Former Barack Obama adviser David Axelrod warned that Vice President Kamala Harris’ election defeat shows Democrats are becoming “a smart, suburban, educated party.”

Axelrod, chief strategist under the Obama administration, noted in a Appearance on CNN The 2024 election results on Thursday proved that the left risks losing the working class vote entirely after President-elect Donald Trump’s victory. crushing victory.

“The only group that Democrats gained in Tuesday’s election was white college graduates, and among working-class voters there was a significant decline,” Axelrod told CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

“The only group…the Democrats won were people who made over a hundred thousand dollars a year. You can’t win national elections that way – and certainly shouldn’t be the case for a party that presents itself as the party of workers.”

While asserting that President Biden had done “good things for working people,” Axelrod expressed concern that the Democratic Party “has itself increasingly become a smart, suburban, educated, and that lends itself to the kind of negative reaction.” that we saw.

These criticisms come after Trump managed to reverse his 2020 losses in the crucial states of Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – winning big margins among his white rural and working-class base while making significant inroads among ethnic minorities.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) echoed this sentiment a day earlier as he sparked a stinging reversal of the Democratic Party in the wake of Harris’ defeat.

“It’s no surprise that a Democratic Party that has abandoned the working class would find that the working class has abandoned them,” the democratic socialist said in a statement. inflammatory statement about X.

“At first it was the white working class, and now it’s also the Latino and black workers. While Democratic leaders defend the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they are right.