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A note on Tuesday’s results
“Always gonna be an uphill battle / Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose”
— The Climb by Miley Cyrus
Tuesday was a tough night, folks. We lost important elections across the country, especially in Virginia, and in the months to come, there will be a lot of people trying to autopsy the results. We can expect hand-wringing from the media about Democratic infighting, Republicans gearing up to flip both the House and Senate, and how it’s all the fault of progressives. But truthfully, Tuesday was always going to be an uphill battle. And these results, upsetting as they are, are a wake up call: we need to make good on our promises, pass the Build Back Better agenda, and stop corporate interests from steamrolling the platform that voters put Democrats in power to pass.
But despite the shadow Virginia’s results cast over the rest of the night, Tuesday also held several bright spots for the progressive movement. We made history that night when we elected Green New Deal champion Michelle Wu — one of our endorsed candidates as part of our Green New Deal slate with Lead Locally — as the next Mayor of Boston. She’ll make history as the first woman, person of color, and Asian-American to lead the city.
Meanwhile, progressive Justin Bibb was elected Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, while Abdullah Hammoud was elected Mayor of Dearborn, Michigan. Progressives won city council and down-ballot races across the country — all on a progressive Green New Deal agenda. And even in races we didn’t win, we made critical inroads into new communities, organizing and changing the narrative around the issues that matter to progressives and the electability of new kinds of candidates.
Let’s be real, Tuesday was a warning. But both our losses and our successes point us to the same lesson: There’s no time left to waste on the issues that will move voters to the ballot box. Now, it’s on Democrats to learn that lesson.
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