The midterms teach us that responding to voters’ needs requires going beyond familiar ground and listening to their moods and needs, as has happened not only in the United States but also recently in Israel, Brazil, Serbia and Hungary.
Piero Fassino, deputy chair of the Defence Committee of Italy’s Chamber of Deputies and a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, tells Decode39. “The latest elections tell us that those who win are those capable of mobilising a broad cross-section of citizens, beyond their own electorate.”
Q: Why did Donald Trump lose the midterms?
A: Because his policies did not win the support of a majority of American citizens, nor did his arrogant behaviour. His entire approach, based solely on the glorification of strength, was rejected. He had promised to make America great again, and never has America been as isolated and weak as it is today.
- Trump has managed to turn a substantial part of the world against him. But the American vote also confirms a trend that has emerged in many elections in recent months. From the vote in Hungary first, then in Serbia, Brazil, Israel and finally the United States — despite these being very different situations — a consistent indication emerges: electoral outcomes are determined by a broad mobilisation of public opinion that extends beyond traditional party electorates.
- In these years of abstention, the principle has taken hold that “those who bring more of their own voters to the polls win elections”. The latest elections tell us something very different: those who win are those capable of mobilising a broad and diverse cross-section of citizens, beyond their own electorate.
Q: What does the Democratic breakthrough in Texas tell us?
A: It confirms what I have just said. The American Democrats managed to prevail even in states that had always been dominated by Republicans. It was not only their own electorate that voted for Democratic candidates, but also a substantial section of Republican voters. We are facing a new paradigm: voting today is increasingly a free choice based on opinion and decreasingly based solely on allegiance.
Q: And how should parties organise themselves now?
A: They must become attuned to the demands of their societies and look beyond their own electorate, developing the ability to build ideas, proposals, messages and programmes capable of responding to the demands of a broad section of public opinion.
Q: What should the broad centre-left alliance, for example, do in this respect?
A: Thinking that we win only if we bring our own electorates to the polls is reductive: we need to look beyond, to the country, to society, drawing this lesson from the American, Serbian, Hungarian and Israeli elections. In Serbia, Vučić was overthrown by a very broad mobilisation that brought together students and civil society.
- The same happened in Hungary. In the United States, Trump lost even in Republican strongholds because a large section of public opinion within that electorate rejected his policies, considering the Democrats’ proposals more credible. So the lesson is to open up and engage with the questions, anxieties, expectations and demands of society at large.
Q: Let me mention two countries that will go to the polls soon: Spain and France, both also facing street protests. What observations can we make?
A: We cannot know now how it will end, but the same rule applies to them: those who know how to become attuned to the demands of those protests will win. Naturally, clearly separating citizens’ movements expressing public opinion — particularly those of young people — from the manipulative actions of violent groups, which must be firmly opposed.
Q: The American Democrats are a very broad coalition, ranging from Talarico to Ocasio-Cortez. The newly elected Texas senator broke a taboo that had held since 1988, and at his final rally he gave a speech invoking God. Could he be the ideal candidate for the 2028 presidential election?
A: First, it should be emphasised that Talarico belongs to the latest generation of a family of Calabrian immigrants, confirming that American society is a plural society and that the melting pot has worked and continues to work, against those who, like Trump, would like to close society off into ghettos.
- The president exploited immigration in such a demagogic and instrumental way that people voted for the other side. Talarico is also the expression of a multiethnic, multicultural, multireligious society.
- In Italy, we are accustomed to all being Catholic, but American society is also plural from a religious standpoint: Catholics, Protestants, Mormons, Muslims, Jews. And cultural and religious plurality is a value. Talarico had no hesitation in affirming his faith, and this not only did not penalise him, but rewarded him for the sincerity with which he presented himself.
