The Democrats thought they’d do really well in 2020. Many expected a blue wave. In the end, they didn’t do too badly. After all, they won the largest prize – the White House. But they fell well short of lofty expectations. They didn’t get anywhere near the vaunted blue wave.
What happened?
GOP Turnout and White Evangelicals
There’s a quick and easy answer, and it’s that far more Republicans voted than pollsters predicted! For whatever reason, the Republicans voted in much larger numbers than they said they would. The more difficult question is what forces drove them to the polls. Perhaps the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court did the trick. Perhaps the fight over COVID-19 lockdowns did it. Or perhaps it was something else entirely.
I’ve written a couple of recent posts digging into voter demographics. But on this topic, the data tell us that white evangelicals, in particular, voted at high rates. And they voted overwhelmingly for Trump. We might also note that white evangelicals also drove the anti-lockdown and pro-‘herd immunity‘ ‘strategy’ for dealing with COVID-19. Consequently, it looks like this group drove a lot of activity on the political right this year.
As for why all this surprised people – much of the surprise came due to a last minute surge in turnout. The exit poll data I cited above shows most late-deciding voters breaking for Trump. Many people interpret this to mean that undecided voters chose Trump. But I suspect that’s wrong. A better read on it: many Trump backers were undecided about whether to vote at all, and then they decided in favor of voting.
The Blue Wave and Social Democracy
We might draw contrasts between 2020 and past elections. In 2018, the Democratic base turned out in larger numbers than the GOP base. And when Democrats vote in heavier numbers than Republicans (e.g., 2006, 2018), Democrats win big. When the GOP base votes more heavily than Democrats (e.g., 2010, 2014), the GOP wins (sometimes big).
That’s not what happened in 2020. Much like 2012, we saw heavy turnout of both bases. When that happens – again, much like 2012 – Democrats win, but they win more narrowly.
Without the late spike in GOP turnout, Joe Biden would’ve won by more like the 8-10 point margin people (including myself) predicted. He’d have won North Carolina and possibly Florida. And Democrats would’ve taken the Senate and built on their House majority.
Some on the left argue Bernie Sanders would’ve done better. Maybe he’d have gotten the blue wave. Insofar as electoral leftists have an argument (many simply assert it), their thought is that a social democratic platform (Sanders is a social democrat) would propel Democrats to victory by turning out non-voters and winning over people fed up with corporate Democrats.
But – at least in the short-term – it’s highly unlikely any of that is true. In cases where Democrats have tried the strategy, it tends to fail. It’s an attractive strategy, and many would support a social democratic platform. But the electoral left needs to start with deeper organizing and education around the platform before using it to ride a blue wave. In our current political environment, I suspect Sanders would’ve done neither better nor worse than Biden.
The Electoral Left
For the electoral left, the social democratic route offers promise. But it’s a long-term project rather than the shortcut that groups like the DSA and Jacobin seem to think it is. As I’ve pointed out recently, the DSA/Jacobin shortcut strategy is largely ass-backwards. Social democracy is an outcome of movements, not the driver of them. Those looking to use social democracy as the very first step to socialism will remain sorely disappointed.
Longer-term, here’s the left’s main challenge: to build enough power to create social democracy, and then to turn this all into a movement to build socialism (i.e., rather than the typical letdown that has happened in actual social democracies). It’s a tall order.
