Anonymous Democrats confess to Time Magazine their party is too extreme on abortion, trans athletes

Some Democrats admitted in a new article on the party's struggles that they had gone too far to the left on significant social issues like abortion and transgender athletes, although the writer wryly noted they were afraid to identify themselves for fear of angering progressives.

In a Time Magazine profile on Democrats facing the political wilderness at the dawn of the second Trump administration, some party members acknowledged left-wing purity tests were hampering their ability to win, such as on transgender females participating in girls' sports.

"There are some sports where trans girls shouldn’t be playing against biological girls," one Democratic lawmaker anonymously told Time's Charlotte Alter. He said most of his fellow Democrats agreed but claimed they were "afraid of the blowback that comes from a very small community."

The same goes for abortion, Alter wrote, saying some Democrats want a retreat from a totally "enthusiastic embrace" through the third trimester.

Women's fencer Stephanie Turner kneels in protest in front of transgender athlete Redmond Sullivan. (Courtesy of ICONS)

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"Refusing to say that even in the third trimester there’s no limits on it, it’s not where the average American is," another anonymous Democratic lawmaker told Time. "The really embarrassing truth is Donald Trump is closer to the median voting on abortion than Democrats were."

It didn't escape Alter's attention that those Democrats were scared to go on the record about social issues that inflame activist passions.

"[T]he fact these lawmakers would only share these thoughts without their names attached shows how much Democrats still fear antagonizing their liberal base," she wrote.

Abortion was an issue that helped power Democrats to a better-than-expected showing in 2022 because of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade, but Alter said the sugar high of that midterm showing may have created "dangerous complacency" going into 2024, when Donald Trump and the Republicans took full control of Washington.

Alter took a slightly disgusted tone with Democrats she interviewed for the piece about how they could claw their way back to power.

Pro-abortion rights activists participate in the "Rally for Our Freedom" to protect abortion rights for Floridians, in Orlando, Florida.  (Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty)

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"Many of these conversations made my head hurt," she wrote. "Democrats kept presenting clichés as insights and old ideas as new ideas. Everybody said the same things; nobody seemed to be really saying anything at all."

There could be an opportunity there for a party that's hit "rock bottom," she added, noting the party seems to be recognizing the importance of electoral victory and not sidelining popular figures in the party like Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

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"Most in the party recognize this is a crisis moment," she wrote. "But every crisis is also an opportunity—a chance to rethink policies, reframe messaging, and recruit new leaders who can meet the moment. The last time Democrats were this deep in the wilderness was in 2005, when few outside the DNC had heard of Barack Obama."