Less than a year into the Trump administration’s blitz on America, many are wondering how we can rebuild our moribund republic. One thing I can tell them: electing different politicians isn’t the answer. I should know: I spent twenty years as a politician in Vermont, beginning with the Burlington City Council alongside my ally Mayor Bernie Sanders and continuing in the House of Representatives, where I served five terms as a founding member of the Progressive Party. Through this experience, I saw up close what most merely observe at a distance. And my conclusion was that electing an unrepresentative political elite is actually undemocratic — the root of all political evils.

Abraham Lincoln defined democracy as government of, by, and for the people. But across the country, politicians are completely unlike the citizens they purport to represent. Congress, even in 2025, remains disproportionately white, male, and old. In terms of class, a majority of its members are millionaires; working people are woefully underrepresented. Is it any wonder, then, that the body’s decisions favor the rich? A legislature, John Adams wrote in 1776, “should be, in miniature, an exact portrait of the people at large. It should think, feel, reason, and act like them.” By this measure, Congress — and all state legislatures in America today — fail utterly.

I saw this imbalance firsthand in the Vermont Legislature while dealing with a housing bill affecting tenants and landlords. As our hearings proceeded, I noticed that the committee members relied more on anecdotal information from their social networks than statistical reports or witness testimony — especially testimony on behalf of renters. Curious, I surveyed the committee to find out how many of us were tenants, as opposed to homeowners. The answer? Zero (including me). I expanded my query to the entire House. The result was startling: of 150 representatives, I could find only one renter. Meanwhile, a third of Vermonters rented their homes. It was clear their interests were at a disadvantage in the chamber, and the resulting statutes reflected it. If fifty legislators had been renters, they could’ve challenged their colleagues’ bias with their own very different experience.