What party’s platform says
Democrats signaled the coronavirus is a top issue. Above, a health care worker conducts a test Monday at a drive-thru
Democrats this week officially approved a new party platform, outlining a sweeping set of policies on key issues including health care, climate change and the economy.
But the platform also reinforced divisions among the party’s moderates and its liberal wing, which has expressed disappointment that the official Democratic agenda does not support “Medicare for All,” the universal, single-payer health care proposal championed by Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont that has become a pillar of the progressive movement.
Some refused to vote for the platform as a form of protest.
A largely symbolic document, the party platform does not contain specific legislation or binding commitments. Taken as a whole, however, it provides a broad look at the party’s agenda and the principles and values that Democrats, including former Vice President Joe Biden, embrace.
The platform was written by a drafting committee that included members from the party’s progressive and more moderate wings. The Democratic National Committee’s platform committee then voted on the platform before sending it to all of the delegates who voted remotely on whether to approve it.
Last month in a parallel process, six Biden-Sanders “unity” task forces gave their own broad policy recommendations to the platform committee. The recommendations amounted to a collection of broadly accepted liberal policy proposals — much like the new platform.
Coronavirus pandemic: The pandemic remains front of mind for many Americans, and Democrats signaled in their platform that responding to the crisis is a top concern. It is the first full policy section of the platform.
Many of the proposals are broadly consistent with what Democrats have supported, including increasing funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and providing more aid to state and local governments for initiatives specific to COVID-19, such as contact tracing.
Democrats also support free testing and treatment for everyone as well as free vaccines when they become available. And they want to expand paid sick leave and unemployment insurance to help workers affected by the health crisis.
Health care: The section on health care is something of a catchall that broadly outlines Democrats’ desire to bring down the cost of prescription drugs, reduce health care costs and improve the quality of care. While it nods to Medicare for All, it stops far short of backing it.
But perhaps the most interesting part of the party’s stance on health care is how it plans to expand coverage. Borrowing language from Sanders, the platform asserts that “health care is a right for all.” But it seeks to secure universal health care through a public option, not “Medicare for All.”
“Democrats believe we need to protect, strengthen and build upon our bedrock health care programs, including the Affordable Care Act,” the platform reads. “Private insurers need real competition to ensure they have incentive to provide affordable, quality coverage to every American.”
The economy: The section of the platform that is devoted to the economy blends and borrows ideas from across the Democratic Party’s ideological spectrum. There are echoes of Sanders (“The U.S. economy is rigged against the American people”) and wonky subsections that address “Curbing Wall Street Abuses” and “Tackling Runaway Corporate Concentration” — issues highlighted repeatedly by Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
Overall, there are few surprises. Democrats, for instance, support raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2026, a policy already widely backed across the party. They want to invest in infrastructure, including high-speed rail.
Democrats also support aggressive steps to encourage homeownership by increasing affordable housing and by giving a $15,000 tax credit to first-time homebuyers, among other initiatives.
Perhaps most notably, the platform promises to “reject every effort to cut, privatize or weaken Social Security.” The pledge is particularly relevant following President Donald Trump’s push to cut payroll taxes, which Democrats said could jeopardize the funding stream for the popular government program.
Climate change: The party’s platform sets aggressive goals of eliminating carbon pollution from power plants by 2035 and achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions for all new buildings by 2030, with the goal of achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
But the platform makes no mention of the “Green New Deal,” a sweeping congressional resolution to combat climate change that is widely supported by the party’s progressive wing. It also does not call for an end to fossil fuel subsidies — an omission that has frustrated activists — although Biden’s plan does.
Criminal justice, racial justice: Democrats want to “overhaul the criminal justice system from top to bottom.” But the platform does not include support for defunding the police, which has become a rallying cry for some activists amid the nationwide reckoning over racial justice and police brutality. Instead, Democrats support “national standards governing the use of force,” like banning chokeholds. The party also wants to eliminate cash bail.
Education: Democrats support making public colleges and universities tuition-free for students whose families earn less than $125,000. The proposal does not go as far as the plan proposed by Sanders, which stipulates tuitionfree public colleges and universities for everyone. The platform does support making community colleges and trade schools tuition-free for all students.