The American left is currently celebrating electoral victories in New York City, New Jersey and Virginia as if they mean something, believing that those not unexpected successes will translate into victory in the 2026 midterms and, more so, a mandate in the 2028 Presidential election. However such thinking is, like leftism, delusional due to the documented, destructive nature of progressive ideology.
Midterm elections, normally, are extremely tough for the incumbent party; the parties of George W. Bush in 2002 and Franklin Roosevelt in 1934 seeing gains in both houses of Congress notwithstanding. It likely will be the same in 2026 though it should be noted in the 2018 midterms under the first Trump Administration saw Republicans actually gain United States Senate seats. While former President Biden was encouraged in the 2022 midterms by the addition of John Fetterman to the Senate, that sentiment no longer remains for leftists.
By the time the 2028 elections turn around any momentum gained from 2026 will likely be insignificant. In politics a day is like 1,000 years, and 1,000 years is like a day. The full damage of leftist policies will be quite evident by the 2028 presidential election.
The full force of the destructiveness of the Democrat policies in Virginia will likely take the longest to be felt. There are still many conservatives in Virginia, minus the influx of government workers, and many good gun laws (or rather lack of government control of the Second Amendment compared to other states).
Also, while Democrats make up both houses of the Virginia General Assembly, that legislature is still at almost a 50/50 Republican vs. Democrat split for the Senate and the House of Delegates, which dilutes at least some of the progressive tendencies of leftist lawmakers.
In New Jersey, the state legislature is much more in favor of the Democrats and continued leftism will be felt, and likely even quicker than in Virginia due to this composition. New Jersey, a great state with wonderful people, sadly in many ways is politically similar to New York City.
And it is New York City that will serve as the center point on the East Coast for the continuing failure of leftism. Certain policies advocated by Mayor-elect Mamdani, such as taxpayer funded busing and childcare, freezing rent, a $30 an hour minimum wage will almost immediately be felt as will the overall feeling of letting the inmates running the asylum of city government and in the streets.
New York City has, almost instantly, fallen down due to leftist mayors being inaugurated going as far back as John Lindsay and David Dinkins. It is notable that Dinkins was essentially run out of office after New York became akin to Gotham City with rampant crime and homelessness. Lindsay operated under the same concepts of Mamdani, with open admissions and government funded education at the City University of New York and being soft on crime. He would have been voted out after his first term except that a rather conservative Democrat and a Republican ran against him for his 1969 re-election, splitting the anti-left vote.
New York will soon become far worse than where it is now. It will be plainly evident perhaps even by the 25th Anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, with Mamdani as mayor. Crime will be out of control. The population of the city will not dramatically increase (and may continue to decrease), businesses will leave and the homeless will be everywhere. The public will see the consequences of these leftist “victories,” well in time for 2028. There’s not much for the left to celebrate.
*Views expressed in this article are those of the author and not any government agency.
Larry Provost is a columnist and commentator in Washington, D.C. A 26-year Army veteran who served in Afghanistan and Iraq, he holds a Master of Divinity from Liberty University, an M.P.S. in legislative affairs from The George Washington University and an M.A. in defense and strategic Studies from the U.S. Naval War College.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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