Why Michigan voters are hearing ‘communist’ as they vote Tuesday

President Donald Trump and Republicans have a new favorite term for their opponents on the left: Communists. 

Trump has been trying to stitch Democrats to communism, the economic philosophy championed by Karl Marx and the bane of the U.S. during the Cold War era. Republicans led by Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy previously used the moniker to great political effect during the Red Scare in the early 1950s. And the strategy has been employed in more recent elections as well.

But the rate at which Trump and his Republican allies are crying “communist” has ratcheted up dramatically in the wake of progressive Democrats winning elections across the country following New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani‘s victory last year. Democrats in Michigan will have another opportunity on Tuesday to nominate a progressive candidate as Abdul El-Sayed faces off against the more establishment Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich., to become the party’s nominee for an open Senate seat. While El-Sayed rejects the Democratic socialist label, Trump called him a communist as recently as Monday.

In a July 28 endorsement video, Trump said Wisconsin Republican congressional candidate Michael Alfonso “will stand up to the radical left communists in Congress.” On July 22, in a speech in Georgia, Trump said: “We have some great candidates running, they got to win by a lot; otherwise we’re going communist.” In a July 3 speech in front of Mount Rushmore, the president said the “communist menace” is a “mortal threat.” In his Independence Day speech, he vowed that the U.S. “will never be a communist country.” 

At stake is the balance of power in Washington, where Trump and Republicans have controlled all chambers of government since the beginning of his second term. Republicans see Democrats lurching to the left and embracing socialism as an opening to link their opponents to the far more radical communism.

Trump is not alone in slapping on the communist label. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, of Louisiana, said during a press conference that the midterm election is a contest over “whether we’re going to maintain our status as a constitutional republic or we’re going to trade that in, dismantle the foundations and go down this dark road of death to communism.”

“These crazy little mini-Mamdanis who are popping up all around the country, they are a danger to you and your family. This is not a game,” he said.

And Rep. Lisa McClain, R-Mich., the House Republican Caucus chair, was similarly direct when speaking at a press conference about the midterm election.

“This is a choice between freedom and tyrannical government control, between the American dream and the failed nightmare of communism,” she said, speaking about the new crop of Democratic candidates. “These are all people who hate our country and everything that our country stands for.”