The Morning After Is Already Here

There is a pattern to American politics. A right-wing government runs itself into the ground. The public turns against it. And before working people can build an alternative, the center moves in with a simple offer: just give us the keys back and we will restore order. The window between those two moments is the one that matters. It is open right now.

The Collapse Is Real

Trump’s second term has been a case study in the distance between populist rhetoric and plutocratic governance. The United States added only 181,000 jobs in all of 2025—the fewest in a non-recession year since 2003—while tariffs raised costs for the average household by $3,800 per year^1,2. The Supreme Court struck down his tariff regime 6 to 3 in February 2026³. The Congressional Budget Office found the One Big Beautiful Bill takes $1,200 annually from the bottom ten percent while giving $13,600 to the top ten percent and throws 11.8 million people off Medicaid⁴. Trump had promised not to touch Social Security or Medicaid⁵. DOGE then moved to cut roughly 7,000 SSA positions and targeted 80,000 VA cuts⁶.

The electoral signals are clear. Democrats swept Virginia’s statewide offices by as much as 15 points⁷. In North Carolina’s March 3rd primaries, three Democratic incumbents who voted to override Governor Stein’s vetoes were ousted by progressive challengers; Nasif Majeed, who voted for legislation defining sex in biological terms, lost 69 to 27 percent⁸. MAGA is collapsing. But that is exactly when the danger begins.

The Familiar Playbook

After Watergate, Democrats ran Jimmy Carter as a reform outsider. He deregulated banks and airlines, appointed the Fed chair who deliberately induced a recession, and abandoned labor. AFL-CIO president George Meany called him a conservative⁹. After 2008, Obama staffed his economic team with Wall Street insiders. His mortgage relief program promised 3 to 4 million modifications and delivered roughly one million while nine million families lost their homes^10,11. Not a single senior bank executive was prosecuted¹². Ninety-five percent of income gains from 2009 to 2012 went to the top one percent¹³.

Democratic centrists represent a coalition whose interests are served by managed capitalism with better optics. They are against us not because they are evil, but because we want different things.

The Lineup for 2028

Gavin Newsom governs California with the nation’s highest state unemployment rate and an $18 to $35 billion deficit he refuses to address with taxes on the wealthy^1,14—while criminalizing homelessness and having done podcasts with Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon to signal cross-aisle credibility. Buttigieg offers vague appeals to AI disruption. Next American Era, launched in February 2026, is led by a former congresswoman now lobbying for OpenAI and Oracle¹⁵. Third Way is running conferences aimed at opposing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez¹⁶. This is not a left flank preparing to govern for working people. This is the party establishment clearing the field.

What Northeast Tennessee Tells Us

The material stakes are impossible to ignore here. Median household income in the Tri-Cities runs 70 cents on the national dollar, with poverty rates exceeding 20 percent in Johnson City and Kingsport¹⁷. Ballad Health failed 74 to 80 percent of its state quality benchmarks for four consecutive years while CEO compensation nearly doubled to $4.3 million¹⁸. Food insecurity has hit 16.8 percent—the highest in 20 years¹⁹. These conditions predate Trump. The “return to normal” centrist Democrats are selling is a return to the conditions that produced all of this.

The Fight to Name the Problem

Two stories are being told about why working-class life is so hard. The right blames immigrants and cultural elites—a false answer that connects to a real feeling of abandonment. The centrist story calls for competent management without naming corporate power, landlords, or hospital monopolies. The socialist story names the cause: wages are low because unions were broken; healthcare is unaffordable because it is a profit center; hospitals close in rural communities because there is no money in keeping poor people alive. These are not mysteries. They are decisions, made by people who profit from them.

The Window and What to Do With It

DSA has surpassed 100,000 members²⁰. May Day 2025 brought hundreds of thousands into the streets in more than 1,000 towns²¹. The 2025 convention voted to work toward an independent mass socialist party²². A general strike on May Day 2028, backed by UAW and the Chicago Teachers Union, is being built now²³.

Fascism is not defeated in blue cities. It is defeated where it lives—in the communities it recruits from, in the economic despair it feeds on. A new moderate will not fix the Ballad Health monopoly. A return to normalcy will not reverse 50 years of wage decline. The window is open. What we do with it will shape working-class life for a generation.

References:

1. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2026, February 11). Employment situation summary: January 2026. U.S. Department of Labor. https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/economicdata/empsit_02112026.pdf
2. Yale Budget Lab. (2025). The tariff impact on U.S. households. Yale University. https://budgetlab.yale.edu
3. Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, 607 U.S. ___ (2026).
4. Congressional Budget Office. (2025). Estimated budgetary effects of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. https://www.cbo.gov
5. Newsweek. (2025, February 19). Trump’s update on Social Security, Medicaid. https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-issues-update-social-security-medicaid-2033082
6. Social Security Administration. (2025, February 28). SSA workforce restructuring update. https://www.ssa.gov
7. Virginia Mercury. (2025, November 4). Democrats sweep Virginia’s statewide races, reclaiming full control of executive branch. https://virginiamercury.com/2025/11/04/democrats-sweep-virginias-statewide-races-reclaiming-full-control-of-executive-branch/
8. WFAE. (2026, March 3). Democratic Reps. Cunningham, Majeed lose to challengers in Mecklenburg. WFAE 90.7. https://www.wfae.org/politics/2026-03-03/democratic-reps-cunningham-majeed-trail-challengers-in-mecklenburg
9. Washington Post. (1977, June 15). A break in the Carter-Meany connection. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1977/06/15/a-break-in-the-carter-meany-connection/b2698498-b055-4036-86b7-09885dc17f2c/
10. Congressional Oversight Panel. (2010, April). Evaluating progress on TARP foreclosure mitigation programs. U.S. Government Publishing Office. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CPRT-111JPRT55737/html/CPRT-111JPRT55737.htm
11. Marketplace. (2018, December 17). Divided decade: How the financial crisis changed housing. https://www.marketplace.org/story/2018/12/17/what-we-learned-housing
12. NPR. (2011, April 26). Why prosecutors don’t go after Wall Street. https://www.npr.org/transcripts/137789065
13. Saez, E. (2013). Striking it richer: The evolution of top incomes in the United States. University of California, Berkeley. https://eml.berkeley.edu/~saez/saez-UStopincomes-2012.pdf
14. California Legislative Analyst’s Office. (2025). Fiscal outlook 2025–26. https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5091
15. Revolving Door Project. (2026). The AI lobbyist starting an abundance nonprofit. https://therevolvingdoorproject.org/new-abundance-group-ai-lobbysits/
16. Semafor. (2026, March 3). How Third Way’s president plans to avoid the Biden fate in 2028. https://www.semafor.com/article/03/03/2026/how-third-ways-president-plans-to-avoid-the-biden-fate-in-2028
17. U.S. Census Bureau. (2024). American Community Survey 5-year estimates: Selected economic characteristics. https://data.census.gov
18. Tennessee Department of Health. (2024). Ballad Health certificate of public advantage annual oversight report. https://www.tn.gov/health
19. Second Harvest Food Bank of Northeast Tennessee. (2025). 2025 hunger study: Northeast Tennessee regional food insecurity report. https://www.secondharvestne.org
20. Democratic Socialists of America. (2025a). DSA membership update. https://www.dsausa.org
21. Associated Press. (2025, May 1). Hundreds of thousands rally across U.S. on May Day. AP News.
22. Democratic Socialists of America. (2025b). Resolution R07: Principles for party-building. 2025 National Convention. https://www.dsausa.org
23. The Nation. (2025). The call is out for mass, simultaneous strikes in 4 years. https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/general-strike-2028-unions-labor-movement/