Florida’s Primary Results Echo Far-Left Takeover of Democratic Party in McGovern Era

The most surprising result in the batch of primaries held this week over the vast stretch of America from Florida through Wyoming to Alaska was the defeat of famed anti-Trump whistleblower, Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, by a state representative, Angie Nixon, in the contest for the Democratic nomination against the appointed Republican senator, Ashley Moody, in the Sunshine State.Of these candidates, Colonel Vindman was by far the best known nationally. His role in spurring the House’s 2019 impeachment of President Trump made him a hero to Democratic money-givers large and small. That helped his twin brother, Eugene Vindman, finance a successful race for a Virginia congressional seat in 2024 and helped Colonel Vindman raise $16 million for this year’s Senate race.The big surprise — and a disagreeable one for Colonel Vindman, whose campaign was evidently husbanding funds for the general election — is that he lost the Democratic primary by a 56 percent to 44 percent margin to Ms. Nixon, who raised only $974,000.Ms. Nixon entered the campaign known to those Floridians who pay close heed to goings-on at Tallahassee as a legislator who charged the podium, speaking through a pink bullhorn, to protest a redistricting bill and who sponsored a 2023 bill for a ceasefire in Gaza that was voted down 104-2.Alexander Vindman speaks during a campaign event at the Broward County Democratic Clubs and Caucuses on February 9, 2026. Joe Raedle/Getty ImagesDuring the campaign, she signed up with the Democratic Socialists of America and campaigned on its more presentable platform planks, such as “Medicare for All” and a $25 minimum wage. In the general election, less palatable planks may get an airing from Republicans — “demilitarize police departments,” “defund the Department of War,” “amnesty for all immigrants regardless of status.”Ms. Nixon carried her home base, Jacksonville, with 80 percent of the primary vote, and won 80 percent at Florida’s one black-majority county, Gadsden, as well. Her winning percentages at counties including Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa, and Orlando suggest she owes much of her margin to black voters, plus, like DSA-adjacent candidates in other states, support from college-educated voters with low incomes (including the two counties, Alachua and Leon, with the highest percentages of campus-oriented voters).In contrast, she failed to carry the more affluent — and more elderly — counties centered on West Palm Beach, Naples, and Sarasota. We seem to be witnessing a passing of the guard here, from the Democrats of the Resistance scrolling through Bluesky in search of candidates and causes with which to display their loathing of Mr. Trump to a younger generation of Democrats determined to display their support of “socialism” and opposition to “Zionists.”Senator George McGovern, the Democratic nominee for president, in 1972. Via Wikimedia CommonsThere is something redolent here of the seeming takeover of the Democratic Party half a century ago by a younger generation of voters and activists opposed to the Vietnam War that resulted in the nomination of George McGovern in 1972 and had a continual influence on elected Democrats and policymakers through most of the 1970s and 1980s. That came from a protest movement incubated on college and university campuses, centered on Vietnam but also influenced by tomes such as Charles Reich’s 1970 “The Greening of America.”Similarly, the great motivating cause of DSA-adjacent Democrats seems to be statehood for Gaza, opposition to Israel, and, in very many cases, hostility toward Jews.I see one highly visible difference between the 1970s and today: the composition of campuses and the ascendant groups of the Democratic Party.In 1970, 58 percent of college and university students were men, while today an almost identical 57 percent are women. Similarly, men formed most of the leadership cadres and masses of support in the campus and political movements of half a century ago. Today, or so it seems to me, women do.The press don’t seem to be spending on exit polls in this year’s spring and summer primaries, but some measure of support for DSA-type candidates can be gleaned from general election polls.Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed on August 5, 2026, at Detroit’s Majestic Theatre. AP/Julia Demaree NikhinsonOne that has attracted special attention was conducted by Fox News in Michigan, just after the DSA-adjacent Abdul El-Sayed won the Democratic primary for senator. Even as other Fox News Senate polls showed Democrats leading in states that Mr. Trump had carried in 2024, the Michigan poll showed Dr. El-Sayed trailing Republican Mike Rogers by 51 percent to 47 percent. By way of comparison, in an open-seat Senate race in 2024, Mr. Rogers lost to Democrat Elissa Slotkin by 49 percent to 48 percent.In the Fox News poll, noncollege graduates favored Mr. Rogers by wide margins over Dr. El-Sayed — men by 63 percent to 37 percent, women by 60 percent to 38 percent. So did male college graduates by nearly the same margin, 59 percent to 39 percent. The odd persons out were female college graduates, who favored Dr. El-Sayed by 60 percent to 37 percent — a mirror image of the three other groups. That’s a familiar pattern to those of us who read, and sometimes overinterpret, the internals of political polls.Given those numbers, perhaps Ms. Nixon’s victory should not have been much of a surprise. Certainly, it fortifies earlier results that have established socialists this year as the most dynamic and potentially the dominant force in America’s and the world’s oldest political party.Creators.com

Florida’s Primary Results Echo Far-Left Takeover of Democratic Party in McGovern Era

Florida’s Primary Results Echo Far-Left Takeover of Democratic Party in McGovern Era

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