Democratic California Rep. Josh Harder made a striking admission about his party this week: Democrats might not be able to govern effectively if they retake House control during the midterms.
Harder, a results-oriented Democrat who wants to slash regulations to build more housing and energy projects, voiced concern about his party’s ability to make progress on key issues if Democrats win back the House in 2026. Harder said it is paramount for Abundance-pilled Democrats to make progress on their policy priorities in the current GOP-controlled Congress because those issues could become more difficult to solve under Democratic leadership.
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“We’ve got to get stuff done right now even under a Republican trifecta,” Harder said during a panel appearance at the New Liberal Action Summit on Tuesday. “Unfortunately, there are so many parts of the Democratic Party that are still very opposed to this agenda that if we flip the House some of these problems may be more difficult to solve, which is a little frustrating to say as someone who wants to do that.”
Though a growing number of Democrats have embraced the center-left Abundance movement following a string of high-profile governing failures in blue states and cities, Harder voiced frustration that many Democrats still oppose cutting red tape and making it easier to build housing and infrastructure projects.
He specifically called out members of the party leadership who are beholden to government regulation at the expense of results.
“We’ve got to win the hearts and minds,” Harder said, referring to members of his own party. “We need to be pushing for a Democratic Party that is pro-growth and that believes that life can be better down the road.”
Harder invoked former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 campaign proposal to build three million new housing units over four years as a laudable goal that would have been impossible to achieve with Democrats’ opposition to nixing regulatory hurdles.
“What was deeply dispiriting about it was the policy substance under that wasn’t going to do anywhere close to that actual policy goal,” Harder said. “And so we have a very clear problem, which is we have got to build out the substance behind what this agenda actually looks like on the ground.”
A spokesperson for Harder did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
Harder’s admission comes as some Democratic strategists have excoriated party leadership for not developing a forward-looking vision after their crushing losses in November 2024. Democrats have largely focused their messaging on combating President Donald Trump roughly ten months into his second term.
House Democrats have largely avoided putting forth concrete policy proposals of how they would govern in the majority since the beginning of the new Congress in January.
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