When Sanders ran for president in 2016 and 2020, many of his supporters insisted that had he won the Democratic primary, he would have gone on to win the general election. In this dreamy hypothetical scenario, we could have been spared Trump in 2016 (perhaps also averting Biden, the genocide in Gaza, and Trump 2.0). “Bernie would have won!” has been a wistful core belief of the Vermont senator’s supporters; some poll data indeed suggests he could have, but given all the oligarchic cash that would have been deployed to oppose him, the unpredictability of polling, and the conservativism of many Americans, who knows? We never will, of course. Sanders is (presumably!) too old to run for president again, so these midterms are the best test yet of whether his politics can beat Trumpism on the ballot.
In Maine, Democratic voters, eager to run a Sanders-style Democrat against incumbent Republican Senator Susan Collins, nominated Graham Platner, a charismatic oysterman and former Marine who supported Medicare for All. When Platner dropped out over sexual assault allegations, he was replaced, in a complicated internal party process, by Troy Jackson, a former logger and labor leader. Jackson’s personality is far less colorful than Platner’s, but his politics are similar. The issue atop Jackson’s platform is Medicare for All; after that, lowering the price of prescription drugs and taxing billionaires and large corporations. The race is close, with Jackson leading slightly.
Angie Nixon, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Florida, is prioritizing Medicare for All too, followed by universal childcare, public education, housing, and unions. She’s polling several points behind Republican Ashley Moody. But even if Nixon loses, no one should write her off—nor underestimate the future of Sanders-style politics in her state: She leads with 68 percent among voters 18–25, and 59 percent among those age 25–34.
There are many other races in purple and red areas around the country where Sanders’s influence can be felt. Smoke jumper and union leader Sam Forstag in Montana’s deep-red 1st congressional district is running against Republican Aaron Flint in a competitive open race, on a vow to “Make Montana Work for Working People,” with housing, health care, childcare and education at the top of his platform. Will Lawrence, in Michigan’s 7th congressional district, which went slightly for Trump in 2024, is polling ahead of incumbent Republican Tom Barrett. Lawrence is running on taxing the rich, affordable housing, and health care for all.
Whether or not these candidates win will not decisively settle the question about whether Sanders-style politics can topple Trumpism in elections. There are too many other electoral factors in play, from the president’s corruption to ICE’s abuses. But the results, if they largely favor the aforementioned candidates, could point the Democratic Party in a new direction for 2028.
The left believes that centrists’ failure to deliver material improvements to people’s lives yielded the toxic combination of resentment and apathy that gave us two terms of Trump—and that we can’t defeat the MAGA right, and build a better America, without remaking the Democratic Party in the mold of Bernie Sanders. Ten years ago, the mainstream portrayed us as naïve, hopeless dreamers who refused to accept political reality. But as more and more Americans struggle in a cruelly unequal economy, and increasingly blame the entrenched politicians in both parties, our dreams don’t look so hopeless anymore.
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