The Political ‘Diploma Divide’ Now Applies to Members of Congress
31st August 2025
The Washington Poop, paper of record of the Deep State.
In a dramatic shift from 50 years ago, Republicans in Congress overwhelmingly attended nonelite universities for undergraduate and postgraduate studies. At the same time, almost half of all Democrats graduated from an Ivy League institution or some other elite university for undergraduate or postgraduate work, a slight increase from the early 1970s.
That’s the key finding from a new research paper published by three leading political observers from the University of Arkansas, Vanderbilt University and the University of Virginia.
The trio put together a 50-year study of members of Congress and their educational backgrounds. They traced the arc from a time when both parties were dominated by figures who attended universities like Harvard, Yale, Georgetown or Stanford to today, when many Democrats still have elite credentials while very few GOP lawmakers attended such institutions.
That’s because ‘such institutions’ have turned into finishing schools for Democrat activists. This is a feature, not a bug. It used to be one could get a good education at ‘such institutions’ no matter your political views, but those days are long gone. Nowadays you can get straight As as a Grievance Studies Major, learning nothing useful, as long as you parrot the Narrative.
This is not news.