Five years ago, as Democrats grappled with a disappointing congressional election that saw their House majority decline by more than a dozen seats despite Joe Biden's win in the presidential election, then-Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D–Va.) voiced her frustration with the party's lurch toward the political left.
If Democrats didn't shift back toward the center, "we will get fucking torn apart," she warned on a conference call with some of the Democrats' top brass. "And we need to not ever use the words socialist or socialism ever again."
