ESPN host Stephen A. Smith, who is considering a run for the presidency in 2028, said on Sunday that he believes the Democratic Party needs to be “purged” of its far-left tendencies before he would associate with it as a candidate.
CNN’s Jake Tapper asked Smith on this Sunday’s episode of “State of the Union” whether he would run for the White House as a Democrat.
“You know what? I’m an independent. I’m a registered independent. I would lean — who leans left. I’m fiscally conservative when it comes to my money. I’m socially liberal. I’m liberal when it comes to social issues pretty much across the board. I believe in living and let living,” Smith said.
“So I’m a moderate,” he went on. “And I would say, if I had to run, it would be as a Democrat, but I’m not happy with the Democratic Party. So the Democratic Party, as presently constructed, it would pretty much need to be purged in order for me to assume that I would want to be associated with them and I would garner their support, because I don’t like the way they have gone about doing a lot of things for a very, very long period of time.”
.@stephenasmith to @jaketapper on potential 2028 bid: “I would say, if I had to run, it would be as a Democrat, but I’m not happy with the Democratic Party. So the Democratic Party, as presently constructed, it would pretty much need to be purged in order for me to assume that I… pic.twitter.com/vgYrvfV2cH
— State of the Union (@CNNSOTU) May 4, 2025
Smith added: “And I think that I don’t view Donald Trump as winning the election. I view the Democrats as losing the election, as absolutely, positively blowing it with some of their actions. And that’s why I think that, again, if somebody was to associate me with that, the party, as presently constructed, where it leans so extremely left, or at least has spent the vast majority of time doing that, oh, that is not something that I would vibe with at all. I would definitely be looking to be a game changer in that regard.”
When pressed by Tapper, Smith said that he would not name anyone he thinks should be “purged,” but the media personality did take aim at the “extreme left” of the party.
“We know how they go about operating. We know what we lean towards when it came to open borders. We know that the spending was excessive, even though it’s excessive on the Republican side as well. I think a $37 trillion budget, when Republicans try to act like it’s just the Democrats, that’s not true. But the Democrats certainly shouldn’t be absolved from blame in that regard,” he said.
“Certainly, with identity politics, woke culture, cancel culture, I thought that that was something that ravaged our nation psychologically, because you had people literally scared they were going to lose their jobs if they pronounced the wrong pronoun, for crying out loud,” Smith continued. “It got that bad.”
Smith said he believes the focus on “the individual” rather than “actual policies” is one reason why Trump won a second term.
“I’m talking about what they preached and what they talked to the American people about more so than what they’re doing. The kind of messages that they were disseminating was incredibly uncomfortable to listen to and to hear,” Smith said.
“And I thought that it wasn’t emblematic of what most Americans are thinking about. They’re trying to pay their mortgages, rent, buy food and groceries, pay gas and deal with the prices, the cost of living. And they want safety in the streets. That’s primarily what most American citizens are about, trying to live in peace and harmony,” he added. “And that’s not something that I think either side has promoted along the way. And that’s why I think the state of the nation is what it is at this particular moment in time.”
