Last time they run they were running much more conservative campaign

Biden barely scraped by the skin of his ass, and my experience phone-banking in 2020, half the voters I talked to thought Biden was for free healthcare, cannabis, defunding the police, freeing the ICE camps, and free college because he was the democratic candidate.

Meanwhile Kamala said the only thing that would be different from Biden's administration is that she would appoint a republican to the cabinet and ran on building Trump's wall. The dem messaging went right of 2020 on trans people, crime, foreign policy, economic policy.

The average voter is very low information when it comes to politics, but they know healthcare is too expensive, they know college is too expensive, they know locking migrants in cages is bad.

Left policy is popular because it materially improves people's immediate conditions. It doesn't matter whether someone has conservative ideas or not when their livelihood depends on a specific policy. When you weaken it or add a bunch of means-testing and complicated rules, your supporters will care less, and your opposition will continue to oppose you.