A former senior Democratic leader has said the results of the midterm elections in the US show the future of the party lies with backing moderate candidates rather than those from its progressive wing.
Irish-American politician Joe Crowley was a member of the House of Representatives representing New York for 20 years until 2018 when he lost out to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a fractious Democratic primary.
He was the fourth most senior Democratic congressman at the time and was considered a possible successor to speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Crowley said he believed the Democrats’ route back to political power would come through the centre ground rather than the progressive left, which is spearheaded by Ocasio-Cortez.
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He said moderate candidates, rather than the party’s progressive left, were those who delivered the breakthrough in the midterm elections.
He said US president Donald Trump had lost the confidence of voters for failure to deliver on his key promises on inflation, lowering the cost of living and keeping the United States out of “endless” foreign wars.
“The elections were a complete and utter repudiation of Trump and what he has done over the last two years,” he said.
He also criticised the administration’s “repulsive” treatment of undocumented immigrants, saying it had alienated not only Democrats but Republicans in traditionally conservative states including Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.
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For Crowley, the central lesson of the election was that the Democrats must back moderate candidates. He believes the results provide an opportunity for Democratic leader in the House, Hakeem Jeffries, to build on that success and strengthen the party’s position nationally.
The Democrats, he said, must concentrate on practical issues such as housing affordability, immigration, tariffs and the cost of living rather than allowing internal ideological divisions to dominate the political debate.
Crowley is senior director of public policy for international law firm Dentons and was in their Dublin offices this week to give briefings on the implications of the election results for the US, Europe and Ireland.
During his time in Congress, Crowley was an active member of the Friends of Ireland and was a strong supporter of the peace process in Northern Ireland. He was also associated with many progressive issues and was a strong advocate of former US president Barack Obama’s health initiative, Obamacare.
His political career came to an abrupt end in 2018 when he lost the Democratic primary in New York’s 14th Congressional District to Ocasio-Cortez, then a relatively unknown newcomer.
“I take nothing from ‘AOC’ and her work ethic and her acumen because she won the election. I always said, ‘I live by the sword, I died by the sword.’”
The defeat coincided with an extraordinarily difficult period for his family. His eldest son, Cullen, was diagnosed with cancer soon afterwards and passed away in 2025.
Despite their political differences, he said he had no personal animosity towards Ocasio-Cortez. He said she wrote a thoughtful letter to him and his wife following their son’s death, a gesture they greatly appreciated.
He remains unconvinced about her political direction and whether she could eventually command support beyond the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
Asked about her potential presidential ambitions, he said her future would depend on how her policies developed.
He also expressed reservations about New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, particularly his socialist politics and proposals for state-run grocery stores.
“I don’t support socialists,” he said, adding that such proposals could threaten neighbourhood bodegas, and run counter to New York’s commercial and social fabric.
On Iran, Crowley believes the United States must find a way back to diplomacy, while maintaining international economic pressure on Tehran. “We must find a way back to the negotiating table.”
He believes the conflict has demonstrated the strategic importance of the Strait of Hormuz to Iran, and the country’s ability to use control of the waterway to inflict considerable economic damage internationally.
“I think they now recognise their own new power of the Strait of Hormuz. I think we have to find ways to maybe work around that so that they don’t have the physical ability to inflict pain on the world economy.”
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