Announcing Trans Rights as DSA Cleveland’s Priority
At the January 2025 general meeting, Cleveland DSA voted to begin a priority project in support of transgender liberation.
In our chapter structure, the passage of a priority project indicates a commitment to putting the full weight of the chapter’s resources behind the initiative. Our bylaws impose a limit of 2 priority projects at any given time. As of this writing, the trans liberation project is Cleveland DSA’s only priority.
As socialists, we believe that every person should be able to express and develop themselves fully as human beings, including trans people. The struggle for trans liberation is connected to the broader struggle for the liberation of the working class.
The mission of the Trans Liberation Project is to create an environment in Northeast Ohio where all transgender people feel supported and free to express themselves without fear of persecution or marginalization. The project aims to achieve this mission locally through a three-pronged approach:
- Building Community
- Taking Local Legislative Action
- Providing Access to Affirming Services
Building Community: To provide a safe haven for trans people, we need to form a base in Northeast Ohio dedicated to fighting for trans liberation that can be mobilized for community defense and campaigns. DSA’s objective is to develop our capacity to turn out large numbers of people in a militant way.
Taking Local Legislative Action: DSA aims to enact legislation that will make Cleveland a sanctuary city for trans people. Inspired by work of DSA chapters across the country, we will draft a trans sanctuary city policy and advocate for it to be passed by Lakewood city council.
Providing Access to Affirming Services: DSA will assist trans people in gaining access to gender-affirming services.
- Name change clinic: DSA will host a name change clinic to make it easier for trans people to update their birth certificate with gender affirming details.
- Gender-affirming clothing: DSA will host clothing swap events to provide trans people free access to gender-affirming clothing.
This is not the first time our chapter has engaged in organizing around trans rights. In a 2024 non-priority activity, we organized a public pressure campaign against HB68 and Governor Mike DeWine’s administrative rules restricting gender-affirming care. We targeted state representatives and senators, the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review, the Ohio Health Advisory Board, the Ohio Department of Health, the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, and the Cuyahoga County Board of Health with public comment, phone banking, emails, and a demonstration outside the Cuyahoga County Board of Health. After receiving thousands of public comments and testimony, the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review blocked the implementation of the administrative rule Reporting Gender-Related Condition Diagnoses and Gender Transition Care which would have required medical professionals to report diagnoses and treatment related to gender-affirming care to the Ohio Department of Health but allowed several other rules restricting care for minors to move forward. Lower courts in Ohio blocked the implementation of HB68. Interest in mass action over the restrictions quickly diminished.
Since January, the Trump administration has issued a series of anti-trans executive orders, including a ban on gender-affirming care for minors and a policy barring trans people from obtaining federal identity documents aligning with their gender identity. These policies are an escalation of the attacks on trans people by the right-wing in the United States over the last decade and further encourage discrimination, harassment, and violence. As the right-wing has scapegoated and attacked the transgender community, the Democratic party has failed to take meaningful action to protect us when it has had the power to do so.
Transphobia, like other forms of oppression, divides the working class and prevents us from building collective power by targeting the human rights of those who are particularly vulnerable. We can’t rely on the two capitalist parties to save us. Winning reproductive rights and trans liberation will require an organized, independent, working class movement with the ability to fight back.
Our chapter has experienced considerable growth in recent months, and we are excited to organize our membership into this priority project. Join Cleveland DSA today to organize for a better world!
You can sign up for a one-on-one meeting with an organizer from our chapter here and join the chapter here.
The post Announcing Trans Rights as DSA Cleveland’s Priority appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America.
Maine unions and community unite for May Day
Hundreds of thousands of workers marched and rallied on May Day—International Workers Day—making it the largest International Workers Day since 2006 when two million immigrant workers left work to demand their rights. Protests were organized in 1,300 locations, large and small; no doubt the first May Day protest in most of these sites. Maine stood out with more than 5,000 participating spread over 26 towns and cities, from Madawaska to Orono to Portland, where almost 2,000 marched and rallied. And in Wayne—population 1,000—seventy people turned out for both morning and evening rallies, one of the highest per capita demonstrations in the country.
Memory and sacrifice play a role in sustaining working-class culture. No 1886. No Haymarket Martyrs. No May Day. More recently, the 2006 May Day protests provided a living link to the past. And UAW president Sean Fain’s call for unions to align contracts and lead a 2028 general strike has introduced May Day to a whole new generation of labor organizers.
As the saying goes, the best organizing tool is a bad boss and Trump is one of the worst bosses possible. Repression and mass layoffs do not always provoke resistance, but this time targeted workers put up a critical mass of opposition. For instance, thousands of teachers from across the country responded to a call by the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers for walk-ins in March to protest Trump’s destruction of the Department of Education, including teachers at Deering High School and Rowe Elementary in Portland.
And many unions have been fighting the bosses all along, linking struggles in specific workplaces to the more general need to defend working-class rights today. The Maine State Nurses Association led a rally to protest Medicaid cuts in March, organized a mass town hall meeting to prevent the closure of the obstetrics department in the small town of Houlton, and saw some of its most active members take a leading role in May Day.
Pair these factors with decades of bi-partisan misery in necessities such as housing, health care, education, inflation, and union busting alongside escalating racism, misogyny, transphobia and homophobia, nationalism, genocidal militarism in Gaza, and anti-immigrant bigotry and it’s not surprising young workers are angry. But objective conditions do not create action on their own. Organized forces with the credibility and capacity to think through a strategy and then put it into practice are required. Fortunately, Chicago’s working class has created this necessary element.
[Read next: The future of housing is public]
According to Jesse Sharkey, past president of the Chicago Teachers Union and lead organizer with the newly-formed May Day Strong coalition, “Chicago became a center of May Day organizing this year for two reasons—first, there was a local coalition that got a lot of people involved. Activists from the immigrants rights community were extremely important in initiating it, and they held open meetings. They invited anyone who wanted to help organize. That drew in trade unionists, and many others. On a second front, Chicago was in the middle of initiating a national call for May Day protests… The call for that effort came from the Chicago Teachers Union and a handful of allied organizations such as Midwest Academy, Bargaining for the Common Good, and the Action Center on Race and the Economy. The NEA also played an extremely helpful role. In late March, we had about 220 people from over 100 organizations join us in Chicago to start planning for May 1 actions. The reason we were able to initiate such a widespread effort was because we have a past practice of closely linking trade union fights to wider working class demands. In places where local unions have worked with community and activist groups, we had networks of communication and trust. Then, once that effort had reached a certain critical mass, some of the big national networks like Indivisible and 50501 got on board and that really grew the reach of the day.”
It’s not that the CTU and immigrant community organizers in Chicago were the only ones thinking about May Day, but their action provided a framework to draw together and amplify similar efforts across the country and to nationalize the protest by providing a framework and resources for labor and community organizers in hundreds of towns and cities. Chicago didn’t create May Day 2025, but it did open a door. Here in Maine, a broad group of organizers came together to walk through that door.
Maine DSA’s Labor Rising working group began discussing May Day plans late in 2024 and we eventually decided to help initiate an organizing meeting open to all community groups and unions. UAW graduate students participated in a preliminary meeting to brainstorm ideas and leaders from the Maine AFL-CIO convened statewide union conference calls. On April 12, more than 70 people attended a meeting in the South Portland Teamsters’ Hall where the group democratically planned Portland’s May Day and adopted the slogan Strength in Solidarity. Working groups took up all aspects of the action and all important decisions came back to the coalition for votes. By the latter part of April, the Maine Education Association and AFL-CIO leaders called for actions all across the state, amplifying the Chicago May Day Strong call and dramatically broadening what the Portland May Day committee could organize on its own.
May Day in Portland began with a rally at the University of Southern Maine to back UAW graduate students’ demands for a first contract, which the administration has stalled for more than 500 days. UAW graduate worker Miranda led the crowd chanting “What’s disgusting? Union busting!” We marched to the Post Office to hear from postal workers, including APWU president Scott Adams. “When our postal service is under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back!” Members of the Portland Education Association led the rally at Portland High School and teacher Bobby Shaddox taught everyone to sing an updated version of Billy Bragg’s There is Power in a Union. “The union forever, defending our rights, down with the tyrants, all workers unite!” Headlining the stop, The Pelikanne, a trans high school student poet, shared their own revolutionary vision with all those assembled. From there, we went up the block to Monument Square to hear Jay Gruber, a member of the librarian’s union, and others at a brief rally before taking Congress Street to march to the final rally at Congress Square Park. Highlights at the final rally included Alana Schaeffer, president of the Metal Trades Council, representing 4,000 workers at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, members of the Maine Coalition for Palestine, Osgood from Portland Outright, Anthony Abdullah from the Maine State Nurses Association, and others. Twenty-five other towns held actions, bringing the total number of Maine participants to over 5,000, the largest Maine May Day anyone can remember. All in all, it was a good day for Maine workers.
[Listen to Maine Mural, DSA’s podcast, latest episode featuring Presente! Maine immigrants rights organizers]
We face a long, complicated road where political pressures to return to passivity and demoralization will persist. Trump is happy and he is strong. There’s no point in underestimating the damage he is going to inflict on working class communities in the coming years. We are not yet powerful enough to stop him. But May Day 2025 constituted a small step towards healing deep wounds in the American working class and it points us in the right direction.
What did May Day teach us? Fittingly, the last word goes to Kirsten Roberts, a rank-and-file Chicago teacher. “The most important element of May Day 2025 is the explicit entry of organized and unorganized labor into resistance to Trump. Trump’s attacks are aimed directly at dividing the working class and turning ordinary people against one another while the billionaires rob and plunder us all. An agenda for working class unity can be built when we stand up for those most victimized and vilified by the right wing bigots AND when we stand together to fight for the things that the billionaire class has denied us—the fight for healthcare, education, housing, and good paying jobs for starters. For decades we’ve been told by both parties that funding war, incarceration, and border militarization are their priorities. May Day showed that working people have another agenda. Now let’s organize to win it.”
*Parts of this article will appear in an extended form examining May Day 2025 beyond Maine in DSA’s journal Socialist Forum.
The post Maine unions and community unite for May Day appeared first on Pine & Roses.
UAWD Votes To Dissolve In Narrow Vote, Results Challenged
This is an updated version of the article published on April 10.
By Henry De Groot
UAWD Votes 160 to 137 to Dissolve
Tensions within the Unite All Workers For Democracy (UAWD) reform caucus within the United Autoworkers Union have boiled over as the majority group on the caucus’s Steering Committee (henceforth, SC majority) pushed to dissolve the caucus.
In a national meeting of the caucus held online on April 27, members voted 52 percent to 46 percent to dissolve the reform caucus, although the vote was immediately challenged by some with allegations of members excluded from the vote and circumvention of the bylaws.
On May 6, the minority tendency on UAWD Steering Committee (SC minority) released a statement which rejected the outcome of the meeting and declared the UAWD had not been dissolved.
Dueling Visions
The initial statement from the SC majority proposing dissolution asserted that internal divisions within the caucus had hardened, blocking productive work from continuing. The SC majority statement also seemed to question the validity of a caucus which is largely composed of non-autoworkers within UAW Region 9A (covering the Northeast), in a union largely composed of midwestern blue-collar manufacturing workers.
We believe in the need for a reform caucus, but not in one that is constantly engaged in insular debate that distracts from the work of building the union.
Following the vote, the SC majority launched a new group, UAW Member Action.
The earlier SC majority statement announced the launch of the new network within the UAW as focused on “developing the future generation of shop-floor organizers and leaders in the UAW, helping members stand up to bosses and win strong contracts, and building stronger local unions, including by running for office.”
Prior to the vote, a counter-statement was released by the minority tendency on UAWD Steering Committee (SC minority) criticizing the effort to dissolve.
The SC minority statement, signed also by a number of rank-and-file members, explored how, from their perspective, the effort to dissolve the caucus was the result of a slow drift away from the original principles of the caucus, and the alleged opportunism of certain UAWD leaders elected to the union’s International Executive Board (IEB). In contrast to this alleged opportunism, the SC minority, instead, asserts a vision of what they call “class struggle.”
The statement from the SC minority also asserted that the effort by the SC majority to dissolve the caucus at the next meeting would violate the caucus’s by-laws and responds to the allegations of dysfunction that are raised in the majority group statement.
The SC minority also punched back at the SC majority, questioning the relationship between the majority group and Teamsters For A Democratic Union and Labor Notes, including financial contributions from leading figures in those organizations which were made to UAWD.
An April 29, 2025 Labor Notes article covering the dispute, “UAW Reformers Close Caucus, Launch New Organization,” covered both perspectives to some extent, but quoted overwhelmingly from the pro-dissolution side.
An SC minority sympathizer told Working Mass that they declined to be interviewed by Labor Notes after the Labor Notes journalist stated they would not disclose their own financial ties to UAWD.
“I did not trust the legitimacy of the journalism, considering the political and financial ties of the authors in the situation,” the UAWD member told Working Mass.
Dissolution Disputed
A May 6 communication from the SC minority reads that
Despite the declaration of the seven pro-dissolution SC members, we are writing to all UAWD members to let you know that UAWD has not been dissolved and will continue on as a democratic membership organization composed of rank-and-file UAW members
The statement calls out the need for class struggle unionism, independence from top leadership, and to speak openly against the genocide in Palestine.
The communication then summarizes a longer list of alleged undemocratic tactics used by the SC majority to carry through the vote. Allegations by the SC minority include claims that members with voting rights were not allowed in the meeting or removed mid-meeting, that the vote itself violated the by-laws, that Robert’s Rules were unduly suspended during the meeting, that the chair “cherry picked” favorable motions and ignored opposing motions, that debate was improperly limited, and that 50 of the 356 participants did not vote in the poll, which – according to the SC minority – only lasted 90 seconds.
Additionally, the SC minority alleges that members of the SC majority incorporated UAWD (or, as they put it, a UAWD-like entity) in the state of Michigan on April 10 “in an illegitimate attempt to claim simple-majority threshold for dissolution according to Michigan law,” that is, incorporated the entity just to dissolve it less than three weeks later.
Most concretely, the SC minority alleges that at least 25 voters can be proven to have been unduly denied a vote, greater than the margin of 23 votes.
Working Mass cannot independently verify any of these claims.
Working Mass also viewed an April 24 cease and desist letter directed to the SC minority calling on them to stop the distribution of member contact information after the SC minority moved to make UAWD member information available to all UAWD members.
Deeper Tensions
The dispute between the majority and minority groups largely replayed the campaigns for the internal leadership which was elected in the fall of 2024, between the UAWD Strong slate winning a majority with two thirds of the vote, and the UAWD Call To Action slate securing only a minority of seats.
However, the close margins of the more recent vote may suggest that the majority group lost some support in the interim, or at least there was a base of UAWD members who were sympathetic to the majority but not willing to follow it in moving to dissolve the caucus.
The UAWD website UAWD.org now hosts a statement announcing the dissolution of the caucus, and relaying that “Our remaining funds will be donated across organizations proposed in the resolution to dissolve. These include other young reform caucuses (Federal Unionists Network, Essential Workers for Democracy, IATSE Caucus of Rank-and-file Entertainment Workers, IBEW Caucus of Rank-and-file Electrical Workers), immigrant legal aid, and the Mexican independent union movement.”
The website also includes a link to UAW Member Action.
The UAWD caucus took power in the country’s sixth-largest union, covering almost one million auto-workers, higher education workers, and other manufacturing and white-collar workers, following the successful UAWD election effort which saw UAWD member Shawn Fain take the union’s top job.
Fain also faced criticism, especially from the Palestinian movement, for his endorsement of Kamala Harris, and more recently for his apparent approval of Trump’s tariffs.
The division also seems to have split members of the DSA active within the caucus, with members currently or previously active in the Boston DSA Labor Working Group (which founded Working Mass), Worcester DSA, Detroit DSA, and other DSA chapters represented in both camps. This echoes an earlier dispute in the University of California UAW local which saw DSA members on both sides of a contract vote.
Forum For DSA Members
Boston DSA and Working Mass are jointly hosting a forum, planned tentatively for the evening of Wednesday, May 21st, to provide a space for DSA members to discuss and debate the political significance of the UAWD dissolution and how DSA should understand and relate to the ongoing reform-caucus movement. You can RSVP here.
Weekly Roundup: May 6, 2025
Upcoming Events
Tuesday, May 6 (6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): Reading Group for “The Destruction of Palestine is the Destruction of the Earth” (Zoom)
Wednesday, May 7 (6:30 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.): New Member Happy Hour (In person at Zeitgeist, 199 Valencia)
Thursday, May 8 (5:30 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.): 
Education Board Open Meeting (Zoom)
Friday, May 9 (6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.): Immigrant Justice Working Group Meeting (Zoom)
Saturday, May 10 (1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.): 
Homelessness Working Group Outreach and Training (In person at 1916 McAllister)
Sunday, May 11 (9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.): Hygiene Kit Assembly with Labor Board and Homelessness Working Group (In person at 1916 McAllister)
Monday, May 12 (5:50 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.): Socialist in Office + Electoral Board Meeting (Zoom)
Monday, May 12 (6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): Tenderloin Healing Circle (In person at Kelly Cullen Community, 220 Golden Gate)
Monday, May 12 (6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): Homelessness Working Group Regular Meeting (Zoom and in person 1916 McAllister)
Monday, May 12 (7:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): Labor Board Meeting (Zoom)
Wednesday, May 14 (6:45 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.): May General Meeting (Zoom and in person at Kelly Cullen Community, 220 Golden Gate and on Zoom)
Thursday, May 15 (7:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): Immigrant Justice Working Group Meeting (Zoom)
Sunday, May 18 (5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.): Capital Reading Group (Zoom and in person at 1916 McAllister)
Monday, May 19 (6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.): Ecosocialist Bi-Weekly Meeting (Zoom)
Check out https://dsasf.org/events for more events and updates.
Events & Actions
New Member Happy Hour
Join us for our New Member Happy Hour starting at 6:30PM at Zeitgeist (199 Valencia Street). Learn more about DSA SF’s upcoming projects, find out how to plug in, or just socialize with socialists! Also open to old members, regular folks and the socialism-curious. Members running for DSA National Convention delegate will also be there to answer questions about their questionnaires, so members should come through, too!
Fundamentals of Workplace Organizing
The Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC) is running a Fundamentals of Workplace Organizing course weekly in May (see below for schedule). We’re getting a group to take the course together and benefit from in-person discussions and activities,. If you’re interested, fill out the form here and join the #ewoc-fundamentals-2025 channel in Slack! The goal is to have more people learn organizing skills, both for your own projects and for organizing with EWOC.
Sessions run every week from 6:00-7:30 p.m. on:
- Wednesday, May 7
- Tuesday, May 13
- Wednesday, May 21
- Wednesday, May 28
The Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC) is a project of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) to build a distributed, grassroots organizing program to support workers org
No Appetite for Apartheid Canvass
We will be holding our next training and canvassing for No Appetite for Apartheid this Saturday, May 10! We’ll be meeting at 10:00 a.m. at 522 Valencia to do training. After the training, we will divide up into groups to visit stores in the Castro and Noe Valley (and maybe restaurants and cafes too!) and discuss de-shelving and boycotting Israeli products!
If you’ve already trained and you just want to canvass, feel free to show up at 11:30 a.m. at 522 Valencia to get a turf. If you are able to provide transportation for people from the training site to the canvassing location, please indicate that you RSVP here.
Hygiene Kit Assembly
Keeping the May Day spirit alive, we have a Hygiene Kit Assembly planned on Sunday, May 11 in partnership with the Homelessness Working Group. We’ll assemble hygiene kits to distribute to our homeless neighbors and talk about ways to come together in community. People experiencing homelessness are systematically left out of political decisions that impact them, and we’ve invited members of local unions and community members to have conversations with us about this disparity at this event. All ages welcome – this event is kid friendly.
Sunday, May 11
9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.
1916 McAllister
Office Hours
Co-work with your comrades! Come to the DSA SF office and get your DSA work or work-work done, or just hang out. We’ll be at 1916 McAllister from 12:00 p.m to 5:00 p.m. on Fridays.
May Day Reportback
This week the world celebrated International Workers’ Day, also known as May Day, to mark the anniversary of the 1886 United States general strike to demand an eight-hour workday. To celebrate this historic day, the Labor Board, in collaboration with other chapter bodies, mobilized chapter members to attend a slate of events focused on immigrant and workers’ rights.
Our events kicked off on Sunday, April 27th with a Know Your Rights canvass in partnership with the Immigrant Justice Working Group. DSA members handed out multilingual red cards and asked local businesses to hang flyers in their windows. It was powerful to see so many neighbors and businesses standing in solidarity with the immigrant community.
In place of the Labor Board’s regular Monday meeting, we held an education event focused on the history of May Day. We screened “We Mean to Make Things Over: A History of May Day,” a documentary co-produced by members of East Bay DSA. The Education Board facilitated a discussion about the documentary and shared several political cartoons from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
On April 29th we turned out dozens of comrades to Maker Tuesday in preparation for the May Day rally. With everyone’s help, we made hundreds of DSA buttons, flyers, and red cards, and assembled goodie bags to bring to the rally.
Though Thursday May 1st didn’t mark the end of our May Day events, it certainly was a high point in understanding how we can come together in solidarity for workers and immigrants alike. The San Francisco and East Bay chapters formed a large contingent at the rally where comrade Hazel W and socialist-elected District Supervisor Jackie Fielder gave empowering speeches about how every struggle is part of the connected fight for freedom, dignity, and justice. Thousands of workers, immigrants and people from all walks of life marched from San Francisco City Hall to the ICE building. We will fight back, and when we fight, WE WIN!
Interested in continuing the fight for workers’ and immigrants’ rights? Come to our next May Day events:
- Sunday, May 11 – Hygiene Kit Assembly from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m. at 1916 McAllister. RSVP here.
- Tuesday, May 20 – Socialist Night School on Salting from 7:00 to 8:15 p.m. at 1916 McAllister. RSVP here.
Socialist in Office Reportback
At the Socialist in Office meeting on April 28, the electoral board discussed several items
- Supporting legislation for a Tenant’s Right to Pay to prevent evictions due to nonpayment after delinquent payments are resolved
- Opposing the SFPD & Sheriff Overtime Budget
- Upcoming hearing on the Four Pillars model for overdose prevention on May 16
- Supporting unhoused families facing evictions from shelters after 90 days
- There will be a rally in support of the families with Faith in Action on May 12 at 4:00 p.m. at City Hall. Please come to support!
- Potential attacks on housing-first policies for permanent supportive housing (PSH) by legislation requiring 25% to be sober housing
If you would like to be involved in these conversations, join the electoral board on Mondays at 6:00 p.m. via Zoom and find us on Slack at #electoral-discussion.
Behind the Scenes
The Chapter Coordination Committee (CCC) regularly rotates duties among chapter members. This allows us to train new members in key duties that help keep the chapter running like organizing chapter meetings, keeping records updated, office cleanup, updating the DSA SF website and newsletter, etc. Members can view current CCC rotations.
To help with the day-to-day tasks that keep the chapter running, fill out the CCC help form.
Maine Mural: Presente! ME
An interview with the local group Presente! ME about their organization’s history and mission helping new Mainers, and current concerns regarding national attacks on immigrant communities.
The post Maine Mural: Presente! ME appeared first on Pine & Roses.
On the Milan Bottoms Development
Who do we want to be?
The following remarks were presented by DSA-endorsed mayoral candidate and current City Councilmember Mary Lupien at the “Day of Action” on April 19.
We are living through a time of profound crisis—and profound possibility .
Across this country, we are watching the destruction of our democracy unfold in real time. The Trump administration is not just coming for immigrants. It is coming for difference and for dissent. For working people. For the systems we rely on—public education, healthcare, the justice system, free speech. They are coming for us. This is not just political. It is existential.
This is not about Democrats versus Republicans. This is about the one percent versus the rest of us.
Because while we were grieving, while we were locked in our homes, while we were just trying to survive the pandemic—a historic transfer of wealth took place. Billions of dollars left our pockets and lined the bank accounts of the wealthiest few. That wasn’t a side effect. That was the plan.
It is still the plan.
And at every level—national, state, and local—we see the same tired lie being sold to us: that if we just give more to the wealthy, eventually the money will trickle down to us. When will we learn that trickle down economics doesn’t work.
Rachel [Barnhart] is right. The democrats have failed us at the national level by leaving the working class behind and as Randi [DiAntonio] said—catering to the corporate class and political loyalists. And that couldn’t be more true locally. We feel it every day.
At the federal level that looks like defunding the department of Education, social security and Medicaid; and giving tax breaks to Trump’s rich friends. On the state level, it looks like giving $1 billion to Elon Musk to build a solar panel factory that didn’t live up to its goals. Locally that looks like spending tens of millions of dollars of Covid relief money on big flashy projects meant to lure outside residents and business investment while benefiting corporate real estate campaign donors.
So now is the time to reject that broken logic. To draw a hard line in the sand and say: public money must go to public good. Period.
We’ve come to rely on systems, but let’s be honest: those systems were never meant for us. Not in their current form. They’ve been hijacked to give us just enough to survive—while funneling everything else to the top.
So it’s time to reimagine. Rebuild. Resist.
But here’s the truth we don’t always talk about: Resistance is hard. This is a marathon, not a sprint. After the excitement of today wears off and we’re alone with our fear- it can feel overwhelming. Especially when it feels like everything is happening at once.
That’s why we need to talk about self-care and community care—not as luxuries, but as necessities. Because you can’t pour from an empty cup. You can’t fight for the future if you’ve forgotten how to feel joy in the present.
Staying connected to our hearts is an act of revolution. Finding beauty, sharing laughter, caring for ourselves and each other—that’s what makes us human. And if we lose sight of that humanity, then what exactly are we fighting for?
This is a moment to reevaluate our priorities—not just as individuals, but as a society. What do we want to build? Who do we want to be?
Because it’s not enough to raise our voices. We have to show up—with courage and clarity—for the people who are most in danger.
Right now, the focus might be on immigrants, but we know this administration’s aim is broader. It’s about silencing protest, punishing difference, and dividing us to maintain control.
And looking around this crowd, we have to ask: why don’t we see more marginalized people here? Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s exhaustion. Maybe it’s a sense that we haven’t shown up for them in the ways they’ve needed.
We have to sit with that.
We have to confront the uncomfortable truth that these systems—white supremacy, patriarchy, colonialism—they continue because we participate in them, even passively. Even when we don’t mean to.
So let’s make a commitment, right here and now, to do better.
To examine our role. To hold each other accountable. To build something truly diverse, equitable, inclusive—truly just. Because justice isn’t a checklist. It’s a way of being. It means recognizing that my liberation is tied to yours. That none of us are free until all of us are free.
This is our time to resist with everything we’ve got.
To love with everything we’ve got.
To build with everything we’ve got.
Not just against something—but for something better.
Let’s fight for a world that honors every life.
Let’s fight for joy, for connection, for each other.
Let’s be brave enough to imagine what’s possible—and bold enough to make it real.
The post Who do we want to be? first appeared on Rochester Red Star.
Lobbyists Set the Agenda During Nevada’s 83rd Session
The Nevada landscape is not the same as the federal landscape. In Congress, we know that power players like Big Pharma and AIPAC run the show. Here in Nevada, it’s the Chambers of Commerce, the Nevada Realtors, the Retail Association of Nevada, mining companies, and big casinos. Labor unions get a slice of the pie, like prevailing wages for new construction and raises for public workers, thanks to their generous donations, with most progressive bills existing due to union backing.
During this legislative session, these power players have run the show. In a published statement, Sandra Jarauigui stated that her bill was watered down by Nevada Realtors, who then decided not to back it anyways. This bill, AB280, would limit rent increases for senior citizens to 10% (now 5%) for one year before sunsetting in 2026. That’s right, a one year long rent stabilization bill, that would allow landlords to immediately raise it to any number they want again when it expires in December 2026. This would conveniently be months before the end of the next legislative session and leave them without protection for over six months, even in the event that a second bill is passed.
Retail Association of Nevada, or RAN, has been loudly opposed to Attorney General Aaron Ford’s anti-price gouging bill, even publishing a condemnation of the bill in their monthly newsletter. They lobbied against it, pushing legislators to vote down the bill. Unfortunately for RAN, if you want legislators to take a politically ugly position such as this one, you’re going to have to pay them the big bucks. Only 3 Democrats voted against the bill: Duy Nguyen, Venise Karris, and Joe Dalia. All 3 of them received the maximum donation of $10,000 from the Retail Association of Nevada. They were the only Democrats to do so.
The bills are then written, sponsored, and presented by corporate lobbyists. AB523 is a bill written and presented by Uber lobbyists. Several articles refer to this bill as a “settlement” or a “compromise”, we prefer the term “quid pro quo”. Uber launched a nationwide campaign to lower their insurance liability in 2023, as a response to a litany of lawsuits regarding sexual assault, injury, and wage theft. Uber decided to go to war with a key pillar of the Nevada political class: legal services professionals. Uber presented this bill as a ceasefire. You allow us to carry lower insurance limits, shield us from all liability prosecution, and define drivers as “independent contractors” in law, and we will stop running ads against your friends in the law firms. Howard Watts allowed Uber lobbyists to fast track the bill through the Growth and Infrastructure Committee. It was introduced, heard, and passed in 24 hours. It then passed the floor unanimously. Not a single state lawmaker opposed the bill.
Next up is AJR8, what some are referring to as a desperate offering to Elon Musk. Sponsored by Assembly Democrat and Corporate Darling Joe Dalia, the bill is heavily supported by the Retail Association of Nevada. A reasonable person can assume that the world’s richest oligarch Elon Musk might have something to gain from the bill, due to his continued reliance on Nevada public dollars for his operations. Musk has also been railing against the existing business court in Delaware, because the court increasingly has ruled against corrupt CEOs and Trump-connected henchmen. Musk expressed his desire to establish a business court in Nevada on X. AJR8 passed the house with 40 votes, with only Assembly Democrats Erica Roth and Selena La Rue Hatch in opposition.
Then there’s SB371, presented by Resorts Association lobbyists on behalf of strip casinos. This bill would increase the penalties for trespassers on the Las Vegas strip. While that might sound reasonable to some, these “trespassers” are mostly homeless people moving from their way down the strip to access the tunnels (a local residence for the unhoused). This bill seeks to “deter” people who have no other choice, by locking them away for three years. Most notably, the bill is sponsored by Nevada Senate Democrat Fabian Doñate and Senate Republican John Steinbeck. Doñate represents one of the poorest districts in Las Vegas, and has seemingly sold out his own constituents. Doñate received the maximum contribution from MGM Resorts in his last election, as well as more than $5,000 in donations from various casino properties. SB371 passed the senate with no opposition.
Lastly, the disappearance of BDR 10-513, rent stabilization. The bill was viciously opposed by the entire corporate coalition, most strongly by Nevada Realtors. The bill was one of only a few bills to not be introduced at all in the session.
In all, the legislative session has been dominated by corporate lobbyists. While their presence is overwhelming — there are 900+ lobbyists in a building with 60 legislators — Nevada state lawmakers have given up on the pretense that working Nevadans have the same influence as their corporate campaign donors. There are no backroom deals between legislators and corporate lobbyists in Nevada, the lobbyists are standing in the middle of the room and loudly declaring “I wrote this bill.”
Neither party stands up against corporate interests. Whether it’s giving away federal lands, lowering insurance rates for Uber, arresting the homeless, or pouring public money into state funded billionaire slush funds, the CEO always comes first in Nevada. Las Vegas DSA wants to see a legislature dominated by worker power, and we will keep fighting until we’ve defeated the corporate giants.
If you want to stay up to date on what bills are making their way through the legislative session and who is supporting them, check out our bill tracker:
Reading Group Report Back: Karl Marx’s Capital
…by a reading group member
From November 2024 to March 2025, Madison Area DSA embarked on an ambitious political education project. A reading group formed to tackle Paul Reitter’s 2024 translation of Capital. The challenges of this book were clear and immense from the beginning. Marx’s words measure to a total of 710 pages with over 100 more pages of introductions and endnotes. It tackles a vast array of topics starting with a theoretical analysis of value, a mathematical assessment of the working day, and a historic review of the working class’s conditions across Great Britain. To call this work a magnum opus feels like an understatement.
How did MADSA respond to the challenge? There are different measures of success that should be considered. Over a dozen members signed up in December to attend the weekly meetings. Attendance dwindled rapidly to a core four members who finished the text earlier this year. We held a majority of meetings in-person at the Social Justice Center, though occasionally some were converted to Zoom due to scheduling conflicts. By the end, a transition from Thursday nights to Saturday mornings was made to facilitate reading group members taking on other active organizing projects on weekday nights.
The drop in attendance was likely multifactorial. For some members, the scheduled in-person weeknight meetings were inaccessible. For others, missed meetings due to other end-of-year holiday obligations made it difficult to catch up. Because each chapter of Capital references previously introduced concepts, falling behind often meant being left behind. In response, reading group members employed a combination of audiobooks, physical books, and digital ebooks to read the material. This allowed time-strapped members to maximize opportunities to read between sessions. Basically, whenever I had free time this winter, I needed to crack open Capital to stay ahead.
Sessions originally consisted of facilitated meetings with a self-nominated leader agreeing to summarize key concepts and key vocabulary each week. The decline in membership led to a decline in formal structure. At the conclusion, the four remaining members brought an equal share of questions and key passages to the table for others to review and discuss. This second model reduced scheduling anxiety and remained effective because as members grew to understand and build off of each other’s strengths. In general, a key source of success was having a member already familiar with the text, this member provided valuable context at the beginning of each session and prepared us with signposts to pay attention to when we read the into the next section.
In summary, I believe MADSA should form a Capital reading group every two years to maintain institutional knowledge of the key socialist theories among chapter members. Future reading groups will benefit most from regularly scheduled meetings that do not interfere with the end-of-year holidays. They should also seek to have members who are already familiar with the text to help draw attention to key ideas for new readers. It is worth considering the use of supplemental material, such as David Harvey’s chapter by chapter lecture series, which could reduce entry barriers or help members stay up to date despite occasionally missing a section. However, I believe there is significant benefit to engaging in the written metaphors and analogies Marx uses to explain his concepts. Members relying only on summarized material will miss the humor and jokes very much needed in the socialist vernacular to call out the contradictory monstrosity of capitalism.
The question of in-person versus video meetings remains up in the air. I invite current MADSA attendees of Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism reading group to contribute a follow-up report to Red Madison to help direct the chapter’s burgeoning political education committee on the best practices for maximizing access to important member education.
Finally, what other key theory should enter the MADSA reading group roster? In addition to reading European socialists like Marx and Lenin, MADSA should make dedicated space for non-European theory exploring the mechanisms of capitalist oppression. Given we organize within occupied Ho-Chunk land in the shadow of a massive land grant university, members would benefit from critical theories of settler colonialism. Reading groups for Fayez Sayegh’s 1965 thesis, Zionist Colonialism in Palestine and La Paperson’s A Third University is Possible represent exciting ways to build the membership’s capacity for material analysis and historical critique.
