Sanders did far, far better than expected but still fell short, a result with myriad explanations—including, in some small part, Warren’s decision not to endorse him (a calculation that earned her vitriolic blowback but serious vice presidential consideration by the Clinton camp). Yet his insurgent campaign—and the ultimate victory of Donald Trump—fundamentally altered the American political calculus, shaking neoliberal orthodoxy, defined by Green as the “conviction that market logic should be rigorously applied to all aspects of public policy.” Clearly, outsourcing public services to the private sector wasn’t cutting it, practically or politically.
Expressions of “resistance” to Trumpism filled the streets, although—as Green notes—the marchers were ideologically diverse and included many conventional liberals. Still, the Sanders campaign had given leftist politicos experience and connections, and many began organizing explicitly left-wing runs for office. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a bartender and former Sanders volunteer, decided to take on one of the most entrenched centrist Democrats in Congress, her campaign powered by Sanders veterans and new organizations explicitly devoted to electing leftists. Much to the surprise and chagrin of the political class, she won, becoming the most recognizable face among a new generation of left-wing politicians seizing office.
In the run-up to 2020, so much lefty energy was coursing through the Democratic electorate that almost every Democratic candidate for the presidential nomination claimed to support Medicare for All (with Biden being a notable exception). “Warren entered the race expecting to take back the mantle of progressive warrior from Sanders,” Green writes, but in this respect she failed. Sanders emerged from the first primaries as the clear vote-leader, yet, once again, Warren did not endorse him. Several high-profile left-wing political organizations split over whom to support (DSA unsurprisingly went to Sanders, while the Working Families Party controversially supported Warren), even as the centrist candidates united behind Joe Biden (assisted by some “behind-the-scenes cajoling from Barack Obama”). The establishment Democrat won out in the end, but, concludes Green, his party is still “at the beginning of a new era,” divorced or at least distanced from neoliberalism, although the era’s contours remain “largely undefined.”