Not All Old Candidates Are Joe Biden, and Not All Young Ones Are Great

What’s really dogging the party is outdated strategies and tactics, such as an overreliance on polling, that are shared by older Democrats but also younger ones like Jeffries and Harris. The Republicans don’t have this problem. Trump is very old too (79), but like Warren and Sanders, he is fairly new to high-level national politics. The Republicans have probably benefited from having a leader who has cultivated a new group of strategists and tactics not tied to the past.

Most of the prominent strategists in Democratic politics constantly tout their experiences working with Bill Clinton or Barack Obama. In contrast, Trump has made experience in the inner circles of George H.W. Bush or George W. Bush essentially a negative credential in GOP circles—giving room for new ideas to emerge. While I strongly oppose today’s current Republican Party, it’s effective at using new media, running the most conservative candidates possible, and pushing a coherent vision for the country.

The other problem with this emphasis on youth is that it’s becoming a new form of problematic identity and demographic politics within the Democratic Party. I emphasize “problematic.” Movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter of course had identity elements, but they were centered on transformative policy change and were therefore incredibly valuable. Just having more younger Democratic officials, like previous efforts to elect more women and people of color, isn’t alone enough to improve the party. The danger is ending up with a slate of Democratic officials in their forties and fifties who are still bad at winning in purple and red states, pushing bold policies, or using their platforms to win broad support for liberal ideas.