The trend marks a clear difference to just a few years ago when liberal firebrands found remarkable profit-taking on more traditional candidates, including incumbent lawmakers, in a twist that energized the activist left while infuriating party conventionalists suspicious that internal divisions would undermine the brand.
Those discussions, though, happened in a tremendously different political environment: Donald Trump was president, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was criticized for failing to win him and liberals were beating the party brass for matching with the establishment candidate over Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the liberal radical whose spirited fight for economic justice won legions of fans from coast to coast.
In 2021: Joe Biden, another establishment candidate who worked on a vow to bring bipartisanship to Washington, is in the White House. And his winning over Trump has flattened the frequent liberal case that Democrats lose elections because they don’t try hard enough for progressive ideals.
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Following in Biden’s mold, a number of Democrats have secured primary matches in the last months by running moderate campaigns against more liberal — or just more radical — contenders.
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Those dynamics have emerged in Louisiana, where Troy Carter defeated Karen Carter Peterson in an April special election to succeed former Rep. Cedric Richmond (D). Both candidates were state senators, but Carter was calmer and received the support of leading figures in the Congressional Black Caucus.
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The trend has also emerged in Virginia, where former Gov. Terry McAuliffe — a longtime Democratic operator allied with the Clinton camp — predominated in a crowded field against more liberal rivals in the gubernatorial primary.
It appeared again last month in the New York City mayoral primary, where Eric Adams, a former police officer, took a more progressive field with a tough-on-crime note that might have found a harder reception just a year ago, following the death of George Floyd at the hands of the police. Adams has since advised House Democrats to compete on a similar law fulfilling position — an exposed shot at the liberals pushing to defund the police.
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The intraparty fight took the center spotlight again this week in Ohio, where Shontel Brown, a Democratic operative who promised to work jointly with party leaders in Washington, easily won against Nina Turner, a progressive activist who’d sworn no such thing.
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And on Friday, centrist Rep. Conor Lamb (D-Pa.), who’s been watching establishment candidates obtain primary after primary this year, fell into the Senate race to replace retiring Republican Pat Toomey. Lamb, a Marine and former prosecutor from western Pennsylvania, joins a crowded field that includes a pair of progressives, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman and state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta.
For party leaders on Capitol Hill, the defeat of possible rabble-rousers is a welcome new trend.
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