New Democrats (United States)
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New Democrats, also known as centrist Democrats, Clinton Democrats, or moderate Democrats, are a centrist ideological faction within the Democratic Party in the United States. As the Third Way faction of the party, they are seen as culturally liberal on social issues while being moderate or fiscally conservative on economic issues. New Democrats dominated the party from the late 1980s through the early-2010s, and continue to be a large coalition in the modern Democratic Party.
With the rise of progressivism in 2016 and 2020, and that of the right-wing populism of Donald Trump, New Democrats began to change and update their ideological positions. Debates over tax cuts on capital gains have been reconfigured to removing caps on state and local tax deduction (SALT).
Despite expansion of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), even with stricter criteria for CPC representation in Congress, the New Democrats' Progressive Policy Institute (established in 1989) persists into the present day, sponsoring "young pragmatists" at the rechristened Center for New Liberalism, formerly known as the Neoliberal Project, to "modernize progressive politics". In 2024, the CPC lost four seats in the overarching House Democratic Caucus, although the number of members in the CPC remained the same. At least two out of nine CPC freshmen planned to also hold seats in the New Democrat Coalition (NDC) as well, joining an additional twenty-two House Democrats who similarly claimed membership in both caucuses. The NDC lost approximately five members, yet gained twenty-three, reestablishing the coalition as the leading Democratic partisan caucus in Congress.
Brad Schneider, chief architect of cap removals from the SALT deductions, is NDC chairman in the 119th United States Congress over rival Sharice Davids. Schneider endorsed a rival candidate for the position, Sharice Davids, as Honorary Chair of the NDC ReNew Democracy Foundation (distinct from the Renew Democracy Initiative). In the aftermath of the loss in the 2024 United States presidential election and a decline in approval for the Democratic party and it's congressional leadership (including by members of the party itself) own the CPC and NDC continue to debate the future of the Democratic Party.