Platner win in Maine shows the Democratic establishment can be defeated
It’s not 2016 anymore. We can throw out the party’s sclerotic leadership.
by Nathan J. Robinson, Current Affairs magazine
A lot of leftists I know became very disillusioned by Bernie Sanders’ two losses in the 2016 and 2020 Democratic primaries. They felt like Sanders’ failure showed you can’t beat the establishment, that the system is rigged, and that the Democratic Party is simply captured by corporate-friendly centrists who will crush any effort to take the party in a different direction.
I’ve spoken with people who think there’s no choice but to run third-party campaigns, and have essentially given up on the Democrats. But we have some new evidence that things may be changing.
In 2016, Hillary Clinton was incredibly powerful within the Democratic Party, quickly lining up “superdelegates” that helped ensure her nomination would be a coronation. Here in 2026, though, the party “establishment” may finally be ripe for being overthrown.
Look at what has just happened in Maine, where insurgent left populist Graham Platner has driven incumbent Gov. Janet Mills from the state’s Senate primary.
Platner, an oyster farmer and populist with the backing of labor groups and Bernie Sanders, was up against a candidate hand-picked for the race by Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer. But by the end, Platner’s lead in the polls and in fundraising was so great that Mills decided not to even go through with the primary, since defeat was inevitable.
The Platner victory is particularly striking given that Platner, a veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, unhesitatingly calls out Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and has called for cutting off U.S. aid to Israel. There was a time in recent American politics when candidates openly critical of Israel would have had virtually no chance of winning an election, due to the enormous influence of the powerful pro-Israel lobby within the party.
Now, as public opinion has turned against Israel over its ongoing war crimes, the Democratic Party establishment is facing an unprecedented wave of challenges from the left.
For instance, in Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed is running against the party establishment’s preferred candidate, Rep. Haley Stevens. El-Sayed is a Sanders-backed, Medicare For All-supporting doctor and public health expert (he literally wrote the book on the subject). El-Sayed, too, openly calls Israel’s actions genocide, and campaigned alongside the socialist streamer Hasan Piker.
The move to campaign with Piker was incredibly controversial in the press and has effectively become a proxy battle over Israel within the Democratic Party—so much so that pro-Israel Democrat Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey even introduced a House resolution condemning Piker by name (apparently a top priority for Democratic leadership at the moment).
And yet, El-Sayed’s poll numbers have only increased since then, and he is now tied for the lead with state senator Mallory McMorrow, who recently faced backlash over deleted social media posts trashing the Midwest and yearning for California.
(Current Affairs first discussed El-Sayed) in 2018, when I suggested he might be the ideal candidate to lead the left insurgency in the Democratic Party. In his gubernatorial race that year, he was defeated. But times have changed, and it may be that Michigan Democrats are finally ready for El-Sayed’s unapologetically progressive politics. (If elected, El-Sayed would be the first former Current Affairs writer to serve in the Senate, which would really be a mark of changing times.)
(Continue reading at Current Affairs magazine)
Read by Robin Bloomgarden for KEPW Whole Community News. Copyright (c) 2026 Current Affairs magazine. Subscribe or donate at currentaffairs.org. Recorded for publication and broadcast with permission of Current Affairs magazine.
