Infrastructure - The Best Investment for 2026 and Beyond
A Three-Pillar, Three-State Strategy
By Jim Shelton
Since 2017, our all-volunteer grassroots group, 31st Street Swing Left, has mobilized substantial support for a wide range of political activities. We knock on thousands of doors, register voters, make calls, network with other grassroots groups and raise money. . . to the sum of $14.5 million over the past nine years.
Unfortunately, time and again we have seen how election cycles are dominated by vast, inefficient, and siloed late-cycle funding and lopsided toward high-visibility marquee candidates. We’ve come to believe that a far better investment is in longer term infrastructure, not roads, bridges, etc., but a foundation that provides sustained professional expertise and action and supports candidates up and down the ballot. Each election cycle we at 31st Street Swing Left adopt a flexible strategy based on persistence and precision. Our 2026 strategy is to build infrastructure in Iowa, Alaska, and Nebraska, which have promising prospects to flip the Senate.
Golden Opportunity for A Tipping Point for Dems
MAGA policies have been a massive disaster on multiple fronts. Numerous polls and November’s elections and special elections show key voters are moving to Democrats in droves, most notably young people, people of color, lower income, independent voters, and especially rural voters. Thus, a golden opportunity has arrived to focus on the red-leaning, rural-influenced “pillar” states, especially for control of the U.S. Senate. Our three “pillars” of infrastructure for financial support are:
Local Social Media - Providing pro-democracy content aimed at key voters.
Local Grassroot Groups - Capitalizing on their strong community ties.
State and Local Democratic Parties - Drawing on their complementary advantages.
We are poised for a crucial tipping point in our favor, perhaps even a major re-alignment. Here’s how:
Well-Positioned in the House
Consistent national polling shows a major and growing shift toward significant voter preference for a Democratic Congress. The razor-thin Republican House majority is highly vulnerable. True, recent Republican gerrymandering tilts appreciable seats their way, for example in North Carolina and Texas, and there are a few vulnerable Democrat seats. But that is outweighed by excellent opportunities for Democratic pick-ups for five to six seats in California, four in Pennsylvania, two each in Iowa, Arizona, and Michigan, plus many others scattered across the country.
As a caveat, the pending cases before the Supreme Court may gut the Voting Rights Act and allow for more gerrymandered Republican-favored seats. This will clearly shift the landscape negatively against the Democrats. If this occurs, even more support for infrastructure is needed in places with competitive House and Senate races.
Senate Requires Expanding the Map with More Good “Shots on Goal”
We need a pick-up of four Senate seats for a majority. Among the states in the spotlight of attention, here is my assessment of our chances: NC - excellent, ME - good, OH fair/good, TX - Iffy. Together that is not very promising to reach 51 seats. And we must also defend Democratic seats in GA, NH, MI and MN. So we need more.
Why Iowa, Alaska, and Nebraska?
These states offer very promising prospects for gains in the Senate and for numerous other offices, despite their largely red recent histories. Here’s how:
Each has “Super Bowl” 2026 elections with a Senate seat, competitive House races, a governors race, legislature, and more.
Nationwide polling finds substantial preference for a Democratic Congress.
State-specific polling is very promising.
Each has major rural populations, hugely negatively impacted by MAGA policies.
Republican governance in these states is also unpopular.
Each has seen significant recent Democratic wins in special and local elections.
Strong blue candidates are stepping up for major offices.
More specifically, in Iowa there are three very strong Democratic contenders for the open Senate seat, and two highly promising House races. Rural communities are staggering under MAGA policies, and Democrats had two recent wins in state special elections in Trump++ districts. In Alaska, one House seat is up for grabs and incumbent Senator Dan Sullivan is unpopular with negatives at an ominous 50 percent, while MAGA policies are hitting constituents hard. Highly popular former congresswoman Mary Peltola appears poised to run for the Senate, and Democrats recently won a slew of local elections. Likewise in Nebraska, Independent Senate Candidate Dan Osborn appears very strong. Building on his excellent performance in 2024, chances are bright for flipping the open 2nd U.S. House district that Kamala Harris carried, and Democrats recently flipped mayor races in Omaha and Lincoln, the state’s largest cities.
Why Build Infrastructure? Why now?
Our current candidate-focused election cycle emphasis is way out of balance, with the vast share of funding heaped up toward election day. Huge amounts are spent on negligible impact TV ads. We also suffer from redundant siloed campaigns, one-off messaging, quickly assembled staff contending with steep learning and relationship-building curves, and other boom-and-bust inefficiencies.
As the grassroots community knows, however, good long-term infrastructure provides a firm, continuous platform and well-grounded resources to help candidates across the board. But infrastructure also withers away during campaign off-season. It requires scaling up and sustaining efforts which take time to hire, learn, and cultivate relationships. Now is the time to build infrastructure for next November.
31st Street’s 3-Pillar Infrastructure Approach for Iowa, Alaska and Nebraska
We have identified the three pillars below and will pursue them opportunistically and aggressively where we see good investments, as our capacity permits.
Local Pro-Democracy Social Media. In our view the right-wing propaganda machine was the largest single reason for our losses in 2024. Fortunately, national progressive forces are successfully fighting back. But we need to focus at the state level. Thus far, 31st Street has supported Alaska’s 907 initiative, which uses effective media to hold Senator Dan Sullivan accountable, so Alaskans know the truth about him. We are also supporting the Iowa Creator Corps, which is assisting Iowa creators/influencers to provide pro-democracy content.
Local Grassroots Groups. These groups, of course, play a key role in a variety of ways including voter registration, organizing and issue advocacy, leveraging their special relationships to key populations like rural residents, people of color, and youth. Our current priorities are the Iowa Farmers Union which focuses on smaller farmers and Main Street Alliance which reaches small business leaders in small towns and cities.
State and local Democratic parties have crucial roles to play including data, partisan voter registration, candidate support and organizing. State parties in all three states have good leadership. They would benefit substantially from a boost to their current modest funding.
Imperative and Opportunity Beyond 2026
Looking forward, we face the grim reality that current red states are expected to gain approximately nine U.S. House seats and electoral votes with 2030 reapportionment. So we have no other choice but to expand the map and make inroads in states like Iowa, Alaska, and Nebraska.
But opportunity is staring us in the face! MAGA policies have been so disastrous that we have potential for a solid realignment toward Democrats among voters who have often voted against us. Right now they have shifted our way and mainly agree with pro-democracy values and issues. But we need to keep these voters with us - with good authentic candidates, by addressing the most salient issues like the economy, mounting communication that pierces the right-wing propaganda machine, and building and sustaining healthy blue infrastructure. Building long-term infrastructure is our best strategy toward a sustained Democratic majority.
What Can You Do?
We see infrastructure as the best investment to take advantage of this golden opportunity for 2026 and beyond. 31st Street Swing Left welcomes support and collaboration for Iowa, Alaska, and Nebraska. But donors and grassroots groups should also seek out other strategic opportunities, notably in areas with competitive House races across the country, or wherever good opportunities and synergy exist. Longer term infrastructure also extends to other areas, for example candidate recruitment, development of software, and other tools. But act now with all means at your disposal! We have many highly motivated organizations on the ground. The seeds for fruitful investment exist, they just need to be cultivated and nurtured.
Jim Shelton is a retired public health physician and epidemiologist, and political analyst for 31st Street Swing Left.
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I am excited to see a group move on from the 7 swing states that were the focus in 2024. It's high time Democrats did some serious outreach to unaffiliated or independent voters in Alaska.
Very well argued, Jim, thank you so much.