Given how few political appointments there are relative to applicants, it's surprising to read that, "There were fewer people who believed in the Biden approach than there were jobs in the Administration."
Stef: thank you for this post, which is an outstanding public service (above and beyond what you did through last year!).
The point Harry quotes seems fundamental to me. If you are correct that Democratic staffing as a whole is drawn from a population that willfully disregards the preferences of the Democratic electorate as determined by the primary, that places a ceiling on the efficacy of the party.
The number of people who are young, willing to be paid fairly low wages, and deal with the stresses of government work self-selects for people who really care and the vast majority of people who really care are progressives.
It also self-selects for people who have the financial and family freedom to accept low wages in an incredibly expensive city. Combined with the "people who care" selection effect, you end up selecting almost exclusively for young, single, politics-obsessed scions of the professional managerial class--which happens to be among the least practical and most out-of-touch groups imaginable.
I suspect you're wrong about this, but I doubt the stats exist to show one way or the other.
The relevant argument--that if you don't pay politicians/staffers well, then only the already-rich become politicians/staffers, and that's bad--seems to me like exactly the sort of pragmatic, counterintuitive argument that appeals to elite moderates, but that leftists would have no time for because it can't be deployed to justify an immediate revolution.
But then, I consider myself a moderate and I've held that opinion for many years.
I think the actual numbers would find highest support among very high-info voters and those people are disproportionately very liberal, but among normal people, injecting people would be bleach would be more popular than paying politicians or people connected to politicians more from the public purse.
True that high-info voters tend to be more liberal, but high-info is a very large category in a country of this size. I'd still argue it's the moderates among the high-info who are more likely to be able to accept a nuanced argument like this. Left-wing members of our coalition, even well-educated and intelligent ones, tend to prioritize moral absolutes and identifying villains over nuance and worrying about incentives.
This honestly seems like lame cope to me… are we to believe that President Manchin or President Bloomberg couldn’t have filled these jobs with moderates? Did Biden at any point make a phone call to someone to the right of Dick Durbin to ask for some personnel recommendations?
Manchin and Bloomberg would have attracted people that would have staffed Republicans or come from private sector jobs. Bloomberg himself is a bad example here, he would have lifted a bunch of people from his company and his foundation (and eliminated the other roles)
And these people who would have staffed a Bloomberg administration… refused to serve under Biden? Daniel Doctoroff wouldn’t take his calls? Kevin Sheekey pretended he was washing his hair for four years? This is why I called it cope - Biden could have dialed Bloomberg’s number instead of Warren’s and gotten some more moderate staff!
This post is very helpful! I like that you’ve done something that I rarely see— you’ve explained a process calmly, without telling us which parts of the process should outrage us. When people explain things that way, I think it distorts the truth a little bit, or a lot.
I think that if the party is going to be better at winning elections, it needs to address the ways this process leads candidates away from considering electoral reality. I hope a lot of people read this!
My position: I’m not outraged by these things, but I do think the party needs to talk about changing the process so that Dems win elections. Clear-eyed analysis like yours is needed.
Enjoyed this post. As a political scientist, and someone who has worked in a number of state and local campaigns, like other commenters, I was surprised by the lack of control the policy side of the campaign, and later the administration had over staff. While the campaigns I worked on were obviously much smaller, this was still surprising. I've also worked for governors, so some some staff divergence isn't surprising, but the degree you describe was. Most surprising this line "There were fewer people who believed in the Biden approach than there were jobs in the Administration." REALLY If that is the state of who is available to work for the party, it does not bode well for our ability to run and staff campaigns that can appeal to median, moderate, and even marginal voters. Your point about who and how the party hires is obviously important going forward.
I think that is more of a reflection of the poor pay and work environment for these sorts or roles, and who is drawn to them despite these factors. In a situation where pay and work environment are poor, only the most passionate will apply. Passion does not always equal efficacy. In fact, it can undercut it.
I do not really disagree, but see the low pay etc. as privileging more upper class college grads who can live with the lower salaries as well as more ideologically motivated types who will can afford to work for less for a “cause”than the more diverse backgrounds Stef is calling for in her piece
In truth I see the same tension here in the North Carolina Democratic Party where there is a real disconnect between how our candidates want to run their campaigns and what they want to say and the positions our party activists want the party say in our platform and resolutions. I can say more about this, but for now let’s just say it’s a problem that may have unfortunate consequences.
"Personnel diversity efforts focused on race, gender, and LGBTQ+ status (which are important!), but failed to also extend to demographic characteristics like socioeconomic status, first-generation college graduates, and first/second-generation Americans. These expanded diversity efforts would have brought additional important voices into the Administration." Good grief - you guys are still pushing the diversity agenda? Isn't that one of the reasons why Democrats lost big time in the last election? Giving preference to people because they tick certain diversity boxes instead of assessing their individual abilities as potential members of the campaign team is so yesterday.
It’s shocking to hear that with only 2 exceptions Biden’s inner circle avoided saying no to people. That’s pretty fundamental to managing employees. What did Biden value more in choosing this inner circle?
Maybe it's a bit like a "weak leadership" problem - part of the responsibility of a leader of an organization is to get your staff aligned with your vision, and Biden seemed like he had trouble doing that.
Can you--or shouldn't you--tell us the names of some of these advisers added for the general that shifted Biden left, and which specific policies they were associated with? Otherwise, this is kind of a guessing game that teases the reader with an insider look at the campaign, but doesn't really provide any specific examples or issues Democrats need to reconsider.
2028 is going to be a reckoning. When exactly did Biden start to decline? Why did so many still back him after that debate? Why did the White House lie and tell the American people he was perfectly fine—when polling showed for three years that age was a growing concern?
Now we’re seeing it in 2026 with Senate candidates being asked if Chuck Schumer should still be leader. (I don’t think so.) At some point, everyone over 70 has to step aside. These people can’t legislate AI when they barely understand email.
And let’s be honest: the Jake Tapper book is going to expose a lot. The cover-up, the internal panic, the backroom deals—it’s all coming.
Jumping off from this analysis, we are wondering how much of the shift to the left (which we noticed and felt betrayed by) was because Biden was cognitively impaired. So, staff, who were more left in their thinking, were actually making the decisions.
This confirms the realization that I had years ago, which is that it doesn't matter what kind of Democrat you vote for, you'll get a left-wing government wedded to pushing through unreasonable and unpopular causes in contempt of ordinary Americans. Because it's those kind of people who present themselves to be hired by a Democratic administration. It's all there are.
Biden redefined the meaning of the Civil Rights Act by executive order on the first day of his administration. Thus creating the grotesque and divisive trans issue out of whole cloth. Who put him up to that? I can't imagine a President who was actually in charge of his administration being pushed into doing that. On Day One. For me, it leads to the question: was he mentally unable to govern as far back as that, or is the Democratic party just that factional and ungovernable? Or both?
Either way, it is dangerous to the country for them to be in charge of the government. The way things are going, I don't see them being fit to govern in my lifetime.
Great post! Want to highlight that I liked it before I nitpick. You write:
"Personnel diversity efforts focused on race, gender, and LGBTQ+ status (which are important!), but failed to also extend to demographic characteristics like socioeconomic status, first-generation college graduates, and first/second-generation Americans. These expanded diversity efforts would have brought additional important voices into the Administration."
and at the end you suggest:
"They should consider in hiring decisions additional factors such as whether someone is a first-generation college graduate or a first/second-generation immigrant. They should aim to hire some staff who have a working-class background in order to make sure the staff better represents the American electorate."
It feels a bit like diversity is a shell game where people with different ideological objectives are emphasizing different types of diversity to stack the deck for their ideological allies. (Progressives emphasize demographics, you emphasize background and geography.) Maybe we should just be honest with ourselves. I'm happy to care about diversity a bit, but it should be include traits besides demographics (e.g. the traits you mentioned, ideology), and not be put on a pedestal where people can weaponize it for ideological gain.
I was fascinated by so much in your article, and learned a good deal. But I do feel there was a hole in it where you—as you recognized—could have distinguished the issues on which Biden truly shifted left from those on which you feel he got a bum rap.
I also think you were too diplomatic toward members of the inner circle who made decisions to avoid confrontation and saying no. These aren’t small shortcomings in top WH staff.
Given how few political appointments there are relative to applicants, it's surprising to read that, "There were fewer people who believed in the Biden approach than there were jobs in the Administration."
Stef: thank you for this post, which is an outstanding public service (above and beyond what you did through last year!).
The point Harry quotes seems fundamental to me. If you are correct that Democratic staffing as a whole is drawn from a population that willfully disregards the preferences of the Democratic electorate as determined by the primary, that places a ceiling on the efficacy of the party.
The number of people who are young, willing to be paid fairly low wages, and deal with the stresses of government work self-selects for people who really care and the vast majority of people who really care are progressives.
It also self-selects for people who have the financial and family freedom to accept low wages in an incredibly expensive city. Combined with the "people who care" selection effect, you end up selecting almost exclusively for young, single, politics-obsessed scions of the professional managerial class--which happens to be among the least practical and most out-of-touch groups imaginable.
Ironically, almost the only people who'd want political staffers (of both parties) to be incredibly well-paid are basically very left-wing people.
I suspect you're wrong about this, but I doubt the stats exist to show one way or the other.
The relevant argument--that if you don't pay politicians/staffers well, then only the already-rich become politicians/staffers, and that's bad--seems to me like exactly the sort of pragmatic, counterintuitive argument that appeals to elite moderates, but that leftists would have no time for because it can't be deployed to justify an immediate revolution.
But then, I consider myself a moderate and I've held that opinion for many years.
I think the actual numbers would find highest support among very high-info voters and those people are disproportionately very liberal, but among normal people, injecting people would be bleach would be more popular than paying politicians or people connected to politicians more from the public purse.
True that high-info voters tend to be more liberal, but high-info is a very large category in a country of this size. I'd still argue it's the moderates among the high-info who are more likely to be able to accept a nuanced argument like this. Left-wing members of our coalition, even well-educated and intelligent ones, tend to prioritize moral absolutes and identifying villains over nuance and worrying about incentives.
This honestly seems like lame cope to me… are we to believe that President Manchin or President Bloomberg couldn’t have filled these jobs with moderates? Did Biden at any point make a phone call to someone to the right of Dick Durbin to ask for some personnel recommendations?
Manchin and Bloomberg would have attracted people that would have staffed Republicans or come from private sector jobs. Bloomberg himself is a bad example here, he would have lifted a bunch of people from his company and his foundation (and eliminated the other roles)
And these people who would have staffed a Bloomberg administration… refused to serve under Biden? Daniel Doctoroff wouldn’t take his calls? Kevin Sheekey pretended he was washing his hair for four years? This is why I called it cope - Biden could have dialed Bloomberg’s number instead of Warren’s and gotten some more moderate staff!
Yes, they would rather work for Their Man rather than someone who is just otherwise ideologically aligned. This isn’t surprising.
The general vibe I get from this article and others is that Biden's staff went to great lengths to trouble him as little as possible.
This post is very helpful! I like that you’ve done something that I rarely see— you’ve explained a process calmly, without telling us which parts of the process should outrage us. When people explain things that way, I think it distorts the truth a little bit, or a lot.
I think that if the party is going to be better at winning elections, it needs to address the ways this process leads candidates away from considering electoral reality. I hope a lot of people read this!
My position: I’m not outraged by these things, but I do think the party needs to talk about changing the process so that Dems win elections. Clear-eyed analysis like yours is needed.
Enjoyed this post. As a political scientist, and someone who has worked in a number of state and local campaigns, like other commenters, I was surprised by the lack of control the policy side of the campaign, and later the administration had over staff. While the campaigns I worked on were obviously much smaller, this was still surprising. I've also worked for governors, so some some staff divergence isn't surprising, but the degree you describe was. Most surprising this line "There were fewer people who believed in the Biden approach than there were jobs in the Administration." REALLY If that is the state of who is available to work for the party, it does not bode well for our ability to run and staff campaigns that can appeal to median, moderate, and even marginal voters. Your point about who and how the party hires is obviously important going forward.
I think that is more of a reflection of the poor pay and work environment for these sorts or roles, and who is drawn to them despite these factors. In a situation where pay and work environment are poor, only the most passionate will apply. Passion does not always equal efficacy. In fact, it can undercut it.
I do not really disagree, but see the low pay etc. as privileging more upper class college grads who can live with the lower salaries as well as more ideologically motivated types who will can afford to work for less for a “cause”than the more diverse backgrounds Stef is calling for in her piece
In truth I see the same tension here in the North Carolina Democratic Party where there is a real disconnect between how our candidates want to run their campaigns and what they want to say and the positions our party activists want the party say in our platform and resolutions. I can say more about this, but for now let’s just say it’s a problem that may have unfortunate consequences.
"Personnel diversity efforts focused on race, gender, and LGBTQ+ status (which are important!), but failed to also extend to demographic characteristics like socioeconomic status, first-generation college graduates, and first/second-generation Americans. These expanded diversity efforts would have brought additional important voices into the Administration." Good grief - you guys are still pushing the diversity agenda? Isn't that one of the reasons why Democrats lost big time in the last election? Giving preference to people because they tick certain diversity boxes instead of assessing their individual abilities as potential members of the campaign team is so yesterday.
This somehow ended up in my feed. Thank you, this was insightful.
It’s shocking to hear that with only 2 exceptions Biden’s inner circle avoided saying no to people. That’s pretty fundamental to managing employees. What did Biden value more in choosing this inner circle?
Obviously they liked yes-men, hence the 2024 disaster!
Maybe it's a bit like a "weak leadership" problem - part of the responsibility of a leader of an organization is to get your staff aligned with your vision, and Biden seemed like he had trouble doing that.
Can you--or shouldn't you--tell us the names of some of these advisers added for the general that shifted Biden left, and which specific policies they were associated with? Otherwise, this is kind of a guessing game that teases the reader with an insider look at the campaign, but doesn't really provide any specific examples or issues Democrats need to reconsider.
Can we also talk about the elephant in the room?
2028 is going to be a reckoning. When exactly did Biden start to decline? Why did so many still back him after that debate? Why did the White House lie and tell the American people he was perfectly fine—when polling showed for three years that age was a growing concern?
Now we’re seeing it in 2026 with Senate candidates being asked if Chuck Schumer should still be leader. (I don’t think so.) At some point, everyone over 70 has to step aside. These people can’t legislate AI when they barely understand email.
And let’s be honest: the Jake Tapper book is going to expose a lot. The cover-up, the internal panic, the backroom deals—it’s all coming.
VERY informative.
Jumping off from this analysis, we are wondering how much of the shift to the left (which we noticed and felt betrayed by) was because Biden was cognitively impaired. So, staff, who were more left in their thinking, were actually making the decisions.
This confirms the realization that I had years ago, which is that it doesn't matter what kind of Democrat you vote for, you'll get a left-wing government wedded to pushing through unreasonable and unpopular causes in contempt of ordinary Americans. Because it's those kind of people who present themselves to be hired by a Democratic administration. It's all there are.
Biden redefined the meaning of the Civil Rights Act by executive order on the first day of his administration. Thus creating the grotesque and divisive trans issue out of whole cloth. Who put him up to that? I can't imagine a President who was actually in charge of his administration being pushed into doing that. On Day One. For me, it leads to the question: was he mentally unable to govern as far back as that, or is the Democratic party just that factional and ungovernable? Or both?
Either way, it is dangerous to the country for them to be in charge of the government. The way things are going, I don't see them being fit to govern in my lifetime.
I would like to read the inner details about Biden’s foreign policy. The only area he was centrist and I kind of wish he wasn’t.
So the answer is Biden hired staff who undermined his agenda? Whoops!
Great post! Want to highlight that I liked it before I nitpick. You write:
"Personnel diversity efforts focused on race, gender, and LGBTQ+ status (which are important!), but failed to also extend to demographic characteristics like socioeconomic status, first-generation college graduates, and first/second-generation Americans. These expanded diversity efforts would have brought additional important voices into the Administration."
and at the end you suggest:
"They should consider in hiring decisions additional factors such as whether someone is a first-generation college graduate or a first/second-generation immigrant. They should aim to hire some staff who have a working-class background in order to make sure the staff better represents the American electorate."
It feels a bit like diversity is a shell game where people with different ideological objectives are emphasizing different types of diversity to stack the deck for their ideological allies. (Progressives emphasize demographics, you emphasize background and geography.) Maybe we should just be honest with ourselves. I'm happy to care about diversity a bit, but it should be include traits besides demographics (e.g. the traits you mentioned, ideology), and not be put on a pedestal where people can weaponize it for ideological gain.
I was fascinated by so much in your article, and learned a good deal. But I do feel there was a hole in it where you—as you recognized—could have distinguished the issues on which Biden truly shifted left from those on which you feel he got a bum rap.
I also think you were too diplomatic toward members of the inner circle who made decisions to avoid confrontation and saying no. These aren’t small shortcomings in top WH staff.
Surely, the George Floyd racial reckoning that began on May 25, 2020 pushed the Biden campaign leftward?