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Left-Wing Democrats Wait on AOC’s Decision as They Look to 2028 Election

Published

6 days ago

March 23, 2025

Left-Wing Democrats Wait on AOC’s Decision as They Look to 2028 Election

For the last decade, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont has been running for president, planning a run for president or pushing former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. to adopt more progressive policies.

But now, as Democrats find their legal and fund-raising institutions under attack from the Trump administration, their base voters furious at their congressional leadership and their party’s popularity at a generational low, progressives are also staring down the prospect of a post-Bernie future.

A movement politician with a large and devoted base of supporters, the 83-year-old Mr. Sanders has signaled that he does not intend to run for president again. The question now is who will lead the network he built from scratch into the next presidential election and beyond.

Interviews with nearly 20 progressive Democrats about the left wing’s future revealed a faction that sees the ideas Mr. Sanders has championed — reducing the power of billionaires, increasing the minimum wage, focusing more on the plight of workers — as core to the next generation of mainstream Democratic politics.

Though there is little agreement about who will emerge to guide progressives into a post-Sanders era, virtually everyone interviewed said there was one clear leader for the job: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York.

And it just so happened that Mr. Sanders and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez spent three days last week on a “Fighting Oligarchy” tour through Arizona, Nevada and Colorado. In Denver, they drew 34,000 people, what Sanders aides said was the largest crowd of his career. Neither has so much as obliquely referred to the torch-passing nature of their trip, and in an interview, Mr. Sanders declined to answer questions about whether Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, 35, would inherit his mantle. But the subtext of their travels appears clear.

She is what’s next — if she wants it.

“Alexandria has been doing an extraordinary job in the House,” Mr. Sanders said. “You can’t sit back. You can’t wallow in despair. You’ve got to stand up, fight back and get involved in every way that you can. There’s nobody I know who can do that better than Alexandria.”

Ocasio-Cortez’s three options

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, who declined an interview request, has said nothing publicly about her political plans. Several people who said they had spoken with her relayed that she was far from making any decisions.

But the fourth-term congresswoman has three clear options.

She could focus on the House, where she has become a well-liked and respected member of the Democratic caucus, and try to become a committee chairwoman if Democrats win back a majority in next year’s midterm elections.

She could run for the seat now held by Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader. Or she could seek the presidency in 2028.

(Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has also mused about dropping out of politics altogether, the people who had spoken with her said. This seems less likely, given her lengthy admonition on Thursday to a crowd in North Las Vegas, Nev., to stay involved in the fight against the Trump administration.)

Her evident frustration with Mr. Schumer after he greenlit the passage of a Republican spending bill this month heated up the long-simmering conversation about whether she might run for his seat in 2028, whether he seeks a sixth term or not.

A person who has worked with Ms. Ocasio-Cortez on campaigns, and who insisted on anonymity to discuss private outreach, recounted being inundated with calls from Democrats — and not just those on the far left — after Mr. Schumer’s vote, asking about the congresswoman’s future and encouraging her to consider higher office.

“She’s not looking to jump to the next thing or the next thing or the next thing, just for the simple reason of jumping to that thing,” said former Representative Jamaal Bowman of New York, a political ally and friend of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s. “When everyone is saying, ‘Speed up,’ that’s actually the time to slow down.”

He added: “You got to take a breath. That race for the U.S. Senate is three years away. Let’s govern for a little bit.”

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has also had extensive conversations with House allies like Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, who said he had spoken with her about his own deliberations over whether to run for the Senate. Ahead of last year’s election, Mr. Raskin decided to remain in the House, passing on a Senate race in which he would have been a heavy favorite.

The Senate provides a larger megaphone for politicians, Mr. Raskin said, but he believes they can accomplish more of their policy goals in the House, a prospect that may appeal to Ms. Ocasio-Cortez — who hardly needs a larger megaphone.

“We are in a moment of crisis, and a crisis is always a moment when new leadership surfaces to speak to the moral and political imperatives of the time,” Mr. Raskin said. “This crisis may be the end of some people’s political careers, and it may be the beginning of some people’s political careers.”

2028 jockeying on the left

The question of who could assume the Sanders mantle — at least in part — is all but certain to come to a head in the next presidential election.

In some ways, the jockeying is already evident.

“I don’t think there’s going to be, in my view, a standard-bearer or two standard-bearers or three standard-bearers for the progressive movement,” said Representative Ro Khanna, a California Democrat who has had conversations to game out a potential 2028 presidential campaign of his own. “We’re going to see the beginning of a new progressive era where we’re going to see successive progressive nominees.”

Of course, there are deep divides in the party over how far to the left Democrats should go.

But some also argue that the tensions in today’s Democratic Party no longer center on the kinds of ideological clashes that characterized the 2020 primary race — left versus moderate and litmus tests on issues like single-payer health care.

At least for now, these Democrats say, the debates concern how and where to draw the line against President Trump and Elon Musk, the richest man in the world.

Several mainstream Democrats, including Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota and Gov. JB Pritzker of Illinois, himself a billionaire, have drawn attention from progressive activists because of their vigorous pushback to the Trump administration.

“The biggest split amongst Democrats is between those who want to stand and fight and those that want to play dead,” said Representative Greg Casar, a Texas Democrat and the chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “We need more leaders from the stand-and-fight wing of the Democratic Party.”

Danielle Brecker, a leader of Empire State Indivisible, which has called on Mr. Schumer to step aside as minority leader, said she saw Ms. Ocasio-Cortez as the “future of the party” with any number of promising paths.

But she questioned the country’s willingness to elect a woman in 2028.

“I sadly think that it probably needs to be some very safe white man,” she said. “I feel terrible saying that. That wound is still very sore.”

How anger may drive Democratic politics

When Mr. Trump was in office the first time, the liberal energy was firmly with Mr. Sanders.

By the time the 2020 Democratic presidential primary race began, several contenders rushed to embrace Mr. Sanders’s goals on heath care and other issues — even though most of the party’s successful candidates in the 2018 midterm elections adopted more moderate stances. The party’s eventual nominee in 2020, Mr. Biden, took a more moderate tack as well.

There are now signs that outraged constituents have regained the power to steer their elected officials. Anger at Mr. Schumer and Senate Democrats last month prompted futile displays of opposition to Mr. Trump’s cabinet appointments. Democrats hosting town-hall events meant to hold Republicans accountable for the Trump agenda have found themselves facing liberal pushback for not being able to change the country’s course.

Taking the nation in a new direction will require, some progressives said, a sustained effort to demonstrate both popular opposition to Mr. Trump’s agenda and support for a liberal alternative.

“After the murder of George Floyd, you saw a massive outpouring,” said Keith Ellison, the Democratic attorney general of Minnesota, whom Mr. Sanders backed in 2017 to become the Democratic National Committee chairman. “You saw a lot of people making statements about police accountability, diversity, equity and inclusion. And then when the movement subsides, they’re ready to roll it all back.

“So there’s a lesson there. The lesson is you’re going to have to stay in the streets.”

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Trump’s Deportation Efforts Hit Roadblock After Judge Issues Temporary Order

Published

5 hours ago

March 28, 2025

Press Room

Trump’s Deportation Efforts Hit Roadblock After Judge Issues Temporary Order

President Trump’s efforts to deport migrants to places other than their country of origin hit a new roadblock on Friday, when a federal judge issued a temporary order requiring the administration to give migrants an opportunity to contest their removal on the grounds that they might be at risk of persecution or torture.

U.S. District Court Judge Brian E. Murphy, who sits in Boston, ordered the government to give migrants a chance to contest their removal to a so-called third country under a federal law that limits deportations to places where the deportees’ “life or freedom would be threatened.” He also cited a United Nations treaty against torture.

The Trump administration has struck deals with Costa Rica, Panama, Guatemala, Mexico and El Salvador as part of its efforts to remove people who are difficult to deport to their home countries. Hundreds of migrants from countries in Africa and Asia, for instance, have been deported to Panama, a country those migrants had no ties to.

In prior administrations, strained diplomatic relationships and difficulties with paperwork have made it hard to deport large numbers of people to certain countries.

The new order is limited to migrants who have a “final order of removal,” meaning their case has already been considered by an immigration court. The administration has also claimed it has the authority to circumvent much of that process using the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which it has used to remove more than 200 Venezuelans from the United States to El Salvador. Another judge has blocked that use of the law, which only applies during wartime. On Friday, the administration asked the Supreme Court to intervene.

The plaintiffs in the case are four migrants, identified only by their initials, who are citizens of Cuba, Honduras, Ecuador and Guatemala. Two are in the United States and fear they will be deported when they arrive for upcoming check-ins with immigration authorities. A third is being held at a county prison in Massachusetts; the fourth “remains in hiding in Guatemala,” a country where a U.S. immigration judge “found it was more likely than not that he would be persecuted,” according to the complaint.

Their lawsuit claims that the administration’s deportation policies violate the Constitution’s guarantee to due process, and the Administrative Procedure Act.

Muneer Ahmad, a professor at Yale Law School who represents immigrants as part of the school’s Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic, called the decision “important,” adding that it would slow what he called “the Trump administration’s efforts to bum-rush immigrants out of the country in disregard of these core legal obligations to protect against torture or persecution.”

Judge Murphy has scheduled a hearing for April 10 to consider whether to issue a preliminary injunction, which would be more lasting than Friday’s temporary restraining order.

Kathleen Bush-Joseph, a policy analyst with the Migration Policy Institute, noted that the case was one of a series targeting the Trump administration’s lightning-fast efforts to deport migrants.

“This will affect the administration’s ability to carry out more high-profile removals to third countries, like those to Panama, Costa Rica and El Salvador,” she said.

Tim Balk contributed reporting from New York.

News

US stocks tumble as deepening consumer gloom raises stagflation fears

Published

8 hours ago

March 28, 2025

Press Room

US stocks tumble as deepening consumer gloom raises stagflation fears

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Wall Street stocks dropped on Friday as signs of strain among American consumers added to worries the US is heading for a bout of stagflation.

A batch of data on Friday added fresh evidence that consumers are growing deeply concerned about how Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs will affect the world’s largest economy, while a separate report showed the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure rose in February.

The gloomy data comes at a time when investors are worried that Trump’s trade levies combined with a broader sense of uncertainty will hurt US economic growth while also increasing price pressures. The new reports sent investors rushing away from US equities and into havens.

Wall Street’s blue-chip S&P 500 was down 2 per cent during mid-afternoon trading on Friday while the tech-focused Nasdaq Composite was 2.6 per cent lower. US government debt rallied, pushing the 10-year Treasury yield down 0.11 percentage points to 4.26 per cent.

“US data is only inflaming stagflation fears,” said James Knightley, an economist at investment bank ING. “Hot inflation and cooling consumer spending are trends that are likely to be intensified by President Trump’s aggressive moves on tariffs and government spending cuts.”

A survey by the University of Michigan released on Friday showed that consumer sentiment plunged in March as Americans worried about their job prospects, inflation and income levels. Households also forecast inflation over the long term of 4.1 per cent, the highest since 1993.

“This month’s decline [in sentiment] reflects a clear consensus across all demographic and political affiliations,” the University of Michigan said.

It added: “Republicans joined independents and Democrats in expressing worsening expectations since February for their personal finances, business conditions, unemployment and inflation.”

Consumer spending, meanwhile, rose 0.4 per cent last month, a reversal from January’s 0.3 per cent decline, but not as strong as the 0.5 per cent increase economists forecast, a separate report from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis showed.

Pantheon Macroeconomics’ senior US economist Oliver Allen said the consumer spending data was “disappointing” and that an “underlying slowdown in demand growth also seems to be under way”.

Goldman Sachs cut its forecast for first-quarter GDP in response to the weak data, by 0.4 percentage points to an annualised growth rate of 0.6 per cent, citing “softer than expected” personal spending growth in February and a downward revision to January’s figure.

The Atlanta Fed also cut its running forecast for first-quarter GDP to show a contraction of 2.8 per cent on an annualised basis, compared with 1.8 per cent as recently as Wednesday. Its model has contrasted with Wall Street banks, which broadly still expect growth in early 2025.

The BEA’s report on Friday also showed that the core reading of the personal consumption expenditure (PCE) price index was up 2.8 per cent in February from a year ago.

Economists expected the index, a measure that is closely watched by the Fed which strips out food and energy, to be up 2.7 per cent, unchanged from January’s upwardly revised rate. The main PCE index rose 2.5 per cent last month, unchanged from January.

The Fed earlier this month boosted its forecast for inflation and cut its growth outlook. Fed chair Jay Powell said at the time that the US economy was still in good shape and the central bank did “not need to be in a hurry” to cut interest rates after reducing them by 1 percentage point last year.

However, the president of the Chicago branch of the Fed, Austan Goolsbee, told the Financial Times this week that the central bank was no longer on the “golden path” of 2023 and 2024 when inflation appeared to be returning to the 2 per cent target without derailing economic growth or lifting unemployment.

News

What to know about the big law firms in Donald Trump’s crosshairs

Published

8 hours ago

March 28, 2025

Press Room

What to know about the big law firms in Donald Trump’s crosshairs

Several large law firms have found themselves in President Donald Trump’s crosshairs since his return to the White House in January.

Newsweek reached out to each of these firms for comment via email.

Why It Matters

Trump is facing two new legal challenges from Jenner & Block and WilmerHale on Friday over executive orders aiming to suspend security clearances of their attorneys and prohibit their employees from accessing federal buildings. He has issued orders against several major law firms that have previously been critical of his actions.

What to Know

Jenner & Block and WilmerHale filed separate complaints in federal court asking judges to block these orders on Friday, raising concerns that they are an unconstitutional attempt to punish them for their past advocacy.

President Donald Trump appears in the White House on January 30, 2025.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

He previously targeted two other law firms, Perkins Coie, and Paul, Weiss with similar orders.

Here is an overview of each of these cases.

Jenner & Block

Jenner & Block, a law firm with offices across the United States that has faced scrutiny from the Trump administration for hiring Andrew Weissmann, a lawyer who served on special counsel Robert Mueller’s team that probed Trump during his first term.

Mueller investigated alleged Russian influence on the 2016 presidential election. Trump has denied any wrongdoing and has described the case as politically motivated.

“Andrew Weissmann’s career has been rooted in weaponized government and abuse of power, including devastating tens of thousands of American families who worked for the now defunct Arthur Andersen LLP, only to have his unlawfully aggressive prosecution overturned by the Supreme Court,” Trump wrote in his executive order.

The firm slammed the order as an “an unconstitutional abuse of power against lawyers, their clients, and the legal system.”

“It is intended to hamper the ability of individuals and businesses to have the lawyers of their choice zealously represent them,” the firm wrote in their lawsuit against the president. “And it is intended to coerce law firms and lawyers into renouncing the Administration’s critics and ceasing certain representations adverse to the government.”

WilmerHale

The order against WilmerHale accused the firm of engaging in “obvious partisan representations to achieve political ends,” efforts to discriminate based on race and its alleged stance on immigration policies. It also raised concerns about its hiring of Mueller and some of his aides.

Mueller, like Wiessmann, rejoined the firm in 2021 after the investigation, but he has since retired.

“While most litigation requires discovery to unearth retaliatory motive, the Order makes no secret of its intent to punish WilmerHale for its past and current representations of clients before the Nation’s courts and for its perceived connection to the views that Mr. Mueller expressed as Special Counsel,” the firm’s case says, according to The Associated Press.

Perkins Coie

Trump’s executive order against Perkins Coie was released earlier this year, and court proceedings are ongoing. Judge Beryll Howell has blocked the administration from enforcing the order, and Trump’s attorneys are trying to have her removed from the case.

Similar to other cases, Trump raised concerns about its ties to investigations into his alleged ties to Russia in his executive order. Perkins Coie has said it’s suffering financial fallout from the order after clients with government contracts ended their legal arrangements with the firm.

“This executive order takes a wrecking ball to the rule of law, to the principles that promote democracy, Dane Butswinkas, an attorney representing Perkins Coie, previously said of the case.

Paul, Weiss

Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP a firm with more than 2,000 attorneys, earlier in March capitulated to Trump, agreeing too give $40 million in free legal aid to charities he supports and end diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs to continue winning government contracts.

He has since lifted the ban on the firm receiving federal contracts.

Trump’s case against the firm pointed to its employment of Mark Pomerantz, who was previously involved in parts of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s investigation into hush money payments allegedly made to adult film actor Stormy Daniels. Trump was found guilty in the case last year but is appealing the ruling. He pleaded not guilty to the charges and said the case was politically motivated.

What People Are Saying

Harrison Fields, the White House deputy press secretary, to Newsweek on Friday: “Democrats and their law firms weaponized the legal process to try to punish and jail their political opponents. The President’s executive orders are lawful directives to ensure that the President’s agenda is implemented and that law firms comply with the law.”

Former federal prosecutor Joyce White Vance in a Substack post Friday: “Expect more from the law firms. The increasing swiftness of the responses show that they now anticipate and understand that they are under attack from a previously unthinkable place, the White House. The Wilmer Hale firm filed their lawsuit less than a full day after Trump took action against them. These firms are prepared to fight it out in the one place where Trump can be forced to listen: The courts.”