"Allyship" and "birthing people": Democrats confront vocabulary problem

The big picture: Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear has been the most vocal about the need for Democrats to "talk like a normal human being," as he's put it in speeches and interviews.

• Beshear told Michigan Democrats at an April convention that the party has repelled red- and swing-state voters by using terms like "justice-involved population" rather than inmates, "food insecure" instead of "hungry," and "substance-use disorder" instead of "addiction."
• "Sometimes these terms make it feel like we're talking down to people, like we're talking at them, instead of to them," he said.

The new terminology was an effort to show more cultural sensitivity and include historically shunned groups.

• But many of the words only made sense to a subset of the left — and were easily weaponized by Republicans to make their opponents look out of touch.

State of play: Beshear isn't the only potential 2028er hitting the theme.

• California Gov. Gavin Newsom has said repeatedly that Democrats need to start being more "culturally normal" — a challenge he might face himself after governing one of the most liberal states in the country.
• Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel argues that the party should "ignore the culture police" and worry less about "a child's right to pick his pronouns" and more about "children who do not know what a pronoun is."
• Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) says Democrats need to speak the language of the "factory line, not the faculty lounge."

The centrist Democratic group Third Way created a guide to "woke" buzzwords it wants the party to stamp out heading into 2028.

• "For a party that spends billions of dollars trying to find the perfect language to connect to voters, Democrats and their allies use an awful lot of words and phrases no ordinary person would ever dream of saying," the group writes.
• "To please the few, we have alienated the many — especially on culture issues, where our language sounds superior, haughty and arrogant."

Flashback: Much of the lexicon sprang from the period that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) — who's also weighing a run for the White House — recently dubbed "Woke 1."

• That was a chapter of Democratic politics that AOC was at the center of, but now is distancing herself from.
• Buzzwords such as "Latinx," "intersectionality," "allyship" and "inclusivity" became increasingly common around the time of the last competitive Democratic presidential primary, in 2020. Several candidates used them, too.

Zoom in: Prominent Democrats rarely talk this way anymore, but such words still show up in press releases and progressive circles.

• Rep. Wesley Bell (D-Mo.) introduced a bill this year that replaced the term "ex-felon" with "qualified criminal justice-impacted individual."
• Newsom in May announced new apartments in Los Angeles for "formerly unhoused people."
• In January, Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Katie Britt (R-Ala.) announced a resolution praising community-based health systems for helping "birthing individuals" and "birthing people."

Zoom out: The disconnect between how Democratic politicians usually talk and how their press releases sometimes read points to the problem: Language that's natural in liberal safe spaces can make Democrats seem foreign in places they need to win.

Yes, but: Even Beshear, who's leading the charge for plainer talk, says the intention behind the words is good. No one is trying to be less inclusive, he says, but words matter.

• The "advocacy speak" was "created for the right reasons," he said. But "I don't think you change stigma by changing words."

Counterpoint: The issue isn't strictly ideological.

• Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is one of the country's most left-wing politicians, but he tends to speak in blunt, straightforward language: "billionaires," "working people," "greed" and so on.
• His 2020 campaign, though, did use terms such as "Latinx" and "reproductive justice."

The bottom line: Trump's speaking style may be rambling and disjointed, but no one needs a glossary to understand him. It's helped him win the presidency twice.

• In 2028, Democrats will be searching for a language of their own that connects.