Why Democrats Choose Moderates Over Progressives

FEATURING DAVID DAYEN – Donald Trump’s administration, with the support of a compliant Republican Party has wreaked havoc on the American political landscape, so much so that this year’s midterm elections and the fate of Congressional control is the most important in decades.

While in the thick of primary season where political parties and party voters choose their candidates for the November races, progressives feel growing despair over the direction that the Democratic Party is choosing. In race after race, establishment forces in the party are tilting primary races toward moderate candidates over progressives.

The standard reasoning has been that moderate candidates are more “electable” in general races. But new research, discussed in an Intercept article by my guest David Dayen, finds that parties are picking moderate candidates not because they think they’ll win, but simply because they want to.

Read David Dayen’s work at www.TheIntercept.com and subscribe to his newsletter at tinyletter.com/daviddayen.

David Dayen, contributor to The Intercept, the Nation, and a weekly columnist for the New Republic. He is the author of Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great Foreclosure Fraud.