The Unauthorized DNC Autopsy

The DNC won't release an autopsy, but ours holds up well. Even our critics agree!

Recently, Politico reported that the DNC will not release the 2024 election autopsy that it has spent the last year working on. Buried down in the piece, Ken Martin has an… interesting explanation as to why:

“In our conversations with stakeholders from across the Democratic ecosystem, we are aligned on what’s important, and that’s learning from the past and winning the future,” Martin continued. “Here’s our North Star: does this help us win? If the answer is no, it’s a distraction from the core mission.”

As an organization dedicated to winning, that stood out. It’s hard to imagine in any other field someone saying that understanding what went wrong was not an essential part of fixing the problem.

What’s even more stunning about the decision is how milquetoast the report was. Per Politico:

This fall, the DNC held briefings with donors and other Democratic stakeholders on its initial findings. At the time, one Democrat who attended an October donor event confirmed that Biden’s initial decision to run in spite of his advanced age was not mentioned by DNC officials as a part of the review. It’s not clear whether his decision to run for reelection is discussed in the private review.

Biden’s age was not mentioned in the excerpts of the review shared with POLITICO on Thursday, nor was it raised in other briefings on the report’s initial findings.

And…

The DNC official described some examples of the report’s findings, including the party’s organizing strategies, necessary technological upgrades and its youth voter problem — though the details shared with POLITICO were sparse and incomplete. Excerpts from the review broadly described Democrats as defensive on immigration and public safety — issues that generally favor Republicans — but didn’t name-check a campaign, candidate or entity for its role in this posture, at least not publicly.

Call me crazy, but Biden’s age does seem like a pretty significant part of the 2024 election.

As Simon Bazelon, author of Deciding to Win said,

“It’s reflective of a broader problem within the party, which is we are scared of ever making anybody in our coalition upset,” said Simon Bazelon, a Democratic researcher who was the lead author of a different autopsy, called Deciding to Win, that was released by Welcome PAC, a centrist group. “I understand the incentives involved there. But it also limits us in a lot of ways because it means we can’t address difficult questions head on.”

In lieu of the party’s autopsy, we think Deciding To Win holds up pretty well. In fact, many of critics do as well.

The British have an idiom meaning strong, emphatic, almost comically intense agreement.

To be in “violent agreement” is to have alignment without harmony, to agree on facts but disagree on framing or tone.

In the eight weeks since Deciding to Win was published, critics have often been in violent agreement.

Throwback Throwdown

Legendary pollster Stan Greenberg took to the pages of The American Prospect today with a concisely titled critique: Deciding to Win is both “flawed” and will “help Democrats.”

Greenberg frames his essay as a takedown, and puts the report in context of intra-party debates going back to the 1980s and 1990s (he juxtaposes Bill Clinton’s reading of his work versus that of Bill Galston and Elaine Kamarck,credited as inspiration for Deciding to Win, and that he was not called).

But strip away the personal dynamics and ideological throat-clearing, and something else emerges: agreement on the fundamentals. Over and over again.

Let’s go to the tape.

1. Democrats are losing moderates and the middle

Greenberg doesn’t hedge here. He states it plainly:

“The study’s authors are right that Democrats have to address their losses with moderate voters.”

That is the starting premise of Deciding to Win. The party has a persuasion problem, not a turnout problem, and it’s concentrated among moderates and working-class voters.

Greenberg agrees.

2. The Democratic Party is elite-captured and out of touch

This is the heart of Welcome’s longstanding argument, and Greenberg endorses it directly:

“Advocacy groups and academic and foundation elites have shaped a Democratic Party that rarely speaks about the economy, cost of living, and middle class and is deeply out of touch…”

In this context, “People vs. the Powerful” is not a critique of “move to the center”, but a rebranding for the progressive readership of The American Prospect. Which is fine!

It’s not voters dragging the party left. It’s institutions, nonprofits, funders, and professional elites reshaping Democratic priorities in ways ordinary voters do not like.

3. Voters want an economic focus, not identity primacy

Greenberg leans heavily on Deciding to Win’s survey data to make this case:

“Three-quarters or more of voters want Democrats to prioritize ‘protecting Social Security and Medicare,’ ‘lowering everyday costs,’ ‘making health care more affordable,’ and ‘creating jobs and economic growth.’”

He adds:

“Almost two-thirds say ‘cutting taxes on the middle class’ should be a priority. Over half want Democrats to prioritize ‘raising taxes on the wealthy.’”

That’s not triangulation, that is exactly what the report calls for.

4. The party is seen as ‘too liberal’, and that’s unsustainable

Again, full agreement:

“More people view Democrats as ‘too liberal’ than view Trump Republicans as ‘too conservative.’ That is not sustainable.”

You can dislike the framing. You can debate the implications. But you can’t dispute the problem, and Greenberg doesn’t.

5. Crime, immigration, gender, and America matter electorally

Greenberg restates one of the report’s most uncomfortable conclusions almost verbatim:

“You cannot win this electoral battle for the middle class if so many voters view your party as out of touch on crime, immigration, gender, and America being exceptional.”

That sentence could be lifted directly into Deciding to Win without editing.

6. The platform analysis is valid, and damning

Greenberg explicitly endorses one of the report’s most discussed methods:

“The Deciding to Win analysis of words used in the 2012 and 2024 Democratic Party platforms is a reasonable way to look at shifting national Democratic priorities.”

He then accepts the conclusion: less economy, less middle class, less responsibility—more identity, more abstraction, more elite language.

7. Biden damaged the Democratic brand

Another point of convergence:

“The report highlights Joe Biden’s historic unpopularity and impact on the party’s brand.”

No footnotes. No caveats.

So what’s the disagreement?

Not the diagnosis.

Greenberg agrees that Democrats:

• Are losing moderates

• Are out of touch

• Talk too little about the economy

• Are overly shaped by elite institutions

• Struggle on crime, immigration, and culture

• Need to fight for the middle class

The disagreement is about framing, not facts. Greenberg has been influential in the party longer than any of the report’s authors have been alive, and is known as a savvy operator. This is a classic case of “credibility transfer”. Greenberg is preemptively disparaging the source’s credibility before presenting a fact that comes from that source, specifically because the audience will reject the fact if they think it’s coming from “them.” (“Them” being Welcome centrists).

At one point, Greenberg sneers:

“Do these data rats ever get out of the basement and see that there is a worsening climate crisis?

We’ll own that one. Greenberg’s DC-based firm is entering its 46th year. No one on the Welcome team lives in DC. We are on the youth soccer sidelines, at the block parties, in the bars, and in the pews with the rest of the scurrying voters in this country who want Democrats in DC to listen. We are in the data, but also in red districts around the country listening to the voters, so Win The Middle slate candidates can represent them. And win.