$300 Million in Progressive Fundraising. Zero Coordination. Time to Change That.

Since 2016, 31 Democratic incumbents lost to Republicans—nearly all moderates. Meanwhile, Bernie, AOC, and Warren have built a fundraising machine that rivals the DCCC. They just won't use it together

Hey everyone. I'm trying something different with this piece. Over the next few days, I'm going to publish a three-part series that's part analysis, part roadmap, part political fan fiction. This is Part 1 of 3.

TL;DR: Trump is literally federalizing DC police while Republicans redistrict in broad daylight. Democrats respond with strongly worded letters because they have no inspiring vision to rally people around. Meanwhile, progressives poll at 69% approval with $300-500 million in fundraising power, but won't coordinate it. We're losing in the marketplace of ideas because we can't imagine and articulate what we'd actually build. This series imagines what could happen if progressives stopped sitting on the sidelines, scared of their vision, and took the lead.

The Numbers That Should Terrify Everyone

Since 2016, 31 Democratic incumbents have lost to Republicans—nearly every single one was a moderate. Collin Peterson, founding Blue Dog member who voted with Trump half the time, lost. Eight Problem Solvers Caucus members lost. Eleven New Democrats lost. Meanwhile, every Squad member keeps winning their races.

The party keeps backing the candidates who lose and blocking the ones who win. But somehow progressives have been convinced they're the problem.

At the same time, Bernie Sanders polls at 69% approval, making him America's most popular senator. AOC crushes Schumer in New York polling, leading him 55% to 36% in hypothetical primaries. Elizabeth Warren maintains 54% approval despite years of attacks.

Chuck Schumer? 17% favorability, hitting a 20-year low even in his home state of New York, where he polls at 39% favorable versus 49% unfavorable. The Democratic Party hit rock bottom at 29% favorability—its lowest point since 1992.

That's a 50-point gap between progressive leaders and the Democratic establishment. The voters have already chosen. They're just waiting for the opportunity to make it count.

But progressives keep acting like they need permission to use the power they've already built. They've bought into decades of "you're too radical" bullshit when the data shows the opposite: being radical wins, being moderate loses.

Why I'm Writing Political Fan Fiction

When I was first getting into politics after the first Bernie Sanders campaign in 2017 and working to co-found Brand New Congress and Justice Democrats, there was a theme that often crossed my mind. Maybe it was because the 1982 World's Fair in Knoxville was so often mentioned in East Tennessee and remembered as a look into the future. But one of the things that I felt strongly about in terms of communicating, electorally at least, and sort of ideologically, was that people had to be able to imagine a future and be able to work towards it. Without a roadmap that shows you the destination, at least in your brain, it's hard for you to figure out a route to get there.

We tried that once when I was working in AOC's office with the short film "A Message from the Future with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez." It was intended to capture the imagination of what a post-Green New Deal America might look like. I even pitched the idea of fundraising to create a new World's Fair-type exhibition for post-GND America. But that proved to be unwieldy.

People often say, yes, great, Corbin, you're great at analyzing the problems and discussing them, but then what do we do? What's the solution? I get it. What's the point of looking at all the problems if they can't be fixed? But when I do try to describe what I see as a solution, it's too radical or bold to be taken seriously.

So I am gonna take the approach of science fiction writing that led to lots of scientific advancements and breakthroughs by inspiring the imagination. By helping people believe in the impossible. Maybe the same can be done with our society, our government, and our politics. After all, if we can imagine something, it's much easier to achieve.

To picture utopia, to strive for utopia, and fall short is much better than accepting a shitty reality and falling short of that even.

It reminds me a little bit of many religions. Most religions that I'm aware of accept that they can never be perfect, but they have an ideal to strive for. For Christians, it's Jesus. That's the one I'm most familiar with because of where I'm from. And everyone knows that they can't be like Jesus, but theoretically they're supposed to try to be. And I think many of us know that we can't have a perfect utopian world, and that doesn't mean that we shouldn't try, because trying something big means failure is better than trying something small and still failing.

So what follows is my attempt to imagine it into being. Part analysis of where we are, part roadmap of how we get there, part dream of what it looks like when we arrive. Call it political fan fiction if you want. I call it necessary.

Because if we can't imagine a better world, we sure as hell can't build one.

Right now, we're moving in exactly the opposite direction. Every day, more insanity. More death, more carnage in the Middle East. More outlandish, seemingly unlawful actions from the White House and Trump. And, more often than not, a tepid response from Democrats whose strategy seems to be wait it out and assume that Donald Trump will become deeply unpopular and therefore they will be able to win back some seats in the House and maybe even the Senate and then position them to be the obstruction opposition party for the remainder of the cycle and then pick a candidate to be their standard bearer in 2028.

I think this is not only a bad strategy but I think that it also fails to understand one of the most important things that we can do and that is restore faith in the Democratic Party and the institutions that need to be rebuilt due to the destructive force of the Trump administration.

You Weren't Crazy. They Were Lying.

We're living through a total collapse of institutional legitimacy. Every single institution that's supposed to serve the public has been caught lying through their teeth about shit that actually matters - your job, your health, your kids' future. And then they wonder why people believe the earth is flat or Democrats drink baby blood.

John Kirby just admitted he believes Israel is committing war crimes in Gaza. But he wouldn't say it at the podium when he was White House spokesperson. He stood there, day after day, and lied to our faces. Because that was his job - not to inform us, but to maintain the narrative. Tens of thousands dead. And our media still debates whether to use the word "genocide," as if the problem is terminology.

Every economic statistic is cooked. CPI says one thing, Zillow shows rents exploding at twice that rate. They tell us wages are growing while people finance groceries on credit cards. Manufacturing is "booming" while the factories in my town are rubble or strip malls. They design the numbers to say what they need them to say. When reality doesn't match, they gaslight harder.

The Democratic Party won't transform itself. It's not designed to. It is an incumbent-protection machine run by vendors whose business model is "keep the clients we have." And every "we'll moderate to win" memo reads like it was written in 2006 because it basically was.

We've Lost the Knowledge of How to Build

Here's what else should terrify the establishment. America built the entire Interstate Highway System in 35 years. Today, replicating that effort at our current pace would take 658 years. California's High-Speed Rail has burned through over $10 billion in 15 years without completing a single mile of operational track. Meanwhile, China could rebuild our entire Interstate system in 7.1 years. They're constructing at 92 times our speed.

We can't even build things anymore. And Democrats keep pretending the system works.

They Have All the Tools. They Just Won't Use Them.

Progressives act like they lack resources, but that's the biggest lie they tell themselves. Bernie Sanders raised $219 million in his 2020 presidential run. Elizabeth Warren raised $131 million. AOC pulled in $15.4 million in the first half of 2025, Bernie $16.1 million. The progressive coalition's combined fundraising capacity gets to $300-500 million annually.

They have more combined fundraising power than AIPAC. They have more fundraising power than the DCCC. They have the megaphone—Bernie's email list, AOC's social media reach, Warren's policy infrastructure. They have the message that polls at 59% even among Republicans on healthcare. They have everything they need to win.

What they don't have is the courage of their convictions.

What that money represents is an alternative power center. Small dollar donations from actual people, not huge piles of corporate cash. That's what frees politicians to be their best selves, to fight for what they actually believe in instead of what their donors demand. When your average donation is $27, you don't owe anyone a phone call about protecting pharmaceutical patents or private equity tax breaks.

But progressives have been so gaslit by decades of "you're the reason we can't win" that they're afraid to actually use this power. They're terrified of being blamed for losses, so they keep their heads down and let corporate Democrats drive the party off a cliff.

But what we have to also consider here is the cynicism. I've heard this story before. Everybody thinks that politics are useless, politics are pointless, and they're all corrupt, and they're all shitty. And once they win, they're going to stay that way.

And you know what? They're not wrong. The corruption is real. It was real before Trump, and it'll be real after Trump unless we do something radically different.

The Specific Machinery Stopping Change

The machinery stopping change is specific and funded. Reid Hoffman alone has spent over $9 million in Wisconsin since 2020, with $500,000 going to a "Mainstream Democrats PAC" explicitly designed to defeat progressives in primaries. Four former DCCC executive directors now run consulting firms that get paid millions to defeat primary challengers. SCRB Strategies collected $400,000 from Pacific Gas & Electric while simultaneously earning $648,000 from the DCCC. The consultants get paid whether Democrats win or lose. The system perpetuates itself.

Since 1975, the RAND Corporation calculates that $79 trillion has been transferred from the bottom 90% to the top 1%. From people who work for a living to people who own for a living.

So what we've got to understand is that we're not only working to rebuild confidence in the Democratic Party, which we can show people that we're serious as a movement. These people can show that they're serious as a movement by backing candidates that are going after incumbent Democrats like Nancy Pelosi, Josh Gottheimer, and others. They can actively call for the recruitment of candidates to run against people like Hakeem Jeffries or whatever the fuck the guy who's the senior Democrat on Ways and Means. I think it's Richie Neal.

Yes, Richie Neal. The guy who killed drug pricing reform to protect pharmaceutical companies. The guy who sits on Ways and Means, supposedly fighting for working people, while taking more corporate PAC money than almost any Democrat in Congress.

Nancy Pelosi, who's worth over $100 million and somehow always knows when to buy the right stocks. Josh Gottheimer, who literally worked at fucking Bain Capital and votes with Republicans to protect private equity. These aren't allies. They're corporate operatives.

Bernie needs to stand up and say "I endorsed Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden when I should have fought harder. I was wrong. I let you down."

AOC needs to say "I got comfortable. I started playing the game. I stopped being the outsider you elected me to be. That ends now."

But then we also have to go after restoring faith in our institutions, whether it's our Department of Justice and the fact that we've seen a weaponization of our police force and our federal officers for decades, long before Trump. It's just gotten more extreme now.

The SEC? Captured by Wall Street since the 1980s. The FDA? Approving opioids that killed hundreds of thousands while blocking generic drugs that could save lives. The Supreme Court? Six millionaires pretending to interpret a document written by slaveowners while taking luxury vacations from billionaires.

These institutions work exactly as designed to protect corporate interests and the wealthy.

The CEOs Who Gave Up on America

Whether it's healthcare bankrupting families, energy projects that never deliver, corruption that's legal, or inequality that's destroying communities, the underlying problem is the same: we've lost the desire and ability to build. I hear people lamenting lazy workers all the time but it's our CEOs and CFOs and business leaders that have gotten lazy. They don't dream of improving America anymore. And why would they? Their villa in western Europe or their island resort is only a private plane or yacht ride away. They are international economic thieves robbing us of our birthright.

The Progressive Bench Nobody Talks About

The progressive coalition goes way beyond just Bernie anymore. Look at the bench.

Bernie Sanders with 69% approval, $219 million proven fundraising
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez leading Schumer 55-36% in NY, $15.4 million first half 2025
Elizabeth Warren with 54% approval, $131 million proven fundraising
Rashida Tlaib with 74% district approval, $8+ million raised
Jasmine Crockett leading Texas Senate polling at 35%
Greg Casar, Chair of Progressive Caucus at 35, youngest ever, about to face a Trump+10 district that could prove everything
Summer Lee won 60% primary, 59% general despite massive opposition spending

These are the politicians the establishment calls "too radical." And they keep winning while the "electable" moderates keep losing.

Every one of these candidates ran on the progressive vision—Medicare for All, Green New Deal, economic populism, anti-corruption. Every one of them faced massive establishment opposition and corporate spending. And every one of them won anyway because they had the courage to fight for something people could believe in.

But instead of learning from these victories, progressive leaders keep acting like they need to apologize for their success. They should be using their proven popularity to elevate more candidates like these, not hiding in the shadows while corporate Democrats drive the party into the ground.

And then there's the candidates already running that fit the bill. Not just Zoran Mamdani, who just won the NYC mayoral primary by acknowledging reality and promising to build our way out of it, but people like Saikat Chakrabarti taking on Nancy Pelosi herself, Omar Fahmy, Katie Wilson, Abdul El-Sayed, Mallory McMorrow, Dan Osborn. They're already actively running. Now, they're not running on a unified platform and they're not running together, but they could and they should.

MAGA wasn't one guy running on issues with a little bit of a national brand. The Tea Party wasn't isolated candidates with good policies. They were movements, coordinated, funded, unified campaigns where every candidate reinforced every other candidate. Democrats have candidates. They have policies. They have position papers. What they don't have is coordination—or leaders willing to coordinate.

The fact is, when progressives run against an incumbent, they only win 9% of the races. But when they run in an open seat, they win more than half. The problem is that they don't have the infrastructure to take on establishment incumbents. That's where our fundraising prowess that is perfectly clear on the left, with grassroots donors, comes into play.

Trump's Opposition That Won't Oppose

Meanwhile, what's Trump doing? Mid-cycle redistricting to lock in gerrymandered maps. Census manipulation to undercount blue areas. Schedule F implementation to purge federal workers. State-level election law changes for 2026 and 2028. Supreme Court decisions dismantling remaining protections.

Right now the Republicans are in the process of gerrymandering their states even further. They're in the process of trying to push through a census that doesn't include everyone in the country. They're in the process of trying to make it much more difficult to vote and easier to challenge the results of an election.

And the Democratic response? Wait it out. Assume Trump will become unpopular. Win back some House seats in 2026. Position for 2028.

They're fundamentally misunderstanding this moment in American history.

The Swing Voters Democrats Keep Getting Wrong

Look at what exit polls and voter studies actually show. The 30% of swing voters who decide elections aren't "moderates" seeking centrist policies. They're cross-pressured voters, economically populist but culturally moderate. They're the "Change-First Populists" who backed Obama then swung to Trump. They want government to fight corporate gouging and lower costs. They support secure borders and safe communities. They demand anti-corruption action against elites.

These voters went from Obama to Trump to Biden and back to Trump based on who promised the bigger shake-up. They don't want compromise. They want someone to fight the people screwing them over.

These voters support Medicare for All at 59%. Even 68% of Republicans want greater government intervention in healthcare. They hate corporate monopolies but also want order at the border. They're economically left but culturally cautious, Bernie Sanders economics with cultural pragmatism.

What people want is food, clothing, shelter, and security, and they want their kids to be better off than they are. They want economic growth and stability. They want to know that they can go to a doctor. They want to know that they can get child care if they need it. They want to know that their tax dollars are not being spent on 2,000 pound bombs dropped in one of the densest and most highly populated areas on the planet, killing women, babies, and innocent men.

The Simple Plan That Would Work

A presidential-led movement announces this fall with one goal. Recruit, fund, and carry a slate of 2026 primary challengers and a governing message people can actually feel in their lives. Not a white paper. A promise to lower what people pay and break the grip of the people who are squeezing them.

But the key word is movement. Not isolated candidates running similar messages. A movement where every race reinforces every other race. Where winning in California helps you win in Texas. Where Bernie's money backs AOC's candidates backs Warren's infrastructure. Where for once, progressives stop fighting alone and start fighting together.

The message gets to economic populism with common-sense order. Your costs are high because corporations are robbing you. Government will compete, prosecute, and build. Secure borders, safe communities, and jail corporate criminals. Kitchen table economics plus basic order.

The money comes from pooling grassroots fundraising across the progressive leadership. Stop acting like ten separate start-ups. Create one coordinated war chest and fund the slate. $300-500 million annually if coordinated.

The media builds a parallel ecosystem, daily shows, pods, Substack network, YouTube/TikTok clips that repeats the same story. Lower your costs, break the monopolies, restore democracy, keep communities safe.

The candidates use open seats and strategically chosen incumbents. Progressives win a majority of open seats. Against incumbents, they win rarely without help. Give them the help. Make Greg Casar in his Trump+10 district the test case that proves everything.

Why Bernie's Answer Is Leadership Malpractice

At a recent town hall, someone asked Bernie how to get corporate Democrats out of the party. His answer? "You. You will run. You will organize. You will do this."

That's not leadership. That's abdication.

Here's a guy with 69% approval, a $219 million proven fundraising machine, millions of supporters, and massive media reach. And when someone asks how to take on the corrupt establishment, he says "you figure it out."

This is the progressive leadership playbook: build massive power, then refuse to use it. Tell supporters they need to organize from scratch while sitting on war chests that could fund primary challenges to every corporate Democrat in Congress.

Why won't Bernie coordinate his resources with AOC's media reach and Warren's policy infrastructure? Why won't they drop the ladder for newcomers instead of making them climb the mountain alone? Why do they keep saying "it's up to you, the public" when they have everything needed to lead the fight themselves?

Because they're scared. Scared of being blamed if it doesn't work. Scared of the establishment calling them divisive. Scared of their own vision.

But being scared while Trump destroys democracy isn't principled—it's malpractice. When you have the tools to fight and you don't, you're not avoiding responsibility, you're abandoning it.

The Moment That Demands Courage, Not Cowardice

I can tell you that right now, it seems like the time, if not now, then I don't know when. Right now you see a Democratic Party at one of its lowest approval ratings since the ratings have been tracked. You see a Republican Party that is also seeing very low approval ratings. The same with Donald Trump. The same with Hakeem Jeffries. The same with Chuck Schumer. All across the board, the current leadership of both parties and just the brands themselves are underwater.

There has never been a better time for progressives to stop sitting on the sideline scared of their own vision.

The revolution is there for the taking. The money exists. The candidates exist. The voters are ready. They've already shown it in the polling. The only thing missing? Leadership willing to actually lead instead of telling everyone else to do it.

Progressives have spent decades being told they're "too radical" while watching moderates lose election after election. They've internalized the blame for Democratic failures while building the most successful small-dollar fundraising operation in political history. They've been convinced they need to wait for permission when they already have more popular support than the establishment they're afraid to challenge.

It's time to stop apologizing for having a vision and start fighting for it. Stop worrying about being blamed for losses and start taking credit for wins. Stop telling supporters to organize from scratch and start using the massive infrastructure that's already been built.

In a world without truth, the loudest liar wins. But what if someone started telling the truth? What if someone admitted the economy is rigged, the wars were lies, the institutions are captured? What if they didn't just admit it, what if they actually fixed it? What if progressives stopped being afraid of their own power and actually used it?

If not now, when the Democratic Party polls at 29%, when Trump threatens democracy itself, when inequality destroys communities, when the planet approaches irreversible tipping points, if not now, when?

The question isn't whether progressives can win. The question is whether they'll finally decide they deserve to.

Thursday: How it actually happened. The 6-month sprint that changed American politics forever.