Gallup records highest favorable rating for socialism
The Wall Street Journal reported that Republican candidates are making socialism and communism central to their Nov. 3 midterm pitch as candidates with socialist leanings or ties to the Democratic Socialists of America move from primary wins into competitive races. Races like Lawrence’s are testing whether Republicans can still make accusations of socialism a political liability, the Journal said.
A September Gallup poll found that 43% of Americans now view socialism favorably, the highest share the pollster has recorded, including 45% of independent voters. Among voters ages 18 to 34, socialism now polls better than capitalism by 57% to 43%. A September NBC News poll found that 64% of voters 65 and older viewed socialism negatively, compared with just 33% of those under 30.
Some Americans still recoil at “socialist” or “communist” labels, the Journal reported, while an increasing number are embracing policies that call for greater government intervention to make life more affordable. Others, especially young voters born long after the Cold War, now openly identify with the labels.
Across the country, candidates with socialist leanings or associations with the DSA have won primaries and are running competitive races, the Journal reported. Populist ideas calling for more government intervention — including capping prescription drug prices, limiting rent increases and taxing billionaires — are gaining traction among Americans of all political persuasions. Because the GOP has spent years calling more mainstream Democrats, including Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi, socialists, some GOP strategists say the accusation has been diluted. The Wall Street Journal wrote that “during an age of growing socialist sentiment, the attack has lost much of its sting.”
“Attacks that would normally be killshots get a shrug by voters,” said Jason Cabel Roe, the strategist for Barrett’s campaign. “The millennials and Gen Z voters are taught that socialism is just a different form of governing. They don’t see it as a pejorative.”
President Donald Trump and many Republicans believe that tapping into decades of deep-seated fears about socialism and communism will resonate with voters, and they have pushed their attacks further, making warnings of a “communist menace” a centerpiece of the GOP’s midterms message. At the GOP convention in September, where he invoked communism 15 times, Trump said of Democrats, “It’s going to be a communist country if they win.” He added, “They dropped socialism. They went right for the big one.”
White House advisers spent months testing whether anticommunist rhetoric could help Republicans in November. The strategy solidified after the election of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whom the Journal described as a “strident democratic socialist.” Trump has been personally involved in the framing and leading the effort as he has rapidly stepped up campaign events in October, according to people involved in the Republican messaging.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the goal of making the Nov. 3 elections a referendum on Democratic extremism rather than rising prices and the war with Iran is complicated by widespread economic frustration.
Will Lawrence, the bearded 36-year-old Michigan congressional candidate, has drawn sustained Republican attacks in his district. He is a former member of the Democratic Socialists of America who once advocated for redistributing land and wealth, abolishing the police and the “forced nationalization” of fossil fuel companies. Republicans are flooding his district with ads portraying him as a radical socialist bent on “destroying the American way of life.” Lawrence, who defeated two moderate candidates in the Democratic primary, is running neck-and-neck with Republican incumbent Rep. Tom Barrett in a swing district in one of the country’s most competitive House races. His campaign has focused on pocketbook issues, opposition to data centers and the war with Iran, and the country’s widening income disparity.
Lawrence said he let his DSA membership lapse this summer and has distanced himself from some of his earlier positions, including defunding the police. He has emphasized face-to-face campaigning across the district, centered in Lansing, and frames the race as a battle over growing inequalities. “People understand that our politics now is more about top vs. bottom than left vs. right,” Lawrence said in an interview. Barrett continues to highlight Lawrence’s past positions, including his support for “open borders” and defunding the police, but stopped emphasizing the word socialism in his attacks last month.
The push is visible across the country. Republicans at the Illinois State Fair handed out placards reading “Common Sense Over Communism.” At an Atlanta golf club, candidates held a “Living Under Communism” event where a Venezuelan exile recounted his experience to the audience over snacks and a cash bar. Michigan Senate contender Mike Rogers’s campaign has called the state “ground zero for a dangerous communist contagion.” Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn has an ad showing her crushing fortune cookies and vowing to “hunt down communists” as she vows to protect against Chinese land ownership in the state. In Florida, Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds enlisted a Bay of Pigs veteran to warn, “I lost my country once. I won’t lose another.” Trump offers membership in an “Anti-Communist Club,” and his supporters have received emails asking, “You’re not a communist, right?”
The term communism has surfaced in some form in more than 880 episodes of conservative podcasts since Oct. 1, according to a Wall Street Journal review, while the tracking firm AdImpact found more than $70 million has been spent on TV ads focused on socialism or communism.
In South Florida, the Journal reported, the labels remain “so politically toxic” — and are so often used to attack Democrats — that a campaign stop by House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries at a Cuban bakery this week prompted two local bakery chains to publicly disavow socialism. One chain hadn’t even hosted the event. Yet even there, many people question whether the labels still carry the same force. “For most voters, the suggestion that some Democratic candidates are actual communists is harder to believe,” said Carlos Curbelo, a former Republican congressman from Miami.
The Wall Street Journal described the Trump-era Republican Party, with its working-class base, as more populist, and reported that some Republican political consultants worry that attacks on Democrats are undercut by Trump’s own embrace of government intervention in the economy. His administration has taken ownership stakes in private companies, and he has promised a $5,000 check to every adult American citizen if Republicans retain control of Congress, a proposal estimated to cost more than $1 trillion. The Journal also reported that some Republicans objected to Trump’s lavish reception for Chinese leader Xi Jinping in September and his friendly treatment of Mamdani, whom Trump once branded a communist.
Even so, there are signs some Democrats are worried the aggressive rhetoric about communism could stick. “No, I’m not a member of the Chinese Communist Party,” Senate candidate James Talarico says in a new Texas ad. More than 60 Democratic candidates, including 10 sitting members of Congress, signed a pledge declaring their support for capitalism. The midterm elections could bring a new crop of Democratic socialists to Congress, expanding the movement’s influence within the party and reshaping Republican calculations.
Vice President JD Vance sees the rise of Democratic socialists as a useful foil for what appears to be an increasingly likely 2028 presidential bid and intends to emphasize the contrast should he run, according to people familiar with his thinking. The Wall Street Journal said Vance was responding to increased support among young people for rent freezes and government-funded healthcare, policies that had previously drawn sustained criticism. Speaking on Fox News in August after Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s Democratic primary victory, Vance said, “My warning to my fellow Republicans would be if we don’t get this right, don’t blame young people for being sympathetic to socialism. We’ve got to blame ourselves.” El-Sayed is now within striking distance of delivering the movement’s biggest midterm victory, the Journal reported. Vance also said, “You don’t stop socialism by throwing slogans at people about the free market.” He added, “As much as I love the free market, you stop socialism by making people’s lives better, and that’s what we’re trying to do every single day.”
MSI previously reported that Trump had escalated warnings about communism ahead of the midterms and that progressive candidates had won New York primaries. Lawrence is running neck-and-neck with Barrett, who stopped emphasizing the word socialism in his attacks last month, and El-Sayed is within striking distance of delivering a major midterm victory to the Democratic socialist movement, the Journal reported.