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US Politics Didn’t Shift as Rightward in 2024 Elections as You May Think

Progressive wins at the local and state levels complicate the notion of a sweeping rightward political turn in the US.

Counterprotesters hold signs encouraging voters to vote "no" on Amendment 2, which would add a permanent abortion ban to Kentucky's state constitution, on the steps of the capitol in Frankfort, Kentucky, on October 1, 2022.

News headlines at the end of 2024 appeared to be all bad for the left in the U.S. as Donald Trump cruised to an electoral victory, and, in a reversal from 2016, handily won the popular vote as well. Some drew sweeping conclusions about the political direction of the country as Republicans kept control of the House of Representatives and retook the Senate, handing them trifecta control of the U.S. government.

Many Democrats were quick to point the finger at their party’s supposed embrace of progressive policy for its ballot box woes. Longtime party strategists blamed “woke era” politics for Democrats’ losses, while members of the party attacked leftist slogans. Never mind that Kamala Harris had neither promulgated policies like “defunding the police,” nor had she adopted any of the leftist rallying cries that blame-casting Democrats were quick to denounce after the election.

It’s undeniable that Democrats suffered major losses at the national level. The situation at the state and local level is more complicated, however, and thus deserving of a more nuanced analysis. And, as progressives continue to pursue gains at the ballot box, victories are appearing in some very unexpected places.

One of the biggest surprises of the last few years, and a trend that continued through 2024, was the popularity of progressive ballot measures (and the commensurate unpopularity of right-wing ones). This trend held true in both blue and red states, pointing to the viability of progressive policy across partisan contexts.

In Kentucky, almost two-thirds of voters rejected Amendment 2, which would have allowed the state to spend tax dollars to fund private, charter and religious schools. Despite so-called “school choice” measures having long been a part of the Republican Party platform, Amendment 2 failed spectacularly in a state that Donald Trump won by over 30 points. This loss exposes the unpopularity of right-wing policy, and shows it can lose when separated from the candidates who promote it.

This pattern was also evident in states where abortion access was on the ballot. Since Roe was overturned in 2022, states dominated by Democrats and Republicans have already constitutionally enshrined or expanded abortion access, and the results in November were no different. Ten states had abortion-related referenda on their ballots, and seven of those ten voted for measures maintaining or expanding abortion rights. Of those seven, Donald Trump won the popular vote in four. And though an attempt to amend the Florida constitution to protect abortion rights failed, a majority, 57 percent, of voters approved of the amendment, falling just short of the 60 percent required to change the state constitution.

Ballot measures for progressive change were popular at the local level too. Two municipalities in Washington State, Everett and Renton, succeeded in passing measures to raise the minimum wage.

Ballot measures were not the only path to victory for progressives in 2024. While progressive wins at the national level were scarce in 2024 (due in no small part to the massive dark money spending against progressives in Congress), left-leaning candidates continued to find success at the state and local levels.

In Georgia, Gabriel Sanchez became the first democratic socialist elected to office in the state after he beat the Republican challenger with more than 60 percent of the vote in Smyrna, an Atlanta suburb. He defeated the incumbent Democrat in the party primary before his resounding general election win. Sanchez ran on a platform that called for a $20 minimum wage and the implementation of statewide Medicare for All, and called Israel an apartheid state that was perpetrating a genocide in Gaza. His success in Smyrna, in the heart of Georgia’s Cobb County where George W. Bush twice carried the county by 20-plus point margins, highlights the electorate in Georgia’s increasing receptivity to progressive policies.

Sanchez was not the only candidate to win election while openly criticizing U.S. support for Israel. In Delaware, incumbent State Rep. Madinah Wilson-Anton cruised to a third term without opposition. Over the last two years, Wilson-Anton has been the most vocal critic in Delaware of Israel’s war on Gaza and was the lead sponsor of a ceasefire resolution that passed the Delaware House, just the second state legislative body to do so. Wilson-Anton’s sponsorship of such a resolution in President Joe Biden’s home state, in an election year, apparently did not raise the ire of voters in her district.

And, in a tale of two Portlands, self-proclaimed democratic socialists built their legislative blocs in city councils on both sides of the U.S. In Portland, Oregon, two candidates endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, Mitch Green and Tiffany Koyama Lane, won seats on the 12-person council. They will join another DSA member, Sameer Kanal, along with a coterie of other progressives on the Portland City Council, where Green believes progressives will have a majority of council votes. At the top of their agenda is rent control, in a city that has struggled to keep up with the demand for affordable housing, even as vacancy rates rise.

In Portland, Maine, meanwhile, the city elected its second democratic socialist to the council. Wes Pelletier, who also foregrounded affordable housing in his platform, prevailed after two rounds of ranked-choice voting. In recent years, Portland residents have repeatedly rejected attempts by the local landlord lobby to roll back rent control laws passed by ballot measure in 2022. Pelletier’s election is yet another signal that Portlanders want to prioritize affordable housing over the concerns of real estate developers.

While these successes might seem a modest counterbalance to the catastrophic collapse of the Democratic Party at the national level, they also complicate the narrative that the adoption of left-leaning policy is to blame for Democrats’ failures. In fact, when it comes to voting for candidates and policies that will most immediately impact voters’ lives, progressive policy appears to be quite popular. That voters chose to adopt these policies in a year in which Democrats ran two extremely unpopular candidates for president makes these electoral accomplishments even more impressive. And, with Donald Trump beginning his second term in the face of lackluster approval ratings and even less enthusiasm for his stated agenda, progressive policy may yet hold the antidote to much of the right-wing malice to come. As Democrats pick up the pieces of the 2024 wipeout and look to rebuild the party, there may be some lessons for them in these down ballot victories.

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