In fact, in counties where more than one-quarter of the population is on Medicaid, Trump gained 17 percentage points in terms of margin, on average, over the party's 2012 performance, more than double his average gain in counties with low Medicaid enrollment rates. And though county results can't identify which individual voters shifted toward the GOP, polls and post-election analyses consistently found Trump improved with lower-income voters who tend to be more affected by health-care cuts. You can point to many reasons for Trump's gains in lower-income regions, but the most relevant one might also be the simplest: Unlike many establishment Republicans, Trump repeatedly promised to not touch social welfare programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. It's hard to overstate just how dramatically Trump's approach differed from those of prior Republican campaigns. In 2012, for example, Mitt Romney was caught on tape saying that 47 percent of the country was reliant on government benefits and hopelessly out of reach to Republicans, while his vice-presidential nominee, Paul D. Ryan, proposed a program to reshape and partially privatize Medicare to lower costs. Perhaps as a result, Trump's 2016 campaign yielded major gains for Republicans among voters inclined toward expanding the social safety net. According to Democratic data scientist David Shor, Trump gained 40 percentage points in margin among voters who supported universal health care but opposed amnesty. The signs of this were visible throughout the cycle; even in the 2016 primary, Trump's strongest supporters were self-identified Republicans who were registered as Democrats, hinting at greater support for government welfare programs among new converts. Trump backtracked on his Medicaid promise in his first term, and his proposals to partially repeal the Affordable Care Act and cut Medicaid spending helped fuel sweeping Democratic gains in 2018. His One Big Beautiful Bill comes with similar risks, and negative reactions are already showing up in surveys — including among his supporters. According to a KFF survey last month, 69 percent of Republicans on Medicaid and 62 percent of low-income Republicans are at least 'somewhat worried' about cuts to the program. And more than 4 in 10 respondents covered through Medicaid or the Affordable Care Act's marketplaces — where benefits will also shrink next year — identified as Republican. Trump won't be on the ballot again, but his allies in Congress also face exposure to a backlash against health-care changes. Many House Republicans, including those in swing seats, now represent districts with high Medicaid enrollment rates, opening new political vulnerabilities. In fact, several battleground Republicans represent districts in which over 20 percent of the eligible population is on Medicaid — and many of them won only narrow victories in 2024. In the face of all these developments, it's also important to remember that the Republican coalition has changed massively since 2012, with a large portion of the well-educated, suburban electorate that backed Romney now voting Democratic at the federal level. If GOP cuts end up pushing lower-income voters they have picked up in the past three cycles back to the Democrats, Republicans will not have the same suburban base to fall back on. In essence, Republicans risk repelling their newest voters after having lost many of their old ones. At the same time, the influence of culture-war issues shouldn't be discounted. Much of Trump's base could end up sticking with the GOP in the years to come, even while objecting to Medicaid changes, if voters continue to perceive Democrats as too socially progressive or focused on the wrong issues. Regardless, the past 15 years of high-profile political fights around health care — and accompanying election losses for both parties — are a testament to the fact that voting blocs cannot be taken for granted in politics. Trump repeatedly persuaded many voters outside the Republican Party's typical base to join his coalition. The durability of this new coalition remains to be seen, and the midterm reaction to his One Big Beautiful Bill will be an important test of its staying power.
Boston Globe
05-06-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
At ‘CPAC of the center,' Democratic moderates beat up on the left
The Democrats in the room aimed to put a new sheen on — and perhaps some more spine in — what has long been tagged as the mushy middle, arguing that they are the majority-makers the party needs in 2026 and beyond to take control of Congress. It was a wonky gathering where center-left Substack pundit Matthew Yglesias was greeted like a rock star and Lakshya Jain, a data-crunching analyst, detailed a ratings system to show which Democratic lawmakers had the highest candidate-quality WAR — Wins Above Replacement — a term borrowed from baseball analytics. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up 'This room may be full of nerds,' said Andrew Mamo, a Democratic strategist who attended the conference, WelcomeFest. 'But the focus is how to not look like losers and how to not be losers.' Advertisement This event was not the place to debate the finer points of policy. There was glancingly little discussion beyond what would sell with voters. If some called it the 'CPAC of the center' — after the big right-wing confab — there was far less red meat, and more crudités (a platter of chopped peppers, carrots, and cauliflower was served in the back). Advertisement Instead, the thrust of the day's discussion was dismissing the party's left wing as an anchor to Democratic chances to win national elections. Scattered potshots were aimed at the activist group Indivisible throughout the day, with Representative Jared Golden of Maine, who represents the most pro-Trump district of any Democrat in the House, calling it 'a hypernational organization with a very single-minded agenda.' One of the event's organizers wore a West Virginia University football jersey — bearing the name and number of former Senator Joe Manchin from when he played quarterback at the school. Interns distributed buttons urging people to sign up for a movement to keep the size of the Supreme Court at nine justices. Some of the advice felt like Politics 101. 'A key to success in politics is to talk to people and to find out what they're saying,' Representative Tom Suozzi of New York told the audience. 'It has to be informed by real-life experiences.' A parade of Democrats who had won in hostile districts and swing states offered paeans to pragmatism. 'Being on 'Team Normal' right now really helps,' said Democratic Senator Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, who was tapped to deliver the party's response to President Trump's first congressional address this year. 'People want practicality.' The conference took place at the Hamilton Hotel in Washington as allies of the Blue Dog Coalition, the most moderate faction among House Democrats, are forming a new super PAC and an allied nonprofit group ahead of the 2026 midterms. The Blue Dogs have long had their own PAC, but never independent entities that can take unlimited donations. The new nonprofit, which has not been previously reported, will be called the Blue Dog Action Fund, with Aisha Woodward, a former chief of staff to Golden, serving as executive director and overseeing a staff of five. Advertisement 'We're willing to get involved in primaries, but our goal is to win the House majority,' said Phil Gardner, who will be a senior adviser to the groups and is a former campaign manager for RepresentativeMarie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington state, a Blue Dog leader. 'Which is going to require winning in seats that Trump won.' The gathering Wednesday was organized by Welcome PAC and supported by an array of center-left groups on and off Capitol Hill. Notably absent from the day's panels, discussions, and side conversations, that included a handful of former Biden administration and campaign aides, was the standard Democratic talk about abortion rights, gay rights, and the importance of Black voters to the party. To a crowd that was mostly white, Jain said his research had found that the race and gender of a candidate did not matter. Michael Ceraso, a progressive operative who made his way in, quipped: 'It's a good place to source a lot of white people.' At one point, when RepresentativeRitchie Torres of New York was speaking, left-wing protesters stormed the stage chanting 'Free Palestine' and unfurling banners about genocide. The event organizers blasted the Carly Simon anthem 'You're So Vain,' from the sound system during the interruption. Liam Kerr, a cofounder of Welcome PAC who wore the West Virginia jersey, said the center was newly energized to take on the party's left. 'Going against the status quo is always fun,' he said. This article originally appeared in Advertisement
