It’s over now 100,000 members in his Facebook group and widely covered in international media, the #WalkAway movement, made up of former Democrats telling their stories about why they left the party, has resonated deeply with the core feelings of Americans today.
Started by a hair stylist from New York Brandon Straka in behind schedule May, the movement caught fire as it harkens back to today’s Democratic Party, where far-left sentiments, from universal socialist agendas to demonizing our first responders and border controls, to questioning the very goodness of America itself, are on the verge of taking a seat at the table.
We are a far cry from the Democratic Party, which was the large tent party that ruled America for most of the 20th century.volcentury and that carried us through World War I, the Great Depression, World War II, much of the fight against communist aggression during the Cold War, both at home and abroad, and even as a moderate and pragmatic ruling force under President Bill Clinton .
When we see far-left socialists overthrow longtime moderate Democrats and liberals, as “democratic” socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently in New York and that they are not outright dismissed, but rather absorbed into the mainstream as a potential novel path forward that marks a troubling and historic change for our country.
Over the past few decades, millions of former Democrats have left their party and become independents or Republicans, whether they were liberals-turned-conservatives or The “Reagan Democrats” who discovered this there was no longer room for conservatives and the center-right in the Democratic Party.
They made an impact at the ballot box as they were credited with playing a key role in President Donald Trump’s 2016 election victories in Rust Belt states such as Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
As a former Democrat, I spoke out often in the national media in recent years to this trend because I think it speaks deeply to the current political and cultural movements taking place in our country.
Like I once said on Fox & FriendsIn recent years, the far left has slowly tried to gain a foothold in our country’s mainstream through fronts like “Occupy Wall Street” and “Antifa.”
There are still many moderate, liberal and even progressive Democrats in office who find this trend as disturbing as many on the right. Unfortunately, they too have been shut down by fringe voices within their party, which remains a diminutive group even as they slowly expand their ranks and influence through disinformation and intimidation.
It is unfortunate for our country that one of our country’s oldest political institutions, the Democratic Party, has become such a distorted mess. After all, this is the party of Jefferson, FDR, Truman, JFK and many others who built America into what it is today. This is the party that fought for the working man when he was truly oppressed, and that provided shelter and integration for tens of millions of immigrants who arrived on our shores in the 19th century.voland 20volcenturies.
The two-party system keeps our country fit and is one of the most stunning aspects of American democracy because it maintains a level of stability and moderation that prevents political disunity, extremism and unrest. As with a free market, the system eventually balances itself through electoral supply and demand – but in the meantime, the growth process can be painful.
Meanwhile, we now see millions of former Democrats settling into the Republican Party, making up a vast part of the party and perhaps a majority or majority as well. Indeed, in 2012, columnist George Will described exactly how “[They] they were called “Reagan Democrats” when, because of Ronald Reagan, they were considered merely seasonal Republicans. Today they are called the Republican base.”
We saw the full impact of this phenomenon firsthand during the 2015 and 2016 presidential primaries, when it was this huge base of former Democrats in the GOP that propelled then-candidate Donald Trump, himself a Democrat, to a series of seemingly unstoppable victories.
No one knows what the future holds, but it is clear that the current state of American ideological organization is an unsustainable and volatile market situation. It will eventually find its balance, but in the meantime, we hope that the #WalkAway movement will increasingly wake up on both sides of the aisle to the risks posed by the far left in our country and the tenuous fragility of our current political situation.
