Elizabeth Warren gave an excellent speech January 12 (text; video) urging Democrats not “to sand down our edges to avoid offending anyone, especially the rich and powerful who might finance our candidates.… When Democrats water down their economic platform to appeal to wealthy donors, whether the transaction is explicit or subtle, we squander trust with working people, and the money just isn’t worth it.”

The Atlantic’s Jonathan Chait disagrees. “The Democratic Party,” he wrote three days later, “is completely unified on the merits of raising taxes on the rich and spending more on benefits for the poor and middle class.” That’s not true. Chait also wrote that it was “revealing” that Warren “did not cite any Democrat who holds this supposedly influential belief.” That’s not true, either. Warren cited Kamala Harris and former Senator Kyrsten Sinema. There are also many others, whom I’ll discuss in a moment.

Before proceeding, let me disclose that Chait and I are friendly acquaintances and that our views are sufficiently similar that in 2011 he successfully recommended me to succeed him as this magazine’s TRB columnist. (A baby tech tycoon bought the magazine the following year, fired me, then later fired himself by selling the magazine to its present owner.) There is, however, some disagreement between Chait and myself about how far left the Democrats should go on economic policy—he’s more cautious than I am—and we’ve aired that disagreement before.

Warren’s speech was refreshing not because it was original (others, including me, have made the same argument) but because it emanated from a politician. Warren relies on wealthy political donors just like other pols; between 2019 and 2024, when she ran for reelection, 42........

© New Republic