Should Older Progressives Step Aside, Too?

By: Sam Massey

For a decade now, it seems, the age problem in American politics has gained increasing steam among voters. For some though, they feel treated as though it is being disproportionately applied to one faction of one party at one specific moment. It is not. The same disease that hollowed out confidence in Joe Biden’s reelection bid still runs through Congress, and it still runs especially deep in the Democratic Party. Even as Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer now plan to retire, major older Democrats are still trying to hold on. Maxine Waters announced she will seek the leadership chair of the House Financial Services Committee again. Jim Clyburn, at 85, is attempting to run for an 18th-term after weighing retirement. Even in retirement though, he would likely be endorsing his 63-year-old daughter. And, Sen. Ed Markey, 79, is running for re-election despite having a clear progressive successor in Ayanna Pressley.

This is not really about one candidate or lawmaker, one gaffe, or one bad headline. It is about an emerging comfort from the elitist political class, as if they’ve convinced themselves that experience and incumbency are always more valuable than the passing of time and need for renewal. The party establishments of both parties keep making the same argument in different forms. We are told that the old guard is uniquely necessary, that nobody else can do the job, that now is never the right time to pass the torch. Democratic voters, meanwhile, have spent years signaling the opposite. Poll after poll and election after election have shown a country that is tired of government by nursing home and donor call sheet. This has been a major aspect of a past article, which you can read here.

Within Democratic politics, this argument has produced an especially tired dodge. When younger progressives call on aging establishment figures to step aside, establishment-minded voters often respond by asking whether that standard should also apply to Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Ed Markey, or other elder figures on the left. The implication is that the demand for generational change is insincere, that it is really just an ideological weapon dressed up as a principle.

But that dodge only works if progressives are unwilling to answer the question honestly. They should answer it honestly.

Yes, older progressives should step aside too.

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The point of progressive politics is not to build a church around a handful of figureheads and keep them in office until they physically cannot remain there. The point is to develop functioning institutions, representative leaders, and political goals that outlast any one person. The establishment is afraid of handing off power; because if they do, they can’t perform their ideal function of siphoning off even more money for corporations and get rewarded with campaign funds. If progressivism is serious about democratizing power, then it cannot treat incumbency as sacred just because the incumbent votes the right way most of the time. A seat is not a lifetime achievement award.

That matters even more because time in office does not just produce wisdom. It also produces calcification. It creates habits of deference when operational lag is at an all-time high, networks dependent on the feelings of major donors, and a culture in which political value gets measured by seniority, fundraising, and insider relationships rather than the ability to organize people toward a transformative project. Washington has a way of turning longevity into its own ideology of stagnation. Members are praised by the establishment as strong fundraisers, skilled political navigators, or indispensable institutionalists when what that often means in practice is that they have become deeply entangled with the machinery that most Democrats claim to oppose at their core.

The question cannot be based on whether or not an older progressive still has good values. Many do. Elizabeth Warren has contributed immensely to the modern left. Ed Markey has too. Bonnie Watson Coleman has too. Bernie Sanders obviously has too, he quite literally revitalized it. None of that is in dispute. The question is whether a movement committed to development, renewal, and democratic accountability should keep treating congressional office as the only place those leaders can contribute.

The answer is pretty clearly no.

There is enormous value in elder leadership, from those joining after a long career of other work or those doing so outside of office capacity. There is value in mentorship, movement building, public advocacy, coalition work, and helping elevate the next generation of candidates. But it has in some ways led to a stagnation in message that is being picked up and given new strength by leaders like Zohran Mamdani. Sanders, to his credit, seems to understand this better than others. He has spent years helping create space for figures like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Greg Casar, and that may end up being as important as any one vote he casts in the Senate. That is what healthy political succession looks like.

Occupation of the same seats for decades directly limits one’s drive and capacity for societal development. It blocks new voices in our politics and undermines new regional coalitions. It allows for mild, consultant-tested strategies that end in Kamala Harris lost all 7 swing states to a genuine fascist in 2024. Remember when politicians tried to cement their legacies by the legislation they pass and people they help, and not merely the fact they occupied a seat longer than anyone else? All it does is reinforce the idea that the path upward is one of patience and loyalty, not goals, challenge, or innovation. For a movement that claims to want structural change, would it not be foolish to ignore the ages of our own top leaders?

This is also where progressives should be more honest about the material side of incumbency. In modern American politics, officeholders are not only representatives anymore. They are fundraising vehicles for the party machine. They are network nodes for donor ecosystems, consultants, interest groups, and party actors. Even genuinely principled members can become institutional bottlenecks simply because they are embedded in a system that rewards money, familiarity, and hierarchy. The language used to defend them is often revealing. They are called effective because they raise money. They are called essential because they know how to work the system. But for a left that supposedly wants to challenge the system, those are not neutral virtues.

None of this means every politician over 75 must be shoved out in disgrace, or that age itself is disqualifying. It means age cannot be waved away when it is politically inconvenient. It means progressives should reject the idea that their elders are exempt from the same generational logic they rightly apply to the party establishment. It means building a standard that is actually a standard.

If progressives believe the Democratic Party needs younger leadership, then they should mean it. Not just for committee barons and failed party brass. For their own side too. A movement that cannot let go of its heroes will never fully create its successors. And if the left wants to be more than a recurring insurgency inside an aging party, it has to prove it believes in political development more than personal attachment. Yes. Older progressives should step aside, too.

This article was written by Sam Massey.