Hello Charlotte Metro DSA Members,

2018 was our second year in existence, and one that saw a lot of change and action.  Firstly, our charter and bylaws were accepted from DSA National and we transitioned from an organizing committee to an official chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America.  With official chapter status, we were able to hold our first officer elections in November, and now we can start the process to become a non-profit, open a bank account and receive a percentage of our dues back from national’s coffers.  

Last year, we hosted several political education events to increase consciousness around issues important to building working class solidarity and power in our community.  In January we hosted Medicare for All expert, writer and fellow DSA member, Tim Faust, for a rousing speech and Q and A session about Health Care justice. In May we put on a labor week with help from local unions and hosted two events at the IBEW hall.  The first of the events was a panel discussion with local union officers and labor organizers, where the speakers dissected local peculiarities of organizing labor in the South and problems facing unions in Charlotte. To cap off the week we hosted the creators of the documentary “Union Time” about unionization of a Smithfield plant in eastern North Carolina.  

Mutual aid is also an important part of building working class power.  Our chapter hosted 6 brake light clinics last year, because broken or burnt out taillights are one of the most common reasons for traffic stops.  By offering free light changes, we can help folks in marginalized and exploited communities avoid police interaction that can lead to arrest or violence.  We also assisted Charlotte Center for Legal Advocacy in their upkeep and maintenance of their office space so they can continue advocating for their clients. Helping CCLA allows Charlotte Metro DSA to increase local ties and help out a wonderful organization that offers legal assistance to the most vulnerable in our community.   

To continue building an effective chapter, many of our members have gone to regional trainings in Atlanta, Asheville and Knoxville.  We have learned skills to help us organize our membership, develop leadership in the chapter and assess obstacles to change locally. These trainings also led to the creation of the Outreach and Retention Committee to continue these lessons and build a sustainable and effective chapter.  

There are already many plans in motion for 2019, and more to come.  Housing will be our chapter’s focus issue in 2019, and in February we had our first Housing Committee meeting.  In less than 18 months, the RNC will be in our city and we have begun strategizing how to be most effective during the convention.  This year we will also have our first May Day picnic to celebrate International Worker’s Day. There will certainly be more to come!  

This is an equal parts hilarious and insightful episode of Religious Socialism podcast. Kelli Dunham is an author, comedian and storyteller — she’s the founder of Queer Memoir, a storytelling series for the queer community and stand-up comedian. But in this podcast, she recounts her religious history — from her childhood attending drive-in churches in Florida, her time at a gay conversion camp, and seven years as a nun in the Missionaries of Charity. Between laughs, she reaches some poignant truths about similarities in the socialist ethic among churches and queer communities, and how laughter can be a healing force. See below to learn more about Kelli Dunham and the podcast: KelliDunham.com Religioussocialism.org/podcast Religious Socialism Podcast is hosted by Sarah Ngu and produced by Devin Briski. Our music is “Made and Broken” by Hugel.

Rabbi Michael Feinberg is the executive director of The Greater New York Labor-Religion Coalition, whose goal is to build a long term alliance between the faith community and labor movements in New York City. He's spent decades as a multi-faith activist building diverse coalitions to advocate for workers' rights. In this interview, we discuss why he prefers the term "multi-faith" to "interfaith," what he learned from Father Daniel Berrigan's radical anti-nuclear protests, the heritage of Bundism (historical secular Jewish socialist movement), and what he thinks the role the faith community can play in the fight for worker's rights.

 

 

The Charlotte Metro Chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (CLTMDSA) strongly opposes the six NC constitutional amendments slated for the November 2018 ballot. These amendments are unintelligible jargon, unreadable, and ultimately part of a concentrated GOP power grab to gerrymander and take powers away from other elected officials. We urge others in the Charlotte-Metro region to also vote against all six amendments. Read more about them below.

 

Amendment 1: Photo ID voting requirement

This will require voters to show photo ID before casting a ballot. Defenders of these laws claim that IDs reduce voter fraud; however considering in-person voter fraud is extremely rare, requiring voters to show identification is more of “a solution in search of a problem.” The reality is that these ID laws prevent many from exercising their right to vote and are discriminatory against the poor, racial minorities, and other vulnerable groups.1

 

Amendment 2: Create an eight-member bipartisan election board

Under current North Carolina law, the election board consists of nine members – four from the governor’s party, four from the other major party, and one independent – with the governor overseeing the board. This amendment will reduce the nine-member election board down to eight, all of which would be appointed by the general assembly thus taking power away from the governor.2 As the current governor is a Democrat, this amendment is simply a blatant power grab by the Republican- controlled legislature.

 

Amendment 3: Reduce the state income tax cap from 10% to 7%

As Democratic Socialists, we believe that people should pay their fair share and that if you have more, you should pay more in order to create a society that meets the needs of all. This amendment would cap the income tax at 7%, thus concentrating more wealth for the wealthy while putting more financial burden on lower-income earners and potentially cutting funds from needed services.

From the News & Observer: “A state’s revenue needs can vary unpredictably over time and income tax caps eliminate flexibility. If income taxes can’t be raised to meet needs, a state’s primary alternative is to raise sales taxes (and various usage fees). Sales taxes (and usage fees) impact poor people much more than they impact wealthy people: Poor people must spend most of their income, subjecting most of their income to sales tax, while wealthier people spend a much lower percentage of their income. Moreover, [this specific cap] locks in rates that are lower than recent historical rates and the new flat-rate tax structure shifts more of the income tax burden to lower earners. Other states such as Kansas that have lowered tax rates dramatically have had poor results. We are already seeing hints of the impact in N.C. with a precipitous drop in inflation-adjusted per student spending in public schools.”3

Amendment 4: Establish a merit system for filing judicial vacancies

This amendment is another attempted power grab by the NC GOP and shifts the power of who appoints judges between elections from the governor to the state legislature. Instead of the governor making appointments, anyone in the state may submit recommendations to the general assembly who will then provide the names of two NCGA-selected nominees to the governor. The governor will then have to select from between those two nominees who are not subject to gubernatorial veto. If a vacancy occurs right before an election, the chief justice of the N.C. Supreme Court is then tasked with the appointment instead of the governor.4

Amendment 5: Protect the right to hunt, fish, and harvest wildlife

There is no current threat to these activities in the state, and having this on the ballot is more so an attempt to get the GOP base to show up to the polls. Since the amendment refers to making these “preferred means of managing and controlling wildlife,”5 this also causes ecological concerns in that it could result in reduced protections for wildlife areas and habitats. It also defers hunting and fishing laws to the general assembly, which takes power away from local groups to establish regulations and create or maintain protected wildlife areas. Again, this is nothing more than another attempted power grab by the state legislature.

Amendment 6: Add rights for victims of felony crimes

As Democratic Socialists, we stand for the abolishment of prisons and the carceral state. This particular amendment is dangerous as it could result in even more people in prisons and with harsher sentencing. There are also risks that this could create even more bias against defendants facing trial.

Mark Rabil, law professor at Wake Forest University says, “Obviously everybody agrees victims should have rights, but the way I see the goal of Marsy’s Law is so much more than that................. The bottom line is

they’re giving victims and victims’ families constitutional party status that can override the constitutional rights of a defendant to a fair trial and the right of districts attorneys to pursue cases in ways they perceive to be fair.”6

On top of the fact that the criminal justice system already largely discriminates against vulnerable communities and racial minorities, this amendment is an open door to further exacerbate that discrimination and create even more disparity within our justice system.

CLTMDSA sees these amendments as disingenuous and not in the best interest of the people of North Carolina. Rather these efforts are to increase GOP control, consolidate power for the wealthy, and create more inequality for the most vulnerable in the state. Please join us in voting NO on all six in November.

1https://www.aclu.org/other/oppose-voter-id-legislation-fact-sheet    2 https://longleafpolitics.com/nc-constitutional-amendments-2018/

3https://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article214823780.html 4https://longleafpolitics.com/nc-constitutional-amendments-2018/ 5https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article216437935.html 6https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article218118890.html

Charlotte Metro DSA

unequivocally supports Palestinian liberation, unequivocally condemns the ​State of Israel’s ​occupation and colonization of all Arab lands, unequivocally supports the fundamental rights of Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality,

unequivocally supports the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties,

unequivocally condemns the Israeli sniper massacre of Palestinian protesters and Israeli bombardments of Gaza,

unequivocally calls for the U.S. embassy to be moved back to Tel Aviv,

and unequivocally endorses the Boycott, Divestment, Sanction movement." from 9/9/18

Memphis-based singer-songwriter Julien Baker's star is rising in the music world. She also identifies as queer, Christian, socialist — like our host, Sarah Ngu. There have been high-profile interviews with her by the New York Times, NPR, etc. mostly focusing on her music. But we wanted to focus on religion. This far-reaching interview explores the early influence of Christian hardcore and church groups, how she thinks about Acts and makes ethical purchasing decisions for herself and her crew, and her conversations with Trump-supporting family members in Appalachia. If you're a fan of Religious Socialism, please visit our Patreon page and support our podcast. We will also be posting the full, unedited 2-hour interview as an exclusive for our patrons. For each according to their ability, or give what you can! https://www.patreon.com/religioussocialismpodcast

Juan Carlos Ruiz is co-founder of the New Sanctuary Movement, a network of churches and synagogues that offer resources to undocumented immigrants in New York City. He began his career as a Catholic priest, but was excommunicated after getting involved with leftist politics in the Catholic Worker Movement. In this far-reaching interview, he discusses his work with immigrants in the Trump era, the effect that US intervention coupled with corporate interests have had on Mexico and Honduras, and the role that history should play in our discourse around immigrant rights. If you're interested in what Ruiz has to say, also check out his op-ed in The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/17/undocumented-immigration-stories-human-rights-mexico-how-i-got-here Also, if you’re a fan of Religious Socialism, please visit our Patreon page and support our podcast. From each according to their ability, or give us what you can! https://www.patreon.com/religioussocialismpodcast

Avi Garelick wears many hats: he runs a Hebrew school associated with the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York city, he is active in Northern Manhattan is Not For Sale, an anti-gentrification group focused on Washington Heights and Inwood, and he's a member of the Democratic Socialists of America. In this interview, Garelick describes participating in a rent strike when his landlord turned off the heat, how his socialist philosophy informs his role as a manager at his job and how the Jewish concept of redemption guides his social justice activism. Photo by Noah Benus.

Dr. Debbie Almontaser is a Yemeni-American and Muslim community leader and activist, founder of the Bridging Cultures Group and the Khalil Gibran International Academy, a New York public school with an English and Arabic bi-lingual program. Almontaser discusses growing up in a largely white neighborhood in Buffalo, New York, rediscovering her Muslim faith in her 20s and making the decision to wear the hijab, the controversy that led to her resigning as head of Khalil Gibran Academy, and winning her ensuing wrongful termination lawsuit against the Department of Education. She also discusses how the aftermath of 9/11 prepared the Muslim community for the election of Donald Trump, and why she finds being called a "moderate Muslim" offensive. Photo cred from Twitter.

A conversation with Reverend Andrew Wilkes, a an African Methodist Episcopal pastor of young adults and social justice and leader in a black Christian community in Jamaica, Queens. Unlike some of our interviewees, Rev. Wilkes identifies as a democratic socialist, and has spent a lot of time working out those principles with his faith. He discusses why socialism is a theological commitment, what democratic socialist policies could look like in practice, why leftist politics has a race problem — and why joy is the most important feeling of Christianity. Photo cred: Huffpost.