Democratic socialist candidates show gains but limited reach in 2026

Campaigns & Elections Congress Political Parties Public Opinion

竞选与选举 国会 政党 公众舆论

The 2026 primary season has included a series of high-profile wins by candidates associated with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

美国民主社会主义者 (DSA) 的候选人在 2026 年初选中取得了一系列备受瞩目的胜利。

Since its founding in 1982, DSA members have worked largely within the Democratic Party to move it to the left on issues they care about.

自 1982 年成立以来，DSA 成员主要在民主党内部开展工作，在他们关心的问题上将民主党推向左翼。

For several decades, the DSA’s impact on American politics was minimal.

几十年来，DSA 对美国政治的影响微乎其微。

Its most visible elected official, longtime Sen.

其最引人注目的民选官员是长期担任参议员的。

Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), has held his Senate seat since 2007, but his 2016 presidential run brought democratic socialism into the national conversation.

伯尼·桑德斯（佛蒙特州民主党人）自 2007 年以来一直担任参议院席位，但他 2016 年的总统竞选将民主社会主义带入了全国讨论之中。

In 2026, DSA is having a moment.

2026 年，DSA 迎来了辉煌时刻。

Its most important breakthrough came in late 2025 with the election of Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City.

最重要的突破出现在 2025 年底，佐兰·马姆达尼 (Zohran Mamdani) 当选纽约市市长。

Then, in the 2026 primaries, candidates from the party’s insurgent left chalked up some high-profile wins in important swing states.

然后，在 2026 年的初选中，该党叛乱左翼的候选人在重要的摇摆州取得了一些引人注目的胜利。

The most prominent was Abdul El-Sayed, who won the Democratic nomination for Senate in Michigan.

其中最著名的是阿卜杜勒·赛义德，他赢得了密歇根州参议员的民主党提名。

Even though he calls himself a capitalist, was never a member of DSA, and wasn’t formally endorsed by DSA, his win, along with several other congressional successes and Francesca Hong’s close second in the Democratic gubernatorial primary in Wisconsin, signaled the left’s growing reach.

尽管他自称为资本家，从来不是 DSA 的成员，也没有得到 DSA 的正式支持，但他的胜利，以及其他几项国会成功，以及弗朗西斯卡·洪 (Francesca Hong) 在威斯康星州民主党州长初选中以微弱优势获得第二名，都标志着左翼势力的影响力不断扩大。

Some Democrats have met the nomination of DSA-endorsed candidates with panic .

一些民主党人对 DSA 认可的候选人的提名感到惊慌。

Democratic control of the House and Senate is in sight because of the economy and President Donald Trump’s low approval ratings , but many party centrists fear nominating candidates whose backgrounds are out of step with mainstream voters could cost Democrats control of the House and especially the Senate.

由于经济和唐纳德·特朗普总统的低支持率，民主党控制参众两院的希望渺茫，但许多党派中间派人士担心，提名背景与主流选民不一致的候选人可能会导致民主党失去对众议院、尤其是参议院的控制权。

Others take a more optimistic view.

其他人则持更为乐观的看法。

They expect these candidates to moderate their views in a general election and bring new young voters with them.

他们期望这些候选人在大选中缓和自己的观点，并带来新的年轻选民。

There is also this: as research by the Cook Political Report’s Erin Covey has shown, in House seats most likely to flip to the Democrats, Democratic primary voters have largely nominated more moderate candidates.

还有一点：库克政治报告的艾琳·科维的研究表明，在最有可能转向民主党的众议院席位中，民主党初选选民大多提名了更为温和的候选人。

So how important is the DSA movement?

那么DSA运动有多重要呢？

Are we seeing the emergence of a powerful new faction in the Democratic Party’s big tent, or is this all hype?

我们是否看到民主党大帐篷中出现了一个强大的新派系，或者这只是炒作？

We set out to see where DSA candidates are running and how they are doing.

我们着手了解 DSA 候选人的竞选情况以及他们的表现。

We identified 282 DSA-endorsed candidates.

我们确定了 282 名 DSA 认可的候选人。

Because DSA is highly decentralized, most were endorsed by local DSA chapters; only 29 carried an endorsement by the national DSA organization .

由于 DSA 高度分散，大多数都得到了当地 DSA 分会的认可；只有 29 个获得了国家 DSA 组织的认可。

Beyond these, many more candidates self-identify as democratic socialists—a universe far too diffuse to capture in its entirety.

除此之外，还有更多的候选人自称为民主社会主义者——这个宇宙太过分散，无法全面捕捉。

We therefore limited our count to candidates with a confirmed endorsement from an official DSA chapter.

因此，我们将统计范围仅限于获得 DSA 官方分会确认认可的候选人。

This study is not intended to be an exhaustive census of DSA-affiliated candidates but merely a first attempt to gauge the movement’s success.

这项研究的目的并不是对 DSA 附属候选人进行详尽的普查，而只是衡量该运动是否成功的首次尝试。

(There are a few candidates who were endorsed by their local DSA chapter, but who do not, on further inspection, seem to share DSA ideology.)

（有一些候选人得到了当地 DSA 分会的认可，但经过进一步检查，他们似乎并不认同 DSA 的意识形态。）

As Table 1 shows, of the 282 DSA-endorsed candidates we identified, more than half were seeking local or state legislative offices (99 were seeking local office, and 104 were running in primaries for state legislatures).

如表 1 所示，在我们确定的 282 名 DSA 认可的候选人中，超过一半正在寻求地方或州立法机构职位（99 人正在寻求地方职位，104 人正在参加州立法机构的初选）。

To get a sense of how large this movement is, it is important to place some of these numbers in context.

为了了解这场运动的规模有多大，将其中一些数字放在背景中非常重要。

For instance, the League of Women Voters counted 76,902 local elections in the United States in 2024.

例如，女性选民联盟统计出 2024 年美国有 76,902 场地方选举。

Nationally, there are 7,386 legislative seats in the nation’s state legislatures, so the number of DSA candidates is a tiny percentage of the total.

在全国范围内，全国州立法机构有 7,386 个立法席位，因此 DSA 候选人的人数只占总数的很小一部分。

The number of DSA candidates who actually won a Democratic nomination is well under 1%.

实际赢得民主党提名的 DSA 候选人人数远低于 1%。

And, of course, we don’t yet know how many of these candidates will win the general election in November.

当然，我们还不知道这些候选人中有多少人将赢得 11 月份的大选。

Moreover, DSA candidates for statewide office and Congress fared worse than local and state legislative candidates, winning fewer than half of their primary elections (As of this writing, a few primaries remain in September, but their number is too small to affect these conclusions.) 1

此外，全州办公室和国会的 DSA 候选人的表现比地方和州立法候选人差，赢得初选的人数不到一半（截至撰写本文时，9 月份仍有一些初选，但其人数太少，不足以影响这些结论。）1

Furthermore, as some journalists have suspected , many of these candidates come from places that are already quite liberal, meaning DSA-backed candidates are favored to win in districts that Republicans are unlikely to win.

此外，正如一些记者所怀疑的那样，这些候选人中有许多来自已经相当自由的地方，这意味着 DSA 支持的候选人更有可能在共和党不太可能获胜的地区获胜。

In our sample, 90 candidates came from California and 21 from New York, accounting for a large portion of the candidates identified.

在我们的样本中，90 名候选人来自加利福尼亚州，21 名候选人来自纽约，占确定候选人的很大一部分。

Table 2 groups the statewide and congressional candidates by their states and districts’ Cook Partisan Voter Index (PVI), which characterizes partisan lean .

表 2 按州和地区的库克党派选民指数 (PVI) 对全州和国会候选人进行分组，该指数表征了党派倾斜。

The largest number of candidates came from states or districts with a history of Democratic strength and where Cook calculates a PVI of D+10 or greater.

最多的候选人来自历史上民主党实力雄厚的州或地区，库克计算这些州或地区的 PVI 为 D+10 或更高。

Even in those districts, however, DSA candidates lost more primaries than they won.

然而，即使在这些选区，DSA 候选人在初选中失利的数量也多于获胜的数量。

As Table 2 illustrates, as a state or district becomes more competitive, fewer DSA-endorsed candidates run, and fewer win.

如表 2 所示，随着州或地区的竞争变得更加激烈，DSA 认可的候选人参选的人数会减少，获胜的人数也会减少。

Only 10 DSA-backed candidates prevailed in districts with a party leaning of less than D+10 in the Cook PVI.

在库克 PVI 政党倾向低于 D+10 的地区，只有 10 名 DSA 支持的候选人获胜。

So, what are we to make of the DSA summer?

那么，我们该如何度过 DSA 夏季呢？

From one perspective, the story of DSA candidates’ influence is overblown.

从一个角度来看，DSA 候选人影响力的说法被夸大了。

The scarcity of candidates and their lack of strong success rates overall make this look more like a skirmish than a war.

候选人的稀缺以及整体成功率的缺乏使得这看起来更像是一场小冲突而不是一场战争。

Complicating the narrative is the fact that, in the post-Biden world, voters have turned against candidates they perceive as too old, such as Rep.

使情况变得复杂的是，在后拜登时代，选民开始反对他们认为太老的候选人，例如众议员。

John Larson (D-Conn.), 78, who lost in a race largely centered on his age , not ideology.

约翰·拉尔森 (John Larson，康涅狄格州民主党人)，78 岁，他在一场主要因为年龄而不是意识形态的竞选中落败。

It is still true that, as the saying goes, politics is played on the 50-yard line.

俗话说，政治是在 50 码线上进行的，这仍然是事实。

America is today, as it has been for many years, a center-right country.

与多年来一样，今天的美国是一个中右翼国家。

“Conservatives outnumbered liberals by 3 to 2 in 2024, just as they outnumbered liberals by 3 to 2 from 2004 to 2024,” according to an analysis by Jim Kessler of Third Way.

Third Way 的吉姆·凯斯勒 (Jim Kessler) 的分析显示，“到 2024 年，保守派人数与自由派人数之比为 3 比 2，正如 2004 年至 2024 年保守派人数与自由派人数之比为 3 比 2 一样。”

Evidence of this is that the progressive congressional candidates who have won their primaries are busy trying to scrub social media of their more left-wing statements.

这方面的证据是，赢得初选的进步派国会候选人正忙于清除社交媒体上的左翼言论。

For instance, Darializa Avila Chevalier, who beat incumbent Rep.

例如，达里亚丽莎·阿维拉·谢瓦利埃（Darializa Avila Chevalier）击败了现任众议员。

Adriano Espaillat (D-N.Y.) in a primary in New York’s 13th Congressional District, recently removed comments from online accounts featuring statements praising communism and Marxism, saying , “I have grown considerably in the years since these tweets, and I am focused on our community and our community’s future.” El-Sayed, as we noted, emphasizes that he is not a DSA member, that he is not a socialist, and that he can build a big tent for the Democrats.

纽约州民主党人阿德里亚诺·埃斯佩拉特 (Adriano Espaillat) 在纽约第 13 国会选区的初选中，最近删除了在线账户中赞扬共产主义和马克思主义的评论，他说：“自从这些推文发布以来，我在这些年里成长了很多，我专注于我们的社区和我们社区的未来。”正如我们所指出的，埃尔赛义德强调他不是 DSA 成员，他不是社会主义者，他可以为民主党搭建一个大帐篷。

Come November, all eyes will be on these candidates.

十一月到来，所有的目光都将集中在这些候选人身上。

Trump and the Republicans will not let these candidates’ more radical statements go—no matter how many times they try to scrub their past social media accounts or how often they disavow them.

特朗普和共和党不会放过这些候选人更激进的言论——无论他们多少次试图清理自己过去的社交媒体账户，或者他们多久否认这些账户。

If left-wing nominees manage to win in swing districts, their overall movement will be strengthened; if they lose districts deemed winnable and cost Democrats control of the House and Senate, their mainstream presence will likely be diminished.

如果左翼候选人能够在摇摆选区获胜，他们的整体运动将会得到加强；如果他们失去了被认为可以获胜的选区，并使民主党失去对众议院和参议院的控制权，他们的主流影响力可能会减少。

Nonetheless, the high-profile wins, fueled by young, white, educated voters , represent a warning to the rest of the party.

尽管如此，在年轻、白人、受过教育的选民的推动下，引人注目的胜利对党内其他成员构成了警告。

They signal that unhappiness with the Democratic establishment and, in the post-Biden world, opposition to elderly officeholders can be leveraged by young, charismatic DSA candidates—and reflect an impatience with party leadership that transcends ideology.

它们表明，年轻、有魅力的 DSA 候选人可以利用对民主党建制派的不满以及在后拜登时代对老年公职人员的反对，并反映出对超越意识形态的政党领导的不耐烦。

This dataset covers candidates for federal, statewide, state legislative, and local offices in the 2026 election cycle who received a formal endorsement or recommendation from a local, state, or national chapter of the DSA.

该数据集涵盖 2026 年选举周期中获得 DSA 地方、州或国家分会正式认可或推荐的联邦、全州、州立法机构和地方办公室的候选人。

A note on sample heterogeneity: DSA chapters do not apply uniform endorsement standards.

关于样本异质性的说明：DSA 章节不适用统一的认可标准。

Some chapters endorse only candidates they determine to be closely aligned with DSA’s platform, while others endorse or recommend whichever candidate they judge to be strongest in a given race—including candidates who read as standard progressive or even moderate Democrats.

有些分会只支持他们认为与 DSA 平台密切一致的候选人，而另一些分会则支持或推荐他们认为在特定竞选中最强的候选人，包括被视为标准进步派甚至温和派民主党人的候选人。

As a result, the ideological composition of this sample is not uniform, and some coded candidates may not reflect “democratic socialist” politics in a substantive sense despite chapter backing.

因此，这个样本的意识形态构成并不统一，一些编码的候选人尽管有分会的支持，但可能并不能反映实质性意义上的“民主社会主义”政治。

The final sample includes 282 candidates, coded across four office-type categories.

最终样本包括 282 名候选人，分为四个办公室类型类别。