Former Rep. Harold Ford Jr. delivered a blunt warning to his own party this week, telling Fox News viewers that Democrats will lose elections if they embrace the agenda of the Democratic Socialists of America.
Appearing on The Five, Ford broke with the party-line boosterism that often defines Democratic appearances on the network, conceding that the socialist wing’s rising influence is a liability heading into the 2026 midterms.
“If we believe that the DSA, their ideas are the right ones for the country, then we’re going to lose,” Ford said, according to PJ Media. He cited last week’s Wisconsin primary results as evidence that the party’s leftward drift is a problem, not a strength.
Ford said he was pleased to see the upset win by “young fellow Crowley,” who mounted a come-from-behind victory, but he flagged the narrow margin in another race — for El-Sayed, who “only won by a very, very small amount” — as a cautionary signal. In Ford’s view, those results show that Democratic voters are more concerned with kitchen-table economics than with revolutionary politics, and that they will abandon the party once they realize the DSA “are not for them.”
Agreeing With Carville, Sort Of
Ford also weighed in on strategist James Carville’s sharp critique of the party’s socialist faction, though he softened the language. Carville had called the DSA wing “fools,” a word Ford declined to repeat.
“I won’t go as far as my friend James, who used the word ‘fools,’” Ford said. “But you are foolish if you believe these ideas are not only going to win, but are going to make the country stronger and better.” He stressed that politics should aim “to make the country better, Democrat and Republican alike,” rather than score points on television or align with “terrorist organizations.”
Ford’s willingness to say this on Fox News stands out, PJ Media’s Matt Margolis noted, at a time when most Democrats appear on the network only to dodge tough questions. Jessica Tarlov, his co-panelist, has been defending Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) as a “moderate” compared with the “core DSA wing” — a claim that drew pushback, given AOC’s membership in the New York City DSA.
But Ford Has His Own Blind Spots
Margolis, however, argued that Ford’s critique loses some force because of the policy prescriptions he offered. Ford said Democrats should build an alternative economic message around eliminating “all of President Trump’s tariffs because they’re driving up costs.” Margolis countered that the runaway inflation Democrats promised the tariffs would trigger has yet to appear.
Ford also expressed disappointment in President Trump, saying he should have cut the federal government “by 5%” to pay for tax relief, arguing “there’s enough waste there to do it.” Margolis pointed out that Democrats have fought Trump’s downsizing efforts at every turn — in the courts and in Congress — treating every eliminated program like a crisis. “Blaming Trump for a fight Democrats themselves have waged is ridiculous,” Margolis wrote.
Despite those disagreements, Margolis credited Ford with getting the big picture right: a small, ideologically rigid faction has come to define the Democratic Party’s direction, and the voters who actually decide elections are paying attention. Whether that warning resonates inside the party remains an open question as the midterms approach.
Source: pjmedia.com — https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2026/08/19/a-democrat-just-confessed-the-midterms-could-be-a-disaster-for-his-party-n4956311
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