Andrew Yang said the Democratic party had some real soul searching to do, even if Joe Biden does manage to become president.
The businessman and former presidential candidate told a CNN panel this week that the party was in danger of becoming out of touch with working class voters — and described his own experience telling ordinary people he was a Democrat.
“I would say, ‘Hey! I’m running for president!’ to a truck driver, retail worker, waitress in a diner, and they would say, ‘What party?’ And I’d say ‘Democrat’ and they would flinch like I said something really negative or I had just turned another color or something like that.” Yang told CNN host Don Lemon during a panel.
“So you have to ask yourself, what has the Democratic Party been standing for in their minds?,” he continued. “And in their minds, the Democratic Party, unfortunately, has taken on this role of the coastal urban elites who are more concerned about policing various cultural issues than improving their way of life that has been declining for years.”
After the results of the 2020 election, which have put Joe Biden at the brink of seizing the White House, Yang has urged his followers to think deeply about Trump voters and his powerful base of support.
“If 68 million people do something it’s vital that we understand it,” he said in a tweet Thursday.
Since leaving the campaign trail, Yang has stayed in the public eye, taking a role on Joe Biden’s small business advisory council and joining CNN as a political contributor.