About one-third of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents say they like political leaders who identify as democratic socialists, according to a Pew Research Center survey released on Tuesday.
The survey of 8,512 U.S. adults, conducted Jan. 20-26, found that 32% of Democrats and Democratic leaners view democratic socialist leaders favorably, while 56% said they neither like nor dislike them. Just 11% said they dislike such leaders.
“This confirms what voters have watched unfold primary night after primary night: the Democratic Party is being remade in the image of the Communist Squad, and its leaders are letting it happen,” Sam Markstein, national political director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, told JNS.
“Only 11% of Democrats say they dislike candidates who call themselves ‘democratic socialists,’ which is why Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries aren’t lifting a finger to stop the takeover,” Markstein said. “When the Democrats’ base cheers on the anti-Israel, antisemitism-excusing radicals of the DSA and the party’s top leaders in Congress refuse to draw a line, the message to the Jewish community is unmistakable: the Democrats’ priorities are not the American Jewish community’s priorities.”
Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, told JNS that the findings show democratic socialist candidates “draw on a strong base of support within the Democratic primary electorate.”
“Those who like candidates who identify as democratic socialists likely comprise a larger share of that electorate than the 32% they are of the broader general election Democratic coalition since they skew heavily to groups (educated, party loyalists) who tend to consume more political news and participate more extensively in politics,” he said.
“Given this data, the only surprising thing about democratic socialist primary wins is that there haven’t been more of them thus far,” Olsen added.
Support varied sharply by ideology. Among liberal Democrats, 52% said they like democratic socialist leaders, while 43% said they neither like nor dislike them and 4% said they dislike them. Among conservative and moderate Democrats, 17% said they like such leaders, 15% said they dislike them and 66% expressed no opinion either way.
Younger Democrats were also more receptive to democratic socialist leaders. Pew found that 39% of Democrats under age 30 viewed them favorably, compared with 35% of those ages 30 to 49 and 26% of those 50 and older.
Among Americans overall, 38% said they dislike political leaders who identify as democratic socialists, 17% said they like such leaders and 43% said they neither like nor dislike them.
“As we’ve seen in New York and Colorado over the last couple of weeks, the Democrats are facing a deepening division between their progressive base and their more centrist establishment,” Dan Schnur, a political-science lecturer at Pepperdine University, the University of Southern California and the University of California, Berkeley, told JNS.
“For decades, the party has been split between working-class beer drinkers and more economically successful wine drinkers,” he said. “It’s notable that the wine drinkers seem to be more likely to embrace democratic socialism than those who would benefit more directly from redistributive economic policy.”
