As the famous saying goes, “We can’t direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.” Politics is a lot like sailing, and Massachusetts’s 2024 Democratic primary was rough waters for a few elected officials.

Sailors – and political observers –must know the difference between the apparent and true wind to reach their goals. For the non-sailors out there, apparent wind is what you feel based on the boat’s motion, while true wind is the literal direction or what you would feel standing on land.

Many politicians here in Massachusetts and across the country misread the wind in 2018 and paid the price for it in 2020 and beyond. It is important not to make the same mistakes with 2024’s results. Here is why 2024’s results likely aren’t the true wind - and how 2018’s apparent wind blew a lot of political futures onto the rocks: 
Primary election turnout is too low to draw conclusions

The Massachusetts state primary is one of the latest in the nation, with only three states holding later contests. This poses a significant hurdle to potential challengers campaigning during the heart of peak vacation season. Election Day is the Tuesday following Labor Day, and there is a depressed turnout, even with aggressive vote-by-mail and early vote offerings. This year, there is no top-of-the-ticket race to attract attention: unlike in 2018, 2020, and 2022, there are no high-octane contests on the Democratic ticket for governor, senator, or Congress. 

Action vs. Status Quo

With a few exceptions, primary challengers draw significant attention if they represent voters’ desire for action. This year, the sample size is tiny because of Massachusetts’s nation-leading rate of incumbency: more than two-thirds of incumbents faced no primary or general challenges. The sample size is two: a state representative race in Cambridge and an obscure county-wide office in Suffolk County.

In Cambridge, a young graduate student who is also a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America – the same group that formally expelled NY Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio- Cortez for being insufficiently committed to socialism – nearly defeated a self-described “progressive” who is also a senior legislative leader and long-time incumbent.

The challenger’s effort was seen as quixotic until about a month before the primary, when an enormous public outcry over the lack of legislative activity, swollen leadership salaries, and committees that did not meet this session nearly swept them to victory.

Across the Charles River, a first-time candidate leveraged her traditional qualifications – she was a lawyer running for Clerk of the Supreme Judicial Court – and the support of several popular incumbents into a winning campaign against a long-time Boston City Council incumbent whose anemic campaign never provided her rationale for running.

2020’s primary, general election proved ‘18 primary wasn’t ideological

In the wake of Trump’s election in 2016, a series of Democratic challengers defeated long-time incumbents: AOC defeated Congressman Joe Crowley, the third most powerful House Democrat; at home, Boston City Councilor Ayanna Pressley defeated 20-year incumbent Mike Capuano, and an outsider toppled Democrat Rep. Jeff Sanchez, the House majority’s Ways and Means chairman.

Many observers – and presidential candidates – thought this meant that Bernie Sanders-style progressivism was on the march in the Democratic Party. The apparent wind of progressivism was wrong: less than two years later, in the presidential primary, voters rejected progressive stalwarts Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders for Joe Biden. In 2018 and 2020, voters searched for an accessible candidate who understood their everyday struggles and was not committed to an esoteric set of legislative and socioeconomic goals. 

As politicians, practitioners, and prognosticators alike plot their courses ahead, let these points serve as your lighthouse to avoid hitting the rocks. The shoreline does not change, similar to the fundamentals of electoral politics. However, the tides and wind frequently shift, as voters’ hopes, desires, and needs do. Do not forget that the majority of eligible voters feel the true wind daily. It is easy to be swept up among the few people on the boat, solely focused on the apparent wind for temporary motion.  

Joe Caiazzo is partner at The JCN group. He has held senior roles with the presidential campaigns of Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton and has worked on numerous other races, including those run by Rhode Island’s Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Elizabeth Warren and Joseph P. Kennedy III.