5 New Year’s Resolutions for the Democratic Party to Adopt in 2022
How Democrats can step into some “New Year, New Party” energy
By Fola Onifade
1. Print this New York Times article by Stacey Abrams and Lauren Groh-Wargo and take detailed notes.
If Democrats want to win in 2022, they should start by reading (or hopefully, re-reading) this opinion piece by Stacey Abrams and Lauren Groh-Wargo literally titled “How to Turn Your Red State Blue.”
In 2021, the Democratic-led Congress approved a $1.9 trillion pandemic-relief bill with no Republican votes. The relief funding, also known as the American Rescue Plan, extended child tax credits to millions of Americans, helping to cover childcare expenses and combat childhood poverty. State and local governments (including Republican-led states) have received billions in funding. A few examples of how that funding was used include: increasing pay for childcare workers in Boston, Massachusetts; preventing evictions in San Antonio, Texas; and supporting students from low-income areas in San Jose, California.
With no Republican support for the bill in Congress, such progress would have been unlikely if Georgia voters hadn’t turned out in droves during the 2020 elections, helping to secure the White House and the Senate for Democrats. Democrats weren’t even thinking about Georgia as a key to winning until the fate of Congress came down to the wire, and the Peach State became the party’s last hope to win the Senate.
But back in 2014, Abrams (who is running for GA governor this year) founded the New Georgia Project, a voter registration and civic engagement organization, and she began to lay the foundation for the massive turnout in the 2020 election, transforming what was once a solidly red state into a political battleground. Georgia’s not the only state with the potential to upend the balance of power in this country. As Abrams and Groh-Wargo say in their piece: “By identifying an untapped or underrepresented voter pool, states can redefine their path to victory.
2. Stop tripping over the filibuster and pass voting rights legislation.
Resolution number 2 might be the lowest hanging fruit on this list if Democrats would stop tripping over a procedural hangup. This is the easiest resolution to follow since Democrats control both houses of Congress right now. And it’s the most urgent, given the failed coup attempt that took place one year ago on January 6th in the U.S. Capitol after Biden won his election and the unrelenting attacks on voting access since.
Democrats failing to protect the right to vote after millions of voters defied the odds in Georgia, Arizona, and elsewhere across the country—securing the executive and legislative branches of government for the party—is wholly unacceptable at this point.
We deserve better, and while it shouldn’t have taken this long, a new year would be a great time for Democrats to show their commitment to democracy by protecting the most basic and important element of it.
3. Hire qualified staffers who've stepped in a Black barbershop or hair salon.
Cultural competency is a critical factor in winning over voters, because politics, at the end of the day, is a matter of culture. In Black communities, hair salons and barbershops are more than just businesses—they’re community centers for conversation, exchanging ideas, and sharing knowledge. Patrons discuss music and entertainment, their hopes and fears for their children, the price of groceries, and the cost of healthcare. Just a few minutes spent in any of these spaces will reveal the complexity and depth among Black voters’ interests that can’t be grasped from one conversation with a Black celebrity or a scroll through “Black Twitter.”
4. Stop asking white guys to explain trends among Latino voters (or really any voters of color).
If you leave it to the white data geeks whose number-crunching steers much of the Democratic decision making machine, they’ll tell you that the Latino vote for Democrats in 2020 “dropped” compared to prior elections because these voters were supposedly turned off by threats of “socialism” and messages like “defund the police.” But those takes are not enough to explain the record level of turnout among Latinos who voted for Biden or the important nuances within the Latino community.
In September of last year, we had Executive Director of Somos Votantes Melissa Morales on our podcast to share her insight on the 2020 Latino vote. And for our last episode of 2021, NBCNews.com’s Suzanne Gamboa broke down what members of the Latino community continue to share with her about what matters to them. Research and reporting led by actual members of the Latino community consistently show that what matters most broadly among this group are issues like education and jobs.
Resolutions 3 and 4 go hand-in-hand because understanding the unique perspectives of voters in a multiracial society requires rigorous analysis to accompany cultural competency. If Democrats really want to understand voters of color in order to win elections, they can start by overcoming their own biases and hire, listen to, learn from, and support organizers, researchers, staffers, reporters, and voters of color from all walks of life who have both the expertise and the lived experience that truly reflect the New American Majority.
5. Prioritize justice over “popularism.”
“Popularism” is the belief among mainstream Democrats that candidates should poll endlessly to figure out what’s popular among voters and only talk about those issues on the campaign trail. But in a country where extending the right to vote to Black Americans in 1965 resulted in a mass exodus of white folks from the Democratic Party, only talking about what’s popular often means ignoring the supposed “unpopular” topic of injustice that threaten the lives of many Americans, specifically Black folks and other people of color, women, trans and non-binary people, disabled people and many others.
Expecting Democrats to abandon “popularism” is a BIG ask, given their tendency to shy away from taking bold action that benefits voters, the party and democracy, but at least there’s some precedent. For example, last year, as mentioned above, Congress passed trillions of dollars in federal relief, billions of which helped significantly reduce child poverty through the child tax credit. At the local level, thanks to the 2019 pilot in Stockton, California created by the city’s former mayor Michael Tubbs, guaranteed income programs have now popped up in several different cities across the nation from St. Paul, Minnesota to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, blazing a path towards economic justice by providing individuals and families with much needed funds. And it turns out, lifting people out of poverty is popular among those who could use the help.