There’s nothing new about wedge politics. The formula is actually pretty simple. One party identifies a small number of issues subject to debate within the opposition party, and then emphasizes those issues in their campaign messaging to separate voters from the other side. Republican consultant Lee Atwater used this strategy in the 1980s, culminating in Ronald Reagan’s 49-state landslide reelection in 1984.
Today, Democrats are facing another wedge campaign problem, but this time it’s different. The party has for decades engaged in identity politics involving race, sex, religion, and social class, and their strategy is now coming full circle as socialism and communism continue their ascendancy among the party’s base. Democrats are now confronted by wedges of their own design, and they imperil their midterm election prospects.
The Michigan primary election Tuesday is a case study of how socialist ideology has metastasized from isolated pockets of cities and urban congressional districts to an entire state. Abdul El-Sayed may have narrowly secured the Democrat nomination for Senate this week, but in doing so, his victory revealed the power of socialism within the party.
El-Sayed does not call himself a socialist; he claims to be a progressive populist. But he’s been endorsed by a panoply of Democratic Socialists, and DSA-adjacent politicians and organizations, so he can’t credibly shed the socialist label. This presents a conundrum that has rattled the party as it struggles to reconcile the policy wedges they’ve created with the realpolitik of 2026.
Consider the question of antisemitism. El-Sayed was unable to deliver an explicit condemnation of the Hezbollah-inspired attack on a Michigan synagogue last March, and he can’t bring himself to recognize Israel’s right to exist. Combine these positions with his continued association with Islamist socialist Hasan Piker, and what emerges is a toxic antisemitism that rightfully frightens a lot of American Jews. Two years ago, Michigan Jews voted for Kamala Harris over Donald Trump by a gaping 78-22 margin. Will they deliver the same level of support in November for a Senate nominee who doesn’t seem to like them very much? We’ll see.
El-Sayed favors a radical overhaul of the U.S. Supreme Court and Medicare for all, opposes voter ID laws, wants to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement, end the First Amendment rights of companies enshrined in the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, take congressional redistricting rights away from states, end the use of fossil fuels, promote transgender surgical and chemical treatments for children, and so much more.
This is not an agenda to improve the lives of Americans. It’s a recipe to consolidate power for him and his party, and to take constitutional rights away from individuals and companies. His education proposals also pave the way for further indoctrination of young children into his radical politics through universal childcare and pre-K, and more money for an already bloated and under-performing public school system largely run by leftist teacher unions.
Despite publicly declining the socialist label, El-Sayed’s campaign priorities clearly include the imprimatur of the DSA and its allies in and out of elective office. On Tuesday, Michigan Democrats said "yes" to this platform, not just in one deep blue city or compact congressional district, but statewide in the nation’s 10th largest state.
El-Sayed may not tell voters he’s a socialist, but his “queer Muslim activist” half-sister Eman Abdelhadi isn’t shy about expressing her communist vision for America, calling for a “stateless, communized society.” Of course, she’s part of academia; Abdelhadi is a professor at the University of Chicago, which she’s referred to as an “evil colonial landlord."
Small wonder traditional liberal Democrats like political consultant James Carville say the party isn’t big enough for him and El-Sayed’s campaign comrade Hassan Piker. “Hasan Piker and James Carville are not going to be in the same political party. One of us is going to leave. It might even be me," said the man who engineered the 1992 election of Bill Clinton.
The ideological cross currents of the 2026 midterm elections are the result of decades of work by Carville and other Democrats who promoted identity politics and left-leaning policies. Having created the wedges that are now threatening to split their party, Democrats do not yet know how to deal with this problem of their own making.
El-Sayed’s nomination goes a long way toward nationalizing the midterms, giving voters a straightforward, binary choice. The goal of socialism, Vladimir Lenin said, is communism, and Republicans should respond with one simple question: Do you want a communist America or a free America?
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