Former Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Barney Frank, in hospice care, went on national television Sunday to warn Democrats they have moved too far left.
Frank, 86, is dealing with congestive heart failure at his home in Ogunquit, Maine, the Boston Globe reported. The Massachusetts Democrat served 32 years in the House and co-authored the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform law.
Frank told CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday that his record gives the message weight. “It’s precisely because I have been on the left that I have undertaken this,” Frank said. He named trans athletes in women’s sports as a debate Democrats should approach carefully rather than treat as a loyalty test. (RELATED: Dying Lefty Legend Making One Last-Ditch Effort To Save His Party. But Is He To Blame?)
“I understand there’s a lot of anger about that,” Frank told CNN. “And I think, in the interest of the transgender community, as well as others, it would be better to go at that in a more granular way, and not simply announce that, if you don’t support it, you’re a homophobe.”
Dying ex-Rep. Barney Frank delivers stark warning from hospice about Dems swinging too far left https://t.co/0WmKdGWFCV pic.twitter.com/Ivfu15hW7J
— New York Post (@nypost) May 3, 2026
Frank told Politico the party must explicitly reject positions like defunding the police and open borders. “For a lot of my colleagues, the argument has been, ‘well, we don’t support defund the police or open borders, and we don’t say we do,’” Frank told Politico. “But my point is, no, it’s not enough … to be silent. We have to explicitly repudiate it.”
Frank cited Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner as an example, the Politico reported. Maine Gov. Janet Mills exited the Democratic primary last week citing fundraising trouble, according to NBC News, leaving Platner as the presumptive nominee against Republican Sen. Susan Collins.
Platner has come under fire for past Reddit posts and a tattoo resembling the Nazi SS Totenkopf emblem, the New York Post reported. NBC News reported that the posts called police “bastards” and minimized sexual assault, and that Platner has since covered the tattoo.
Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren endorsed Platner, NBC reported. National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Tim Scott called him “a phony who is too extreme for Maine.”
Frank also discussed President Donald Trump. He told CNN Trump is an “idiot savant” who was “good at one thing and terrible at everything else.” Frank told Politico one of his regrets is that he “won’t see the continued implosion of Donald Trump.”
“His mind is alert. He’s totally with it. But his body, I think, is starting to give out,” Segel told the Boston Globe.