A seismic shift is reshaping American politics, and Sean O'Brien's stunning interview with Bari Weiss reveals the brutal truth Democrats refuse to face.
For over a century, labor unions were the backbone of the Democratic Party. It was political gospel—as predictable as the sunrise. But 2024 shattered that assumption forever. Nearly half of union households voted for Donald Trump, and among Teamsters members, a staggering 65% chose the Republican ticket.
Sean O'Brien, the fourth-generation union member who leads 1.3 million Teamsters, didn't mince words about why this happened. "Democrats fell in love with their captors," he told Weiss. "They fell in love with big money. They fell in love with big tech, and they forgot who they truly represent—working people."
This isn't just electoral disappointment—it's wholesale abandonment. O'Brien described how Kamala Harris, when finally pressed to meet with Teamsters leadership, arrogantly declared: "I'm going to win with you or without you." That dismissive attitude crystallized everything wrong with today's Democratic Party.
The numbers tell the story of betrayal. Over the past 20 years, Democrats controlled the federal government for 16 of those years. What did working Americans get? Deregulation that destroyed 400,000 Teamsters jobs. Trade deals that gutted manufacturing. A focus on "social justice issues" while families struggled to afford groceries and housing.
"Our members identify with more money in their pockets, more job protection, better pensions—core issues," O'Brien explained. Instead, Democrats offered boutique causes that resonated in faculty lounges but fell flat in union halls and factory floors.
The contrast couldn't be starker. While Democratic senators like Chuck Schumer wouldn't even sign a letter supporting striking Amazon workers, Republican Josh Hawley was the only politician to walk O'Brien's picket lines. When Teamsters struck 22 Amazon locations in December, the supposed "party of labor" was nowhere to be found.
This is where Trump's New Republican Party steps in. The attached leaflet isn't just campaign literature—it's a roadmap for the most significant political realignment since the New Deal. Trump's GOP is explicitly rejecting decades of Wall Street Republicanism in favor of Main Street populism.
"I'm proud to be the President for the workers, not the outsourcers," Trump declared, capturing exactly what O'Brien's members want to hear. The new Republican platform champions tariffs over free trade, manufacturing over financialization, and economic nationalism over globalist schemes.
This isn't about party labels—it's about survival. Working families watching their neighborhoods hollowed out by deindustrialization, their children priced out of homeownership, their jobs shipped overseas, finally have a political party speaking their language.
O'Brien remains a Democrat, but acknowledges the writing on the wall: "This election should signify that something is broken in the Democratic Party." That something is the complete disconnect between liberal elites and the people who actually build, transport, and produce the goods that keep America running.
The great realignment is here. The only question is whether Democrats will continue lecturing their former base about voting "against their interests," or finally ask why they lost them in the first place.