COMMENTARY: Democrats failing the political math of Boulder attack

Democrats have a math problem: “No Person Is Illegal” + “Free, Free Palestine” = Jews set ablaze by an antisemitic undocumented immigrant in Boulder, Colorado

The question now is whether the party can change the calculations with its current coalition.

The facts in the Boulder case aren’t contested. Mohamed Sabry Soliman is an Egyptian national who was in the country illegally when he turned his “improvised flame thrower” on peaceful activists supporting the hostages held by Hamas.

Also not in dispute: The Democratic Party’s stance on the issues of border security and anti-Israel rhetoric. It opposes the former and has a discomfiting tolerance for the latter.

Democrats have spent decades burnishing their brand as opponents of immigration enforcement. They blocked President Donald Trump’s first-term attempt to build a border wall, and they unanimously supported legislation to give amnesty to millions of illegal aliens in the United States.

On the crime front, the vast majority of Democrats in Congress voted against the Laken Riley Act, passed in response to the gruesome murder of a Georgia college student killed by an undocumented alien who had previously been arrested on other charges and released. And Democrats continue to support sanctuary city policies across the country.

As for the party’s “Free Palestine” problem, the surge of antisemitism in the party’s coalition is hardly breaking news. Just ask Gov. Josh Shapiro, the popular Democrat who could have helped Kamala Harris carry the must-win state of Pennsylvania but whose standing as a practicing Jew and a supporter of Israel made him politically suspect in his party.

During this year’s Passover season, an antisemitic assailant snuck into the governor’s mansion while Shapiro and his family slept and set the building on fire. The attacker cited Shapiro’s stance on Gaza as his motive, quoting language often heard among progressives.

In 2023, Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s chants of “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Shall Be Free!” led to a censure resolution by the House of Representatives. The slogan is a regular feature at anti-Israel rallies and appears in Hamas propaganda.

While the censure resolution easily passed the House, only 22 Democrats voted in favor of it. An additional 188 Democrats voted in defense of Tlaib.

Not surprisingly, the party has seen its support among Jewish voters slipping. In 2024, Fox News and The Associated Press exit polling found just 66 percent of Democrats voted for the Harris-Walz ticket, the lowest percentage since the Reagan era.

But the bigger problem is that typical Americans who tune in to politics only around Election Day continue to pick up the message that if you like undocumented aliens and hate Israelis, the Democratic Party is for you.

That is a simplistic and incomplete description of an entire political party whose nominee won 48 percent of the vote in the November election. However, most voters don’t do complexity and nuance. If Democrats keep holding “Free Palestine” rallies and suing to get undocumented immigrants with gang ties back into the country, voters will react.

On a recent episode of his 2Way program, veteran political journalist Mark Halperin said left-leaning reporters giving Democrats a pass on this math problem aren’t doing them any favors.

“The dominant media is wrapping them in blue bubble wrap and leaving them completely vulnerable to reality.”

So why aren’t Democratic leaders stepping up to address this problem within their ranks? Democratic operative Dan Turrentine, who also appeared on Halperin’s show, put it this way: “They’re afraid of their base. A lot of senators and governors have this super-progressive 15 to 20 percent of the electorate, and they’re like, ‘I don’t need the headache of going to war with them, so I say nothing.’ That was Kamala Harris’ principle during her campaign,” Turrentine said.

During the campaign, Democrats and their allies tried to give Harris cover on her role in the Joe Biden age cover-up and her extreme stance on transgender issues. New books about the Biden White House reveal that the press shrugged off the age issue. And when news outlets bothered to cover the transgender topic, it was to denounce Trump for even bringing it up.

What happened? Democrats lost the House, Senate and White House.

Today, many Democrats insist their party doesn’t have an undocumented immigration or antisemitism problem, that it’s all right-wing spin. In 2026, they may be reminded of another political theorem: There is no education in the second kick from a mule.

Michael Graham is the managing editor of InsideSources.com.