With the midterm elections fast approaching, progressive champion Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has a warning for Democrats to stop catering to the wealthy elites if they want to recapture majorities in the House and Senate this year.

"A Democratic Party that worries more about offending big donors than delivering for working people is a party doomed to fail in 2026, 2028, and beyond," Warren, the three-term senator from Massachusetts who ran unsuccessfully for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, emphasized in a speech Monday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

The address by Warren, who to a degree stayed out of the national conversation during President Donald Trump's first year back in the White House, seemed to be her attempt to shape the Democratic Party's approach to the 2026 midterms in her populist image.

The speech was part post-mortem of the 2024 elections, when Trump and Republicans enjoyed sweeping victories as they won back the White House and Senate and held onto their fragile House majority.

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Pointing to the wealthy elites and major Democratic Party donors, Warren argued that "these movers and shakers want the Democratic Party to respond to the 2024 losses by watering down our economic agenda and sucking up to the rich and powerful, claiming that less progressive Democratic Party will win more elections. They are wrong."

Democrats scored decisive victories and overperformances in the 2025 elections and in a slew of special elections and other ballot box showdowns last year, which were fueled by their laser focus on affordability amid persistent inflation.

"Americans are stretched to the breaking point financially, and they will vote for candidates who name what is wrong and who credibly demonstrate that they will take on a rigged system to fix it," Warren emphasized.

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And she charged that "revising our economic agenda to tiptoe around that conclusion might appeal to the wealthy, but it will not help Democrats build a bigger tent. And it definitely will not help Democrats win elections."

"Democrats need to read the room. Any room not stuffed with billionaires is a room that will tell you it is critically important to lower those costs," Warren reiterated, as she took questions from reporters following her speech.

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Warren, a vocal critic of the president, also argued that "Donald Trump has not delivered" when it comes to lower costs. "People have made it clear that this is what matters to them and Donald Trump has not delivered. Our job is to both hold him accountable and to put out our own proposals in order to lower those costs. We do that, we will win."

The senator's speech comes amid a fierce policy debate among Democrats over whether to embrace an economic populist message promoted by Warren, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, and newly elected New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, or to support a more moderate, business friendly agenda, in order to court moderate voters souring on Trump and the GOP.

Warren's address is also her latest move to play an influential role in the 2026 elections.

The senator, who's a member of the informal Senate "Fight Club," a small group of left-leaning senators who are challenging Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's approach to the midterm elections, last week announced she had donated $400,000 to a slew of state Democratic parties.

Democrats have come out against federal law enforcement's use of lethal force following shootings involving federal immigration officials in Minneapolis and Portland last week, with some going so far as to accuse them of murder. 

However, their attitudes about lethal force after a U.S. Capitol police officer killed Ashli Babbitt paint a very different picture of these Democrats' views on police using lethal force. 

As recently as this year, Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who have rebuked Trump administration arguments that shootings involving federal immigration officials last week were justified, also rebuked a multi-million dollar settlement awarded to the family of Ashli Babbitt earlier this year, calling it a "slap in the face" and a "sickening message to police." Babbitt was shot and killed by a U.S. Capitol police officer during the Jan. 6 riot as she was pushing and beating against a door that led into the Speaker's Lobby just outside the House chamber along with a mob of others. 

Several other Democrats who supported law enforcement's actions on Jan. 6, 2021, have gone off on federal border patrol officials following the Portland and Minneapolis shootings last week, with some going so far as calling them murderers.

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In Minneapolis, a woman accused of interfering with federal deportation efforts was fatally shot by ICE in Minneapolis, while an illegal immigrant couple who DHS said were deeply involved in criminal activity were shot by CBP agents in Portland after the driver of the car tried to ram his vehicle into agents.

Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., referred to the actions of ICE in Minneapolis as "murder" in a post on X. However, just days before, on the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot, Goldman reintroduced legislation to "honor those who defended the capitol" when a mob took it over in 2021.

Rep. Primal Jayapal, D-Wash., who has claimed to have been very close to Babbitt when the Speaker's Lobby was trying to be breached, has chastised Republicans who she believes have failed to adequately honor U.S. Capitol Police for their work on Jan. 6, 2021. "They were begging for protection from Capitol Police. Yet they refused to honor Capitol Police there[after], refused to accept that it was real," Jayapal told Teen Vogue in 2022. 

Meanwhile, after the shootings last week, Jayapal too accused federal border patrol officials of committing murder, telling local news the incident "looked like outright murder" to her eyes. 

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Reps. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., and Jason Crow, D-Colo., were also among those Democrats praising Capitol Police for their actions on Jan. 6, 2021 last week, while condemning the federal officer involved in the shooting that occurred as well. Crow complained that a plaque honoring U.S. Capitol Police officers who protected people on Jan. 6 was not hung up because of GOP obstruction, but was unafraid to condemn federal officials for "kill[ing]" someone. Raskin, who has also condemned the multi-million dollar settlement to the Babbitt family, said he was "sickened" at ICE agents for "killing" a woman in Minneapolis. 

Raskin's colleague from Oregon, Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., demanded on X last week that federal immigration officers be held accountable for their involvement in the Portland shooting. She referred to the illegal immigrant gang members shot as "victims" even though they tried to ram their car into officers. However, after the Capitol riot in 2021, Bonamici regularly praised the "heroism" of the U.S. Capitol Police and suggested they should be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. 

Rick Wilson, co-founder of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, sought to explain the discrepancy between Democrats' reaction to Babbitt's shooting versus the ICE shootings in a post on X, arguing "Babbitt was a domestic terrorist," and the victim killed in Minneapolis, Renee Good, "was a mom, murdered by ICE."

When reached for comment, Raskin echoed Wilson's sentiment, arguing two different investigations found the Babbitt shooting was "entirely reasonable and appropriate." He added that anyone taking the position that Good was treated properly would also have to agree that hundreds of protesters on Jan. 6, 2021 "could have been legitimately shot in the face three times."

"Without the benefit of any investigation, Trump and his Administration have labeled Ms. Good, a U.S. citizen and 37-year old mother of three, a ‘domestic terrorist’ and immediately excused her killing after she was shot three times at point blank range, not while charging at the police but while trying to get away from them," Raskin said. "In both cases, the Trump Administration is telling the American people to ignore the law and the evidence of their own eyes."

Raskin also demanded in his comments to Fox News Digital that, following the Minnesota ICE shooting, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem "must appear to answer questions" before lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

During the subsequent days following last week's shooting, U.S. Border Patrol chief Mike Banks slammed rhetoric from left-wing politicians for emboldening folks to do things like ram their cars into federal immigration officials.

"The rhetoric they are putting out. The constant lies they are putting out to their constituents – saying things like kidnapping, disappearing, it's encouraging these people to continue violating the law. They are actually putting their constituents in danger."