An Independent’s Ask of the Democratic Party

As I shared last week, I write as one of the 45 percent of ordinary Americans who describe themselves as independent. As independents, our hope is that the parties’ candidates represent viable choices. Thankfully, this was the case for most of my voting life.

Our current dilemma

That changed in 2016. In my hierarchy of values, a candidate’s ethics are a prerequisite to consideration. The ethics of candidate Donald Trump failed to qualify him as a legitimate choice.

Unfortunately, the failed ethical test now also applies to a generation of Republicans who knowingly chose relevance and proximity to power over their own ethics.

This leaves me with little choice but to hope the Democratic Party develops a persuasive platform, not just for people like me, but also for people who might be persuaded to return to the party after voting Republican in 2024.

Given this, what do I hope for?

Be practical, not ideological

The America that nominated Trump three times and elected him twice is not going to choose the same old Democratic Party of 2024 simply because Trump is unpopular. If Democrats believe that, they are conforming to Einstein’s definition of insanity.

Trump was unpopular with voters in 2024 and they still chose him. What I hear repeatedly is that while they might not like Trump, they just can’t stomach voting for a Democrat.

Why the repulsion?

Democrats use language that feeds the FOX News narrative that they are a “socialist party,” for open borders, for big government, soft on crime, against the wealthy, and for “they/them.” Their identity politics communicates a priority of minority interests versus the interests of the “average Americans.” They have let DEI become a symbol of Democratic softness.

Regardless of how I personally feel about these issues, 2026 or 2028 will not be the years to promote them. Democrats need to change their focus and their language in order to avoid giving red meat to the opposition. We can focus on being relevant without compromising our values.

Model Bill Clinton

In 1996, Bill Clinton famously said “The era of big government is over.” This wasn’t Clinton’s preference. But he had the shrewd sense to see the writing on the wall after a disastrous midterm election and he chose to ride the wave rather than swim against it.

There is wisdom in his words and Democrats should embrace it.

This means abandoning their traditional reflex to see everything through the lens of ever- increasing taxes and benefit programs. People in the middle are tired of it. Public trust in government effectiveness is at an all-time low.

True or not, the average person in the middle believes that most government programs are not designed to help them. To them, Ronald Reagan’s view that the most terrifying words in the English language were “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help” still rings true.

The core problem is not that redistribution exists; it is that redistribution has become the default Democratic strategy rather than the backstop. Policy debates fixate on who pays and who receives, instead of whether the system is producing enough opportunity, income, and supply in the first place.

You cannot fix the affordability problem with more government spending. And average Americans get that.

Shift the debate

This means Democrats must shift their focus from inequality and redistribution to pro-growth strategies that will produce higher earnings, lower living costs, better health, and real upward mobility for average Americans under economic strain.

We must shift the debate from broad goals of inclusion to technical matters of policy.

Policy should be judged by whether it expands affordable housing, healthcare capacity, childcare access, skills-to-jobs pathways, and investment-led growth that raises wages and lowers prices. That means reforming permitting and zoning rules that choke housing supply; modernizing healthcare payment and licensing systems that limit capacity; reducing regulatory duplication that delays infrastructure and energy projects; aligning education and training with labor market demand; and enforcing fiscal discipline that rewards outcomes rather than program size.

Doing this doesn’t require that government spend more. It means that government in many respects should do less, even when the work of doing less is hard.

Almost every interaction average Americans have with the government is uncompetitive compared to their experience in the private sector. As long as this is the case, programs that involve more government will not sell.

Stop vilifying the wealthy

Demagoguery directed at the wealthy by the left is both unfair and self-defeating. It prejudicially excludes too many people and resources from the tent who could be critical to a new majority.

If you listen to many on the left, all problems could be solved if the wealthy just “paid their fair share.” They believe that many are struggling because others are wealthy. They believe that the economy is zero-sum and that the system is rigged. If you are wealthy, you have cheated the system. While they would protest this characterization, they are at their core uncomfortable with how capitalism works.

If we learn anything from Trump’s success, it is that the majority of Americans don’t resent the wealthy for being wealthy.

Drop the “fair share” argument

The “fair share” argument is dishonest. For one thing, Democrats never actually define what a “fair share” is. Most likely, it simply means “more.” But Americans understand there is a limit to “more.” They understand the observation of Margaret Thatcher who said “The problem with socialism is that, eventually, you run out of other people’s money.”

While what the wealthy pay might not be “fair,” they do account for virtually all of what gets collected. In tax year 2023, the top one percent of earners paid 38.4 percent of all federal income taxes while earning 20.6 percent of the nation's income.

The top 10 percent paid 70.5 percent of all income taxes. The top 25 percent paid 86.3 percent.

The bottom half of earners paid only 3.3 percent of the total.

Given this is the case, if and when more taxes are needed, the only source will be the wealthy. So why not get on their side?

Drop the tax rate argument

Warren Buffett opened the door to this argument when he observed that his assistant paid a higher marginal tax rate than he did. Liberals pounced. But they should know better.

Since 1913, capital gains have been taxed at lower rates than ordinary income. Dividends have been taxed at lower rates since 2003. Policy makers on both sides have believed that the way to encourage investments of capital is to lower tax rates on the earnings of capital. They also recognize that earnings of corporations have already been taxed once so by taxing dividends you are taxing those earnings twice.

The super wealthy derive their income from capital gains and dividends, not ordinary income. As a result, their marginal tax rate will be lower than those who have W-2 income, at least at the higher marginal tax rates on such income. What Buffett left out was that while his marginal rate was lower, his total tax was considerably higher.

While policy makers should debate the incentives in the tax code, they should not criticize those that abide by it. It is Congress’s responsibility to create the tax code. It is the taxpayer’s responsibility to obey it.

Acknowledge the good in wealthy people

Democrats would have you believe that if you create a business that makes you wealthy you become a bad person. It also means you automatically become a Republican who opposes paying taxes, dislikes government programs, and knowingly profits at the expense of everyone else.

While several prominent billionaires in our world are easy targets, most Americans don’t think this is an automatic condition of being wealthy. Again, Trump teaches us that Americans like the capitalistic system and aspire to become wealthy themselves.

The philanthropy of the wealthy is a supporting example.

Americans gave a record $617.2 billion dollars to charity in 2025, led by the super wealthy. Bill and Melinda French Gates have given $63.9 billion dollars to the Gates Foundation. Warren Buffett has contributed $7.9 billion dollars since 2006 and plans to leave the balance of his net worth to his various foundations. MacKenzie Scott gave away more than seven billion dollars in 2025 alone.

Michael Dell committed to giving $6.25 billion to seed 25 million new Trump Accounts. Ray Dalio pledged $75 million dollars to seed the Trump Accounts for around 300,000 Connecticut children. Companies including BlackRock, Visa, Comcast, IBM, and JPMorgan Chase have signed on to match employee contributions to the program.

This list only scratches the surface of the generosity of wealthy Americans. Even the often-vilified Elon Musk gives hundreds of millions of dollars to Republican causes that he believes in. Rather than vilify him, why not ask why he prefers Republican causes over Democratic ones and try to learn from that?

Choose government efficiency over new taxes

Democrats should give tax increases a rest this election cycle. Focus on making government more efficient. Focus on pro-growth policies.

Only after these levers are pulled - after growth constraints are eased and government performance improves - will the case for additional spending or higher taxes become stronger.

At that point, revenue increases should be framed not as punishment, but as investment. Treating additional revenue as a moral corrective rather than a financing tool misstates reality and weakens political coalitions needed for reform.

Recognize you lost the border argument

Most of us agree that immigration is key not just to our heritage but to economic growth.

But the reality is that Democrats lost the argument when President Biden bet on reaching a bipartisan agreement to reform immigration rather than taking executive action to stem illegal border crossings. So admit you got this wrong, support immigration enforcement, and move on.

Change the approach to climate change

Donald Trump may call climate change a hoax, but polling shows that most Americans, Republican, independent, and Democrat, are smarter than that. The majority does not need to understand the science of global warming in order to observe it in their daily lives: more frequent and severe natural disasters, record heat, flooding, wildfires, and rising insurance premiums.

What Americans want, however, is a rational discussion of the challenges and policy proposals that are consistent with a pro-growth agenda, not just about restrictions in consumption. I recommend Democrats read Robert Eccles’ book, An American's Guide to Climate Change: How America Can Lead and Prosper. Eccles says “This book is written for the exhausted middle - the millions who care about America’s future but are tired of extremes, false choices, and lectures from both sides. This is a conversation about how America can turn the climate challenge into an opportunity for technological leadership, job creation, and economic growth.”

Enough said on that.

Reform the defense department

The war in Iran is unpopular, and it should be. It is a colossal blunder and Democrats should profit from it.

A more productive strategy, however, would be to pivot to the apparent inadequacy that the war has revealed in our nearly trillion-dollar war machine. Senator Durbin asked in a recent Senate hearing: Why does the most expensive military in history still get outmaneuvered by a country with a fraction of its budget? The answer lies in the new world order of asymmetric warfare, for which the U.S. is dangerously unprepared. Ukraine builds cheap drones that outperform our million-dollar missiles. China now dominates the commercial drone market we invented. Democrats should demand accountability for defense spending instead of playing defense against the soft-on-security label.

Remember RFK’s dream

“Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not?”

As long as the Democratic Party sees things as they are and sees politics as a competition for a shrinking pie, they will lose. As they should.

But when they start to see things that never were, and see the path to that future through the promotion of economic growth, they can win. And they should.