A Centrist on the Road

I recently traveled through the American Southwest. The scenery was spectacular, and the spring climate was remarkably pleasant.

Travel has a way of producing conversations that are different from ordinary social life. You meet people briefly, often in beautiful or unfamiliar places, and sometimes talk more freely than you might at home. Other times, of course, people avoid anything controversial.

During this recent travel, I had a few conversations about public policy and the state of American politics. Sometimes views were offered openly. In other cases, they emerged only after questions. None of the conversations were confrontational.

What struck me most, however, was not the number of political conversations, but how few there were. Despite making my interest in politics clear more than once, most people avoided the subject almost entirely.

That itself seemed revealing.

Democratic Party Politics

The easiest conversation to begin was with someone who had volunteered an interest in politics. This person had been active in Democratic Party politics and described their own views as left wing, but not far left wing.

We agreed on a number of things, including the need for Democrats to reach voters outside their normal constituencies. I shared the CIVPAC website and asked for reactions. My suspicion is that the site may have been reviewed, but it did not generate much enthusiasm.

I heard, from someone else, the view that Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania should leave the Democratic Party. I found that revealing. Fetterman still votes with Democrats the overwhelming majority of the time. He is also exactly the kind of culturally heterodox Democrat who may be able to reach voters the party otherwise struggles to reach.

It may be easier to accept the concept of a broader coalition in the abstract than to accept the reality of sharp disagreement from members of one’s own coalition.

A Competitive Senate Race

Another conversation concerned a competitive Senate race in the Northeast. The person I spoke with knew the race well and was clearly dissatisfied with the available choices.

The reaction was not enthusiastic support for one side so much as exhaustion with the alternatives. The sense I took away was not ideological excitement, but political fatigue.

For CIVPAC, races like this are difficult. A candidate may be more centrist on a number of public policy issues than most members of that candidate’s party and may even have broken with party leadership on some important questions. But that same candidate may also have supported party leadership on many other issues in ways that weaken any claim to independence.

At the same time, the opposing candidate may hold views on socialism, foreign policy, public safety, or political violence that many moderates find difficult to accept.

The conversation itself was short. Unlike my exchange with the Democratic activist, this did not feel like a conversation with someone trying to shape the future of a party. It felt more like a conversation with someone tired of choosing among imperfect options.

My suspicion is that this kind of voter may be more representative of the broader electorate than the activists who dominate so much political discussion.

Immigration and Economic Dislocation

I have also encountered strong views about immigration, especially when people believe immigration has affected their own economic prospects.

The H-1B visa program for highly skilled workers is a good example. At the national level, expanding the supply of skilled labor may increase growth, reduce costs, and support innovation. That is the standard economic argument, and it has real force.

But the individual experience can look very different. Someone who invests time and money in retraining for a technology-related career, only to find the door closed, may experience immigration policy not as an abstraction, but as a personal economic threat.

I am not in a position to judge whether any particular person’s career disappointment was caused by foreign labor competition. Labor markets are complicated, and individual outcomes rarely have a single cause.

But the feeling is real. And politically, feelings of unfairness matter.

Policies that appear efficient at a national level can still generate resentment and distrust if people experience the burdens and benefits as unfairly distributed. A politics that ignores those concentrated costs should not be surprised when affected voters become angry.

International Politics

Another conversation turned to European politics, immigration, and nationalism. The person was very familiar with European politics and followed political developments there closely.

The views expressed did not fit neatly into standard American categories. There was concern about democratic backsliding and authoritarian politics, but also some sympathy for European leaders who had taken a harder line on immigration. The argument was that immigration restrictions may have protected some countries from social and public-safety problems experienced elsewhere in Europe. There was also interest in pro-natalist policies, including benefits and protections for new parents.

This was not a wholehearted endorsement of European nationalism. Nor was it a full-throated condemnation.

What interested me most, however, was how poorly the conversation fit American political categories. A person with cross-border experience expressing partial sympathy for nationalist European leaders because of concerns about immigration, crime, and demographics does not fit comfortably into the ideological narratives that dominate American politics.

For myself, I viewed recent political change in parts of Europe, including the defeat of Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party in Hungary, with guarded optimism. Guarded because it is never immediately clear how a new government will actually govern. Optimistic because cooperation with democratic allies and support for Ukraine matter a great deal.

Real voters are often more complicated than our political labels.

Conclusions

There is nothing remotely scientific about gathering political impressions while traveling. But informal conversations sometimes reveal things that polls cannot.

I had only a handful of political conversations. Despite making my interest in politics clear, most people I encountered did not express political views at all.

I increasingly think that silence itself may say something important.

Most people may simply be exhausted by the current political environment. They may also be reluctant to expose their views to criticism from people they do not know well. In many social settings, politics increasingly feels less like a conversation and more like a potential social risk.

People naturally search for conversational ground with strangers. Passing on an obvious invitation to discuss politics may therefore tell us quite a bit.

I also suspect that some vocal people already have relatively fixed political identities and voting behavior. But the quieter majority may still be politically available in ways activists and highly engaged partisans often underestimate.

Both parties should recognize that and act accordingly.

In retrospect, I also wish I had identified myself more strongly as a centrist independent and not simply as someone interested in politics. I wonder whether that would have changed some of the conversations — or perhaps encouraged more of them.

Maybe next time.