A report shared with NPR on July 29, 2026, says the Democratic Party is splitting apart between two groups: voters with college degrees and working-class voters without them. The report says Democrats should focus more on the economy and stop making "defending democracy" their main message.

The report was written by Joan C. Williams, a San Francisco law professor, and Jared Abbott, who leads the Center for Working Class Politics and has a PhD from Harvard. It is based on a survey of more than 5,000 Americans conducted earlier in 2026. NPR

The report defines "working class" as people without a four-year college degree who earn $40,000 to $100,000 per year. That group makes up the middle 50% of American incomes. The survey found that college-educated liberals and working-class voters care about very different things, including LGBTQ+ rights, abortion access, climate change, immigration, and how to spread wealth.

The biggest gap is on "resisting authoritarianism." Liberal college graduates rank it as their second-most important issue. Working-class voters rank it 19th out of 20. The NPR article carrying the report has the headline: "To win over working class voters, Democrats need to stop talking about democracy."

Williams told NPR she is focused on winning elections. "I am tired of losing. I want to build a sustained progressive coalition capable of delivering on progressive goals," she said.

Abbott said Democrats have a values problem. He told NPR that until the party takes seriously the values of self-reliance, patriotism, tradition, and personal security, it will keep losing.

The report offers two fixes. First, Democrats should consistently back economic populism, which means arguing that the economy is rigged against ordinary people. Second, they should stop doing anything that makes college-educated liberals look like they look down on people without degrees. The report says whichever party wins working-class voters will have the advantage going forward.

This is not a new concern. Exit polls cited by the Brookings Institution show working-class voters went 56% for Donald Trump and 42% for Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. Brookings Institution The Conversation wrote in June 2026 that Trump began winning working-class voters in 2016, breaking through states that Democrats had relied on for years. The Conversation

The Democratic National Committee acknowledged the problem in a May 20, 2026, document on its own website, noting that Trump's campaign targeted working-class households with economic messaging. Democratic National Committee

Other research has pointed the same way for over a year. Politico reported in November 2025 that working-class voters view Democrats as "woke and weak." Politico Third Way, a centrist Democratic group, published a report in February 2025 on the party's relationship with white working-class voters. Third Way

Data for Progress, a polling and research group, has argued for a while that economic populism is the answer. A September 2025 analysis found that bold economic populism appeals to working-class voters across party lines, income levels, and education levels. Data for Progress A June 2025 analysis by the same group said Zohran Mamdani's electoral win showed that economic populism works. Data for Progress

The new Williams-Abbott report agrees with that populist push but goes further. Other groups like Data for Progress and Third Way have focused mostly on economic policy. This report says there is also a values gap and that Democratic messaging about democracy itself is turning away the very voters the party needs. The 19th-out-of-20 ranking for "resisting authoritarianism" is the most striking number in the report, and the authors call it the most urgent.

The Washington Post reported on July 9, 2026, that Democrats are trying to recruit candidates with working-class backgrounds to win those voters back. That approach focuses on who runs for office, while the Williams-Abbott report focuses on what the party says. Washington Post

Data for Progress polling has also tracked the split inside the party. An April 2025 survey showed Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez leading Chuck Schumer by 19 points in a hypothetical 2028 Democratic primary, a result that fits the argument that the party's base is moving toward the kind of economic messaging the report supports. Data for Progress

The report arrives about 100 days before the 2026 midterm elections. The Democratic Party's problem with working-class voters is now documented by multiple research organizations and acknowledged in the party's own internal communications.

The bigger picture is that this report does not stand alone. Several research groups, the DNC, and party-aligned organizations have all reached the same conclusion: Democrats are losing working-class voters, and the trend has been building for years. What makes this report different is its argument that talking about democracy is not just failing to persuade working-class voters but actively pushing them away. If the authors are right, Democrats face a hard choice between two groups of voters who increasingly want different things, and that choice will shape the party's direction well beyond the 2026 midterms.