Republican strategist Lindy Li on Friday told the 42 million Americans expected to lose food assistance starting Saturday that they should be “making better choices” so that they don’t have to rely on the federal program that provides meals to more than 12% of the U.S. population, including 16 milli...
  • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
    33·
    2 days ago

    Li previously ran as a Democratic candidate for Congress, describing herself as a “tree-hugging progressive,” and sought the endorsement of the Democratic Socialists of America. She lost her Congressional bid, and years later, shifted to the Republican Party and to becoming a strong supporter of Trump.

    Does anyone know of any examples of politicians swinging hard in the opposite direction? I’m not talking about things like the Lincoln project or changes made up to age 25 or so, but actual significant leftward movement from adult politicians.

    • ShaggySnacks@lemmy.myserv.oneEnglish
      9·
      2 days ago

      Elizabeth Warren was a Republican who thought people used bankruptcy as a means of escaping personal liability.

      Warren later recalled that she had begun her research believing that most people filing for bankruptcy were either working the system or had been irresponsible in incurring debts, but that she concluded that such abuse was in fact rare and that the legal framework for bankruptcy was poorly designed, describing the way the research challenged her fundamental beliefs as “worse than disillusionment” and “like being shocked at a deep-down level”.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Warren

      It was after that Elizabeth Warren moved to become more progressive about how bankruptcy laws and financial regulations.

      Widely regarded as a progressive, she was previously a registered Republican, changing her registration to Democrat in 1996. According to Warren, in the six presidential elections she voted in before 1996, she cast her ballot for just one GOP nominee—Gerald Ford in 1976. Her conservatism at the time was not rooted in social issues like abortion or gay rights, but rather on economic policy.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Elizabeth_Warren

      • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
        4·
        2 days ago

        Ooh, thank you! I may wish she were further left, but I don’t doubt that she earnestly believes in the views she says she holds, which was what I was wondering.

    • qarbone@lemmy.worldEnglish
      331·
      2 days ago

      You can never trust her again. She doesn’t believe in ideology, she just wants power and is willing to go to any side and any length to get what she feels entitled to.

      • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
        10·
        2 days ago

        Don’t worry, that’s not why I’m asking. No, she’s a rat forever.

        I just wonder if it’s always in this direction. My suspicion is that it tends to flow from more discerning parties to less discerning parties, and in the US right now, the republicans are the least discerning of the national parties. I could see people moving from actual leftist parties to the greens (in the places where the greens are either liberal or controlled opposition) in other countries, I’m not sure if they’re leftist in some countries), but that’s still a rightward move.

        • Sconrad122@lemmy.world
          61·
          2 days ago

          I think Graham Platner, if you take his word for what is in his past and present political mindsets, would be an example of a right-to-left swing, but not done as a politician. Shaun on YouTube is another one that comes to mind potentially, depending on how old he is for whether that qualifies as an under age 25. In the US at least, we don’t really have a strong left wing to draw in people looking for a change, so most of those conversions are happening less in the public sphere and more in corners of the internet, where it hasn’t been enshittified to ensure even those spaces are dominated by tight wing narratives

          • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
            4·
            2 days ago

            That’s part of why I’m asking- the vast majority of leftists I know grew up in right wing or centrist circles and moved left on their own, but I don’t know if there are politicians who really reflect that.

            Actually, Graham Platner is very relevant and I’m interested in whether people trust him enough to elect him and whether he stays true to the principles he ran on.

    • khannie@lemmy.worldEnglish
      82·
      2 days ago

      Does anyone know of any examples of politicians swinging hard in the opposite direction?

      I just learned today that Hitler was a lefty in his early days. True story.

      He was always anti-Semitic though. That wasn’t unusual for the times however.

      Someone describing themselves as a tree hugging progressive railing against supporting society’s most vulnerable can go and fuck themselves with a fishing rod though.

      • ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works
        5·
        2 days ago

        You’d be looking at some early 20th century interpretations of leftism though, which is an important nuance. Lenin was a member of the Russian Social Democrats, but most people probably wouldn’t attribute his legacy to Social Democracy.