Democratic Party leadership claims that the threat to democracy posed by a second Trump presidency and Republican-dominated Congress is real, and they are correct. The Republican Party is clear in its intention to undermine essential market regulations and basic individual rights. With the backing of a loaded Supreme Court, Trump’s administration stands to finally break the promise held out by Democrats throughout the rising tide of fascism: that we can defend democracy through our legal system. When that tide breaks, it will most immediately impact trans and reproductive rights, the unhoused, immigrants, and asylum seekers—but it ultimately will affect us all.

Nevertheless, the Democratic Party’s actions contradict its own apparent concerns. For example, while touting the value of free speech and protest, the Biden administration has overseen the crackdown on student protest across campuses nationwide. This does nothing to distance Democrats from the charge of repression that it levies against Republicans. Furthermore, instead of allowing for a competitive primary process (ironically, something permitted by the Republican Party), the Democratic National Committee saw to it that Biden was effectively the only candidate on the ballot. Even before Biden’s disastrous debate and the question of his cognitive decline, unprecedented thousands of Americans expressed their will for another candidate by voting “uncommitted” or “no preference” across the country—not least because of his commitment to funding Israel’s genocide of Palestinians. Democracy may be under threat, but it is already compromised today.

People want to stand up for democracy, yet with Biden at the helm, the Democratic Party reveals itself to be unable and unwilling. Following the recent attempt on Trump’s life, Democratic Party leadership has been more interested in the symbolic high ground, calling for national unity against “political violence.” The hypocrisy is blatant. On one level, this calls for unity with a candidate and party who incite the very violence at issue. On a deeper level, however, the Democratic Party fails to reconcile this call for unity with the state of violence it has perpetuated. Biden may be the first president to stand on a picket line, but he has done little to nothing material for the American and global working class. While Biden has focused our attention on “shrinkflation” and “hidden fees” (admittedly insidious practices), the prices of housing and healthcare continue to rise. Instead of moving to socialize these costs, the Biden administration funds war abroad, which benefits everyone from landlords and developers to insurance agencies and weapons manufacturers. Meanwhile, working people suffer degradation and death.

Given these conditions, the Democratic Party rightly appears bought by capitalist forces, which allows the Republican Party to (falsely) claim it will oppose “elites” in the name of those most desperate. Behind the culture war he stokes, Trump (like populists the world over) taps into real pain felt by the working class. In order for the Democratic Party to stake any claim to legitimacy, it must field a candidate who will rise to the moment and confront the threat of fascism without hesitation, all the while attacking its root economic causes. That candidate is not Joe Biden.

From the City of Charlotte to Mecklenburg County and beyond, join the call: it’s time to drop Joe!

Let the following know it’s time to drop Joe:

Alma Adams: (704) 344-9950

Chuck Schumer: (202) 224-6542

North Carolina Democratic Party: (919) 821-2777

In this episode, Tripp Fuller of Homebrewed Christianity podcast joins to talk faith that's beautiful enough to be called good news, a process vision of socialism, fiction and popculture as the fullest expressions of humanity, and miscellaneous nerdiness. Join us October 17–19 in Denver for theologybeer.camp ! Use the coupon code TAKEHEARTHOBBIT for $50 off your ticket. Email us at religioussocialism@gmail.com if you plan to come, we'd love to meet up.

Two Dead at the Hands of Lazy Cops in Kent County

In the Greater Grand Rapids Area, the police have now twice used a dangerous car chase maneuver against an unarmed, fleeing individual, leading to their death. These individuals were wanted for nonviolent crimes and should have been detained using standard protocol. To be clear, the car maneuver we’re talking about is the PIT maneuver, in which a pursuing vehicle swerves into a fleeing vehicle’s back tire in order to cause a spin out. It was never designed to be used against humans, and even the police have even admitted that the maneuver was used incorrectly in both cases. They just aren’t going to do anything about it.

The first instance was April 8th, when Riley Doggett (17) was a passenger in a stolen vehicle being pursued by the police. The driver crashed, and Riley got out of the car and fled until the police caught up and swerved into the fleeing teenager, fully running him over. He died from his injuries days later. The Kent County Sheriff’s office callously remarked that “[Riley’s] actions unfortunately placed him at high risk for a deadly encounter, whether with a citizen or law enforcement. It was fortunate for the community that a Kent County Deputy was the one to confront Mr. Doggett during his crime spree.” Apparently, we as citizens of Grand Rapids should feel safer knowing that our cops are slaughtering people without a trial. The footage of the event can be viewed here, though viewer discretion is advised due to the disturbing content.

The second instance was on the morning of April 17th, when Samuel Sterling (25) was filling up his tires and officers from multiple agencies showed up at his house with a warrant for breaking his parole. A chase ensued, and Samuel was eventually caught by an officer using a PIT maneuver to pinch Sterling against the side of a Burger King. The driver reversed, and Sterling fell to the ground. He can be heard saying to the officers, “I got no gun, bro…why you hitting me like this?” The cops then cuff him, take his belongings out of his pockets, and stand around his body, doing nothing to help him. An officer can be heard telling two firefighters to keep his cuffs on because he was a “wanted, violent felon.” This isn’t true. Samuel’s three felonies were for carrying a concealed weapon and theft, all nonviolent crimes. You can watch the video here, though again, viewer discretion is advised. Samuel died just a few hours later in the hospital. 

To add insult to injury, only the offending officer in the second instance is being charged with murder. This is likely due to the fact that this crime falls under the jurisdiction of our progressive state attorney general, Dana Nessel, because the offending officer was a member of the state police. The Kent County Sheriff’s Deputy Josiah McMains is left in the hands of the extremely conservative Kent County prosecutor Chris Becker, so they get off much easier. This is further evidence that the divide between “criminals” and non-criminals is not only socially constructed, but arbitrarily enforced. Becker is throwing the book at Riley’s friend, charging him with Fleeing and Eluding Causing Death, and attempting to try him as an adult. Meanwhile, the blood-thirsty thugs in blue will seemingly continue their vehicular rampage until they’re forced to stop by a higher power, because it saves them time and effort during a chase. What sort of a justice system is that?

All of this feels familiar when we remember the doorbell footage from April 4, 2022 which showed Grand Rapids Police Officer Christopher Schurr struggle to detain Patrick Lyoya, get frustrated, and unceremoniously end the struggle with a bullet to the back of Patrick’s head. At the time Chris Becker assured us that, despite his work being so closely aligned with the GRPD, he did not know Officer Schurr personally and wouldn’t need to recuse himself. More than two years later, and we’re still waiting for that trial to happen and Patrick’s family is still waiting for justice.
And as if this isn’t bad enough, the Grand Rapids police are now campaigning for the right to sue their detainees in civil court; even though they can beat an innocent man without fear of being charged. This means that after arresting you, an officer will be able to steal from you via civil suit. It’s vital that we organize now to rein in our out-of-control law enforcement before it becomes too late. Fight police oppression by protesting any chance you get and vote against this dishonest “Back the Blue” initiative, we can’t afford to give these thugs any more power to oppress us.

The post If the Police Can’t Catch their Criminals, They’ll just Kill Them Instead appeared first on Grand Rapids Democratic Socialists of America.

For five years flight attendants have been locked in contract negotiation with American Airlines (AA) to bargain for a better contract. Since then inflation has increased by more than 30%, yet starting pay remains frozen at $27k a year. 

The flight attendants and their union have authorized a strike with a 99% majority, but government agencies won’t let them. The Railway Labor Act requires flight attendants to obtain approval from the National Mediation Board (NMB) before striking, which the NMB has refused. The NMB’s limit on the right to strike impacts more than the 27,000 flight attendants at AA. In fact, it hurts all railway and airline workers in the nation, their families, and the communities they live in.

With no legal ability to strike, negotiations have been left at a standstill, which benefits no one but AA. They get to freeze employee wages while continuing to inflate their prices and fees. This story repeats across all industries because our government prioritizes the interests of capitalists who own corporations over the interests of workers who keep them running day in, day out.

The AA contract negotiation has gone on for five years: two under Donald Trump and three under Joe Biden. Republican and Democratic politicians may strongly disagree on specific policies, but they regularly come together to keep workers down (for example, Joe Biden recently appointed a Republican to the NMB).

As socialists we recognize the ability to strike as fundamental and necessary to fight the tyranny of capital. Any and all action to restrict this ability should be opposed and overturned. 

Follow the APFA on social media to keep an eye out for how you can support their fight for a better contract.

Last Tuesday was election night across New York State. The night highlighted both the enduring challenges and promise of the rising Socialist movement. In the most widely covered race of the night, Reactionary forces across the Right and Center, including AIPAC, funneled tens of millions of dollars into the 16th Congressional District to secure the defeat of DSA-endorsed incumbent, Congressman Jamaal Bowman by George Latimer. While at the state-level, all eight DSA incumbents in the State Senate and Assembly won their reelection bids, and they will be joined by DSA-endorsed candidate, Claire Valdez, who won her insurgent campaign to represent the 37th Assembly District in Queens. Tonight, we will hear from David Vibert, a steering committee member of DSA’s National Electoral Commission, to give his perspective on last week’s elections and their ramifications for the socialist movement in New York state and beyond. We will also hear from RPM’s own Jack Devine and Alex Randazzo on their breakdown of Bowman’s defeat, and what his loss tells us about the evolution of the 16th district since he first won the seat in 2020 and what we can learn in his loss 4 years later.

by M.W.D.

On February 25, 2024, Aaron Bushnell—a local unaffiliated comrade who was deeply involved in local mutual aid efforts, and a friend to many—self-immolated in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington D.C. in protest of the genocide in Gaza and the complicity of the US military. On March 1st, friends of Aaron organized a vigil, not only to commemorate Aaron, but to “pay homage to Palestinians taken from our world, the resistance fighters and ordinary people who continue to love humanity in the face of unspeakable brutality and genocide.”

M.W.D., a friend of Aaron and an active member of San Antonio DSA, gave the following speech at the vigil. 

I am a comrade of Aaron Bushnell, and I would like to share two stories and offer thoughts on strategy. 

In early September last year, mutual aid comrades spent an evening at Canyon Lake. As we were walking back to our cars, I was whistling The Internationale. Aaron was behind me, and started singing along. I thought it was a delightful interaction, and I remembered it two months later, when a group of his friends came together to sing karaoke to celebrate Aaron. We sang Dolly Parton, we sang The Internationale, among other songs. Aaron was leaving to Ohio to skillbridge out of the military industrial complex, once his contract was up. 

In the idea of internationalism, let me offer some thoughts on strategy. We must win a permanent ceasefire, and stop US military and diplomatic aid for Israel. Let us be accomplices in achieving a free Palestine, to achieve a lasting peace built on community—not on repression, apartheid, ethnic cleansing, and genocide.

Organizing always begins somewhere, so start organizing where you are. Use Aaron's protest, the South Africa Genocide Case against Israel, the daily atrocities—to talk with your friends, family, and coworkers, at church, at social groups.  Hell, talk with normal people here, trade numbers, share food together, and connect with San Antonio for Justice in Palestine (SAJP). Merely connecting with each other won't let us win—but I know it will be a necessary part of any strategy to win. We need a mass movement, of ordinary people, of civilian and military populations. 

More broadly, we must have a diversity of tactics, with coordination and trust between groups wherever possible. Some people will put pressure electorally, and I would like to also emphasize direct action as described in the Crimethinc zine, Strategizing for Palestinian Solidarity. It describes tertiary targeting, where companies with economic ties to weapons manufacturers that sell to Israel are targeted to cut their ties with those weapons manufacturers.

If you are active duty, I encourage you to check out the GI Rights Hotline, which has a high success rate of getting people out of the military through conscientious objection.

We—you—we must be inventive. All tactics are necessary, the moment is urgent. In terms of diversity of tactics, Aaron probably would have liked me to say that you might be wary about "Party" organizations that can put a clamp down on radical inventiveness and diversity of tactics. 

Aaron was a deeply compassionate person. I would like to emphasize that we must care for each other, challenge each other to develop, politically, as people. We must support each other deeply, like Aaron's comrades and their social groups have supported each other in these past few days, and deeply, as the people in Palestine have done since the start. While organizing, avoid snarky dismissals of serious issues. Instead, I suggest to take the time to deliberate—to give cause-and-effect reasons for why an action will probably be (or not be) materially effective, and to fill in each other's blindspots. Be kind and patient with each other. 

There is a genocide in Gaza happening right now. The conditions for life are being withheld and destroyed. People are massacred trying to get food for their children.

This is what our ruling class has decided will be normal. But we are not the ruling class. And we can decide things to be different. Free Palestine.

With recent Supreme Court rulings further criminalizing homelessness and stripping government authority to enforce major 20th century reform legislation, we are belatedly publishing this resolution from our 2024 Chapter Convention on the undemocratic nature of the first US Constitution and the place of the battle for democracy in our organization’s socialist vision.

Whereas

The United States is run by and for the capitalist class, and this class rule takes the specific form of the liberal-constitutional regime outlined in the Constitution.

This Constitution was imposed undemocratically by an alliance of slaveowners and capitalists in order to secure their property against popular democracy, and yet the working-class majority who would not even have been eligible to vote on it at the time of its ratification have been forced to live under its provisions ever since.

The political institutions established by the Constitution are intended to be an obstacle to democracy at every step, including, but not limited to: the outrageously unrepresentative Senate, the Electoral College, and the glut of the imperial Presidency and the surrounding bureaucracy.

The Constitution has allowed for further usurpations of popular sovereignty, including, but not limited to: judicial review by a panel of unelected judges who serve for life, the establishment of a repressive standing army, and the sale of elections, public officials, legal services, and the press to the highest bidder.

The process the Constitution provides for its own amendment is intentionally very difficult, stultifying, and anti-majoritarian.

The historical tendencies towards the concentration of capital in few hands and the concentration of people in few states has rendered any constitutional paths that may once have been open to the socialist movement forever closed, obstructing progressive reform and leaving those reforms already won through historical mass struggle defenseless as the political servants of the capitalist class conspire to strip them away.

The DSA has pledged to fight for a “a world organized and governed by and for the vast majority, the working class,” which is clearly impossible under the current Constitutional regime and cannot be won through the antidemocratic channels of reform laid down by the Constitution.

DSA’s platform affirms that DSA is an antiracist organization dedication to the abolition of white supremacy yet the Constitution was written by slaveowners and to this day serves to deny self-determination to Black, Indigenous, and other oppressed populations,

We understand that the fight for socialism is the fight for democracy but, with no democratic means of reforming the undemocratic Constitution, we must follow the revolutionary path to democracy in order to take the democratic road to socialism.

Therefore, be it Resolved, 

Cleveland DSA affirms, from the DSA Political Platform, that “the American political system was not made to serve the working class” and that “the nation that holds itself out as the world’s premier democracy is no democracy at all” by officially raising the demand for a new and radically democratic constitution, drafted by an assembly of the people elected by direct, universal and equal suffrage for all adult residents with proportional representation of political parties, and rooted not in the legitimacy of dead generations of slaveowners and capitalists, but that of a majority consensus of the working masses. 

Additionally Cleveland DSA urges DSA as a whole to take up a stance of opposition to the Constitution, openly indicting it as antidemocratic and oppressive, encouraging all DSA members in elected office to do the same, taking concrete actions to advance the struggle for a democratic republic such as agitating against undemocratic judicial review, fighting for proportional representation, delegitimizing the anti-democratic U.S. Senate, and advancing the long-term demand for a new democratic Constitution. We declare that to be a socialist is to fight for an expansive working-class democracy in which the state and society are democratically managed by the majority. In the U.S. this means demanding a new Constitution.

Be it finally Resolved, this resolution shall be published on the Cleveland DSA website.

The post Winning the Battle for Democracy appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America.

Mark your calendars!

Our next chapter meeting is Saturday, July 20th at 10am. It will be an hybrid meeting, you can attend in-person at the Ventura Diversity Collective or online via Zoom.

This meeting will serve as our annual chapter convention. If you would like to vote in, or, volunteer for a chapter leadership position please RSVP!

This year we face an unprecedented challenge. Our chapter’s steering committee is currently at a critical juncture. We are in urgent need of new leadership. As of now, only two members are committed to continuing on the committee. Without additional volunteers to step up and take on leadership roles, we face the very real possibility of having to dismantle our chapter. The work we do is vital. Our efforts to promote social justice, economic equality, and democratic socialism in Ventura County depend on a strong, active steering committee. Your passion, ideas, and dedication are what drive our movement forward. Without a full committee, we cannot maintain the momentum necessary to achieve our goals. We are calling on you, our members, to consider taking a leadership role in the steering committee. Your involvement is crucial. By stepping up, you will help ensure that our chapter remains a vibrant and effective force for change in our community.

CLICK HERE TO RSVP

The Milwaukee Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) opposes the efforts to recall members of the Milwaukee Board of School Directors as privatizers seek to further undermine the public school system.

The recall effort comes as several board members, including DSA-endorsed member Missy Zombor, supported necessary funding measures to continue vital school services despite pressures from the Republican-led state legislature to further cut education funding. 

“This is a political game, and it is the city’s families and public educators who will lose: Milwaukee DSA recognizes this recall as an attempt by school privatizers to further undermine the public education system in Milwaukee and beyond, turning that system into a profit-making venture instead of a necessary hub for quality learning,” Milwaukee DSA Co-Chair Pamela Westphal said. “Now more than ever, the children of Milwaukee need the social and educational benefits of public education to enrich their lives, we must stand up and fight back against privatizers who are trying to break those social bonds.”

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction has already threatened to withhold millions in state funding from Milwaukee’s students over delayed financial reports from 2023, leading to the resignation of the district’s superintendent and comptroller.

“Some of the biggest failures of the United States’ domestic policies of the past 50 years have involved selling off our public services to those seeking to exploit the working class for profit. Milwaukee DSA recognizes this as an avenue for harm, not growth,” Milwaukee DSA Communications Officer Greg Brown said. “People in Milwaukee who want to see better education outcomes in our community should focus on building a robust public system with proper funding and public control instead of further stripping that system of its resources for privatization and profit, a common goal of the leaders of this recall effort.”

Milwaukee DSA publicly endorsed Zombor in her 2023 election and is Milwaukee’s largest socialist organization fighting for a democratic economy, just society and sustainable environment.

###

This episode is a condensed recording of a live conversation between Andrew Wilkes, Gary Dorrien, and Andrew Wilkes exploring the power of the Black Social Gospel for the Civil Rights Movement through the present struggle for liberation and equity in the U.S. and beyond.