Politico has published this article arguing that the "most compelling stars" of the Democratic Party are socialists: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/04/17/democrats-your-stars-are-socialists-226661
Speaker Nancy Pelosi, miraculously transformed over the past few months into a relatively moderate Democratic elder stateswoman, has understandably been pushing back against the notion that she leads a socialist party defined by a few radicals in the House.
On 60 Minutes, she stalwartly declared: "I do reject socialism as a economic system. If people have that view, that's their view. That is not the view of the Democratic Party." She dismissed the left-wing members in her caucus as, "like, five people."
In a speech at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer expressed the same sentiment, telling the crowd that there are 62 Democratic freshmen, "not three."
In sheer numbers, this is true. But it's the wrong way to count.
The problem Democrats have is that the most compelling stars of the party are self-described socialists with a knack for generating controversy and media attention, and with committed mass followings. Pelosi might wish it weren't true, but poll numbers, fundraising and follower-counts don't lie.
Sanders is reliably second—sometimes first—in national and state presidential polling of Democratic candidates. He's out-raised everyone in the field, and with his massive small-donor base, probably can continue to do so for the duration. More than anyone else, he has defined the Democratic Party's current agenda. He can clap back at establishment critics, as he did the other day at the Center for American Progress, and make their lives very uncomfortable.
It'll be much harder to maintain that the Democratic Party isn't a party of socialists if it nominates one as its presidential candidate, which everyone paying attention realizes is a real possibility.
If that happens, it won't be the work of conservatives hoping to negatively brand the Democrats, but of the party faithful. The same goes for the prominence of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It is often said that conservatives are "obsessed" with her; maybe so, but the same is true—and probably more so—of everyone else.
AOC has been on the cover of Time magazine, Rolling Stone (with Pelosi, as it happens), the Hollywood Reporter, and Bloomberg Businessweek. Annie Leibovitz photographed her for Vogue. She's been interviewed on "60 Minutes."
She has nearly 4 million Twitter followers and more than 3 million followers on Instagram, where she feeds the insatiable obsession of her fans—not her critics—with videos from her apartment.
There is a documentary about her congressional campaign, purchased by Netflix for a record-breaking $10 million. She's the hero of a comic book (or as an admiring website put it, "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is so badass there's literally now a comic book about her"). A video narrated by her and set in the future about how she saves the planet with her "Green New Deal" quickly garnered more than 1.7 million views.
She was among the top 10 House Democrats in fundraising the first quarter of the year and had the highest percentage of small donors. Her ally, Rep. Ilhan Omar also excelled.
As Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote in a piece about AOC for her in Time's most influential list, not exaggerating, "millions are taking cues from her."
It's obviously vexing to Pelosi to see a House majority built by the careful avoidance of ideological extravagance and won in marginal districts hijacked, at least in terms of public attention, by a few freshmen and a 77-year-old Vermont socialist.
They might not define the center of gravity of the party at the moment, and the radical freshmen have lost most of their tussles with Pelosi, but there is a reason that they are so famous, with such fundraising prowess.
