Adam Bonica and Jake Grumbach have convinced us that moderation isn’t the silver bullet so many take it to be. There is indeed little evidence that chasing a hypothetical “median voter” yields a strong electoral payoff, particularly in the twenty-first century. In fact, election messaging of any sort—despite the outsized attention it receives from pundits—appears to move the public only slightly, and the effects are typically not enduring. Of course, in an age of razor-thin election outcomes, even small adjustments can make a difference; there might thus be some benefit to individual Democratic candidates in more “red” areas of the country adopting positions that don’t squarely align with the party’s national platform. But overall, we find Bonica and Grumbach’s argument convincing.

Still, there’s an important factor that Democrats’ post-2024 soul-searching hasn’t sufficiently addressed: place. Not just how many votes a party attracts but where it gets them is key to electoral success in the United States. Focusing on candidate ideology misses how political geography shapes politics. Given the unusual nature of our electoral system, which disproportionately empowers less populated areas, geography’s effects are profound. But Democrats have long forsaken party-building in rural America, and the GOP now dominates there nationwide. Democrats’ long-term prospects, and the stability of American democracy writ large, depends on reversing course.

The idea that Americans are polarized by place is often couched in the language of red states and blue states and, of course, those all-important purple ones, the linchpin of presidential races. As we show in our recent book, however, geographic polarization is far more granular. In the latter part of the twentieth century and as recently as 1992, rural and urban dwellers tended to vote in tandem in presidential races, supporting candidates of each party at similar rates. In congressional races, Democrats often won more rural districts than Republicans. Yet starting in the mid-1990s, non-Hispanic white rural dwellers gradually defected to the GOP as their local economies stagnated. The trend intensified starting in 2008 with growing distrust of college-educated urbanites; it was cemented through mobilization of voters by conservative organizations. Meanwhile, residents of major cities continued to support the Democratic Party at high levels, and those living in other metropolitan areas increasingly did so as well.

The result is that the Republican Party now receives a small but critical advantage in virtually every electoral institution, not just the Senate and Electoral College but also the House and state legislatures. This structure not only helps the GOP win elections but also insulates it from accountability. Each of the last six times Republicans won majority control of the Senate, they were elected by a group of states in which less than half the county’s population resides. Moreover, because the Senate is tasked with confirming nominees to the Supreme Court, this electoral bias translates into outsized power to shape the judiciary and, in turn, the rulings it hands down. Four of the six sitting conservative justices were confirmed by senators from states that are home to less than 50 percent of the U.S. population. In short, the rural-urban divide helps facilitate minoritarian rule.

To be clear, it’s not that rural dwellers themselves are dominating politics; they comprise just 20 percent of the U.S. population, and they don’t have strong lobbying groups to set the national policy agenda. Nor is it true that rural people exhibit particularly high levels of authoritarianism: we don’t know of any evidence to that effect. Nevertheless, the GOP’s dominance of rural areas allows it to rule without having to appeal to most Americans, empowering it to advance unpopular and extreme measures such as gutting health care, cutting taxes on the rich, and undermining access to reproductive care.

How can Democrats address their woes in rural America, improve their odds nationally, and combat rising authoritarianism? We join other political scientists in arguing for Democrats to invest much more heavily in state and local political parties as organizations. Both major parties have grown weaker over the last century, even as partisan polarization has intensified. In several dozen interviews with local party leaders, we found that, particularly in rural areas, the Democratic Party struggles to conduct basic functions. Local parties are often run—valiantly—by volunteer retirees; they receive few resources and little support from state or national party organizations. As a result, they often struggle to mobilize voters when elections roll around, and that can make it difficult to field a full slate of candidates.

Though it too has weakened, the GOP has operated quite differently. White evangelical churches, gun groups associated with the National Rifle Association, and Right to Life organizations have served as an important mechanism for mobilizing Republicans in rural areas. In addition to pulling the party to the right, these groups help “connect the dots” for voters, socializing them into consistent partisanship. Indeed, conservatives’ electoral and policy successes more broadly have largely been driven by organization building. Unions once served a similar function for Democrats, but their decline—particularly in the private sector—has ripped apart much of the local social fabric that held the party together. Certainly, the GOP’s reliance on these particular groups has contributed to its extremism, but its success is nevertheless instructive: it shows just how much being organized and present in the day-to-day lives of voters matters.

Party-building isn’t at odds with Bonica and Grumbach’s prescriptions for Democrats: to boost turnout, generate more credibility with voters, and build broader coalitions. In rural America, home to some of the most disadvantaged people in the country, there are ample opportunities to do all of these things. Our analysis of public opinion finds that rural and urban people hold similar views on most issues, such as support for government spending on education, health care, infrastructure, and even policing. On so-called “culture war” issues such as gay marriage and abortion, rural voters typically hold somewhat more conservative views, but the differences are relatively small.

Plus, Republican domination of rural areas isn’t total: still close to 30 percent of rural dwellers identify as Democrats, and another 16 percent consider themselves independents. These are voters who could be mobilized, persuaded, and attracted to a bigger-tent party—but doing so requires party-building at the state and local level. Democrats need to rebuild relationships and credibility with rural voters; sending in a few organizers from elsewhere just before each election won’t cut it. Rather, the party needs to commit to a long-term approach that begins with listening to voters and hearing their concerns, recruiting local leaders and standard bearers who understand their communities, making sure statewide candidates take the time to campaign locally, and working in coalition with local groups.

Party-building will help revitalize democracy in another way, too. For a democracy to work well, citizens need a meaningful choice at the polls. Consistent one-party rule, so prevalent in rural and urban areas alike, allows those in power to govern with little fear of accountability—and to double down on extremism and facilitate dysfunction in government.

To be sure, rebuilding the party will come with challenges. As Bonica and Grumbach point out, the nationalization of elections has made more local appeals difficult, and the Democratic Party’s national brand is indeed tarnished in most rural areas. But the nationalization of politics is not insurmountable. Local and state organizing efforts offer the most promise for re-rooting candidates and parties in rural communities and generating healthier relationships between parties, voters, and policymakers. National leaders have recently pledged to invest in state parties, with an eye toward rural areas. This is welcome news, but it is far from sufficient.

The stakes are high. An increasingly extreme Republican Party is running roughshod over basic democratic norms and advancing an extremely unpopular policy agenda. The country needs an opposition party, one that can compete across a broader electoral terrain than it currently does. Unless Democrats address their woes in rural areas, they will remain locked out of power. Democracy will only further erode as a result.