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Imagine your perfect political candidate. What’s their background? Where do they come from? What do they look like? What is their belief system? Are they religious? Do they have a family? What’s their sexual orientation? What’s their gender identity? Where do they stand on current issues? National issues? International issues?
Do you have them? Good.
Chances are slim that any two readers will imagine the same candidate, given the infinite possible combinations.
Unfortunately, this is also how many Americans approach the ballot box. Every individual voter is entitled to their own litmus test to determine whether or not they want to vote for someone. But when a candidate checks all but one of your boxes and you walk away, it creates an impossible environment where candidates must have an opinion on every niche issue—or risk losing votes or, worse, facing a digital dogpile for dismissing a potential voter.
Living in a democracy is both a blessing and a curse when it comes to political discourse. The meeting and discussion of ideas make us more thoughtful and more understanding when done correctly. But it has an uglier side, where outrage brews if a politician hasn’t addressed an issue quickly enough, or where people dismiss a good representative because they don’t quite “fit the mold.”
The Amazon Prime Effect: Unrealistic Expectations
In modern America, you can get almost anything custom-made and delivered to your door within days. Now with AI, you can even generate images of things that don’t exist in seconds. This individualist drive at the heart of American capitalism also seeps into politics.
Every business should bend to your schedule. Every teacher should cater to your child uniquely. And every politician, it seems, should subscribe to your personal priorities and wants.
I’m all for holding Democrats to a high standard, and I’ve engaged in activism to move them on issues. There are innovative ways to run primaries against Democrats who have been abhorrent. There are fundamental tenets of the Party and of good governance that every candidate should meet. If they don’t, they should be held accountable. That isn’t the issue.
The problem comes when the bar is set so impossibly high that almost no one can clear it. When litmus tests are so bespoke that no one could keep them all straight, are we really engaging constructively—or just being too complicated?
The Moving Goalpost Game
Politicians are human. They aren’t the omniscient, omnipotent beings that media and history sometimes make them out to be. Expecting them to have all the answers sets up an impossible task: people demand responses on everything—even when it’s irrelevant to their office.
Is it a requirement for a county board supervisor to have a stance on federal trade policy? No.
Does a school board member need a position on international conflicts overseas? Probably not. If they do, that’s great—but what can they actually do about it?
Should a state delegate issue a statement on every national news story? Of course not, or they’d never stop posting.
Not everyone has to have a stance on every niche issue. On the campaign trail as a manager, I’ve heard it all:
“Will your candidate divert traffic from my neighborhood so I don’t hear as many cars?”
“Where do they stand on letting citizens kill feral cats?”
“Do they support removing astroturf fields from schools due to cancer risks?”
“What about balloon pollution hurting coastal wildlife?”
“What about bat populations and wind turbines?”
My answer was always: “I’ll have to ask and get back to you.” Because if I answered wrong, that’s another lost vote. Politics has become a series of tests seemingly devised for candidates to fail.
And when the bar keeps moving, even politicians who change or grow face another hurdle: the question of whether it’s ever “too late” to be right.
Too Late to Be Right?
A common practice in activism is to pressure officials to improve on policy—whether online or in person. But too often, even when leaders come around, they’re met with the dismissive response: “Well, it’s too late now.”
What’s the point of persuading someone if you’ll shame them for not having that view earlier? People learn. They grow. Shouldn’t we applaud that?
We should give each other the grace of knowing that most people come to activism with good intentions. When people evolve, we should welcome them rather than punish them. Otherwise, we risk demotivating allies—or worse, fueling the petty, spiteful streaks that some politicians already carry.
There’s Only One AOC—and You Ain’t Her
Since 2018, we’ve had some great primary challengers who shook up the status quo. They’ve made our party and our democracy stronger. But more often, candidates run simply to run. They assume being younger, flashier, and good at branding is enough.
I’ve said it before: a candidate’s viability isn’t about their identity, their age, or their merch. It’s about how they lead, how they treat people, what they stand for, and whether they show up with integrity.
Not every young candidate is AOC. Not every older incumbent is Joe Crowley, either. Some veterans in office are dead weight. Others are doing phenomenal work and don’t deserve to be attacked for age alone.
When every incumbent faces a challenger—many without real cause—it’s like the Boy Who Cried Wolf. People stop taking the challenges seriously, especially when the incumbent is both progressive and popular. Primaries are a powerful tool for progress, but not one to be wielded recklessly.
No One Size Fits All Candidate
Monolithing all of our voters—and all of our candidates—is how we lose. Not every candidate will work in every locality, but pitting Democrats from very different districts against one another to decide “who is a better representation of the Party” is equally foolish.
For instance, Representative Abigail Spanberger and New York State Senator Zohran Mamdani may both run in the same year, but they are not running the same race. They serve different states, different communities, and vastly different constituencies. Mamdani’s free rent proposal and Socialist label would never gain traction in most of Virginia, just as Spanberger’s CIA and law enforcement background would not resonate in Mamdani’s race.
And you know what? That’s fine. That’s the strength of the Democratic Party. We are a coalition—a spectrum of views and priorities—but we agree on far more than we disagree.
As I wrote in an earlier piece about Mamdani’s race, he might not win a rural House seat in Virginia. But a Virginian candidate running a similarly bold, community-rooted, digital-forward, coalition-building campaign absolutely could. That’s what we need to understand.
As long as our candidates are rooted in their districts and advancing an agenda that improves people’s lives, why should one be deemed “more representative” of our Party than another? The measure of success shouldn’t be conformity—it should be whether they deliver for the people they seek to represent.
Policy, Not Personality
Our time is better spent advocating for policy than policing the “right kind of candidate.” When we center politics on personalities, we lose sight of the fundamental goals. Policy is what endures.
Politics should be about the outcomes we create, not about worshipping personalities. Idolizing politicians prevents accountability—and blinds us to their humanity. The more we treat them as infallible, the more division and disappointment we invite.
Politicians are not deities. They’re public servants. Our culture of fanaticism tricks us into thinking they’re perfect beings, but they’re just people who decided to do more.
Because at the end of the day, anyone can say the right things or present the right image. Authentic leadership is measured by what we deliver for our communities.
That means no politician is a perfect savior. We can support the individuals we believe will be the most effective advocates for our communities. If we get multiple good choices, even better—but at some point, we have to make a choice.
That’s why I reject the idea that “both sides are the same,” which drives people to stay home. But Democrats must show voters why we aren’t the same. That means electing officials who champion policy that improves lives. And it means that post-primary, we champion our nominees.
What’s happening right now in places like New York City and Minneapolis, where Democratic establishment figures refuse to support duly elected nominees who both happen to be Muslim, socialist State Senators.—shows the problem clearly. The “Blue No Matter Who” crowd quickly changes its tune when it’s not their preferred candidate. If we want people to have faith in the Party, Democrats must practice what we preach: fight hard in primaries, but once voters have decided, help elect Democrats in November and hold them accountable afterward.
Because democracy doesn’t work if support is conditional, if we want voters to believe in Democrats, Democrats have to believe in democracy—especially when the nominee isn’t the one they wanted.
TL;DR
Voters often chase an impossible idea of the “perfect” candidate—expecting politicians to check every box, comment on every issue, and never make mistakes. This mindset creates unrealistic litmus tests that punish good representatives, discourage growth when politicians do evolve, and fuel unnecessary primary fights. Not every candidate is an AOC-style disruptor, and identity or branding alone doesn’t make someone viable—integrity, policy, and service do.
At its core, politics should be about policy, not personality. Leaders are human, not saviors. If Democrats want to win and govern effectively, they need to hold candidates accountable while still uniting behind nominees post-primary. Otherwise, we risk eating ourselves alive while the other side advances unchecked.
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By the Ballot is an opinion series published on Substack. All views expressed are solely those of the author and should not be interpreted as reporting or objective journalism or attributed to any other individual or organization. I am not a journalist or reporter, nor do I claim to be one. This publication represents personal commentary, analysis, and opinion only.

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