AMNA NAWAZ: Progressive wins in Michigan could signal a leftward turn in the Democratic Party's base.

And, in Washington, some congressional Republicans face allegations of misconduct.

On those topics and more, we turn now to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.

That's "The Atlantic"'s David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart of MS NOW.

Great to see you both.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Hey, Amna.

DAVID BROOKS: Good to see you.

AMNA NAWAZ: A few new anecdotes from this week that I'm going to try to put to you, and you can divine the party's direction for Democrats moving forward here.

Start with this.

In Missouri this week, we saw the moderate candidate there, Wesley Bell, defeat the progressive Cori Bush in a congressional primary rematch.

But there are signs, as we mentioned, of an ascendant progressive wing.

In Wisconsin, the front-runner in next week's Democratic gubernatorial primary is a Democratic Socialist.

That's Francesca Hong.

And of course, in Michigan, as we have been covering all this week, the progressive Abdul El-Sayed won the Democratic Senate primary, beating the moderate Haley Stevens.

You may have already seen just today the Republican candidate in that case -- in that race, rather, Mike Rogers, released this video, trying to appeal directly to those Stevens voters.

Take a listen.

MIKE ROGERS (R), Michigan Senatorial Candidate: To the vast majority of people across Michigan who do not want to throw their support behind a campaign filled with anger, divisiveness, calls for violence, and the views that are out of touch with your values, well, you have a home with us.

The fight is far greater than just left versus right.

The fight is for the very soul of our nation.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jonathan, are Democrats worried that more centrist Democrats in Michigan could decide to turn towards the Republican in this case?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, sure.

And I would say even, without that terrible ad, that they should be, because Haley -- keep in mind, Dr.

El-Sayed won the nomination, but barely.

This was not a blowout.

This was a squeaker.

And so he needs those folks who voted for Haley Stevens to vote for him.

Now, I have said from the beginning, former Congressman Mike Rogers is going to be a tough candidate, no matter who -- an opponent, no matter who the nominee was, whether it's Haley Stevens or Dr.

El-Sayed.

But that ad shows just how ugly and nasty this fight is going to be.

AMNA NAWAZ: In terms of that, David, what we have seen from Republicans on the messaging front so far is some anti-Muslim rhetoric already.

Republicans are now using Dr.

El-Sayed's full name in their ads, which they haven't used before, which is Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, which I guess is supposed to scare people or something.

But the president is also talking about a rising communism threat.

None of these candidates are communists.

Are those the strongest messages the Republicans have right now?

DAVID BROOKS: No, they should just say, these people are too left-wing for you.

The Democrats are doing the same thing they did in 2020.

They're angry at Trump.

I understand that.

They're angry at their own leaders for not standing up to Trump in the way they think he should be stood up to.

And so they're swinging left.

In 2020, it was moderately left.

If you remember the Democratic primary debate, presidential debate, almost all the candidates said, I believe in open borders.

That was political suicide.

This is political suicide times 10, because if you look, for example, there are 16 Democrats who have won in Trump districts, where Trump also won.

What do those 16 Democrats have in common?

They're all moderates.

This is one of the firmest pieces of research across the board, massive amounts of evidence.

Moderates do better than progressives.

They do better in race after race and race by an average of maybe four points.

And so if you want to win and defeat Republicans, nominate a moderate.

It's not that complicated.

You take a look at what happened in Georgia a couple of years ago.

You had Raphael Warnock, a moderate, and Stacey Abrams, a progressive.

Warnock wins, Abrams loses.

It's the case over and over and over and again.

But Democrats seem to have not learned this message, at least the kind of voters who voted for El-Sayed.

He did very well in highly educated and more elite districts.

He, like all socialists, did very poorly among workers.

In the general election, there are going to be a lot more people without college degrees than with college degrees, or at least in this primary campaign.

So this is bad news for Democratic electability.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I would just say Dr.

El-Sayed is not a socialist.

He's a progressive, just to be clear.

He's not a member of the DSA.

AMNA NAWAZ: He's backed by many Democratic Socialists.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, sure, he's backed by, but he's not like Mayor Mamdani, who is a member of the DSA.

And I would push back on David.

It's not just anger at Trump.

It's anger at Trump policies.

It's not just we don't like the president because he is who he is.

We don't like the president, particularly in Michigan, because of the tariffs, because of the war.

There are lots of tangible Trump policies that Dr.

El-Sayed ran on to get people's votes.

And that message that he's -- he argued during the campaign is one he's going to take to the general election.

And it's just a matter of whether it will penetrate.

And that's the big test here.

DAVID BROOKS: Voters in almost every presidential race, I think, in every one of my lifetime, have always said, who's closer to the center?

And they vote for that person.

Trump seemed closer to the center than Kamala Harris.

Biden seemed closer to the center than Donald Trump.

Donald Trump over the last few years has run away from the center.

He is handing this election to the Democrats.

All they have to do is sit there and be couch potatoes.

They do not have to support Medicare for all so that Republicans can go to them and say, you like your private health insurance?

Mr.

El-Sayed's going to take that away from you.

That is politically bad news, and that's only one of the issues on which the party is moving further and further away from the center, and therefore... JONATHAN CAPEHART: I mean, I disagree that the Democratic Party writ large is moving far away from the center, and that a few races won by Democratic Socialists or people who identify as progressive, like Dr.

El-Sayed, that - - to me, I just don't -- I do not see it that you can put this -- make this blanket argument that the Democratic Party is running far left.

AMNA NAWAZ: We will see what happens when voters have a chance to speak on this.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And that is the key thing.

It's the voters who have made these decisions.

AMNA NAWAZ: I know you both are following these other headlines as well, which is a new round of political misconduct stories that we are covering.

And let me just run through a few of these that I know folks have seen in our coverage.

The Republican Congressman Chuck Edwards of North Carolina ended his reelection bid after an Ethics Committee found that he harassed two of his aides.

In Ohio, of course, you have the Republican Congressman Max Miller there refusing to drop out, even as he faces abuse allegations from his ex-wife.

And his ex-father-in-law, former father-in-law, Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno, is telling him to step down.

And, in Florida, there's Congressman Cory Mills, who's been accused of assault and is under investigation, is also staying in the race.

Jonathan, we should point out Democrats did force out Eric Swalwell after a slew of allegations.

They took a few weeks to unite around pushing out Graham Platner, but how are you looking at these allegations now?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, I mean, I'm looking at it like this.

Miller's decided to stay, not to heed the president's advice to not run or whatever.

The other -- the last member you mentioned is also sticking - - sticking with it.

And I think... AMNA NAWAZ: Cory Mills, yes.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Cory -- yes.

I think they have themselves to blame.

They just look at what then-candidate Donald Trump did in 2016, when credible accusations of sexual misconduct that were leveled against him by multiple women, then the infamous grab them by the expletive recording that came out in October of 2016, and yet he still -- folks still stayed with him.

Like, he brazened it out.

He withstood all the criticism, all the calls for him to get out, and he became president.

So, if you're a Republican who's found himself in this situation, why wouldn't you think that I can -- if the president can do it, then why can't I?

And that's exactly what they're doing.

And Republicans, again, I think have themselves to blame for this.

AMNA NAWAZ: David, the House speaker, Mike Johnson, says he's not going to intervene, right?

Do you think you should?

DAVID BROOKS: Absolutely.

You know, he's running a body that should have some integrity.

And some of these scandals are perennial scandals.

There are always going to be financial scandals.

They're going to -- men are going to be idiots and there are going to be sex abuse scandals, and they should all go for that.

But what worries me is the rise of bullyism, is the number of candidates who have either because of Trump or because they hate Trump, frankly, if you throw Graham Platner in there, they have decided that bullying is fine.

And Max Miller seems to be the perfect example of this, rich kid who had a temper and still apparently has a temper, and who has half the U.S.

Senate against him.

And that bullying, we know where that cultural vibe comes from.

That does come from the White House.

And it's become acceptable to be a bully in all sorts of noxious ways.

And Mike Johnson should say, who's not a bully -- he seems to be a good guy, good Christian guy.

He should say, no, we actually don't stand for this.

And, of course, then they'd say, well, what about Donald Trump?

And he'd have to dance around that.

But at least he can -- he can control the culture in his own organization.

AMNA NAWAZ: Before I let you go, I want to get both of you quickly on the president's latest move, which are two new executive orders related to birthright citizenship.

This follows the Supreme Court striking down his previous effort to undermine this in -- from the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.

He's got these two new orders more narrow in what they're targeting here.

But I just want to ask each of you, why do you think the president is so singularly obsessed with this one issue?

Jonathan?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, multiple times at this table during the campaign, I said the president was running an openly racist, xenophobic, white nationalist campaign for president.

And key in that campaign was doing something about immigration.

It wasn't just about sealing the border.

It was about stopping immigration from countries that messed with the demographic makeup of this country.

There are a lot of people who fear the browning of America.

And by going after immigration so aggressively, he's trying to do something about that.

So I am not surprised the president is looking at what the Supreme Court did and is trying to figure out ways to still try to accomplish his goal, whether it runs afoul of the Supreme Court decision or not.

I don't think he really cares.

I think he's really just trying to do everything he can to stop immigration and in the process change the nature of who we are as a country.

DAVID BROOKS: I have -- Trump supporters I spoke to say birthright citizenship was fine between 1925 and 1965, a low immigration era.

Now we're in a high immigration era.

They think the fundamental coherence of the culture is being weakened.

And that's their argument, and they're really upset about it.

They think it's an existential threat, which I think Trump shares that, and that's why he's going back to this issue again and again and again.

The only thing I'd point out, if you ask Americans by large majorities, they support immigration, right now, larger than majorities than any time in the last 10 years.

If you ask Americans, should America be a more diverse country or a less diverse country, you get like three-quarters of the people saying we want to be a more diverse country.

So those people who think we should shut down birthright citizenship in order to create coherence instead of diversity, they're in a pretty small minority in this country.

AMNA NAWAZ: America's figuring out who she is.

(LAUGHTER) AMNA NAWAZ: Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks, thank you so much.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Thanks, Amna.

DAVID BROOKS: Thank you.