Commentary: Democrats to emerge from shutdown scarred from polarization

On November 9, seven Senate Democrats and one Democrat-aligned Independent shocked the party by caving to Republicans. They supported a funding package that would reopen the government without any gains on extending healthcare subsidies. Earlier that same week, Zohran Mamdani won the New York City mayoral election on a massively popular cost of living campaign.

The Democratic establishment is so disoriented, they don’t seem to know their left and right.

Among other provisions, the deal will continue to fully fund the government through January. In “return,” the Republicans “conceded” to reverse the reduction-in-force layoffs that Trump implemented in October. They also agreed to guarantee backpay for federal workers. Neither of these was in question when the shutdown began. The GOP offered no clear or sure concessions on addressing healthcare costs.

The House is voting on the measure today, and it then goes to Trump’s desk.

Several Democratic heavyweights defected. These include Minority Whip Dick Durbin and former vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine. These represent the centrist party establishment, aligned with the likes of Hillary Clinton.

They’ve come under heavy fire from other Democrats, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and California Governor Gavin Newsom. After all, the liberals have the leverage. A late October NBC News survey found that 52% of Americans blamed Republicans for the shutdown, with only 42% blaming Democrats. An Economist/YouGov survey found that, across the political spectrum, Trump’s approval rating has fallen over his handling of the shutdown.

As it turns out, Trump didn’t need leverage. He just needed to wait out his opponents’ divisions.

But as much as it exposed spineless politicians, the shutdown revealed the masses haven’t let their felt needs go unheard. Democrats chose to make healthcare their main issue. A year after Biden told us the economy was in great shape, his party’s had to acknowledge that Americans’ wallets are hurting.

Just days before the Senate vote, center-left Democratic candidates won governorships in New Jersey and Virginia. They ran on affordability platforms, including issues like rising energy costs. Mamdani won in New York by focusing on three promises: freeze the rent for stabilized tenants, provide fast and free buses, and universal childcare. Hakeem Jeffries endorsed him, and Barack Obama called him twice. Compare this to Kamala Harris’s presidential bid, which only offered to “defend democracy.”

Class contradictions are intensifying in the United States, forcing a reckoning among the Democrats. It’s no secret that Biden and Harris lost the election due to complicity with the genocide in Palestine and the fact that they were tone deaf to the deteriorating economic condition of the multinational working class.

Due to this larger polarization, the Democrats are more and more splintered. On the one hand, a centrist wing is deluded about the importance of compromise and the sanctity of American institutions. On the other, both progressives and moderates have taken up cost-of-living issues. They see that they face popular demands everywhere, from more active labor unions to mass movements of youth. These are inevitable under capitalism. The party’s feet have been put to the fire. No matter how you slice the pie, the more the Democratic Party promises it can protect the system, the more it will fall short of meeting people’s needs. Regardless of how negotiations round off in Congress, a people’s agenda is on the table, and in the streets.

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