--- title: Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms description: Abdul El-Sayed's Michigan victory is challenging long-held beliefs about progressive electability as Democrats set their strategy for November. canonical: https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/ author: Rebecca Schneid article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-08-05T18:26:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-05T20:29:06.726Z article:section: Politics og:title: Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms og:description: Abdul El-Sayed's Michigan victory is challenging long-held beliefs about progressive electability as Democrats set their strategy for November. og:url: https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6f9a80b13f9f34b0/6a739bea017cc17864b295b9/AP26217542750110.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 6000 og:image:height: 3375 og:image:alt: AP26217542750110.jpg og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms twitter:description: Abdul El-Sayed's Michigan victory is challenging long-held beliefs about progressive electability as Democrats set their strategy for November. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6f9a80b13f9f34b0/6a739bea017cc17864b295b9/AP26217542750110.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Rebecca Schneid](https://time.com/author/rebecca-schneid/)  ## Rebecca Schneid Reporter Aug 5, 2026 6:26 PM UTC  Abdul El-Sayed speaks during a news conference at the Spirit of Detroit shortly after winning the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Michigan on Aug. 5, 2026. Abdul El-Sayed speaks during a news conference at the Spirit of Detroit shortly after winning the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Michigan on Aug. 5, 2026. Julia Demaree Nikhinson—AP  by [Rebecca Schneid](https://time.com/author/rebecca-schneid/)  ## Rebecca Schneid Reporter Aug 5, 2026 6:26 PM UTC Abdul El-Sayed's [victory in Michigan](https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/abdul-el-sayed-haley-stevens-michigan-democratic-senate-primary-election-result/) is the latest in a string of progressive primary wins that are challenging the Democratic Party’s thinking about electability—and it could reshape the party's strategy heading into November. Michigan offered the clearest example yet on Tuesday. El-Sayed won the Senate primary, while progressives also notched victories in key House races. William Lawrence, the founder of the Sunrise Movement, captured the nomination in the battleground 7th Congressional District, and Donavan McKinney unseated Rep. Shri Thanedar in the safely Democratic 13th District. **Read More:** [_Abdul El-Sayed Wins Michigan Senate Primary, Delivering Progressives a Major Battleground Victory_](https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/abdul-el-sayed-haley-stevens-michigan-democratic-senate-primary-election-result/) Progressives had already accumulated a series of high-profile wins this summer: [Janeese Lewis George](https://time.com/article/2026/06/17/DC-mayor-race-Janeese-Lewis-George-DSA-democratic-socialists-midterm/) claimed victory in the mayoral primary race for Washington, D.C., in June; [Chris Rabb](https://time.com/article/2026/05/19/chris-rabb-pennsylvania-third-house-district-democratic-primary-election-results/) beat out two moderates for a House seat in Pennsylvania; and [Graham Platner](https://time.com/article/2026/07/09/graham-platner-maine-senate-midterms-democrats/) won Maine’s Senate primary, although he later dropped out. But Democratic strategists have already acknowledged that progressive candidates can do well in safely blue districts; Michigan signaled that they can stand out in competitive states. What makes El-Sayed’s win even more notable is that he’s the first progressive to carry a senatorial primary in a state that President Donald Trump won in 2024\. The outcome suggests that progressives may be able to secure wins when and where Democrats need them most. It’s a theory that more centrist party members have long doubted—but if proven, it could also shift the party’s strategy not only this fall, but also looking ahead to elections in 2028\. ## What does this mean for the future of the Democratic Party? El-Sayed’s victory is representative of a shift in the Democratic Party, according to Evan Roth Smith, a pollster and political consultant. He tells TIME that it could settle a 10-year debate among left-wing politicians who have tried to find the best strategy to respond to Trump-era Republicans. The questions on either side of the debate, he says, are: “Is the party’s future about passion and organizing and envelope-pushing?” He explains that progressives believe this approach can appeal to “ideologically eclectic voters in the middle.” Or, he asks, do the centrists present a stronger strategy for the party, which is to lean into candidates who are “optimized around the median voter” in the hopes of swinging them to the left. **Read More:** [_What Is a Democratic Socialist?_](https://time.com/article/2026/06/18/what-is-a-democratic-socialist-mamdani-lewis-george-bernie-sanders-aoc/) Smith believes that progressive candidates’ wins show that the base is fed up with the more conventional approach put forth by establishment Democrats. Instead of emphasizing electability, the party could find success by putting its support behind those who are “optimized around the truest and innermost desires of the primary electorate.” “That calculus collapsed because of the events of [2024](https://time.com/7173550/how-kamala-harris-lost/),” Smith says, referring to the period in which President Donald Trump won his second term and Democrats lost the Senate. Importantly, El-Sayed’s win was not as much of a landslide as polls had projected, something Trump noted in his [reaction](https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/117043300198873853) on Truth Social. “As usual, the polls were way off on this one,” he wrote. These polling inaccuracies may reveal a potential blind spot toward progressives, Smith says, explaining that Democrats are likely to take note as Wisconsin heads into its primary next week. Polls show progressive gubernatorial candidate Rep. Francesca Hong winning in the state. “Hong is in many ways the presumptive nominee for governor of Wisconsin at this point,” he says. “But what we saw last night is a major polling miss that heavily overestimated the progressive candidate, which will make people in Wisconsin raise their eyebrows and say, ‘Well, we all think Hong the frontrunner, but maybe this polling's no good.’” Smith says there is reason to believe Wisconsin has more accurate polling practices than Michigan. Either way, Democrats will watch Hong’s primary closely. Establishment Democrats claim that she is [unlikely](https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/elections/2026/08/03/tony-evers-hits-campaign-trail-with-david-crowley-to-stave-off-hong/91160104007/?gnt-cfr=1&gca-cat=p&gca-uir=false&gca-epti=z117048p119450l002450c119450u116548e1105xxv117048&gca-ft=27&gca-ds=sophi) to beat the GOP’s presumptive nominee, Rep. Tom Tiffany, and that her loss could even hurt Democratic candidates in downballot state races. Red-state progressives faced some losses on Tuesday. Notably, Missouri Rep. Wesley Bell, a moderate, crushed a comeback attempt by his progressive predecessor, Cori Bush. The real proving ground comes in November, Smith says. Midterm elections are the first real chance for progressives to topple longstanding narratives from within their own party that their ideology is not electable. Midterm wins might show that there is “a better path to victory than the caricature of establishment Democrats as lab-grown moderates,” he says. It would give progressives the chance to show that their policies “get people who are disengaged or tuned out, excited.” But the biggest takeaway from El-Sayed’s race is that the Democratic Party can no longer be made up of factions, Smith says. “What the Democratic Party has to look at itself and say is: ‘How do we make the party a home for both of these camps?’” he explains. “Because otherwise, it’s not tenable.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/"},"headline":"Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms","datePublished":"2026-08-05T18:26:32.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-05T20:29:06.726Z","description":"Abdul El-Sayed's Michigan victory is challenging long-held beliefs about electability as Democrats set their strategy for November.","url":"https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/","keywords":["democrats","Michigan","Midterms","News Desk"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6f9a80b13f9f34b0/6a739bea017cc17864b295b9/AP26217542750110.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Rebecca Schneid","jobTitle":"Reporter","url":"https://time.com/author/rebecca-schneid/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6f9a80b13f9f34b0/6a739bea017cc17864b295b9/AP26217542750110.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"AP26217542750110.jpg","caption":"","creditText":"Julia Demaree Nikhinson—AP","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/democrats/","name":"democrats"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/article/2026/08/05/progressives-rack-up-primary-wins/","name":"Progressives Rack Up Primary Wins, Testing Democratic Assumptions Ahead of the Midterms"}}]}] ```