Del Beccaro: Leftist Democrats are being thrown under the bus, and socialists are in the driver’s seat
Originally posted at Foxnews.com
Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman has lost his re-election bid in New York. In the olden days (20 years ago), such an outcome was inconceivable. In the modern Democrat Party, however, the rush to socialism knows no loyalty.
No matter what yesterday’s socialist or big government proponent did for the cause, that is not good enough for the current socialists, let alone tomorrow’s.
In history, the run-up to class warfare/high tax/redistributionist policies we associate with socialism becomes a spiraling rush. Examples include the end of the Roman Republic and the end of the ancient Greek Athenian democracy.
The same is true within the Democrat Party today.
James Carville recently said the Democrat Party is “not a left-wing party.” Contrary to his spin, however, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have the momentum within the Democrat Party.
Three far-left mayors are defining the Democrat Party. Consider the election of Mayor Zohran Mamdani in New York in 2025 and now three of his adherents in New York’s 2026 primaries. In Chicago, Mayor Brandon Johnson is to the left of his very liberal predecessor, Lori Lightfoot, who was chased out of office.
In Los Angeles, Mayor Karen Bass, who underwent training in Castro’s Cuba, campaigned down the stretch of her primary on providing government-funded teeth replacements for methamphetamine addicts. Post-primary, she is being challenged by a DSA candidate.
Goldman’s defeat demonstrates dramatically the mean streets that are the Democrat Party primaries these days.
Goldman, of course, was the lead prosecutor for the Democrats’ impeachment of President Donald Trump in 2019. Recall that the Russia, Russia debacle was the very centerpiece of the Democrats’ attack on Trump’s first term.
Goldman was dogged in that role – often with the truth being damned.
In 2020, Trump was not returned to the presidency in significant part by the fallout of his impeachment over the now-debunked Russiagate.
In 2022, Goldman was rewarded with a congressional seat in New York, where a once-victorious New Yorker like him would have held a near lifetime seat.
Once in Congress, Goldman remained a fierce attack dog for the Democrats.
Such loyalty to the cause simply is not enough for the modern socialist Democrat Party. Goldman, who is Jewish, lost to the Mamdani-endorsed Brad Lander, who is also Jewish but describes himself as a “liberal Zionist.”
Importantly, Lander’s website prominently features his socialist promise to “Tax Obscene Wealth.” Alongside him is one of the Democrats’ richest leftists, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
As a result, Goldman became yesterday’s headline for the new Democrat socialists. He is not alone in being cast aside.
MARK PENN: DEMOCRATS WIN THE MOMENT, BUT LEFT-WING TILT THREATENS THEIR FUTURE
Consider the case of former President Joe Biden, who did everything his party demanded. He signed one of the biggest spending bills in history.
The trillion-dollar, so-called Inflation Reduction Act was promoted by Democrats as “lower[ing] health care costs for Americans by extending the expanded Affordable Care Act subsidies” and “the largest investment in climate action and clean energy in world history.”
Biden appointed many far-left judges and also satisfied the race-conscious wing of his party, appointing “63 Black federal judges, the most of a presidency of any length.”
You would think the Democrats would be celebrating him after all he did for their cause, but you would be wrong. This May 2025 NBC headline, however, said it all: “Can Democrats blame their problems all on Biden?”
Today, they are reviling former first lady Jill Biden’s decision to write a book.
Now consider Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
He defeated a Republican incumbent to take over one of New York’s U.S. Senate seats. His re-election victories twice hit 70%.
In 2016, he was unanimously elected Democratic leader after securing big Democratic gains in the Senate in the 2006 and 2008 elections as the chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. His voting record gives him a “Strong Dem” rating with the Progressive Left and an “A” rating.
Are Democrats four square behind him?
No.
In 2025, Politico noted that the “survey by the liberal firm Data for Progress, first shared with Politico, found that 55 percent of Democratic likely voters said they supported or leaned toward supporting Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, while 36 percent backed or leaned toward backing Sen. Schumer.”
Why? Because he couldn’t keep the government shutdown going — even though Democrats called it a Republican shutdown.
As a result, we found that “Angry Democrats call on Schumer to resign after eight vote to end shutdown.”
As for the eight Senate Democrats who voted to end the government shutdown, “Furious Democrats are set to train their fire far beyond the eight Senate Democrats who cut a deal to end the shutdown, directing their frustration into defeating establishment-leaning candidates in primaries across the country,” The Hill reported.
Those eight included Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin with a lifetime liberal voting record. The others are not as liberal as Schumer and may well be cast aside in the years ahead.
In short, the current momentum within the Democrat Party is not the moderation some thoughtful Democrats of the Bill Clinton era desire. To the contrary, the modern Democrat Party’s rush to socialism knows no loyalty to party regulars.
They want socialism and they want it now.
