Populist Progressives Have Problem With Party; Dems Don't See It

(Source: MIRS.news, Published 08/08/2025) A national poll of progressives shows the far-left is increasingly disappointed with the Democratic Party and are pushing for what they call populist policies, according to the progressive organization Our Revolution.

However, the Democrats don't see the rift.

A national poll of more than 5,000 progressives from Our Revolution claims 95 percent believe the party should listen to the grassroots, and not consultants. Eighty-seven percent of progressives feel frustrated or let down by Democratic leadership and 90 percent believe the path to winning for Democrats is to have big, bold ideas, not going with the safe play.

"There's been an ongoing rift between progressive voters, whose main concerns center around economic populism and the establishment wing of the Democratic Party, and that includes elected officials," said Our Revolution Executive Director Joseph Geevarghese.

Geevarghese pointed to the Democrats hamstringing the campaign of U.S. Rep. Bernie Sanders in 2016 and 2020, as well as other races such as the New York mayoral race where Democrats Andrew Cuomo and Eric Adams teamed up against Zohran Mamdani.

He said the fault line for the schism between the progressives and the rest of the party lies along three issues, with the first being economics. The second is that the wealthy are wielding too much power in politics, and the last is that the Democratic Party primary shouldn't be using any big donors or corporate funding, an issue slated to be taken up at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) meeting later this month.

"I think you're going to start seeing this bubble up in the Michigan Democratic Party, and other state parties, because state parties, at the end of the day, are the gatekeepers for determining who can run, and what the rules of the primary are, et cetera,” he said.

Several progressive organizations have already introduced legislation and are now moving to collect signatures on a citizen-backed initiative to put a ban on government contractors making over $250,000 and utilities from giving to campaigns.

"What activists understand is there's a system that's rigged, where people with money have an outsized voice in the shape and direction of government, and they get that the rich are plundering our tax dollars," Geevarghese said.

He said while taking money away from the Democrats would put them at a tactical disadvantage against Republicans, he said it would endear them to the same base that has put the populist message of President Donald Trump on a pedestal and actually follow through with the promises.

"We will be more authentic and ultimately strengthen our chances of winning if our candidates are not beholden to corporate benefactors," he said.

Instead, he said the model the progressives are looking to embrace is the small-donor, grassroots-funded campaigns that put everyone on equal footing financially.

He said the progressives were also looking to make sure that the money spent by the government was going to fund things like health care, and being used to hire vendors that don't violate labor laws or climate laws.

"They've got enough money to send people to Mars, but not enough to provide a basic level of food and health care assistance to people," Geevarghese said.

He said economic populism was a message that resonated with voters and pointed to the groundswell of support that backed Sanders, some of whom ended up voting for Donald Trump because he was talking about a similar message.

He took umbrage with the term "Democratic Socialist" and said the ideas being pushed by the progressives have been around since former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the New Deal. He said the party needed to return to those ideals.

"Trump speaks the language of economic populism. I just feel like the label is – Socialism, Marxism, Communism – I'm not sure what people are talking about. It's just terms that are thrown around to attack people at this time," he said.

However, Rep. Dylan Wegela (D-Garden City) was one of the people who has embraced the label of Democratic Socialist. He said he isn't surprised by the polling among progressives that there is disappointment and the corporate money was one of the reasons the Democrats weren't connecting with the working class.

"If we want to connect with regular people, we need to start putting forward bold agendas and making sure people have health care and housing and food," Wegela said.

He echoed Geevarghese in saying billionaires and corporations needed to be extricated from the party, because the political system needed to be leveraged to create social housing programs and keep corporations out of the bulk buying of housing. The system needs to create more wealth equity instead of wealth disparity.

"I think everyone knows there's something wrong with our political system. I hope that people are waking up that the thing that is wrong is Capitalism and that having everything be about who can make the most money and be in the most competition with each other and not about how can we cooperate and make public services good for people," he said.

He said he isn't concerned with where that corporate money would go if it was expelled from the party and said that the Supreme Court's Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission was the worst thing to happen to democracy in the United States.

He said he was aware that corporate interests had many other ways of influencing elections through political action committees and 501(c)4s using so-called dark money.

Wegela said not taking corporate money was the key to his success in District 26.

"I think people know that I'm not bought and sold. So, if they don't agree with me on every single thing, they know that I'm at least there doing what I believe is right, and I think that matters for something," he said.

He said anyone running should be able to inspire people to open their wallets and make small dollar grassroots money. He did admit to being backed by labor unions and environmental groups, but said they aren't corporations.

"I believe that in the wealthiest country in the world, we can have a society where people's basic necessities are met and when I say that, that means that people have access to healthcare, housing and food," he said.

He said taking care of the citizens would reduce crime and increase the overall quality of life. He believes small businesses would be supported, because there would be people to support the businesses. The government would support public services, working roads, clean air and clean water.

"I don't think that this is some mythical utopia. I think it's something that other countries have started to figure out and do, and if we commit ourselves to working together to fight oligarchy, we can do that for sure," he said.

Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel Jr. said he doesn't see how the party could deny a voice to people with money, because it went against the First Amendment.

"Citizens United was pretty specific about what the laws are and I don't know how the Democratic Party or anyone else would enforce that," Hertel said.

Hertel said he was holding townhalls across the state. The next one was expected to be held with labor representatives on Monday in Marquette to talk about "kitchen table issues."

"The whole idea of issues being labeled one way or another I'm not a big fan of, but when you talk about affordable housing, cutting the cost of prescription drugs, you talk about raising wages, those are things the Michigan Democratic Party believe are 100 percent essential," he said.

He pointed to the labor successes that were passed while the Democrats had control of the House and Senate, and the free lunch programs for children that were put in place in Michigan.

"I would say those are some pretty strong progressive ideas," he said.

He said the Michigan Democratic Party doesn't hire consultants and the party was working from the ground.

He said in his travels he saw excitement from people and anger directed at President Trump and the economic situation of the country.

"We're the party of the working people and that's who we fight for," he said.

He said that the state party provides the same services to the progressives and the establishment Democrats and doesn't take sides in the primary, opting to let them fight it out among themselves.

"I understand why there have been past frustrations. I don't disagree with that frustration actually," he said.

He said there was room in the party for people, regardless of what they were looking for ideologically under his leadership over the past six months.

"I don't think there is a schism. I'd rather be a party that has diverse opinions than a party that only sits in loyalty to one man," Hertel said. "If you agree with everybody sitting around the table with you, you probably don't have a whole lot of original ideas," he said.