SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
dan osborn
Winning Back the Working Class: To What, Exactly?
The working class deserves its own political organization, independent of the Democratic Party, in order to win back its rightful place in our political system.
Jun 17, 2026
I recently attended a webinar sponsored by the Working Families Party, entitled Winning Back the Working Class. Everyone attending seemed to share the view that the working class has drifted away from the Democratic Party and that Democrats must change their messaging in order to win these voters back and prevail against MAGA Republicans.
The presenters provided sophisticated polling analyses, looking closely at the issues that matter most to working-class voters and what turns them off about the Democratic Party. The bottom line was that the Democrats needed to put forward a strong, progressive economic-populist agenda.
While I share the desire to derail MAGA in the coming elections, I find the “winning back” framework problematic. For starters, why do Democrats need to be convinced that a progressive economic platform should be adopted? A party that was truly in tune with the working class should arrive there on its own. And clearly it has not. Why?
In this case, the obvious answer may be the right one: the Democratic Party establishment does not believe in progressive populism. It is not comfortable, for example, with forcefully attacking job insecurity by guaranteeing a job at a living wage for everyone who wants to work and cannot find employment in the private sector. It does not want to provide universal health insurance or dramatically facilitate union organizing in order to empower working people.
Ideologically, Democratic leaders are more comfortable with a liberal version of trickle-down economics—one that lets corporations play the central role in the economy. It expects rising prosperity to flow from government policies that enhance private investment and profits. Getting rich is shared value and woven into the party’s culture as thousands of consultants, pollsters, and operatives compete for a share of the billions of dollars spent during each election cycle.
At best, the populist economic messaging is just a tactic for gaining votes. Working-class voters know it and look elsewhere.
Given that the Democratic Party is not fundamentally a working-class party, how will the adoption of more populist messaging change its character? It won’t—and, again, working-class voters know it.
In fairness to these progressive analysts, they understand that much more is needed. They want Democrats to recruit and run more working-class candidates, which would demonstrate a deeper commitment to working-class concerns. Over time, more working-class candidates could help transform the party into something closer to a working-class party and help solve the “winning back” problem. But everyone knows it won’t happen anytime soon.
The Working Families Party has been recruiting and supporting progressive candidates in Democratic Party primaries for many years. The party sees its mission, as best I can tell, as transforming the Democratic Party by advancing a working-class agenda within the Democratic Party and in state legislatures. It has been effective in states such as New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, helping secure increases in the minimum wage, paid family leave legislation, and higher taxes on millionaires.
But something important is missing from its reliance on polling-and-messaging. If the Working Families Party were a working-class party, then its working-class base—not pollsters—would be developing its platform through some kind of bottom-up, face-to-face process. One can imagine dozens of grassroots meetings during which working people discuss and debate the issues they want their party to fight for. Polling can certainly play a role in testing issues with a wider electorate and bringing new concerns to the base for discussion. But the workers in the Working Families Party should be shaping the agenda.
Perhaps I am being naive or nostalgic, but isn’t that what progressive populist parties should do?
There is also the question of where the “winning back” should occur. Transforming the Democratic Party is only possible where the party actually exists. In vast areas of the country, it has withered away, making “winning back” impossible.
I took a quick look at nine Great Plains and central states: Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, Iowa, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, and Idaho.
- In 1990, these states still retained elements of a progressive-populist tradition, and 10 of their 18 U.S. senators were Democrats. Today, none are.
- Of the roughly 1,400 state legislative seats in those states, Democrats do not even field candidates in approximately 40 percent of them.
- Nationally, there are about 130 U.S. House districts where Democrats routinely lose by 25 percentage points or more.
In these places, there is no party to win the working class back to.
One option is simply to concede roughly half the country to MAGA forces. But it would be a grave mistake to abandon the tens of millions of working-class voters who live outside blue and purple areas. Many of them may have voted red in the last election, attracted by populist rhetoric designed to attract them, but at the end of the day, they’re not going to be satisfied by what the Republicans deliver. Where do they go?
That leaves another option: build a new party of working people that concentrates on the red areas where Democrats have abandoned the field. Such an effort could begin with candidates like Dan Osborn, who has stepped into the working-class political vacuum in deep-red Nebraska. He ran well ahead of Kamala Harris in 2024 and is currently polling competitively against Pete Ricketts. There is room for many more candidates like him in these one-party states.
Building something new is a heavy lift, to be sure, and it will take time. But the discussion about why and how to do it must begin now. We need to remove the blinders that prevent us from seeing that an alternative to the Democratic Party must be built—a new party, of and by working people, is needed to fill this vast political vacuum.
The call to “win back the working class to the Democrats” needs to be turned inside out. The working class deserves its own political organization, independent of the Democratic Party, in order to win back its rightful place in our political system. Only then can working people speak in their own voice about how to build an economy that serves people rather than wealth—one that attacks runaway inequality and job insecurity.
****
The questions raised in this essay are explored in much greater depth in my new book, The Billionaires Have Two Parties, We Need One of Our Own: How Working People Can Build Independent Political Power.
The book examines why so many working people have abandoned the Democratic Party, why independents are now the largest political bloc in many states, what voters in the heartland actually want from politics, and whether a new working-class political organization can be built without acting as a spoiler.
Drawing on new polling and historical research, it argues that working people can build independent political power even in places where the Democratic Party has ceased to function as a competitive second party.
If these arguments resonate with you, I hope you’ll take a look at the book.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Billionaires Have Two Parties. Why Do the People of America's Great Plains Have Only One?
Abandoned by the party they once considered their own, many Democrats across vast areas of the nation's heartland turned to the Republicans to vent their anger at a system that was screwing them.
Jun 03, 2026
Not so long ago the Democrats wielded significant power in the Great Plains states. In 1990, 10 of the 18 Senators from Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, Iowa, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, and Idaho were Democrats. Today, none are.
In much of this area, the Democrats are no longer functioning as a competitive second party. They lose by 25 percent or more in 21 of the 30 congressional districts in these states. By my rough count, the Democrats did not even run candidates in about 40 percent of the region’s 1,400 state legislative races. Clearly, something has gone profoundly wrong.
What happened?
During the Reagan era (from his election in 1980 and up through the early 1990s) Great Plains Democrats resurrected the populist traditions of the late 19th-century People’s Party, the progressives of the early 20th century, and the Nonpartisan league a few years later. The core ideology of this tradition focused on protecting family farmers and workers from the rapaciousness of big corporations and banks. The political opponents of the Reagan Revolution followed in their path and enough of them were in Congress in 1983 to form the Congressional Populist Caucus.
"It is political malpractice to abdicate so much of America’s heartland."
These 14 congresspersons adopted the populist moniker and fought against corporatized free trade deals, the high Federal Reserve interest rates, plant closings, anti-union legislation, and farm foreclosures. And they did so in alliance with, and in support of, dozens of community groups including abortion and gay rights organizations.
But in 1990, a powerful segment of the Democratic establishment created the centrist Democratic Leadership Council and made a firm decision to embrace corporations, agribusiness, free trade, and Wall Street deregulation, while moving away from labor unions and family farmers. In the 1992 presidential primaries, Bill Clinton was the Democratic Leadership Council’s representative, while Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa represented the progressive populists. As we know, Clinton won.
In When the Democrats Lost the Heartland Corey Haala shows that this turn to neoliberalism was not the inevitable result of technological advances, nor was it predetermined by the iron laws of capitalism. Rather, it was a victory by one interest group within the Democratic Party over another, and the consequences were felt immediately.
After the centrists won, they starved the Great Plains Democrats of funds and legislative victories, leaving them with little to offer their constituents—the populist-oriented farmers and workers struggling to survive against corporate power.
Working-class voters and family farmers sensed that the party’s priorities were changing long before Chuck Schumer said the quiet part out loud:
“For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs of Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.”
The same logic could easily have been applied to the Great Plains.
Abandoned by the party they once considered their own, many Democrats turned to the Republicans to vent their anger at a system that was screwing them.
Rebuild the old or build something new?
Despite this fundamental ideological shift, it’s hard for progressives to move away from the Democratic Party, especially given the rise of MAGA. Don’t we have to do everything we can to support Democratic candidates in order to win back Congress and stop the fascist takeover of America?
Of course, defeating the MAGA Republicans is crucial. And the fortunes of the Democrats are a real concern in blue and marginal districts where new seats can be won and old seats can be held. Third-party candidates in those competitive districts would only serve as spoilers likely to help elect MAGA Republicans.
But that’s not the case in the ruby red states in which the Democrats have given up on 40 percent of the local races, and where they lose congressional seats by 25 percent or more.
In these areas there is nothing to spoil.
It is political malpractice to abdicate so much of America’s heartland. One strategy is for progressives to recapture the Democratic Party in the Great Plains and elsewhere, infuse it with new energy, change its neoliberal brand, and run new working-class candidates across the board.
But a new survey by the Center for Working Class Politics shows that many of those who have given up on Trump show little interest in voting for Democrats. And a recent New York Times/Siena survey reports 43 percent of registered voters nationally are dissatisfied with both parties. That’s a hell of a headwind to overcome, given how tarnished the Democratic Party brand has become.
Something new that isn’t blue?
Dan Osborn’s race for the US Senate in Nebraska points in another direction. This former local labor leader is running against both parties, what he calls “the two-party doom loop,” in an unabashed progressive populist campaign—the Nebraska Fairness Plan. As he says “It’s not a party’s platform or written by consultants. It’s written for the people who punch a clock and wonder why nobody in Washington is fighting for them.”
Osborn is appealing to independents, disaffected Democrats, and even disgruntled Republicans. So far, the race is a toss-up in a state where Republicans outnumber Democrats by nearly two to one. The Democratic nominee, Cindy Burbank, has said she will avoid playing the spoiler by dropping out before ballots are printed if she doesn’t see a path to victory.
Osborn’s effort (and the polling we report on in The Billionaires Have Two Parties, We Need a Party of Our Own) strongly suggests that the best path forward in the Great Plains districts largely abanoned by the Democrats is to create a new organization by and for working people to run independent candidates.
That requires a break from the Democrats. Osborn says he will not caucus with either major party, and attacks both billionaire parties that have left so many working people high and dry. Independent working-class candidates will need to take strong progressive populist positions that protect jobs, create new ones, and save what’s left of family farming—positions with strong support across the Great Plains.
Working people can build independent political power even in places where the Democratic Party has ceased to function as a competitive second party.
And progressive political activists will need to get comfortable with turning neoliberalism on its head—putting people instead of capital in the center of our economy. That means promoting real job creation, not public-private partnerships that enrich corporations and rarely produce new jobs.
We will need to promote strong policies like “the right to a job at a living wage, provided by the public sector if the private sector fails to do so.”
As radical as this policy seems, polling shows again and again that it is very popular. People want stable, secure jobs even if the government has to step in to provide them.
Rebuilding progressive populism in the Great Plains requires the kind of boldness that challenged corporate power from the 1880s onward. Those populists were able to grow their appeal nationally, and their efforts led to progressive reforms like the graduated income tax, anti-monopoly moves against the robber barons, the formation of public universities and colleges, and even a public bank in North Dakota, among other successes.
We must escape the corporatist framework that governs today’s Democratic Party, which appeals to wealthy donors, admires the billionaire class, and has given up on the working class it considers socially backward.
Can it be done? Not quickly. Not easily. But the Great Plains once produced some of the most powerful populist movements in American history that challenged concentrated wealth, built durable institutions, and won reforms that reshaped the country. We won’t know what is possible until we try again.
We need to leave our blue bubbles, talk face-to-face with alienated working people, and rebuild an independent politics rooted in work, community, and economic security.
And really, where better to spread populism than in America’s heartland, “where the wind comes sweeping down the plain.”
If we dare to act boldly, perhaps we can once again become the wind.
*****
The questions raised in this essay are explored in much greater depth in my new book, The Billionaires Have Two Parties, We Need One of Our Own: How Working People Can Build Independent Political Power.
The book examines why so many working people have abandoned the Democratic Party, why independents are now the largest political bloc in many states, what voters in the heartland actually want from politics, and whether a new working-class political organization can be built without acting as a spoiler.
Drawing on new polling and historical research, it argues that working people can build independent political power even in places where the Democratic Party has ceased to function as a competitive second party.
If these arguments resonate with you, I hope you’ll take a look at the book.
All book proceeds support our Reversing Runaway Inequality educational programs for working people.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Emulating Dan Osborn, Nebraska Independent Targets Corporate Greed in US House Run
Austin Ahlman argued that "it's Tyson; it's Google; it's Facebook; it's every other corporation that is putting the squeeze and pressure on communities like mine and ripping us apart" that are "stealing your way of life."
May 14, 2026
As the winner of the Democratic US Senate primary in Nebraska mulls dropping out to boost Independent Dan Osborn, another congressional candidate not tied to either major political party launched a campaign for the state's 1st Congressional District on Thursday.
Joining incumbent GOP Rep. Mike Flood and Democratic primary winner Chris Backemeyer is Austin Ahlman, a 28-year-old investigative journalist, anti-monopolist, and self-described "insurgent Independent running in NE-01 to fight for the little guy."
Ahlman's launch video shares some struggles his family has faced—his parents working at the Tyson Foods meatpacking plant in Norfolk that closed in 2006, his dad's cancer battle, and his mom's suicide—and his work in journalism, "uncovering corruption among Democrats and Republicans, and taking on the corporations that are destroying our way of life."
It also features his fights for loved ones: against a bank for his family home, to assist his grandmother, "who was getting cheated by utility and insurance companies," and to help his brother "get his small business off the ground."
"My family's story isn't unique," he says in the three-minute ad. "Families all across our state are fighting, but the only ones who seem to be getting ahead are the elites on the coasts and the politicians who are selling us out to them."
The emotional ad makes Ahlman's policy priorities clear: taking on rising costs, Wall Street buying family homes, corporate monopolies, taxpayer-funded foreign wars, and health insurance companies that deny coverage.
"It's time we show the billionaires in Wall Street and Silicon Valley who are pitting us against one another that we won't let them steal our way of life out from under us," he concludes. "If you agree, then join us, and let's take Nebraska back."
As Nebraska Public Media reported Thursday:
Since Ahlman isn't running with a party affiliation, he will need to petition onto the general election ballot. According to the Nebraska Secretary of State's Office, Ahlman will need to collect at least 2,000 valid signatures from voters in the 1st Congressional District to get onto the ballot.
"I think most people these days are Independents," Ahlman said in a Thursday interview with Nebraska Public Media News. "They do feel pretty fed up with things."
He said he'd like the country's spending to refocus on the US and not in conflicts abroad.
"There is so much money from Americans' pockets being poured into other countries, armies to fight wars in places that we couldn't even find on a map. And I think this is one area where current voters in... this district don't have a choice," he said. "The blue-haired baristas are not the ones stealing people's way of life. Your uncle, who's perhaps a little gung-ho at Thanksgiving, is not the one stealing your way of life. It's Tyson; it's Google; it's Facebook; it's every other corporation that is putting the squeeze and pressure on communities like mine and ripping us apart."
On social media Thursday, Ahlman called out the GOP incumbent for taking campaign cash from corporate political action committees and special interests.
"I'm in this to beat Mike Flood—and yes, this is personal. We grew up in the same town, but Millionaire Mike's life was not like mine. I lived in trailer parks. Our whole family spent periods living in my grandmother's basement. I went to bed hungry," he explained. "Last year, Millionaire Mike... voted to hand tax cuts to big business and billionaires while gutting healthcare, education, and food programs. Those callous votes show he takes voters for granted."
Meanwhile, the Lincoln Journal Star reported Thursday that the Independent Norfolk native is already drawing vote-splitting criticism "from Republicans and Democrats alike."
In response, Ahlman said: "It seems I’ve pissed some people off! Look, taking on the establishment of both major parties was never going to be easy. They're fighting back, and that isn’t very surprising. But here's the deal—the overwhelming majority of real people in Nebraska—whether they're registered Republicans or Independents or Democrats, they all want change."
"They're sick of being looked down on, and sold out on, and lied to," he stressed. "Congressman Flood is selling us out to big money donors as he climbs the ladder in Washington. Americans are ready to elect Independents who work for them, not party bosses or corporate donors. That's why we're going to win."
The state's Democratic Party is standing by its candidate. The party chair, Jane Fleming Kleeb, told Drop Site News' Ryan Grim that "Chris Backemeyer is the clear choice for Nebraska's 1st District. He brings real federal experience from the State Department and is laser-focused on what Nebraskans actually care about—lowering costs and expanding access to affordable healthcare. Mike Flood has failed this district, and a fringe Independent won't fix that. Nebraska doesn't need noise from either extreme—we need a steady, experienced leader who will fight for fairness and protect our democracy. That's Chris Backemeyer."
Backemeyer was at the State Department under former Democratic President Joe Biden. While there, Zeteo News' Prem Thakker noted Thursday, he "helped coordinate aid to Israel amid its genocide in Gaza."
According to Thakker, the Democrat has received "much of his campaign donations from the DMV," a term for the Washington, DC, metropolitan area, which includes Maryland, and Virginia. Donors include key Biden officials, such as former Secretary of State Antony Blinken and ex-National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.
The journalist also highlighted some early polling from Adam Carlson's Zenith Research that shows Ahlman doing well, particularly after respondents are introduced to candidates' biographies:
"In head-to-head matchups in these post-bios ballot tests, Ahlman (I) doesn't just outperform Backemeyer (D) overall by 16 points, but outperforms him among nearly every single subgroup," Carlson wrote. "Ahlman's largest overperformances relative to Backemeyer are among groups that Democrats have struggled with of late (especially in this part of the country)—Independents (+46), age 18-44 (+34), moderates (+26), white noncollege (+25), suburban voters (+24), white men (+21), and gun-owning households (+20)."
"In the post-bios three-way vote, Backemeyer (D) is in third place, 6 points behind Ahlman (I)," the pollster added. "But Flood still leads by 14 points despite only being at 42%. As we've seen, if Backemeyer drops out, Ahlman takes the lead if it's a 1:1 race against Flood."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Nebraska Democrat Wins Senate Primary—But Signals She'll Drop Out and Back Working-Class Independent Dan Osborn
"We believe Dan Osborn... represents the best opportunity to defeat Pete Ricketts and deliver real results for working families," said the chair of the state Democratic Party.
May 13, 2026
The winner of the Democratic US Senate primary in Nebraska has no expectation that she'd be able to win the general election in November, and her official website alludes to a plan to drop out of the race—which could ultimately help the party in its goal of wresting control of the chamber from Republicans.
The campaign website of Cindy Burbank, a pharmacy technician who jumped into the Democratic primary race after hearing the Republicans were plotting to place a right-wing "plant" on the ballot, suggests Burbank did some maneuvering of her own to secure a favorable result—even if she has no intention of actually going to the US Senate and instead aims to help Independent candidate Dan Osborn win.
Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.) "knows he’s losing to Dan Osborn and this is his plan to cheat his way to victory. We can’t let that happen," reads Burbank's website. "Support me—and I’ll make sure Pete Ricketts’ stooge never gets anywhere near our November ballot!"
Osborn, a former organizer who came within seven points of beating Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) in 2024, has been endorsed by the state's Democratic Party, which poured money into Burbank's campaign before Tuesday's primary.
In March, state Democratic Party Chair Jane Fleming Kleeb said William Forbes, an anti-abortion rights pastor who has voted for President Donald Trump in recent elections and attended a training run by a right-wing group, had joined the Democratic Party to "deceive Nebraska voters."
"The Nebraska Democratic Party made a deliberate, principled decision not to field a candidate in the US Senate race," said Kleeb. "We believe Dan Osborn—a veteran, a mechanic, a Nebraskan, and an independent voice—represents the best opportunity to defeat Pete Ricketts and deliver real results for working families."
Forbes has denied being a "Ricketts plant," as Kleeb has called him, and Burbank on Tuesday denied she had joined the race with the intention of dropping out to help Osborn win in a state where a Democrat has not won a Senate race since 2006. She told NBC News that "some people" she had worked with on previous political campaigns had spoken to her about running, but said they were not connected to Osborn's campaign or to the state Democratic Party.
But she added that following her overwhelming win, with 89% of primary voters supporting her, that Osborn is "a great guy, and we have to keep in mind that he might be able to be on [the ballot].”
“For me to stay on the ballot and take votes away from Osborn, it’s not fair,” she told the outlet.
Burbank added that she "will drop out when and if the time comes that I cannot win in November. And I think anybody with any dignity should do that."
David Dayen, executive editor of The American Prospect, said Burbank's resounding victory "suggests a well-educated [Democratic] electorate" and a well-organized push by Kleeb.
Osborn, who has emphasized that he would caucus independently if elected to the Senate, came closer than expected to beating Fischer in 2024, when Trump carried Nebraska by 20 points.
Polling has been limited so far, but Tavern Research found ahead of the primary election that 47% of likely voters were supporting Osborn while 42% backed Ricketts. The same survey found Ricketts 16 points ahead of Forbes, 9 points ahead of Burbank, and 7 points ahead of a generic Democrat. Earlier polls sponsored by Osborn's campaign found Ricketts just one point ahead of the Independent.
Tavern Research said the polls pointed to "an Independent problem in Nebraska" for Ricketts, whose wealth and financial industry ties have earned him the nickname "Wall Street Pete."
The state has long been a stronghold for Trump and the GOP, but Cook Political Report currently rates the state's Senate race as "likely Republican," downgrading it from "solidly Republican," ahead of the November election.
Osborn, a US Navy veteran and mechanic, became president of his union while working at the Kellogg's plant in Omaha and led a successful strike there in 2021, securing benefits for his fellow union workers. He has called his platform the Nebraska Fairness Plan and is vowing to "take on the corporations and their chosen political lapdogs to restore economic liberty and fairness for the working Americans who make this country run."
He has called to overturn the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling that allowed unlimited corporate spending in elections, refuses corporate political action committee donations, and has demanded an end to corporate practices like "shrinkflation" and surveillance pricing.
"We deserve a government that is truly of the people, by the people, and for the people," reads Osborn's platform. "But for decades, career politicians in both parties have been bought and paid for by the corporate cronies and lobbyists pouring money into our political process to bend the system to their will. When I’m in the Senate, I will champion the strongest anti-corruption platform Washington has ever seen."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Why the Working Class Has Given Up on the Liberal Establishment
Billionaires are in control of both parties and working people across this country are not dumb. They are ready for populist change. How do we know this? They told us.
May 05, 2026
You’ve spent 25 years working for a company. You’re proud of your work. Your wages and benefits are good, and you’ve put together a decent life. Then your CEO says the company is heading for some tough times, and that everyone from the executive suite to the shop floor will need to make some sacrifices. You are willing to join with others to help the company survive. You feel part of it. It’s your identity. You will sacrifice if that’s what you and your company need to survive.
But when the sacrifice comes, the price paid is far from equal. You, along with hundreds of other workers, are laid off and are replaced with low-wage sub-contractors.
How would you feel?
I found out when a similar scenario was foisted on 114 food service and maintenance workers at Oberlin College in 2020. Many of them had been there longer than any of the administrators and most of the faculty. Their work for the college was their life, their identity. They cared for the students. They were proud to be associated with this elite liberal institution, wokeness and all. It was by far the best employer in northeastern Ohio, which has had its industrial base decimated over the last four decades.
In 2018, Oberlin’s administration had come up with a PR program called “One Oberlin” to secure the school’s finances, upgrade facilities, and prepare for the college’s third century. At the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic the Oberlin community was asked to pull together to make ends meet. But while the financial stress was real, it turned out “One Oberlin” was not: It failed to include the college’s unionized blue-collar workers. They were summarily dismissed, dispatched with a little severance and little else. They were devastated.
We know how they felt because a group of Oberlin student interns interviewed many of the laid off workers. These workers were hurt and they were angry. They saw this very liberal institution as hypocritical, as betraying its values, and as uncaring and cruel.
As an Oberlin alumnus, this was a wake-up call. Although a group of us did all we could to call out the college’s hypocrisy and compel it to save these jobs, we couldn’t get them to consider the workers as part of “One Oberlin.” (We were able to raise about $180,000 from alumni for these workers to cushion the blow.)
That led me to conduct a larger study of the impact of mass layoffs on politics. It didn’t take much of a leap to see that Oberlin’s liberal establishment was very similar to that of the Democratic Party. A declared ethos of caring and positive social values seemed always to stop when budgetary restraints forced a choice between the interests of workers and those of the party’s elites and their wealthy allies.
That turned out to be the case throughout the Midwest, where the Democratic Party’s fortunes have flagged over the past few decades as their “Blue Wall” crumbled. We used demographic and mass layoff data in conjunction with election results and found a statistically solid causal relationship: As the county mass layoff rate went up, the Democratic vote went down between 1996 and 2020. Year by year, voters in areas hard hit by mass layoffs were abandoning the Democratic Party.
Sherrod Brown, the former senator from Ohio who is trying to reclaim his job this year, found that the Democrats are still being blamed for the job destruction caused by NAFTA. After his loss in the 2024 campaign, he said:
The national Democratic brand has suffered, again, starting with NAFTA. My first term in the House [was] when NAFTA was voted on. I led the freshman class of 160 Democrats, and 40 Republicans, give or take, in opposition to NAFTA. I was in all the strategy meetings, all the vote counts. So, more Democrats voted against NAFTA than for it. More Republicans voted for it than against it. But it was seen [as a mark against Democrats], because we had a Democratic president, even though it was negotiated by a Republican, but that’s all background noise now. But what really mattered is: I still heard in the Mahoning Valley, in the Miami Valley, I still heard during the campaign, about NAFTA.
I’ve seen that erosion of American jobs and I’ve seen the middle class shrink. People have to blame someone. And it’s been Democrats. We are more to blame for it because we have historically been the party of [workers]. They expect Republicans to sell out to their corporate friends and to support the rich. But we don’t expect that from my party…
Our YouGov survey of 3,000 voters in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin found that 70 percent of the respondents have negative opinions of the Democrats. That’s what happens when the Democrats, like Oberlin, bastions of liberal good will, become so cavalier about job destruction.
Can the Democrats Recover?
Everyone who wants to stop MAGA this coming fall, as well as in 2028, sure hopes so. But in the 130 congressional districts where the Democrats lose by 25 percent or more, the odds are slim. In those districts, the Democratic Party’s presence is so diminished it might as well not even exist. And it’s in those districts we need something new, starting with working-class candidates like Dan Osborn, who is running as an independent in Nebraska for the US Senate.
Are voters in red areas ready for working-class independents? Our YouGov survey shows they are. Looking only at rural county data in those four states (the reddest areas), there is strong support for a new party, independent of the two parties, that would run on a progressive populist working-class platform:
Voter Support for the New Independent Workers’ Political Association
- Rural Republicans: 50%
- Rural Independents: 50%
- Rural Democrats” 77%
(For more data and analysis please see my new book, The Billionaires Have Two Parties, We Need a Party of Our Own.)
A Policy Hail Mary?
If the Democrats want to reconnect with working people, they need to put job security front and center. They need to stop relying on public-private partnerships, which use public funds to encourage corporate job creation that too often fails to materialize. And the Dems need to purge vacuous language, like the phrase “the opportunity society,” which promotes corporate-first thinking that adds to, rather than reduces, job precarity. In fact, they should replace their corporate-first thinking, with people-first thinking.
To do so the Democrats should call for federal job guarantees. They would do well to read Jared Abbot’s review of a compendium of poll data that shows massive support for the government serving as the employer of last resort. People don’t want handouts; they want a chance to earn a fair living. (Even the new “Working Families Guarantee” agenda, put forward by the Working Families Party, guarantees just about everything but stops short of a federal job guarantee.)
But a shift to ensuring people-first job security will not come easily to a party dominated by wealthy donors, millionaire politicians, lobbyists, pollsters, and consultants. Corporate leaders will rail against the prospect of workers having access to federal jobs and thereby forcing the company to bid up wages and benefits to retain and attract employees. Heaven forbid that direct government support go to workers instead of corporations!
Until the party supports job guarantees and runs hundreds of working-class candidates, we can expect more working people to reject the Democratic establishment (and the liberal college administrators) who care so little about working-class job security.
That leaves us with a dangerous political vacuum that is pulling the working class both away from politics and towards demagogues who claim they will trash a system that has neglected so many for so long. But most working people know that genuine positive change is better than destructive change and they would welcome a new working-class party, especially in red areas. They have told us so.
They know that billionaires are in control of both parties, and that they really do need a party of their own.
Keep ReadingShow Less
The Third Party Spoiler Argument Is No More!
The sad truth is that in 130 congressional districts there is, in reality, only one party, and the Democrats lose by 25 percent or more time after time, that is, if they even run a candidate at all.
Apr 29, 2026
When you write a book called The Billionaires Have Two Parties, We Need a Party of Our Own: How Working People Can Build Independent Political Power, you provoke a lot of angst in some of your readers. More than a few are still haunted by the memory of Ralph Nader and his quixotic 2000 presidential campaign, good fun until, as many believe, he took the election away from Al Gore, the Democrat, and gave it to George W. Bush, the Republican.
Spoiler, spoiler, spoiler echoes in their minds as this year’s make-or-break November elections approach. Won’t talk of third parties encourage defections from the Democrats and risk helping MAGA? Better, it is thought by the worriers, to bury all such discussion.
Even my friend Bob Kuttner, the astute political commentator, knocks me down with the age-old observation that the “American constitutional system, with its lack of proportional representation for minor parties, makes it almost impossible for new parties to gain a lasting foothold.”
That’s certainly the case when the focus is on presidential races. The story, however, is entirely different at the state and local level, where independent third parties have won thousands of offices and have helped to reshape America. The Populists did it in the 1880s and 1890s, the Socialist Party did it in the early 20th century, and the Minnesota Farm-Labor Party did it in the 1920s. These third parties led the charge to stop child labor, legalize labor unions, and rein in the corporate robber barons. They, not the Democrats, constructed the foundation of the New Deal that elevated the lives of working people.
I would like third party skeptics to take a four-step cure:
Step one: Close your eyes and recall what happens on just about every election night. What do you see about five seconds after the polls close? Half the voting districts in the country flash red. They are immediately lost to the Democrats again and again and again. The sad truth is that in 130 congressional districts there is, in reality, only one party, and the Democrats lose by 25 percent or more time after time, that is, if they even run a candidate at all.
Step two: Admit that in those districts the Democratic Party is ineffectual and therefore the spoiler issue isn’t an issue. Repeat once a day: The spoiler problem does not exist in the 130 congressional districts that the Democrats lose by 25 percent or more.
Step three: Take a strong dose of Dan Osborn, the working-class candidate who is running for Senate in Nebraska as an independent and is doing better than any Democrat has done in decades. Why? In deep red America the Democratic brand is poison, but progressive populism can take hold and grow when contested by independent working-class candidates. Run as a Democrat and you’re defeated before you start.
Step four: Think more carefully about what works. While progressive groups like the Working Families Party do admirable work reforming the Democrats in blue and purple districts, their identity as progressive Democrats makes it almost impossible for them to have any impact in red America. (See Chapter 6 of my book.)
I hope that these four steps make it easier for the worriers to hear the central argument of my book:
Working people are alienated from the Democratic Party and need a political home of their own, especially in red America.
We need to understand the causes of that alienation and how a new political home can be built outside the two major parties without becoming a spoiler in any shape or form.
It’s time to put aside the spoiler canard. In fact, it’s time to get used to the fact that more and more independents are running in red America, attacking both billionaire parties. The Democrats, not the independents, are becoming the new spoilers as they realize that they are now the third party. (See Montana right now.)
You may find other points of contention in my new book, and I’m happy to talk about them all, but the third-party spoiler problem isn’t one of them. Take a look and decide for yourself.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Investigation Shows How Decades of Corporate Consolidation Have Devastated US Cattle Ranchers
"The marketplace is fundamentally broken," one rancher explained.
Dec 23, 2025
Even as US beef prices have continued to surge, American cattle ranchers have come under increased financial pressure—and a new report from More Perfect Union claims that this is due in part to industry consolidation in the meat-packing industry.
Bill Bullard, the CEO of the trade association R-CALF USA, explained to More Perfect Union that cattle ranchers are essentially at the bottom of the pyramid in the beef-producing process, while the top is occupied by "four meat packers controlling 80% of the market."
"It's there that the meat packers are able to exert their market power in order to leverage down the price that the cattle feeder receives for the animals," Bullard said.
To illustrate the impact this has had on farmers, Bullard pointed out that cattle producers in 1980 received 63 cents for every dollar paid by consumers for beef, whereas four decades later they were receiving just 37 cents for every dollar.
"That allocation has flipped on its head because the marketplace is fundamentally broken," Bullard told More Perfect Union.
Angela Huffman, president of Farm Action, recently highlighted the role played by the four big meatpacking companies—Tyson, Cargill, National Beef, and JBS—in hurting US ranchers.
Writing on her Substack page earlier this month, Huffman zeroed in on Tyson's recent decision to close one of its meatpacking plants in Lexington, Nebraska to demonstrate the outsize power that big corporations have over the US food supply.
The Lexington plant employs more than 3,000 people and is capable of processing 5,000 head of cattle a day, and its closure is expected to both devastate the local economy and have a major impact on US ranchers throughout the region.
Huffman noted a report from the Associated Press estimating that the Lexington plant's closure, combined with projected job cuts at a Tyson plant in Amarillo, Texas, could cut national beef processing capacity by up to 9%.
"Ranchers were already dealing with high costs, drought, and years of uneven prices," Huffman wrote. "Now they face even less competition for their cattle. When there are fewer packers active in the market, ranchers have less bargaining power, and cattle prices fall even as beef prices in grocery stores stay near record highs."
Dan Osborn, an independent US Senate candidate running in Nebraska, has made the dangers of corporate consolidation a central theme of his campaign, and on Monday he released a video explaining why he spends so much time talking about monopolies, particularly in the agricultural industry.
"If you're a farmer, your inputs, your seed, your chemicals, you have to buy from monopolies," he said. "Sygenta, Chinese-owned company you've got to buy your seed from, they control and manipulate that market. And then when your production's over and you're selling it, you're selling it to monopolies as well."
Want to know why I talk about MONOPOLIES all the time? This is why. 👇 pic.twitter.com/MuYh0gZRVr
— Dan Osborn (@osbornforne) December 22, 2025
Osborn said that the trend of industry consolidation wasn't just limited to agriculture, but is now moving forward with major railroad and media mergers.
"We need to create an economic environment in this country that favors competition," he said. "That's what a free market is. A free market isn't three or four big people or big corporations controlling everything."
Keep ReadingShow Less
With GOP 'Looking at' Tyson's Alleged Market Manipulation, Nebraska Candidate Osborn Says 'Enforce the Law'
"Candidate for Senate Dan Osborn is already doing more for the people affected by the Tyson closure than the current Nebraska senators," said a worker rights advocate.
Dec 12, 2025
Instead of "another investigation" into possible wrongdoing by meatpacking giant Tyson, independent US Senate candidate Dan Osborn is demanding that elected officials in Nebraska simply "pick up the damn phone" and demand action from the Trump administration following the company's closure of one of the nation's largest meat processing plants in what one antitrust expert said was a clear-cut case of market manipulation.
Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.), whom Osborn is challenging in the 2026 election, said Thursday that his team is "taking a look at any allegation of wrongdoing" by Tyson, weeks after the company announced its massive plant in Lexington, Nebraska is set to close in January—putting more than 3,000 people in a town of 11,000 out of work.
The closure comes months after Tyson boosted its stock buybacks and following an announcement that its adjusted operating income had increased by 26% compared to 2024. Tyson controls about 80% of the US beef market along with three other companies, and the Department of Justice is investigating whether the four corporations are colluding to keep beef prices high.
Despite near-record high prices in the industry, Tyson said last week it was closing the Lexington plant and scaling back operations at its facility in Amarillo, Texas to "right-size its beef business and position it for long-term success."
Basel Musharbash, an antitrust lawyer at Antimonopoly Counsel in Paris, Texas, attended a press conference with Osborn across the street from the Lexington plant this week and said that the "legal analysis here is pretty straightforward" regarding whether Tyson has engaged in market manipulation.
“The Lexington plant accounts for around 5% of the nation’s cattle," said Musharbash. "By shutting down a plant that slaughters such a large portion of the cattle in this region and the country, Tyson will single-handedly reshape the nation’s cattle markets from boom to bust.”
Ranchers will be forced "to accept lower prices, and Tyson will be able to make higher profits," he said.
Osborn and Musharbash say Tyson has broken the 2021 Packers and Stockyards Act, which prohibits meatpackers from engaging "in any course of business or [doing] any act for the purpose or with the effect of manipulating or controlling prices."
Addressing Ricketts on social media, Osborn said Tyson workers "don’t need another useless congressional report that leads to nothing. We need ACTION!"
"Tyson workers and Nebraska ranchers need you to demand that [US Agriculture] Secretary Brooke Rollins immediately initiate an action to hold Tyson accountable for any market manipulation," he said.
The USDA told the Nebraska Examiner this week that it is monitoring "the closure of the plant to ensure compliance with the Packers and Stockyards Act," but Musharbash said Rollins can and should "compel Tyson to either keep the plant open or sell the plant to an upstart rival who will introduce honest competition into this cartelized industry."
"There is nothing left for Ricketts to 'look into,' and Nebraskans certainly don’t need some intern on Ricketts’ staff to write a research paper about this issue for the next six months while Tyson hollows out the Lexington community for its selfish gain," added Musharbash. "Nebraska—and this whole country—deserves better leaders than this."
Osborn pointed out Thursday that Ricketts has taken more than $70,000 in campaign donations from Tyson.
“The people of Lexington need their elected officials to fight now more than ever,” Osborn said at the press conference this week. “The law that’s been on the books for over 100 years should be enforced... So pick up the damn phone, call Brooke Rollins, and get the USDA to enforce the law.”
By visiting Lexington and speaking out against Tyson's gutting of thousands of jobs, former Federal Trade Commission member Alvaro Bedoya said that "candidate for Senate Dan Osborn is already doing more for the people affected by the Tyson closure than the current Nebraska senators."
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Rigged System': Pro-Union Nebraska Candidate Shreds Private Equity for Jacking Up Home Prices
"Hard work should lead to home ownership, not permanent rental payments to corporate landlords," said Osborn.
Jul 21, 2025
Independent Senate candidate Dan Osborn, a mechanic and former labor union leader, posted a lengthy thread on the social media platform X on Monday in which he discussed the role that private equity firms play in increasing the cost of housing in the United States.
Osborn, who earlier this month announced he'd be running against Republican incumbent Sen. Pete Ricketts, drew a line between the lack of affordable housing and private equity firms that have gone on a buying spree of residential properties in recent years.
" Wall Street discovered they could make billions by turning homes into commodities," Osborn explained. "Since 2008, private equity firms and hedge funds have gobbled up hundreds of thousands of single-family homes—the exact starter homes that young families used to buy. Because of their financial strength and ability to pay in cash, larger investors can out-compete first-time homebuyers, making it harder for real people without millions to buy homes in neighborhoods where these corporate giants are active."
Osborn then pointed to reporting that the Flat Water Free Press did three years ago about how real estate firm VineBrook Homes aggressively bought up properties in Omaha, Nebraska, and then proceeded to evict current residents while also jacking up rents.
"From January 2020 through September 2021, VineBrook bought more Douglas County single family homes than anyone else, according to data from the Douglas County Registrar and Assessor of Deeds," the publication wrote. "All told, VineBrook Homes has bought up some 250 houses in the metro area since October 2019, a company spokesman said."
Osborn made the case that what VineBrook has done in Omaha is part of a concerted strategy by investors across the country to buy up single-family houses and raise rents for tenants. He then linked to a recent report from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution from earlier this year that found 30% of single family homes in the Atlanta metro area are now owned by investors.
"The shift to these corporate landlords almost NEVER brings an improvement in housing conditions or rent prices," Osborn charged. "New layers of bureaucracy and random new fees always seem to appear... And back in Nebraska, here's what the VineBrook situation was like for the North Omaha residents: '...tenants complained about unresolved maintenance issues, unfounded evictions, aggressive rent collection tactics, and poor customer service.'"
Osborn emphasized that he was "open" to a number of ideas to remedy this situation, including the removal of "unfair tax advantages that give private equity an edge over individual homebuyers"; ending "taxpayer subsidies for giant corporate mergers that create housing monopolies"; barring foreign investors from "buying up American neighborhoods"; and enacting "reasonable limits on how many homes Wall Street can control in any one community."
"Every kid deserves what we had—a real shot at the American Dream," he wrote in conclusion. "Hard work should lead to home ownership, not permanent rental payments to corporate landlords. Time to fix this rigged system."
Osborn kicked off his Senate bid two weeks ago by ripping into the budget megabill recently passed by Republicans that slashed roughly $1 trillion from Medicaid over the next decade and enacted tax cuts that are heavily tilted toward the wealthiest taxpayers.
He launched his campaign following an unexpectedly close race with Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) last year, which he lost by fewer than 7 points despite being heavily outspent.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Ripping GOP Megabill's Attack on Medicaid, Pro-Labor Dan Osborn Runs for Senate in Nebraska
"We're seeing tax cuts for the billionaires at the expense of workers, people that are struggling to get by," Osborn said.
Jul 08, 2025
Mechanic and former labor union leader Dan Osborn, who last year ran for the United States Senate as an independent in deep-red Nebraska and came within 63,000 votes of defeating incumbent Republican Sen. Deb Fischer, is getting back into the ring.
Osborn announced on Tuesday that he will be running for Senate again next year against Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-Neb.), whom he lampooned in his opening campaign video as "Wall Street Pete."
🚨MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT🚨
Ok. You've all convinced me. I'm in.
I'm running for Senate against billionaire Pete Ricketts In Nebraska.
This race represents the foundational battle taking place in America right now:
The Billionaire Class vs. The Working Class
Who's with me? pic.twitter.com/QQmcq4H3bl
— Dan Osborn (@osbornforne) July 8, 2025
In an interview with New York Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg, Osborn said that he believes he can make the recently passed GOP budget bill a key issue in a state that has not elected a non-Republican to serve in the Senate since Democrat Ben Nelson defeated Ricketts back in 2006.
"They were sold a bill of goods that if you work hard in this country, your government is going to be there, to have a level playing field for you to get ahead," Osborn explained to Goldberg. "But now we're seeing tax cuts for the billionaires at the expense of workers, people that are struggling to get by."
In fact, The New York Times reports that Osborn is resurrecting many of the class-based economic themes that he deployed in a race that he lost by just six-and-a-half points despite being in a state that President Donald Trump won by more than 20 points.
"If you're truly a party for the working class, your candidates are going to be mostly working-class," he told the Times. "I like to call it paycheck populism, because I get a paycheck once a week. I know how much money comes in. I know much money goes out. And I know how much harder it is to live now versus eight years ago."
In his interview with the paper, Osborn once again made sure to bring up the just-passed GOP budget bill.
"We can talk about the Big Beautiful Bill and the fact that it is going to continue funneling money toward the top by taking from social services, and healthcare from hard-working people," he said. "I doubt there's a bunch of billionaires that are in line for Medicaid."
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More Stories
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy