He's Backing Losers and Infuriating the DNC. It Might Be Exactly What Democrats Need.

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David Hogg has had an interesting summer. First, the 25-year-old Parkland shooting survivor-turned-political activist left his high-profile job as a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee over disagreements regarding Hogg's plan to spend tens of millions of dollars to back young progressive challengers to Democratic incumbents and establishment candidates. Then one of those challengers, 33-year-old Zohran Mamdani, won his longshot bid to be the Democratic nominee for New York City mayor. Not long after, though, a pair of Hogg-backed candidates both lost their Democratic primaries for Congress by big margins.

Hogg's critics point to a number of losses like these for candidates backed by his group, Leaders We Deserve, to argue that the activist and the candidates he backs are too green, or too soft, to actually accomplish the organization's goal of reimagining Democratic Party politics as a place where young progressives can thrive. Hogg is undeterred, confident that his approach will win back the Gen Z voters that the party bled during Donald Trump's 2024 presidential victory. And each high-profile victory for a young progressive like Mamdani shows there is a desperate appetite among left-leaning voters for some version of what Hogg is trying to provide, whether or not he ultimately has the chops to make it work.

On one level, David Hogg is performing a service the party badly needs: He's one of relatively few people acknowledging that the party's current gerontocracy has been a massive failure with massive consequences. What's less clear, however, is whether Hogg is up to the task of replacing that gerontocracy with something better.

Hogg is hoping wins like Mamdani's will inspire a “tsunami of young people to run for office.” He described Mamdani's victory as an “Obama-like moment” for young voters disillusioned by the failures of an aging Democratic Party leadership. “It almost feels just fictional for young people in Gen Z,” he told me.

In actuality, LWD didn't have much to do with Mamdani's success. The group did not publicly endorse him until just a few days before the primary when it was very clear an upset was on the cards. It did ultimately give $300,000 , however, to a super PAC supporting Mamdani and other candidates against former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, the largest single contribution to the super PAC. Three days prior to the election, Madani filmed a campaign video with Hogg as the pair of them talked with young voters in Washington Square Park. One New Yorker asks Hogg what the name of his group is and he replies “Leaders We Deserve.” The citizen says “leaders we deserve? There's one right here,” pointing to Mamdani, who responds with laughter and an exuberant slam dunk motion that was typical of Mamdani's man on the street vibe that carried him to a decisive 12-point victory.

Mamdani's win is not necessarily emblematic of LWD's other work. Hogg and I spoke about a month after Irene Shin, state Democratic delegate, suffered a bruising loss in a Virginia special election to fill late Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly's old seat. Shin, 37-years-old, was the progressive candidate Hogg backed in the race, and, according to a new report by the Washington Post , his group promised to spend $400.00 on her behalf. But after internal polling showed Shin vastly behind his opponents, Hogg's money never came through. Shin lost her race, earning only 14 percent of the vote, with Connolly's former chief of staff claiming victory.

Then in July, Hogg's chosen candidate, 25-year-old TikTok influencer Deja Foxx, faced off in an Arizona special election to fill the late Rep. Raúl Grijalva's seat. Foxx worked on Kamala Harris' first presidential run in 2020 as one of the campaign's youngest staffers and in the years since built up a large social media following. Two weeks before election day, internal polling showed Foxx rapidly gaining ground in Arizona's 7th Congressional District. She ultimately lost, though, by over 30 points to Adelita Grijalva, the late Rep. Grijalva's daughter who was favored to win and racked up progressive endorsements of her own from Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Hogg attributed Foxx's loss partly to the timing of the special election, taking place in the middle of summer when college students aren't on campus, a key constituency for Hogg's candidates. Though both races reflected an unfortunate loss for LWD, Hogg insisted that one of his biggest goals is just getting money in the hands of younger challengers so that they stand any kind of a chance. “We know that the cards are stacked against younger people, especially younger women, and we want to do everything we can to support them and get money behind them,” Hogg said. “So that if they do lose, the reason why is not because they weren't able to get the financial support in order to get ahead.” The candidates Hogg does back seem to appreciate that support, which isn't coming from traditional Democratic party organs and which notably doesn't include any corporate contributions.

During the 2024 election cycle, LWD endorsed 12 candidates across state and federal races, and four won. Averie Bishop, 28-years-old and a former Miss Texas pageant winner, was one of the losing candidates, running for a Texas House seat held by an eight-term Republican incumbent. Hogg poured $500,000 into her race and Bishop, who had never held elected office before, ended up earning 46 percent of the vote—about eight points shy of the incumbent winner.

Bishop told me working with Hogg was “phenomenal,” as LWD helped her land interviews, prepare for campaigning, and stay focused on her mission to challenge the political machinery of a deep red state. But another losing candidate, who asked to remain anonymous, told me they felt abandoned by Hogg, as he initially pledged to invest a significant amount more into the race than he ended up spending.

“Sometimes there's going to be candidates who we may not spend as much money on because a poll comes out that shows that the pathway to victory is actually substantially harder than it initially was,” Hogg said. “Sometimes, I would rather have somebody mad at us for not spending as much money as we could have, when we know it's not going to make a difference than just spending a ridiculous amount and still losing.”