The story the Left tells itself about the Right's success is wrong--and holds us back from connecting with people who can be won to liberatory politics.
What the Left Gets Wrong About the Right challenges many of the dominant frameworks through which progressives have interpreted right-wing movements. Drawing on over a decade of original research and reporting at conferences held by Turning Point USA and other right-wing groups, Daniel Martinez HoSang argues that the Left's prevailing assumptions often miss the diverse and evolving onramps through which people--many of them previously disengaged or even sympathetic to progressive causes--are entering right-wing politics.
As HoSang shows, the Right is building multiracial, diverse coalitions grounded in spaces like wellness communities, parental rights movements, and small business networks--places that feel welcoming and inclusive for people the left and liberals assume would be alienated by the Right. The Right, for instance, rarely demands ideological purity or formal commitment. Instead, they often begin with cultural, emotional, or community-based entry points that make right-wing ideas appealing. The Right's growth, in HoSang's reframing, is not simply a resurgence of earlier fascist or authoritarian traditions, nor merely as the product of online disinformation or charismatic demagogues like Donald Trump.
By decentering Trump and MAGA, What the Left Gets Wrong About the Right illuminates a broader ecosystem of right-wing mobilization. As HoSang argues, only when we understand the emotional and structural forces driving the Right's appeal can we begin to reimagine the collective democratic renewal required in response.
