The Future of the Democratic Party Lies Far From Washington

Gottfried added that this is something Republicans have recognized for decades, but which Democrats and progressives too often ignore.

“Right-wing Republicans, as far back as around the 1960s, were focusing on local public offices and local party positions very quietly, taking over school boards and taking over local Republican Party committees,” he noted to me. “To this day, you see right-wing groups taking over school boards and library boards and getting people elected dogcatchers and gradually working their way up the chain to controlling state government, state courts, state political parties, and capturing control of the national political party. Progressives have not done much of that.”

Naturally, New York is a different political beast than the rest of the country. You’re unlikely to see the same impassioned fights over adding a traffic circle in Mankato, Minnesota, as you might if you attend a meeting of the Village Independent Democrats in Manhattan. However, every area of the country has town councils, school boards, state representatives, and state senators—and, as Gottfried notes, they are all sensitive to the pressure that comes when committed locals start turning the screws and agitating for change.