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DSA-LA Voter Guide is Here + LA Over Budget On Liability Claims
Thorn West: Issue No. 217
State Politics
- AB X2 – 1, which requires oil companies to maintain higher reserves with the goal of preventing gasoline price spikes, was approved by the State Senate today in a special legislative session. All that remains now is for the Assembly to approve the Senate’s amendments. Governor Newsom promoted the legislation and called for the special session.
City Politics
- DSA-LA has released its voter guide for this November! Read and share!
- Across California, ballots are in the mail. Here is how to register to vote.
- A quarter of the way through the current fiscal year, the city has already spent the entire $100 million budgeted to settle liability claims against the city. The Controller’s office had previously broken down which city departments are most responsible, with the LAPD responsible for over half of the city’s liability.
- Following the latest round of settlement payouts, the city’s reserve fund is now below 4% of the total general fund, and is likely to dip further. Per the Controller’s office, dropping below 2.75% triggers an official “fiscal emergency.”
Police Violence and Community Resistance
- Amid a budget crisis, Charter Amendment FF would spend 23 million to give certain police officers and park rangers better pensions. The LA Times (and DSA-LA) endorses a no vote.
- Non-stop fear-mongering from media, politicians, and law enforcement about a non-existent crime wave appears to have made an impact on voters. Nathan Hochman, considered the most right-wing primary challenger of incumbent LA County District Attorney George Gascón, leads him in the general by high double digits, according to a recent poll. Similarly, Prop 36, which rolls back criminal justice reforms voters approved in 2014, also shows broad support in polls.
Labor
- 2,400 Kaiser Permanente behavioral health workers in Southern California, represented by the National Union of Healthcare Workers, have announced that they will go on indefinite strike beginning on October 21 if their demands are not met. At issue are several concessions won by a similar strike of Kaiser workers in Northern California, in 2022.
Transportation
- AB 761, which further enables California municipalities to take advantage of federal loans to fund critical infrastructure projects, has officially passed. The new funding opportunity has been suggested as a way to expedite the planned extension of the Metro K Line from LAX to West Hollywood.
- This Sunday from 9am – 4pm, CicLAvia will hold one of its biggest car-free open streets events of the year, closing a route sprawling from Echo Park to East LA to all auto traffic.
Climate Justice
- The California Air Resource Board will soon consider whether to amend the Low Carbon Fuel Standard to require that gasoline manufactured in California produce less carbon-intense emissions. Meanwhile, the media has focused on the likelihood that this would likely raise the price of gas.
The post DSA-LA Voter Guide is Here + LA Over Budget On Liability Claims appeared first on The Thorn West.
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Democracy, Like Flowers: A Reflection on Organizing Mutual Aid in Western NC
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Presente, "Farmer" Steve Melkisethian
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Tenants and Workers Rally for Fair Rent and Wages + Gov Newsom Vetoes 16% of 2024 Legislation
Thorn West: Issue No. 216
State Politics
- The deadline for Governor Newsom to sign or veto state legislation passed on Monday. Prominent legislation vetoed by the governor include SB 1047, an AI safety bill, SB 961, a bill that mandated new cars sold California warn drivers when they’re speeding, and AB 3129, which would have allowed the state to block private equity purchases of health care facilities. Further roundup here.
- Newsom approved several bills that derived from the work of the California Reparations Task Force, including one that required the state to acknowledge and formally apologize for the its role in American chattel slavery. However, Newsom vetoed SB 1050, which facilitated restitution for those who had property taken through racially motivated eminent domain, because it relied on a separate bill to establish a Freedmen Affairs Agency, which was stalled just before the legislative deadline.
- It’s rarely noted in media coverage of vetoed legislation, but of the 189 bills Newsom vetoed, 170 passed with veto-proof majorities in both chambers. However, the legislature has not overridden a governor’s veto since 1979.
City Politics
- Newly appointed City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson sat for an interview with LA Public Press
- Leaked documents revealed that the state attorney general wants Los Angeles to redraw council districts ahead of the 2026 election, after the most recent redistricting process in 2020 was discredited by scandal.
- Mayor Bass has appointed former Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell to serve as chief of the LAPD. Next, City Council will vote on the appointment.
- Two candidates from DSA-LA’s 2024 endorsement slate have received endorsements from the LA Times: Karla Griego for School Board District 5 and Ysabel Jurado for CD 14. To help get DSA-LA’s endorsed candidates elected, see our event calendar, or sign up for a working group here.
Housing Rights
- DSA-LA was part of a coalition that organized a tenants and workers solidarity march on Saturday to demand affordable rent and liveable wages. This year, the city will reconsider the formula that determines how much rent on the city’s rent-stabilized units can be raised each year. DSA-LA is organizing to ensure that the adjustments favor tenants; see here for more.
- The city of Los Angeles must increase its zoning capacity by 250,000 residential units to comply with state housing law. The LA Times notes that almost all of this added capacity is currently being planned for already dense areas. This makes it more likely that building the new units will come at the expense of tenants, and will require demolishing existing rent controlled units.
The post Tenants and Workers Rally for Fair Rent and Wages + Gov Newsom Vetoes 16% of 2024 Legislation appeared first on The Thorn West.
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Protect Our Water: End Line 5
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Last month, several GRDSA folks traveled to the Straits of Mackinac for a gathering of Great Lakes Water Protectors. We joined a potluck, a kayak paddle-out, a water festival and a day of workshops on a gorgeous campsite.
The impetus for this annual gathering is the struggle to stop the construction of the pipeline tunnel across the Mackinac straits and ultimately shut down Line 5 completely.
In many ways, it’s fitting that this took place over Labor Day weekend. This holiday is disproportionately enjoyed by those who work weekday 9-5 jobs, while many working class people, often doing essential jobs, still have to work.
We know that the current and coming environmental crisis will disproportionately affect working class people who don’t have the resources to adapt to disasters caused by pipeline spills and continued reliance on fossil fuels. These challenges range from access to clean water to mitigating damage from floods and extreme weather events.
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The struggle against Line 5 is also deeply related to indigenous land and water rights as it trespasses on tribal land and threatens access to traditional food sources. They would be disproportionately hurt if it were to ever break, despite having no say in its construction or maintenance. Every day Line 5 is allowed to operate risks disaster, if it were to fail it would cause incalculable damage to our environment and drinking water for generations. That’s why it’s so important we protest it every chance we get, only a mass movement of those most affected can finally remove this threat.
The post Protect Our Water: End Line 5 appeared first on Grand Rapids Democratic Socialists of America.
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Statement of Solidarity with Striking ILA
The post Statement of Solidarity with Striking ILA first appeared on North NJ DSA.
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It’s Time to Permanently End U.S.-Israeli Police Exchanges in St. Louis County
Ten years ago last month, the world watched militarized police forces ‘manage’ the collective outcry of civilians protesting the police killing of Michael Brown. In uniform and weaponry, the police were indistinguishable from combat-ready soldiers.
Another event, also a decade old last month: Operation Protective Edge, the Israeli military’s 2014 action in Gaza. From its official start in June to its cessation on August 26, 2014, the summer’s war left thousands of Palestinians and scores of Israelis dead.
As scholars like Angela Davis have noted, these events — in Ferguson and in Gaza — are connected in ways that St. Louisans should know about and act upon.
For example: As police fired tear gas at demonstrators in Ferguson, the demonstrators received advice from Palestinian activists on social media about how to manage their reactions to the gas. “Solidarity with #Ferguson. Remember to not touch your face when teargassed or put water on it. Instead use milk or coke!” wrote Ramallah-based journalist Mariam Barghouti. “And of course DON’T wash your eyes with water,” added Palestinian doctor Rajai Abukhalil. Like Black Americans, Palestinians are a population familiar with the state repression of protest.
But the impact of Israeli policing of Palestinians on policing in St. Louis County runs deeper than social media. More than 100,000 police officials across the United States have made professional visits to Israel as part of an international “police exchange,” as the activist group Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP) documented in a 2018 report titled Deadly Exchange. These visits are funded by pro-Israel lobbying groups such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).
According to the St. Louis Jewish Light, the St. Louis chapter of the ADL “organized four trips for St. Louis-area police officers” as of November 2017. One trip alone, in March 2017, included “top law enforcement officers from Creve Coeur, Florissant, Frontenac, Olivette and St. Ann.”
The JVP report finds that U.S. police on trips to Israel examine Israeli policing infrastructure and attend conferences on policing strategy. On the March 2017 trip, area police met “with Israel Defense Forces commanders” and “spoke with Israeli officials at border checkpoints separating parts of the West Bank controlled by the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority. They also visited an Israeli prison”, as recounted in the Jewish Light.
U.S. police delegations have also met with senior members of the Israeli security state, including figureheads of Shin Bet, the security agency whose regular torture of Palestinian detainees has been documented for decades by human rights groups and news outlets inside and outside of Israel.
The ADL “quietly paused” its funding for U.S. police trips in 2019, but the group insists that it is only a pause, and that funding might resume at any time.
This possibility is alarming for many reasons. Human Rights Watch (HRW) declared Israel an apartheid state in 2021; Amnesty International followed suit the following year. The advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), issued this July, found Israel in violation of the United Nations convention condemning racial discrimination – specifically, the convention’s article “condemn[ing] racial segregation and apartheid.” As the HRW report exhaustively documents, Israeli policing plays a crucial role in the maintenance of this apartheid.
The role of prisons in these visits is also gravely concerning. The UN released a new report on July 31 about the detention of Palestinians in Israeli prisons. In a press release, UN human rights chief Volker Türk said: “The testimonies gathered by my office and other entities indicate a range of appalling acts, such as waterboarding and the release of dogs on detainees…in flagrant violation of international human rights law.” Surveillance footage was recently leaked of Israeli prison guards gang-raping a Palestinian detainee at Sde Teiman military prison.
Finally, St. Louis-area police met not only with Israeli police, but also with officials from the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). If this happens again, local officers will likely meet with a military that the ICJ’s January decision found to be “plausibl[y]” failing to protect “Palestinians in Gaza…from acts of genocide.”
The solution to this problem is simple, and it was modeled by Durham, North Carolina. In April 2018, the Durham City Council voted 6-0 to “bar the city’s police department from engaging in international exchanges” featuring “military-style training.” The resolution was prompted by the Durham Police Department’s participation in police exchanges with Israel, like those undertaken by St. Louis-area officers.
Mayor Tishaura Jones and the St. Louis Board of Aldermen should work together to draft and pass a similar resolution with respect to the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department and encourage other area boards to do likewise. By doing so, the Board would demonstrate continued leadership after its principled passage of a ceasefire resolution in January.
Clearly, visits to Israel are not the only source of America’s over-militarized policing; nor are they the main source. But they are one source, and in the light of Gaza’s ruination, those visits must end. A decade after Michael Brown’s killing, it is long overdue.
Nicholas Dolan is a PhD student in the Department of English at Washington University in St. Louis. The views expressed are the author’s alone and do not reflect the views of any institution or organization.
The post It’s Time to Permanently End U.S.-Israeli Police Exchanges in St. Louis County appeared first on Midwest Socialist.
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2024 Voter Guide
This year, Las Vegas DSA mobilized over 70 members to knock 10,000+ doors for our first endorsed candidate in the Nevada legislature primaries. In keeping with that energy, we have formed an Electoral Working Group to begin the work on recruiting, training, and running candidates from within LVDSA membership.
This year, we offer a voting recommendation and explanation for each of the 7 ballot questions, and a rundown on the CCSD School Board. We will not be recommending candidates in the general and have chosen to focus our capacity and energy on building our own strategy and growing the socialist movement.