U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and a dozen senior citizens sat at folding tables, looking out over the gently curving streets of Vista Del Rio manufactured home park in Vancouver on a recent Tuesday.
She was there to get ideas on how federal legislation might be able to help parks like this one. The community of 55-and-older residents has been for sale for a year and a half. The region’s housing shortage has made such parks an especially precarious form of housing for seniors on fixed incomes.
After touching on expanded home loans available through the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and permitting reform, the conversation turned to the two-term Democrat’s reputation as a member of Congress willing to vote across party lines.
“I’m a total Trump supporter,” said Shari Roberts, a resident of the park. “There are a lot of us who look at what you’re doing of going across aisles and listening to both sides and making decisions based not on politics but on policy and what’s good for the nation. I appreciate that about you.”
The path of a centrist Democrat who can appeal to Republican and Independent voters to win purple districts is a strategy that national groups are hoping to copy in 2026. One, called the Welcome PAC, sees Gluesenkamp Perez’s blue-collar identity and strong ties to her district as a model to lower the temperature in American politics and flip the Republican-controlled House in the next election.
In 2022, Gluesenkamp Perez was the first Democrat to win the 3rd District in more than a decade. It was also her first foray into politics. Since then, she’s split with her party on a number of hot-button issues. She voted against the Biden administration’s plan to forgive student debt, she supported the Laken Riley Act, which mandates the detention of undocumented immigrants accused of theft and other crimes, and she supported the SAVE Act. If signed into law, it would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote. Opponents argue it would create unnecessary requirements and end up disenfranchising Americans.
Despite these contentious votes, some Democrats see her ability to win a majority in her district as more important than friction with the national party.
“I think that anything that moves us off the ledge of feeling like winning is defined by complete annihilation of people who disagree with you is a good thing,” Gluesenkamp Perez said at Vista Del Rio.
The politics of authenticity
Democratic working-class newcomers have been appearing in high-profile political races across the country lately.
In Wisconsin, Rebecca Cooke was raised on an Eau Claire dairy farm and currently works as a waitress. She’s facing off against incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Francis Van Orden after narrowly losing to him in 2024. In Maine, Graham Platner is challenging Susan Collins in the U.S. Senate. Platner is an Army veteran and oyster farmer. When Bobby Cole is not running against third-term Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, he’s a chicken farmer and firefighter. The website of Iowa Senate candidate Nathan Sage proudly states: “Raised in a trailer park in Mason City. Mechanic, Marine, Veteran.” Sage is running for the seat left open by Republican U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst. For her part, Gluesenkamp Perez helped run an auto repair shop in Portland.
What’s different this year is the recruitment of Democratic candidates from non-traditional backgrounds, according to Seattle political consultant Dean Nielsen with CN4 Partners, which created the media campaign for Cole in the Texas governor’s race. A common denominator, he said, is that many work with their hands and have strong ties to their communities.
“For me, it’s exciting that we’ve got candidates that are a breath of fresh air or are people that you want to sit down to have a beer with, that are relatable,” Nielsen said.
Among the groups championing Gluesenkamp Perez is the Washington D.C.-based Welcome PAC, whose stated goal is to win enough seats to flip the House and take back control of one chamber of Congress. The group is part super PAC, part nonprofit, and part Substack.
“The vision of our organization is essentially to recalibrate Democrats to where the median voter is,” said the organization’s co-founder, Lauren Pope.
Besides promoting Gluesenkamp Perez, Welcome PAC is backing fellow Democrats Rep. Jared Golden of Maine and Cooke’s bid in Wisconsin — more rural districts where Pope said media markets are less expensive than those of more prominent Democrats.
Welcome PAC’s bet is that despite the increasingly polarized tone of national politics, the majority of voters are neither extreme liberals nor extreme conservatives. A slogan on their website reads “Win the Middle 2026.” The group’s plan involves backing independent-minded candidates who can represent the sometimes contradictory characteristics of their districts, in particular places where President Trump won, even if they sometimes make progressives wince.
“You don’t necessarily always get a reward for being a depolarizer and prioritizing place-based politics and the things that your district prioritizes,” Pope said. “But you do get electoral victories.”
‘Independent thinkers’
That pitch is appealing to some donors in Southwest Washington who believe single-party control of the U.S. government is unhealthy for America. Among Welcome PAC’s supporters is Camas resident David Nierenberg, a longtime supporter of Gluesenkamp Perez. So far, Nierenberg and his wife Patricia have given $770,000 to the Welcome PAC since early 2024, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
Over the years, Nierenberg’s politics shifted from liberal Democrat to Republican. For seven years, he worked for Utah Republican Mitt Romney at the management consulting firm Bain and Co. Today, he’s the president of Nierenberg Investment Management Company. He avoids political titles altogether these days, saying that he belongs to “the American party.”
Nierenberg said the Welcome PAC is focusing on a mix of incumbents and challengers in 12-15 seats around the country.
“I do not necessarily expect that they will always vote with House Democratic leadership because they are independent thinkers,” he said. “The leadership is smart enough to know that if we don’t re-elect a candidate like Marie in Washington’s 3rd district, this would be a Republican district. And most of those other districts are the same way.”
Over the years, the Nierenbergs have given millions to the PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center, early learning programs in Southwest Washington, and the Humane Society’s low-income veterinary clinic in Vancouver. The couple was given the Clark County First Citizen Award in 2025 for their many contributions to the region.
His support for the slate of moderate Democrats comes from concerns that cuts to social services embedded in President Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” will cause stress and harm to regular people as they continue to take effect.
“I believe in fiscal responsibility, and I believe in a vigorous foreign policy, but I’m also very committed to civil rights,” Nierenberg said. “What I’m doing politically aligns with where I’m spending my time and our money as philanthropists trying to focus on those people who are at the greatest risk of being left behind.”
The contradictory electorate
The Welcome PAC isn’t the first group to try to shift voters from extreme candidates to more centrist ones. The organization No Labels advocated unsuccessfully for a bipartisan “Unity ticket” in the 2024 presidential election. But unlike Welcome PAC’s blue-collar candidates, No Labels focused on establishment politicians like Democrat Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, and Republicans Nikki Haley of South Carolina and New Jersey’s Chris Christie.
In 2026, Gluesenkamp Perez will run against state Sen. John Braun, R-Centralia, the minority leader in the state senate. Braun is more mainstream than her previous challenger, Joe Kent, a former Green Beret who twice lost the race for the 3rd congressional district. Kent was appointed this year to be the director of the National Counterterrorism Center in the Trump administration. His campaigns suffered from criticism about his connections to far-right groups. Braun’s more conventional Republican background includes being a budget writer in the state Legislature, where he worked on issues including property tax reform and public education. Besides being a state senator, he’s the president of Braun Northwest, an emergency vehicle company.
It’s still anybody’s guess whether promoting moderate Democrats in the midterms is a winning approach.
“Nowadays, voters dislike the other party much more than they did 40 years ago,” said Jan Voelkel, an assistant professor of public policy at Cornell University whose research focuses on political polarization.
According to Voelkel, voters want leaders who think like them and fight for their side. But, he said, politicians have drifted farther to the extremes than the majority of Americans. One reason is primary elections. In that initial culling of candidates, winners must appeal to voters who show up for primaries, who also tend to be the most ideologically extreme. That polarization, and a key vote doomed six-term Republican Jamie Herrera Beutler in the 2022 primary against Kent.
But research shows voters give other contradictory messages.
“We find over and over again that voters support Democratic principles and they are exhausted with political polarization,” Voelkel said.
To that end, he said, labeling oneself a moderate who can appeal to the broad majority of a district could be a winning strategy, even in today’s political climate. Working across party lines is one of the best ways to counter ideological polarization, according to Voelkel.
In one recent example, Gluesenkamp Perez was one of the only Democrats who supported a bill to avoid the current government shutdown. That topic also surfaced during her visit to Vista Del Rio, several weeks into the shutdown.
“I don’t think we should make American suffering a point of leverage,” Gluesenkamp Perez told the group. “It’s discouraging when both sides think they’re winning a messaging war and it’s just about a messaging war and not about a government that’s working.”
This push for bipartisanship is resonating with some voters, including those at the manufactured home park.
“It’s the only path forward,” said resident Deb Swope. “We gotta have 150 of you.”
