Katie Pavlich: Post-defeat, Dems veer left

It’s been just one week since Hillary Clinton’s stunning presidential defeat, handily losing to underestimated Republican Donald Trump.

Based on reporting leading up to Election Day, Clinton and her team didn’t see it coming. They had pre-ordered fireworks for a night of celebration and popped champagne on the campaign bus hours before polls closed, convinced a victory was headed their way.

{mosads}And then, the results started coming in. By the time 10 p.m. rolled around on the night of the election, Clinton staffers became rattled and nervous. They disappeared for hours from the press and made no statements about how the night was going.  

When Wisconsin fell, the first breakdown of Clinton’s “blue firewall,” it was over. Clinton supporters inside the New York City Javitz Center started to cry, and some left early. Just a few Manhattan blocks away, Trump’s party was just getting started.

Later in the night, news came that Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta was making his way, alone, across the city to address supporters. He arrived without the Democratic nominee, who again proved she was above it all, and tried to console devastated attendees that votes were still being counted.

“We’ll have more to say tomorrow,” Podesta said. “Go home, get some sleep.”

Shortly after Podesta’s remarks, around 2:30 a.m., Trump made it over the 270 electoral vote threshold and was declared the next president of the United States. Clinton called him to concede. It was officially over.

Since Trump entered the GOP race in July 2015, there has been endless talk about an ongoing Republican civil war. Right up to Election Day, op-ed headlines were published everywhere about how to rebuild the Republican brand and how to salvage what would be left of the party after a Trump loss. Now the tables have turned and it’s Democrats who are doing an autopsy of what went wrong. Already, we’re seeing the party turn further to the left.

The day after Clinton’s loss, Team Bernie Sanders was asked for comment about the results.

“We have nothing polite to say right now,” a top Sanders adviser told CNN the morning after the election.

Sanders himself isn’t cutting Clinton any slack and essentially laughed at her excuse to donors that FBI Director James Comey is the reason for her loss.

“I will tell you I think there needs to be a profound change in the way the Democratic Party does business. It is not good enough to have a liberal elite,” Sanders said on CBS News this week. “I come from the white working class and I am deeply humiliated that the Democratic Party cannot talk to the people from where I came from.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), who was favored by the progressive wing of the party over Clinton to run for president, is leading the charge against Trump and his inner circle from the Senate. She’s also criticizing what she sees as watered-down liberal policies like ObamaCare, which, according to her, should have been a push for single-payer healthcare from the beginning.

“Let’s be honest: It’s [ObamaCare] not bold, it’s not transformative,” Warren said during a private meeting with the Democracy Alliance this week.

Interim DNC Chairwoman Donna Brazile, who was busted by WikiLeaks for feeding Clinton at least two debate questions, is reportedly being blamed for Clinton’s loss and was screamed at by a staffer during a post-election meeting. The internal strife at party headquarters has prompted former DNC Chairman Howard Dean to run again for the position. Rep. Keith Ellison (Minn.), who represents a progressive wing of the party and sits on the Congressional Progressive Caucus, is also running. He’s been endorsed by Sanders and incoming Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.).

“It is not enough for Democrats to ask for voters’ support every two years. We must be with them through every lost paycheck, every tuition hike, and every time they are the victim of a hate crime. When voters know what Democrats stand for, we can improve the lives of all Americans, no matter their race, religion or sexual orientation. To do that, we must begin the rebuilding process now,” Ellison released in a statement.

In the past, Ellison has supported socialized medicine, gutting defense funding, the abolishment of the Second Amendment, expensive and job-killing climate change mandates, a 63 percent tax rate and more progressive pipe dreams.

In the wake of a Trump victory, the Democratic Party is tacking to the left in an attempt to harness the populist message that put Trump in the White House. Unfortunately for them, talk of more government overreach in a time when voters want less involvement won’t win them back the white working class they’ve been claiming to represent for years.

Pavlich is editor for Townhall.com and a Fox News contributor.