What Democrats Want

After losing the presidency, Senate, and House to Republicans in 2024, Democrats are navigating a more favourable political environment heading into November’s midterms, but face a deeper question about what it means to be a Democrat in 2026 and what the party wants to become in the run up to 2028.

To find out, Focaldata surveyed 1,331 Democrats in the United States between 25 and 31 March 2026.

The findings reveal that:

• The Democratic base is lurching to the left, and the party faithful now views socialism more favourably than capitalism. Given the trends identified by Gallup, we expect that this is the first time our question wording would have found this dynamic. Democratic voters generally oppose supply-side economics, with only 37% preferring a growth-led vision of the economy, in contrast to a majority (55%) who believe the best way to help ordinary people is through ‘regulating and constraining market forces’.

• While many Democrats are positioning the party away from ‘culture war’ issues, two-thirds of Democrats agree that civil rights and fighting discrimination are inextricably linked to economic policy.

• There are five main segments of the Democratic base when it comes to their political attitudes and what they want from the party and its leaders. These segments are Loyal Progressives, the Populist Left, Frustrated Capitalists, Disillusioned Skeptics, and Concerned Civics. Each has different needs and beliefs, and creating majority support in the party requires uniting at least two of these segments.

• Loyal Progressives (98% net favourable towards the party) want bolder progressive convictions, delivered with principled conduct and institutional integrity. The Populist Left (net zero on party favourability) want the same destination but from a posture of anti-establishment scepticism, with sharper economic edges and less patience for party machinery. Frustrated Capitalists want boldness of a different kind entirely: economic credibility and direct address of their material circumstances, without the ideological framing that defines either progressive lane. Disillusioned Skeptics want someone who fights hard for them, but have largely disengaged from the political process.

• Looking ahead to 2028, Democratic voters want a young, progressive presidential candidate focused on kitchen-table issues like the cost of living. Despite more radical shifts in tone from some Democrats in the Trump 2.0 era, ‘combative and confrontational’ politics performs worst of any political style, a potential early indicator of a ceiling on the emergent ‘Newsomism’.

• The party has not internalised the 2024 election loss. Kamala Harris is still seen as the party’s most effective messenger, and leads the early 2028 primary polls with over 40% of the vote. A majority of Democrats say they would rather lose with integrity than win with Republican-style tactics.

The Five Segments of the Democratic Base

Loyal Progressives (14% of the sample)

The engaged, loyal heart of the Democratic party, Loyal Progressives are highly educated, mostly in their 60s, and turned out strongly in 2024 (89% voted for Harris). They carry the highest levels of political interest, vote likelihood, and party favourability of any segment, with near-universal levels of positivity (98%). They feel proud, energised, and hopeful, and score lowest on frustration, anger, and embarrassment.

They believe in playing by the rules, and want bolder progressivism from the party, willing the party elites to share their unapologetic pride in Democratic values. Around half (48%) want the party to adopt bolder positions, and 83% say being principled is a political asset, scoring the highest of any segment on both counts.

While they want the party to go further in its progressivism, that does not extend to going further on breaking norms. They mostly support prosecuting Trump (86%) and procedural obstruction (77%), but draw a line at zero-sum tactics: only 27% endorse tit-for-tat norm-breaking.

In terms of figureheads, this is the Harris/AOC swing group. Their 92% messenger effectiveness rating for Harris is the single highest score in the dataset for any politician in any segment. Though with Harris’ high name recognition, this is perhaps more of an act of political solidarity with a candidate they see as blameless in the party’s 2024 loss. .

Concerned Civics (13% of the sample)

The ‘democracy-first’ segment, Concerned Civics are the oldest group (62% are aged 60 or over), the whitest demographic, and most likely to be highly educated. They typically want a candidate who can be trusted with the rule of law, speaks in substance rather than slogans, and treats democratic integrity as a non-negotiable part of their political identity.

They are the only segment to respond negatively to social justice as a policy framing, and the only segment that is actively repelled by combative, confrontational messaging. 34% find aggressive executive orders acceptable, the lowest of any segment, and only 13% endorse zero-sum politics. They don’t necessarily back down from a fight; 75% support prosecuting Trump and 75% also support using procedural rules to block Republican legislation, but they want their toughness to come from a place of principle and fall firmly within political norms.

Frustrated Capitalists (29% of the sample)

Disproportionately young (a majority are under 40), male, and from a minority background (47% are White, 26% are Black, and 20% are Hispanic), Frustrated Capitalists are the segment most tangentially attached to the Democratic Party. Just half (50%) view themselves as ‘strong’ Democrats, and a third only ‘lean’ towards the party. Many of the demographics which swung towards Trump in 2024 overlap strongly with this segment.

They are one of the most pro-market segments on almost every economic measure, and are the only segment where less than half of its members believe in regulating and constraining market forces as an economic strategy.

This group is very much economy-first, and is not really interested by the vociferously anti-Trump tactics of some of the party faithful. 30% say Democrats don’t spend enough time ‘building, investing, and creating new economic opportunities’, twice as high as the overall party average, and only 51% say investigating and pursuing criminal charges against Trump officials would be an acceptable political move.

Populist Left (15% of the sample)

This segment is the core Sanders wing of the party, and the most left-wing group overall. The Populist Left is predominantly white (70%), has the highest share of women of any segment (61%), and is financially the worst-off group. They are the most anti-establishment segment by a wide margin, defined by their overwhelming agreement that ‘the system needs a complete overhaul’, ‘politicians serve the wealthy’ and that the system is unfair. This group is looking for, in Bernie Sanders’ words, a ‘political revolution’.

Almost two-thirds say the party devotes ‘far too little’ attention to cost of living, the most emphatic response of any group. They are also the most admiring of confrontational politics (84%) while stopping short of pure win-at-all-costs: only 39% endorse zero-sum tactics, and 63% would still hold Democrats to a higher standard.

The tension in this segment is a mobilisation problem. In 2024, 19% did not vote, the highest non-participation rate of any segment. Their strong political ideologies in combination with low turnout show that they are not a ‘Vote Blue No Matter Who’ group. If the Democrats don’t show strong left-of-centre credentials, a sizable share will just sit an election out..

Disillusioned Skeptics (29% of the sample)

Defined by indifference, Disillusioned Skeptics are one of the two largest segments, at 29% of the sample. They are one of the most racially diverse groups (47% White, 24% Black, 16% Hispanic), skew younger, and are concentrated in the South. In 2024, 18% sat the election out entirely.

They care about housing and wages but are not heavily motivated to show up at the polls. Their issue priorities are practical and local — crime, affordable housing, immigration reform — registering neighbourhood-level concerns that the party does not seem to be adequately addressing for them. They are low-interest, low-trust, and low-turnout.

They are not neatly grouped into a particular ideological bucket. The progressive lane doesn't give them a sufficient reason to show up in the polls, but incremental reform and pragmatic positioning actively depresses their vote share in our conjoint experiment. What moves them is someone who fights hard and means it, within recognisable political structures, on the economic issues they actually face. That candidate does not yet exist in the current 2028 field.

Attitudes Towards the Democratic Party

Across segments, the core Democratic base remains favourable towards the party, but is demanding more from those who represent them. When it comes to the feelings people have about the party, 59% of Democrats say they are ‘hopeful’ about the party’s future, but ‘pride’ and ‘frustration’ come next in equal measure, at 35% each.

Just 16% of Democrats want the party to moderate its positions, about half as many as the number who want the party to take a bolder direction. This is not a sign of a party in which primary voters, at least, will respond well to a ‘pivot to centre’ in the coming years.

Candidate Lanes and the 2028 Primary