Those responses suggest a commitment to the current state of affairs on the Left, where Democrats have chosen to focus on social justice issues rather than economics. Democratic strategist David Axelrod, for instance, praised the Haris campaign and blamed racism and sexism for her loss — issues the candidate herself previously denied played a role in the election.

White women in particular have become a favourite target for blame from this camp of Democrats, much like in 2016. North Carolina state Sen. Sydney Batch called for white women to “dig deep and figure out why they, to this day, given all Donald Trump’s sexism, all of his racism, is still the person they voted for over Harris”, calling this demographic’s support for the former president “dumbfounding.” Joy Reid of MSNBC also blamed white women for Harris’ loss, and complained that this group missed their second opportunity to “change the way that they interact with the patriarchy” by voting for a woman president.

The argument is reminiscent of the response to the Democratic defeat in 2016. Then, Hillary Clinton blamed sexism for the result, while mainstream media outlets widely cast Trump’s supporters as both racist and sexist.

But a different corner of the Democratic Party is urging a change of course, away from identity politics and towards economic populism. This group argues that, rather than winning over minority voters, identity politics actually alienates them. “Donald Trump has no greater friend than the far left, which has managed to alienate historic numbers of Latinos, Blacks, Asians, and Jews from the Democratic Party with absurdities like ‘Defund the Police’ or ‘From the River to the Sea’ or ‘Latinx’”, New York Democrat Ritchie Torres wrote on X yesterday.

Matt Yglesias, a centre-left journalist and co-founder of Vox, expressed similar concerns in a list of proposed “principles for Common Sense Democrats”. These included acknowledging that biological sex is “not a construct”, rejecting race essentialism, and accepting that “the government should prioritize the interests of normal people over those of people who engage in antisocial conduct.” Harris distanced herself from social justice activism during her presidential campaign, instead portraying herself as a border hawk and declining to lean into her race and gender. But she was haunted by clips from her 2020 primary campaign, during which she endorsed, among other things, taxpayer-funded sex changes for illegal immigrants and prisoners.

In addition to the pushback against social progressivism, reform-minded Democrats are urging a stronger focus on economic issues. California Rep. Ro Khanna said on X that Democrats needed to win back the working class. In an interview with MSNBC on Wednesday morning, Khanna spoke of “rebuilding” the party, arguing that Harris should have gone on Joe Rogan’s podcast and that Democrats in general need to engage with alternative media as a way of engaging with and listening to the American people.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders similarly criticised Democrats for embracing the “status quo” on the economy and, as a consequence, losing the working class. “It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now, it is Latino and Black workers as well,” he said following the election. Jaime Harrison, chairman of the Democratic Party, responded by calling Sanders’s statement “straight up BS”, claiming: “Biden was the most-pro worker President of my life time.”

If Trump’s victory is a wake-up call for Democrats, polls offer some answers as to where the party went wrong. The economy was the single most important issue for voters, followed by immigration. Far beneath those two issues were abortion, climate change, and racism. Over the next four years, Democrats have the opportunity to recalibrate toward issues that Americans care most about.

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is UnHerd’s US correspondent.

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