Democrats’ socialist turn is a GOP Electoral College dream

Published April 18, 2026 2:00pm ET | Updated April 20, 2026 9:00am ET



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Let’s jump in a time-traveling Delorean and go to the year 2032. November 2032 to be exact. The Republican incumbent president and his Democratic opponent are neck-and-neck in the polls leading up to Election Day. The seven key swing states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, and North Carolina are all up for grabs. Both campaign headquarters are tense as the returns come in. 

But things start to look up for the Democratic ticket early in the next morning as Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin all go in their column. In any other year, that’s usually game, set, match for anyone who sweeps what was once called back in the day, “The Blue Wall.” 

But not this time around. Because of the 2030 Census, which ended up showing sizable migration from blue states to red. California, New York, Minnesota, and New York led the way in this dubious regard, while Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Idaho, and Utah ballooned. 

The result? 

California, once the grand prize with 54 electoral votes that have gone blue in every presidential election since 1988, lost three electoral votes after the 2030 Census, all thanks to the performance of former Governor Gavin Newsom, whose taxes and regulations and fiscal mismanagement resulted in millions fleeing the state, including some of his own relatives, for the climate and coastline of Florida. 

New York saw the similar fate in 2030, with the socialist policies of Zohran Mamdani resulting in higher rent, higher taxes (to pay for all the free stuff he promised) and a noticeable drop in quality of life after police retirements ushered even higher crime for what was once dubbed the greatest city in the world. What was 28 electoral votes became 26. 

For the same reasons, Illinois’ 19 electoral votes became 17. Minnesota’s went from 10 to 9. Pennsylvania dropped from 19 to 18. Even tiny Rhode Island decreased from 4 to 3 votes. 

Add it all up, and we’re looking at 9 electoral votes gone from reliably blue states. Where did they go?

Texas jumped from 40 to 44 ECs. Florida, once 25 votes as recently as 2000, jumped from 30 to 34. Arizona increased from 10 to 11. Utah bumped up from 6 to 7. And Idaho also went up a notch from 4 to 5. The total is a gain of 11 electoral votes that would likely go to the Republican.

Even with winning the blue wall and all other states following recent precedent, a Democrat would still need to pick off one or two reliably red states in order to get above the threshold of 270 electoral votes. If you’re wondering why Democrats are increasingly talking about blowing up the filibuster after taking power and getting rid of the electoral college, there’s a good chance they’re seeing the same projections just laid out above. 

As Barack Obama once said during a State of the Union address, elections have consequences. And when socialists, left-wing or fake moderate candidates (See: Spanberger, Abigail) keep winning in blue states, this is the result. 

Take a special election that just occurred in New Jersey, for example. Oddly, and perhaps intentionally, the election was held on a Thursday, which almost never happens. A socialist named Analilia Mejia easily defeated moderate Republican Joe Hathaway, who tried to win by distancing himself from President Trump. It wasn’t even close, with Meija winning by almost 20 points. 

What are Meija’s positions, you may ask? 

  • Raise taxes 
  • Free college 
  • Abolish ICE 
  • $25 minimum wage
  • Cancel all student loans
  • Universal healthcare and childcare for all

And yes, more than enough New Jerseyans in the 11th district actually support these positions, just as a majority of New Yorkers voted for fellow socialist Zohran Mamdani, who promised many of the same things. 

Speaking of Mamdani, he’s quickly learning that governing is far more difficult than campaigning, even in a city and state with essentially one-party rule like New York.

He recently appeared on CBS’s This Morning, where he was asked about the current state of his campaign promises, including free childcare, rent freezes and free busing. 

“Promises haven’t been materialized yet because the rent isn’t frozen, the buses aren’t free, no universal child care. And so New Yorkers are saying, ‘It’s been 100 days, why haven’t you done it?’ What do you say to that?” asked anchor Gayle King. “Because your campaign promises were big for a lot of people.”

“As they should be, because New Yorkers are facing a big crisis in affordability, so I’ll go through one by one. We said that we would deliver universal child care. On day eight, we announced that agreement with Governor Hochul. For the first time in New York City now, we are delivering universal child care for two-year-olds. Two thousand this year, 12,000 next year, every single two-year-old by the end of year four,” Mandani said with a smile. 

OK, Mr. Mayor. What about other ages? When was this promise confined to only two year olds?

As for freezing rent, here’s what he had to say:

“We said we believe that the rent should be frozen for New Yorkers who live in rent-stabilized housing. There are six vacancies on the board that determine that. We filled those vacancies. They’re going to make their decision. They’re an independent board. They’ll make that decision this summer.” 

OK, so Mandani’s promise of freezing rent is subject to a board’s decision? He never mentioned that hurdle during the campaign. 

How about the free busses?

“And then we said that we would speed up the slowest buses in America and make them free as well. And we’re proud to say that we’re already speeding up buses for more than a million New Yorkers, putting six minutes back in their pockets, which, as you know, in New York City, time is money. And we’re working with Albany to make them free.” 

Again, another promise contingent on things out of Mamdani’s control and basically in the hands of state lawmakers in Albany. Gov. Hochul has already rejected paying for such a proposal, while the head of the Metropolitan Transit Authority has also expressed disapproval. 

But this all doesn’t seem to matter to voters, at least for now. Officials like Analilia Mejia in New Jersey and Mamdani in New York, along with socialist Seattle mayor Katie Wilson, are now joining Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) as the faces of the party.

For Democrats, this likely means it will be increasingly difficult to get a so-called moderate over the finish line in the presidential primaries. A recent Axios report says party power brokers would prefer a straight white guy at the top of the ticket, and certainly not a socialist. 

“Some top Democrats are quietly debating a fraught question: whether the party’s best bet for winning back the presidency in 2028 is to nominate a man — perhaps a straight, White, Christian man,” the March report read. 

But Mejia and Mamdani are prime examples of socialists having all the momentum. Mejia, who never ran for public office before, topped former Rep. Tom Malinowski in the primary, who is a relative moderate. She proceeded to outperform the alleged moderate Mikie Sherrill, who had held that congressional seat before running for governor. Same goes for Mamdani, who beat the relatively moderate Andrew Cuomo easily in capturing the mayorship.

There’s bad news and good news for conservatives here.

The bad news is that socialism is becoming more accepted by voters on the left. 

HEY SOCIALISTS: WE’VE ALREADY FIGURED OUT THE SUPERMARKETS

The good news is that it gives Republicans a huge opening to paint the party as one that increasingly embraces socialism and all of its radical plans against common sense.

If Democrats prevail and more socialists get elected than ever before, it may hurt them badly in the long term, especially under a favorable Electoral College map in 2032.