Retrieving common ground in the United States

Trumpism was about appealing to working-class voters, particularly men, through a combination of nostalgia and nativism and by blaming the minority and the migrant. The new liberal politics seems to have been successful in wooing a large swathe of those voters back, by refusing to be trapped into playing the opponent's game

Between the Senate, the House of Representatives, and executive offices, after this week’s election, US politics is at its most diverse.

3 min readNov 7, 2026 07:00 AM IST First published on: Nov 7, 2026 at 07:00 AM IST

Throughout the rise and consolidation of Trumpism, explicitly or as unsubtle subtext, the foundation of Make America Great Again (MAGA) has been a repudiation of diversity and fair representation. Attacks on “DEI”, women, people from “sh*****e countries”, minorities and migrants went hand in hand with demonising establishment liberals and centrists as out-of-touch with “authentic” Americans. No doubt, some of Donald Trump’s positions had wide resonance. They might even continue to echo among MAGA supporters. That said, the Democratic sweep in the midterms holds broader lessons. The centre in America appears to have moved beyond the cold arithmetic of demographic sums to reinvigorating the idea of an umbrella coalition, in which there is a recognition of common ground and shared stakes.

Between the Senate, the House of Representatives, and executive offices, after this week’s election, US politics is at its most diverse. Abdul El-Sayed is the country’s first Muslim senator, Chris Papas the first openly gay senator, and Peggy Flanagan the first Native American. America will have five Black governors serving simultaneously for the first time, and Hakeem Jeffries, the frontrunner for Speaker, may well be the first African-American to hold the office. Nithya Raman, mayor-elect of Los Angeles, joins Zohran Mamdani as a South Asian at the head of one of the country’s most important cities. They campaigned around issues that cut across traditional divides — the cost-of-living crisis, war with Iran, corruption. These diverse leaders on Democratic tickets have breached Republican bastions.

Trumpism was about appealing to working-class voters through nostalgia and nativism. The new liberal politics seems successful in wooing a large swathe of those voters back, by refusing to be trapped into playing the opponent’s game. For the better part of a decade, liberal politicians across democracies have struggled to articulate a politics that is representative of diversity and also universal in its themes. A viral video from El-Sayed’s campaign trail offers an answer. Asked by a conservative voter to denounce the Muslim Brotherhood, El-Sayed interrogates the very premise of the question, “I am not running to be a Muslim senator, I’m running for US Senate and I happen to be Muslim.”