The Slow, Then Sudden, Death of the Hawkish Democrat

The speech that arguably won Barack Obama the presidency was delivered six years before he ran for the White House and four years before he reached Congress. In October 2002, Obama, then a state senator from Illinois, delivered a blistering speech against the impending war in Iraq. “I don’t oppose war in all circumstances,” he declared at a Chicago rally. “What I do oppose is a dumb war.”

Years later, that stance would distinguish Obama from Hillary Clinton, the initial front-runner in the 2008 Democratic primary. The two contenders were largely in accord on domestic policy, which made their differences on foreign policy loom large. Clinton, like most Senate Democrats, had voted to authorize the Iraq War. But with that decision now deeply unpopular on the left, Obama leaned into his early opposition. His campaign produced supercuts of his anti-war sentiments over the years and even filmed supporters reciting the lines of his 2002 speech, in one of the earliest examples of viral video in American politics. The contrast proved consequential. Surveys showed that Democratic voters upset by the war broke for Obama, who narrowly edged out Clinton and went on to win the White House.

[David Frum: Can’t stop it, so lead it]

Today’s Democrats appear to have learned from Obama’s example and the Iraq debacle. On March 2, Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia, a swing-state politician and potential presidential contender, announced his campaign for reelection and delivered a broadside against another Middle Eastern war. “Eight months ago, President Trump lied to the country when he falsely claimed to have obliterated Iran’s nuclear program,” Ossoff told supporters. “Now he says he’s taken the United States to war for regime change without evidence of imminent threat, without having exhausted diplomacy, without clear objectives or a plan for the aftermath, and without the consent of Congress.”

Ossoff’s speech was powerful, but it was most notable for not being noteworthy. Numerous high-profile Democratic politicians, including moderates in purple states and some considering a run for the presidency, have expressed similar sentiments. Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona, a veteran of the Iraq War, has repeatedly dubbed the Iran campaign “a dumb war,” echoing Obama, and warned about America being pulled back into the Middle East. California Governor Gavin Newsom accused Trump of “engaging in an illegal, dangerous war that will risk the lives of our American service members and our friends without justification to the American people.” Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey, a past and likely future presidential candidate, called this week for the withdrawal of U.S. forces “from this reckless and unauthorized war of choice with Iran.” The progressive standard-bearer Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez predicted that Trump’s bombing would prove “catastrophic,” while on the other end of the party’s ideological spectrum, even Democratic candidates endorsed by AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby group, distanced themselves from the war.

The contrast with the Democratic Party of yesteryear could not be more apparent. Back in 2002, Democrats with White House aspirations felt compelled to authorize the Iraq War, even if they would later turn against it. Many of these politicians had witnessed decisive interventions in places such as Kosovo, Bosnia, and the first Gulf War that had salutary outcomes and ended without devolving into quagmires. Influenced by this experience, Senators John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden—the Democratic nominees for president in 2004, 2016, and 2020—all voted to back the invasion of Iraq. Today the dynamic has flipped, and presidential contenders are tripping over themselves to repudiate Trump’s war. Because so many have staked out opposition, these politicians are unlikely to be the next Obama. But they are ensuring that they will not be the next Hillary Clinton, a promising potential president whose support for a disastrous Middle Eastern war sabotaged her candidacy.

[Franklin Foer: Trump is betraying Iran’s pro-democracy protesters]

The reasons for this reversal are not just hindsight. Ever since Donald Trump assumed office, American politics has become polarized around his personality, with feelings about the president often dictating opinions about his policies. As a result, it has become very difficult for Republicans to oppose his agenda—and toxic for Democrats to support it. Moreover, unlike the Bush administration in 2002, the Trump administration has made little effort to sell the nation or the international community on its intervention, making military action less popular and easier for a poll-conscious politician to reject. Back in 2003, some 60 percent of Americans supported the invasion of Iraq, including about 40 percent of Democrats, creating significant cross-pressures on ambitious liberal elected officials. Today nearly all polls show that most Americans oppose the current campaign in Iran, and that an overwhelming majority reject a prospective ground invasion. When it comes to Democrats in particular, the numbers are laughably lopsided. A YouGov poll released this week found that 81 percent of Democrats believe that war with Iran is “not justified.” Just 7 percent disagreed.

In short, both the ghosts of the past and the polls of the present have conspired to push the Democratic Party in a staunchly anti-war direction. And given that wars tend to lose popularity the longer they drag on, this is likely the most popular the Iran war will ever be among Democrats. If the conflict turns out to be a success for Trump, his opposition will have to account for its nay-saying. But most Democratic elected officials seem to prefer taking that bet over the alternative. Obama’s argument didn’t just carry the day in his primary; it reshaped his party entirely.