Michael Barone

It’s beginning to be a habit. It, in this case, is the messy business of center-left political jettisoning one leader suddenly deemed unelectable and, without resort to the usual rules or democratic procedure, designating a replacement. It’s the process that came fairly close to giving Americans President Kamala Harris in 2024.

It’s happening not just here but all over the Anglosphere. While the American political firmament post-July 4 was preoccupied with demands for the ouster of Maine’s Democratic nominee for the Senate, Graham Platner, our cousins in Britain were witnessing the protracted ouster of Labour Party Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his replacement by Birmingham Mayor Andy Burnham.

The Democratic Party has always been a (sometimes unruly) coalition of out-groups, but the identities of the out-groups have changed. The Roosevelt-Kennedy party was a coalition of white Southerners and blue-collar workers, farmers and union members. But the Clinton-Obama party has morphed into a coalition of white college graduates and racial minorities (with Hispanics trending Republican).

Party leaders and loyalists, however, still long to see themselves as champions of a downtrodden working class. This has inclined them, when searching for a presidential candidate in early 2020, to focus on the Scranton roots of Joe Biden, son of a Chevy salesman and grandson of a state legislator.

And, when searching in early 2026 for a Senate candidate in Maine, the only state Harris won where a Republican is defending, to enchantment with the grizzled oyster farmer Graham Platner, a prep school dropout and grandson of a nationally prominent modernist architect. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) charged in with endorsements and stuck with Platner after revelations about his Nazi tattoo and weird behavior with women. All were leaning on a wide-open door. Maine Democratic primary voters gave Platner 72% of their votes on June 9. In the primary and in polling against incumbent Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Platner, like the three victorious DSA candidates in New York congressional primaries on June 23, ran strongest among affluent white college grads and far behind among working-class Democrats whose characteristics he supposedly embodied.

Politico’s Monday story, which included allegations amounting to rape of a Democratic woman, has prompted almost all Democratic politicians to urge Platner to step aside, and, under Maine law, he can petition to take his name off the ballot until the close of business on Monday, July 13.

Today’s Democrats are acting much like Canada’s liberals who dumped Trudeau, Britain’s Labourites who pushed out Starmer, and the 2024 Democrats who spent nearly four weeks pushing Biden off the ticket after his disastrous debate performance.

As this is written, Platner hasn’t complied. He may be reflecting that Al Franken might still be a senator from Minnesota and Andrew Cuomo governor of New York had they not resigned in response to lesser charges.

There are lessons here aplenty. It’s risky to support little-known candidates. Nostalgia for a working-class politics that hasn’t existed for two generations can produce bad strategy. It’s off-putting when those who claim to be preserving “democracy” overturn the choices of voters. Going off the deep end may not be a profitable response to the otherwise going off the deep end.

Trump’s affection for tariffs and inability or unwillingness to force regime change in Iran have put his party on the path to off-year losses. But the anti-American rhetoric and the dicey candidates of the DSA Democrats are making their side unacceptable, even repulsive, to many voters. Ditching unpopular leaders sometimes helps, but not so much if it gets to be a habit.