After a decisive Trump win, Democrats must figure out what comes next — and it starts in Philadelphia | Editorial

The red wave that powered Donald Trump back to the White House, flipped the Senate, and propelled many down-ballot Republican races has prompted Democrats to form a circular firing squad.

Democrats were quick to point fingers at President Joe Biden. Some said he should have stepped aside sooner to allow a traditional primary to play out. Others said Biden should have stayed in the race instead of bowing to pressure from big donors like actor George Clooney and other elites.

Others picked apart Vice President Kamala Harris’ truncated campaign. Some argued she should have picked a running mate from a blue wall state like Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania or Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan instead of progressive Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota.

Some said Harris should have distanced herself sooner from Biden because voters wanted change. Still others questioned why she campaigned with former conservative Rep. Liz Cheney instead of playing more to the progressive base.

The blame game is easy. But Democrats must figure out where to go from here.

Trump is not an aberration. He has dominated the political stage for nearly a decade — even while out of power. Democrats lost to him twice and barely beat him a third time, thanks largely to his deadly mismanagement of the pandemic.

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Trump, 78, won again on Tuesday despite a criminal conviction, a sexual abuse finding, a financial fraud judgment, three other criminal indictments, and fueling a deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Any one of those blots would have ended the political career of others. But Trump managed to grow his voter base of white males, adding mostly Black and Latino men, despite a lifetime of racism and a plan to deport immigrants.

Clearly, Democrats have work to do to figure out why they keep losing to such a contemptible character.

Ground zero of any rebuilding effort should begin in Philadelphia. The city is the key to winning Pennsylvania. And winning the commonwealth is the key to winning the White House.

Yet, voter turnout in Philadelphia keeps declining, despite Democrats having a registration advantage of 7-1. Harris got fewer votes in the city than Biden got in 2020, and than Hillary Clinton got in 2016.

Philadelphia is also ground zero for party infighting. Bob Brady, the city’s longtime Democratic boss, blamed the Harris campaign, claiming it didn’t show any “respect” and failed to provide enough “street money” to pay committee members to get out the vote.

“I never talked to the lady, and she’s the candidate,” Brady said in his Archie Bunker way.

The Harris campaign responded by releasing a photo of Brady standing next to Harris. Brendan McPhillips, senior adviser to the Harris campaign in Pennsylvania, blamed Brady.

The vice president’s team “knocked more than two million doors in the weekend leading up to Election Day, which is two million more doors than Bob Brady’s organization can claim to have knocked during his entire tenure as party chairman,” McPhillips said.

Both camps may share some blame. Indeed, the turnout issues extended across Pennsylvania and the country.

However, Philadelphia needs new blood, and it can’t come soon enough. Brady, 79, has been the party boss since 1986. Turnout keeps declining as the party is calcified and bereft of innovative ideas to grow registration and turnout.

Beyond the field operations, Democrats need to rethink how to win back voters, especially working-class whites and Latinos.

Democrats must do more to address kitchen-table and quality-of-life issues, which Republicans effectively exploited. The high cost of living — including taxes and housing — in many blue states is forcing people to move to red states like Florida and Texas. The population shift is expected to give those states additional electoral votes and political power after the 2030 Census.

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At the same time, the factionalism between progressives and moderates needs to be put aside for the greater good. The same goes for the generational divide exposed by the war in Gaza.

While Democrats have long said that they stood for fairness, justice, and equality, some party faithful and independents are turned off by the focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion and gender issues, which the GOP has effectively politicized by labeling it all as “woke.”

Democrats must find a balance between inclusionary efforts without alienating key constituents. And better explain to voters how issues like systemic racism undermine democracy.

Democrats must also take a page from Republican strategist Karl Rove and focus on growing state legislatures across the country. Republican control at the state level enabled the party to gerrymander congressional districts and restrict access to voting.

Of course, independently drawn maps and open primaries are the best option, but until the rules are changed, Democrats need to better compete.

Many voters are understandably despondent and distressed by another four years of Trump. But the best way forward is to fix the problems to help attract and motivate more voters.

As the late Sen. Ted Kennedy said during his stirring concession speech after failing to secure the Democratic nomination for president in 1980, “[T]he work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”