By Eli Gerzon and Henry De Groot

MALDEN — More than 300 union members and community activists picketed outside the constituent offices of Rep. Katherine Clark (D-MA) on Wednesday evening, calling on her to endorse a ceasefire of the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza. Clark is the second most powerful Democrat in the House and has built her career as a progressive who opposes gun violence and supports unions, women, children, and democracy.

“Katherine Clark has the power to put an end to the bloodshed. What has she done? Nothing!”

Yousif Abdallah, North Shore Labor Council – AFL-CIO

A union delegation met with Clark’s staff inside while picketers chanted “Ceasefire Now!” on the sidewalk. A delegation from Jewish Voice for Peace had previously met with Clark to discuss the ceasefire and told Working Mass she responded: “If I thought calling for a ceasefire would save lives, I would have already done it.”

Later in the evening, a second picket was formed in Belmont outside the Unitarian Universalist church, where Clark was speaking at an event on the state of democracy along with Massachusetts Senate President Pro Tempore Will Brownsberger (D-Belmont). Three activists interrupted her speech to call for a ceasefire before being escorted out by security.

A Ceasefire Would Save Lives: The Ongoing Genocide in Gaza

Despite what Clark says, a ceasefire is necessary to stop the horrific mass killings of Palestinian civilians by the Israeli military and the Israeli blockade of necessary food, fuel, and medical supplies.

In over 100 days of fighting since October 7, more than 32,000 have been killed in Gaza and the West Bank, including more than 11,000 children. On October 7, Hamas forces killed approximately 695 Israeli civilians and 373 Israeli soldiers

The BBC reports that almost 2 million Gazas — 85 percent of the population — have been forced from their homes. All schools in Gaza remain closed, and infectious diseases are spreading rapidly among refugees. Israel is using water and food as a weapon against Palestinians: “Gazans now make up 80 per cent of all people facing famine or catastrophic hunger worldwide.” Israeli Defense Forces have intentionally targeted hospitals; UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned that only 16 of 32 hospitals “are even partially functioning.”

South Africa has sued Israel at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, calling on the court to immediately grant emergency measures to stop the war in Gaza; South Africa has accused Israel of conducting a genocide and maintaining an apartheid regime.

Clark represents the 5th Congressional District, which includes suburbs north and west of Boston, including Malden, Melrose, Revere, Framingham, and parts of Cambridge. She has served as the Democrats’ House Minority Whip since last year, making her the second-ranking House Democrat after Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) was Clark’s top donor in the 2023-24 cycle.

From the all-Democratic Massachusetts federal delegation, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, as well as Reps. Stephen Lynch, Jim McGovern, and Ayanna Pressley have all endorsed the call for a ceasefire. In addition to Rep. Clark, Sen. Ed Markey, as well as Reps. Bill Keating, Richard Neal, Seth Moulton, Jake Auchincloss, and Lori Trahan have failed to call for a ceasefire. Markey and Warren voted in support of Sen. Bernie Sanders’s Senate Resolution 504 which would have conditioned U.S. aid to Israel on an investigation into human rights abuses.

Labor Moves in Support of a Ceasefire

The double demonstrations were the state’s first labor actions in support of the Palestinian people and a ceasefire since the escalation of the fighting after October 7. The rally was largely organized through Massachusetts Labor for a Free Palestine, an informal group of union organizers that has come together since October 7.

The event was endorsed by several major labor unions including the Massachusetts Teachers Association, SEIU Local 509, the Harvard Graduate Student Union-UAW, and UAW Region 9A, as well as the North Shore Labor Council – AFL-CIO, the Western Mass Area Labor Federation – AFL-CIO, Pride At Work-Eastern Mass, Jewish Voice for Peace – Boston, One Fair Wage, and the Boston Democratic Socialists of America.

Several speakers expressed that if Clark failed to endorse the ceasefire demand, the progressive movement would put forward a challenger in the next Democratic primary, calling on the crowd to chant “Vote Her Out!” Clark has not faced a primary challenge since 2014.

The rally comes days after SEIU, the nation’s second largest labor union, endorsed a ceasefire. SEIU is the largest U.S. union to support the ceasefire movement yet; the UAW, the nation’s sixth largest union, endorsed a ceasefire in December.

The growing support in the U.S. labor movement for a ceasefire is a marked reversal in labor’s orientation since fighting escalated more than three months ago. The days following the October 7 attack were marked by labor unions expressing support for Israel, and union activists who expressed solidarity with Palestine faced harassment, intimidation, and doxxing.

Labor calls for a ceasefire were initially confined to an online petition backed by UFCW Local 3000 and United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE). Activists organizing in locals around the country have gradually won local union support for the ceasefire demand.

Eli Gerzon is an editor of Working Mass, a member of Boston DSA, and an activist with Jewish Voice for Peace.

Henry De Groot is an editor of Working Mass, a member of Boston DSA, and the author of the book “Student Radicals and the Rise of Russian Marxism.”

Featured image credit: Yousif Abdallah of the North Shore Labor Council – AFL-CIO addresses the picket on January 24, 2024. Photo by Clare Kelley/Working Mass

Additional photography contributed by Pine McCabe.

How would an ecosocialist Green New Deal change work and labor, and what is the role of unions, bargaining for the common good, and rank-and-file organizing to help us win GND struggles in the near and long term? DSA’s GND Campaign Commission and National Labor Commission hear from organizers from across the country about their work and how it fits into the theory and practice of a just transition and socialist horizon.

Panelists:

• Vanity Amano – Vanity is a public school teacher and a member of United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA).
• Sydney Ghazarian – Sydney is a former GNDCC organizer who works for Labor Network for Sustainability. She is a member of DSA LA.
• Gustavo Gordillo – Gustavo started and led the campaign to win the Build Public Renewables Act in New York. He’s a union electrical worker and member of NYC DSA.
• Marcelina Pedraza – Marcelina has been a union electrician for 25 years and is currently a member of UAW Local 551 at Ford Chicago Assembly Plant. She is also a member of UAWD, a rank-and-file caucus of UAW members. She is a community organizer passionate about environmental and workers’ justice, and as Board President of the Southeast Environmental Task Force, is fighting for a cleaner neighborhood.

Files:

• Audio (.m4a)
• Transcript (.vtt)

Upcoming Events

Wednesday, 1/24 (6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.): HWG Reading Group: Mean Streets (In person at 1916 McAllister)

Friday, 1/26 (12:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.): Office Hours (In person at 1916 McAllister)

Saturday, 1/27 (11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.): Homelessness Working Group (HWG) Office Hours (In person at 1916 McAllister)

Saturday, 1/27 (1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.): HWG Sock Distro (Meet in person at 1916 McAllister)

Sunday, 1/28 (11:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.): January Office Cleaning/Organizing (In person at 1916 McAllister)

Thursday, 2/1 (6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.): Ecosocialist Monthly Meeting (Zoom)

Check out https://dsasf.org/events/ for more events.

Events & Actions

Homelessness Working Group Sock Distro Mutual Aid on 1/27

Come join the Homelessness Working Group this Saturday, January 27th for our sock distro mutual aid project! We’ll be meeting at the DSA SF office at 1916 McAllister St. at 1:00 p.m. before heading out to different neighborhoods to pass out socks, sandwiches, and hygiene products. Feel free to show up an hour early if you’re able to help prep sandwiches!

Join the Tenant Organizing Working Group for SHOP Training!

Come join the DSA Tenant Organizing Working Group for the final session of a three-part training to develop successful socialist tenant organizers.

Part 3 of the Socialist Housing Organizing Program (SHOP) covers the basics  of an organizing conversation to recruit your neighbors to the tenant union.

You can attend upcoming training on Tuesday, February 6th at 6:30 p.m. at 1916 McAllister.

All trainings to take place at the DSA SF office at 1916 McAllister. Zoom is available upon request. Register today!

Show Your Smolidarity at the February Chapter Meeting

The Priority Mutual Aid Working Group will be providing childwatch at the chapter meeting next month on February 14th!

Parents and caregivers can fill out this form before the meeting to help ensure we have enough volunteers and supplies on hand. We hope to see you and your kiddos there!

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.

Questions? Feedback? Something to add?

We welcome your feedback. If you have comments or suggestions, send a message to the #newsletter channel on Slack.

For information on how to add content, check out the Newsletter Q&A thread on the forum.

The California Faculty Association, a union covering the 23 campuses of the California State University system, is pushing back against the non-response of CSU administration at the bargaining table. Negotiations began this summer. As of California Red copy deadline, picket lines are expected to go up at all campuses first thing on Monday morning, January 22. 

CFA’s demands include:

• A 12% pay increase for all faculty

• A full semester of paid parental leave

• pay equity for lowest-paid faculty

• safe and accessible lactation spaces 

• safe and accessible gender-inclusive restrooms and changing rooms, and 

• the limiting of police power on campuses.

First, a one-day strike with DSA support
The CSU’s response of a 5% pay raise and persistent rejection of other demands precipitated a one-day strike across four campuses in December, including San Francisco, Pomona, LA, and San Diego. DSA and YDSA support for these labor actions was strong and well appreciated. Bottom line, this spirit has been shown through tabling, phone-banking, and union building, and fight-back efforts with picket-line participation and presence at CSU Board meetings. Our message: we are in; faculty and students are not alone!

At San Francisco State, YDSA member Cami Dominguez reports that she sees the big picture of this contract struggle as an example for other faculty and unions, and DSA’s solidarity with the wider struggles of class action. Cami was part of a scab patrol that confronted a faculty member conducting a class during picketing. She and other strikers spoke to both the faculty member and students present about the problem of crossing a picket line. Cami also remarked that participating in the strike “changed the dynamic we had with faculty”, seeing this as a “united effort” to maintain a positive learning environment.

DSA aligns itself with rank-and-file causes and action, such as this strike, and sees its involvement as integral to a class struggle on campus and building solidarity among students, faculty, and socialists. “We are not going to be quiet about being socialists,” commented Ellie Gomez, with whom I spoke in the SF DSA office. 

Full week of strikes coming
More labor actions are in the works. There will be a full week of CFA strikes across the entire system January 22-26. Because the SFSU campus does not begin classes until January 29, it will do informational picketing and leafleting for those faculty there during strike week, support picketing at East Bay and San Jose campuses, and promote pro-labor syllabi for faculty during the first week of classes. This may be the largest higher-education faculty strike in US history. 

Teamster Local 2010 members who work for the university were planning to strike alongside the faculty for their own demands, but settled on January 19. Although its contract does not allow sympathy strikes, the local is encouraging its members to honor the faculty picket lines.

Picket lines on all campuses will go up Monday at 8 a.m.  If you’d like to join in, go to the CFA web page to sign up.  The CFA Executive Board welcomes the ongoing contribution by DSA and YDSA as a vital element towards its success in fighting for its members.

An orientation to labor opens a unique opportunity for solidarity

For years, EBDSA has worked to reforge the link between union militants and the socialist movement. This places a strategic wager that rebuilding unions into fighting, democratic vehicles for working-class struggle and organization is not just desirable in and of itself (although it is), but that it’s also a necessary condition for a vibrant, strong socialist political current to survive and thrive in this country. 

In EBDSA this work has taken the form of a chapter jobs program, a local EWOC formation (the East Bay Workplace Organizing Committee or EBWOC), impressive labor solidarity work on the picket lines, and robust political education around the centrality of workplace struggle to winning material gains for the working class. This multifaceted approach means that EBDSA members have built relationships with union members and workplace militants in a variety of workplaces, brought some of them into DSA, or gone into union workplaces themselves. 

When it became clear in October that Israel was engaging in a genocidal military campaign against Palestinians, EBDSA Labor Committee members sprang into action and began meeting to pull together unions around concrete demands on the US state in a public rally, and created a template resolution for union members to adapt and try to pass through their unions. 

Within a few weeks, the effort had spread beyond EBDSA and began calling itself Bay Area Labor for Palestine (with the blessing of the pre-existing national Labor for Palestine formation). Members of more than a dozen local unions were soon attending Bay Area Labor for Palestine’s weekly meetings and comparing notes on how to pass resolutions through their unions, counter bad faith smears on their unions from pro-Israel groups, and prepare for a December rally. 

Bay Area Labor for Palestine successfully coordinated rally plans with local Palestinian- and Arab-led organizations, which meant that the rally formally brought together the local Palestinian liberation movement and representatives of the local labor movement. A boisterous spirit of unity and solidarity permeated the rally and march, with two thousand participants.

What’s next?

Some socialists worry about an overemphasis on workplace organizing, pointing out the importance of politics and principles to build beyond just “trade union consciousness”. The involvement of workers from newly formed unions who we’ve supported through EBWOC (like the Trader Joe’s Union local 4 in Rockridge and the Berkeley Ecology Center) and existing unions where EBDSA has members or relationships (like OEA and SEIU 1021) in Bay Area Labor for Palestine show that we’re not just cultivating a workplace only focus, but a broad politics of solidarity beyond the workplace. Union members where we didn’t have pre-existing relationships are also involved, indicating that this spirit of solidarity attracts like-minded workplace militants who see the connection between workplace struggle against the boss and global struggles against militarism and imperialism.

Bay Area Labor for Palestine is not just an EBDSA project. It’s a grassroots grouping of union members seeking to support and develop workplace organizers who can advance the cause of Palestinian solidarity in our unions. In some union locals, that means passing a ceasefire resolution. In others, where that’s already been accomplished, it can mean trying to divest pension funds from Israeli companies, or pressuring the AFL-CIO to back a ceasefire. 

Our experience in the East Bay shows that a multi-faceted approach to labor organizing can pay unexpected dividends in other areas of our work, like international solidarity. As DSA chapters continue to deepen our labor work across California, our ability to move in concert with unions and union members will hopefully increase the leverage, power, and will of the labor movement to challenge US imperialism at home and abroad. 

“Climate Criminals put Profits over Humanity.” So reads the title of the Indigenous Environmental Network statement on the 2023 Conference of the Parties in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. COP 28, the twenty-eighth United Nations summit on climate, ended late last year, repeating the decades-long failure to plan a disciplined international  fossil fuel drawdown. Although long-held scientific consensus calls for that drawdown, the heads of powerful states and their minions who dominated the Conference appear to be more willing to preside over the end of the world than the end of carbon-dependent capitalism.

Just more “blah, blah, blah”
The early years of the COP held some promise as these international gatherings seemed to address both the seriousness of the crisis and the need for global cooperation. This year, the empty and self-congratulatory concluding statements from COP 28 President Sultan al-Jabar of the United Arab Emirates, echoed by other heads of petrostates, came as no surprise to climate activists protesting outside the UN meetings. With an ever-increasing number of fossil fuel lobbyists—over 2,400 in Dubai—it’s no wonder that industry interests trumped the need for drawdown commitments with teeth. Absent credible fossil fuel phase out plans, COP28 doesn’t amount to much more than Greta Thunberg’s characterization of past COPs: just more “blah, blah, blah.” 

Also missing from commitments needed in Dubai was a plan–with a budget– to take care of workers affected by fossil fuel phaseout. The UN’s own International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) demanded  “. . . adoption of a Just Transition Work Programme that ensures labour issues are central to climate policy.” It didn’t happen. Likewise, loss and damage compensation for most-harmed countries remains uncommitted.  If the phrase “Just Transition” has any meaning, it requires a “polluters pay” framework for the wealthy nations and corporations who have most benefited from fossil fuels to provide the financial resources that most-affected workers, communities, and countries will need on the path to climate mitigation and adaptation.

Closer to home: CARB
Having never attended a COP, I still find the dynamics in Dubai unpleasantly familiar from my observation of California’s major climate planning process, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) Scoping Plan. Though hosting fewer than the 475 carbon capture lobbyists attending COP 28, the state CARB hearings in 2022 reflected the outsized influence of the Carbon Capture and Storage Coalition on the planning board. With the fossil-fueled fantasy of carbon removal technology—as yet unproven—California’s oil and gas industries shoved the “real zero” demands of CARB’s own Environmental Justice Advisory Committee (EJAC) off the agenda to be replaced by a vague promise of “net zero,” requiring no production or extraction reductions. Like the Climate Justice Alliance and other frontline climate activists at COP 28, EJAC was marginalized and rejected. 

Though the International Trade Union Confederation at COP 28 had way more standing than our rag-tag committee with a petition from 135 unionists at the CARB hearings, we were both dismissed. Neither the ITUC demand for a labor-focused climate plan at COP 28, nor our demand for inclusion of the CA Climate Jobs Plan in CARB’s blueprint made a dent in the industry-dominated agreements in Dubai or Sacramento. The only “union” mentioned in CARB’s draft plan was the “European Union.” 

In addition to the parallels between Dubai and Sacramento—capitalist capture on the inside and urgent protest on the outside—there was a new development at COP28. Remaining the elephant in the climate movement room for far too long, war became a central theme in the protests at this COP.  International outrage and organizing responding to the Israeli attacks on Gaza brought the issue of war and militarism to the well-fortified gates of power, making the exclusion of this crucial global issue more visible.

Lessons and strategies
What lessons can ecosocialists extract from global climate planning at COP28 and the similar dynamics in Sacramento?  What strategies emerge now that climate denial is no longer a viable fossil fuel defense and our opposition now lobbies for eco-modern mirages to prolong their profits?  How can CA DSA respond?

Capitalist control of the process, with big oil calling the shots, is enough to turn Pollyanna into a doomer. But in DSA, we have a vision and an organization to build power for a future beyond capitalism and its carbon dependence. We can lend muscle to the labor, anti-war, and frontline groups currently barred from power and relegated to protest. Our national DSA Green New Deal Commission gives us guidance to create Building for Power campaigns:  labor and community coalitions to win union jobs for climate mitigation. 

Recent collaboration between our GND Commission and our International Committee brought us a webinar linking current anti-militarism activism and climate movements. Targeting local war profiteers, as suggested in that presentation, certainly has possibilities here in a state where the military/tech/higher education complex swells the economy.  

Less developed within DSA is the potential to build working class power in coalition with climate-vulnerable communities. But environmental racism does have formidable foes in our state, and we can learn from them. We’ll have a chance this year in a statewide referendum fight to defend drilling restrictions passed by the state legislature in 2022. The Western States Petroleum Association and their astroturf creations have put a measure on the November state ballot to roll back the legislation. Voices in Solidarity Against Oil in Neighborhoods (VISION), a climate justice coalition, and their frontline allies, will work to defeat the measure. 

We know a better world is possible. Get in touch with our CA Ecosocialist Working Group to join us in struggle to create it. 

The DSA International Committee’s Mexico Working Group has been collaborating with the Mexico Solidarity Project on a speaking tour for Mexican journalist José Luis Granados Ceja. In preparation for the Bay Area tour event, East Bay DSA has put together a three-part presentation series on Mexican solidarity. Andrew Morales, co-chair of the East Bay DSA Anti-Imperialist Committee, explained the reasons for this Mexico solidarity work in an exclusive interview with California Red. 

On an international level, Andrew cited right-wing United States politicians’ threats to invade Mexico by forcibly sending in US troops across the border and the lack of pushback by the Democratic Party. He also mentioned Mexican President Obrador (also known as AMLO) and his successes within the country and the challenge he and his party, Morena, presents to the long history of US imperialism directed against Mexico. Andrew stated that the Morena Party’s prioritization of Mexico’s domestic needs has conflicted with US financial interests and elicited these open calls for US intervention.

The first event in the three-part EBDSA Mexican Solidarity series has already taken place. EBDSA’s Anti-Imperialism Committee hosted a talk in December with author Rob McKenzie about his book El Golpe: US Labor, the CIA, and the Coup at Ford in Mexico. El Golpe addresses the US history of infiltrating and weaponizing labor movements throughout Central and South America to serve US financial interests and Cold War policy. The book culminates in a report of the violent suppression of workers on strike at a Mexican Ford factory and shows how US intelligence facilitated this attack. 

In his talk, McKenzie tied these events to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the ways in which NAFTA served US capital interests, and the long-lasting negative impact NAFTA has had on both Mexican and US labor (particularly in the field of automobile production). The author was able to get the president of his local UAW chapter to join for this event and speak on the recent UAW “Standup” strikes, linking those strikes back to Mexican labor and the need for UAW solidarity with the Mexican working class. You can find a recording of the event here.

The second event is happening January 23 at 6:30pm PST. This will be a hybrid night school on Oswaldo Zavala’s book Drug Cartels Do Not Exist: Narcotrafficking in US and Mexican Culture. In the discussion we will learn about the political and economic factors underlying Mexico’s historical War on Drugs, its connections to US imperialism, how it relates to immigration and border issues, and how it has recently been weaponized by right-wing forces in the United States to justify invasion. You can RSVP for the event here.

These events are meant to build up interest for the third and final installment of the series. On February 4, 2024, from 2 to 4 pm, as part of the larger nationwide tour, Mexican journalist (and Mexico Solidarity Project’s own) José Luis Granados Ceja will speak at Cesar Chavez Library, 3301 E. 12th St, Oakland, CA, 94601. He will address a wide range of topics, including immigration, the US/Mexico border, labor, US/Mexican trade, Mexico’s national sovereignty, and recent leftward political developments and successes in Mexico. This is an in-person event.  You can find a description here. 

Mexico Solidarity Project is also currently working with DSA San Francisco to set up a possible San Francisco stop for the tour to occur on February 5, 2024. Details for that event will be finalized soon. Following these stops, Jose Luis will continue on his tour with additional stops in San Diego and Los Angeles.

Over the next few weeks, California Assemblymember Ash Kalra (D-25) is expected to unveil the latest iteration of CalCare, a state single payer bill drafted by the California Nurses Association. Kalra’s last effort, AB 1400, cleared the Assembly Health Committee, only to be withdrawn when it became obvious that there was not enough support on the Assembly floor. Will this one fare better?

Few would deny that our health care system is not working. COVID 19 exposed many of its most egregious failures, not the least of them a mortality rate during the pandemic that was two to three times as high in black and brown communities. Prices keep skyrocketing, access to providers is difficult for many, medical bills remain the leading cause of personal bankruptcy. Nationally, two-thirds of all working age adults experience medical debt.

Broad public support for single payer
Poll after poll has shown broad public support for single payer. A recent study by the UC Berkeley Labor Center projected massive savings under a system of unified public financing—enough to cover a costly but badly needed long-term care benefit and still spend less than we’re spending now.

But getting the politicians to act has been an uphill battle.  In 2006 and 2008, single payer bills passed both houses of the state legislature, only to be vetoed by then-governor Schwarzenegger. Another bill, SB 562, cleared the Senate in 2017; Assembly Speaker Rendon refused to allow a floor vote, most likely to shield Governor Jerry Brown from the kickback of an anticipated veto. 

Our current governor, Gavin Newsom, ran as a single payer candidate in 2018.  Though hardly a reliable ally, he has at least made a commitment and knows the political cost of betraying it. With the defeat of AB 1400 eighteen months ago, it was the Legislature that got cold feet. Perhaps more troubling, there was a noticeable falling off of active support from organized labor, the one force with the resources and lobbying clout to counter the private health care industry.

A love-hate relationship with Kaiser
Union misgivings resulted from a significant change in the language of AB 1400. One Californian in four gets medical care from Kaiser, a health maintenance organization (HMO) that has collective bargaining agreements with tens of thousands of union members. Kaiser’s 9.6 million members in California are apt to have a love-hate relationship with Kaiser: people appreciate its model of integrated health care, but often get less than satisfactory treatment if their particular ailments are costly to treat. 

Earlier single payer bills tried to prevent such abuses by removing market incentives to discriminate: first, by allowing everyone, not just members, to be treated at Kaiser, and second, by enforcing uniform standards of care for all health care providers. But CNA has concluded that capitation—paying providers based on how many patients they treat—is inherently discriminatory, since it rewards those whose patients are healthier and effectively penalizes those whose patients are sicker. AB 1400 barred capitation and removed the language from earlier bills that spelled out ground rules for integrated care systems. Since capitation is a big part of the Kaiser system, some wondered whether Kaiser would continue to exist if AB 1400 passed. 

Whether or not such concerns were justified, they clearly need to be addressed if we are to build a movement strong enough to win. Partly toward that end, Healthy California Now, the state single payer coalition that California DSA recently joined, pushed SB 770 through the Legislature last year. SB 770 seeks to remove both legal and political barriers to passage of single payer legislation—first, by getting around the various federal rules that might hinder implementation of a state plan; second, by involving a broader range of labor and health care activist forces in drafting a new bill. 

Internal conflict in the single payer coalition
CNA actively opposed SB 770, arguing that it was unnecessary at best and, at worst, a cynical effort to derail CalCare. Ash Kalra, an early supporter, changed his mind and came out against it. Some CalCare partisans have gone farther, launching bitter internal fights in both Health Care for All-California and Physicians for a National Health Program. 

Both organizations are longtime bulwarks of the state single payer movement. Both worked for AB 1400. But they were now excoriated for their support of SB 770 and their continued participation in Healthy California Now. When they declined to change course, the critics broke away and formed their own organizations. 

Whatever motivates this internecine conflict, it’s worth noting that it began as a difference of opinion among policy experts over whether paying health care providers through capitation is acceptable under a single payer system. But most Californians probably aren’t particular about how their doctors are paid, so long as they get the care they need. 

Single payer advocates sometimes talk as if the abuses of capitalist health care could be corrected if only we enacted the proper structural reforms, getting the details right and shunning compromise. But state single payer legislation is already a compromise: federal legislation would clearly be preferable. A national health plan, making delivery as well as financing of health care a public responsibility, would be even better. Even that requires a vigilant, organized public to make sure it does what it’s supposed to.   

In California, the potential is there. Already, a coalition of health care activists and immigrant rights advocates has succeeded in winning full MediCal coverage for all undocumented people. DSA-Los Angeles member David Monkawa, who was active in that campaign, argues that “the single payer movement must recognize and fight for immediate reforms as a basis for unity.” Writing a perfect bill counts for little if we haven’t developed an effective strategy and built a movement that unites all who struggle for health care justice.  

As we all know this is an election year. California Red recognizes that there are different points of view within DSA regarding how the organization should approach electoral politics in general and the presidential election this year in particular. We welcome submissions on the topic.

2024: The fascist danger

During a panel presentation on “Labor Communications and the Left” at the annual International Labor Communications Association conference in San Diego in December, I asked the audience of a hundred or so union staffers from several dozen labor organizations two questions. “How many of you think that there is a serious possibility that the day after the election in November we will wake up to find ourselves in a fascist country?” Around two thirds of the room slowly raised their hands. “What, if anything, are you as labor communicators planning to do to stop that from happening?” No one raised their hand.

This was perhaps an unfair question. The first day of the conference had been euphoric, as one presenter after another recounted the tremendous strike victories that their unions had won—autoworkers, actors, screenwriters, hotel workers, grad students and others—over the previous year, and how their communications strategies had contributed to the wins. Not yet into the 2024 calendar year, perhaps it was too much to expect that their unions had started thinking seriously about the coming elections, and how to convert strike energies and strategies into political action. And yet….

Pretty much everyone with eyes open will agree that the Republican Party has steadily devolved over the past few decades into a fascist party.  And with the rise of Donald Trump since 2016 as its leader, the rotten cherry is on top of that fully baked shit pie. 

Actual fascism

The term “fascist” is mostly thrown about loosely to mean someone you don’t like, or who acts in a bullying manner. Getting closer to what fascism looks like historically, the term is used to describe an authoritarian regime or police state. 

But there are various types of those forms of government, and even people serious about a rigorous definition can disagree about fundamentals.  The trouble is partly that fascism isn’t a cookie cutter phenomenon, as it crops up in specific geographic and historic circumstances, which causes different surface appearances and even structural variations, with some qualities more prominent than others depending on where and when.

The best attempt I know of to provide a definition useful across time and space is Thomas Paxton’s, from his The Anatomy of Fascism:

a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood, and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.

This is a good start (if quite a mouthful), but at least two unaddressed questions for our current situation arise out of this definition:  the role of the charismatic leader, and how the "mass-based party of committed nationalist militants" matches up in a country like ours without a parliamentary system and only two mass parties. For these questions, the Republican Party has been providing answers, step by step, for decades, accelerating the past eight years with Trump’s foot on the pedal.

Paxton firmly roots his discussion in historical case studies—not just the classic scenarios of Italy and Germany after World War I, but close examinations of more recent examples. But he is not a socialist, and he fails to distinguish Marxism and Stalinism. He notes but does not fully explore the implications of fascism’s customary appearance as a right-wing populism framed for working class followers as an anti-elitist faux socialism (e.g., National Socialism in Germany) to counter a rise in popularity of socialist remedies to economic and political crisis. Let’s just recall how Bernie Sanders restored a socialist analysis to political conversation simultaneously with the rise of Trump.

The characteristics Paxton ascribes to fascism thus lack a necessary class component. Ultimately a fascist movement, usually perceived by the capitalist class initially as a threat, becomes the defense of that class, as the upstart party entrenches itself in state power, and a significant fraction of the holders of economic power, used to operating under the fig leaf of political democracy, figures out how to make their accommodation with this more direct form of violent domination of the other social classes.

The word none dare speak

From 2016 on and throughout Trump’s term in office, “fascism” was the word most liberals and much of the left refused to speak. Although evidence began mounting up during Trump’s first campaign, people were (and remain, if less so) leery of the term; they should not be. He is a fascist. And he is the maximum leader of a fascist movement.

What does this mean? It means on November 6 we could wake up to find ourselves moving via a more or less legitimate democratic means of an election to a non-democracy: a police state, a country where the conditions that at various times and in various places have been the norm for African Americans and other historically oppressed and marginalized groups, become extended to the entire population. 

What might this look like? Take a look at the treatment of socialists, trade unionists, gay people, trans people, women under fascism. For people of color, recall that the anti-Jewish laws devised in Nazi Germany were modeled on the Jim Crow laws of the southern United States. What goes around comes around. Given the advances in surveillance and other repressive technologies in the hands of the state and private corporations today, this will be a fascism on steroids.

With the rise of a mass movement for a ceasefire in Gaza, a new generation has been introduced to anti-imperialist politics. This is a hopeful development, but the promise of creating an international dimension for post-Bernie socialist youth faces some challenges. At an anti-APEC street demonstration in San Francisco late last year, I saw a few young people holding a banner that read, “Dis-elect Biden”. A man of about sixty on a bicycle was riding by and stopped. The dialogue that followed was not productive. He said he was for a ceasefire, but if we “dis-elected Biden” we would get Trump. The young people said that they didn’t care, there was no difference between the two. The man on the bike became apoplectic, and security had to step over and separate the arguers.

No “lesser of two evils”?

A common refrain at the Palestine demonstrations and in individual conversations I’ve been hearing and having with young activists is that they will not vote for the “lesser of two evils”, let alone work for Biden. This is an understandable principled position, but also a historically blinkered point of view. 

Anger against Biden for his failure to pressure Israel into a ceasefire? Legitimate. A belief that there’s no difference between Trump and Biden because Biden is not stopping Israel’s genocidal war? Untrue.

That’s because it’s not about Biden. Every US president since the late nineteenth century has been an imperialist. The United States is the premiere imperialist country of the capitalist world system. It has military bases all over the world. The president is commander in chief of the armed forces. By definition, any US president—at least any so far, and Trump was certainly no different in this regard—is bound by the job to place the interests of US imperialism above the aspirations of the Palestinian people. Exchanging Biden for Trump would not change US policy toward Israel and Palestine immediately for the better and more likely for the worse. It would also squander the new momentum building within the Democratic base against the bipartisan anti-Palestinian racism unquestioned in US foreign policy for decades. 

Retaining the possibility for a socialist movement

The possibility for socialists to build our movement remains with Democrats in power and supporting the party’s progressive wing. Please do not think I am saying that a vote for Biden or another Democrat is a move in the direction of socialism.  I’m saying that we retain the possibility for building a mass socialist movement within a nominally democratic society; under a Trumpian fascism, that possibility will no longer exist. I’d suggest we listen to what he said at a rally last year: “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists, and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country.”

Under fascism the time horizon for socialism recedes dramatically. Think Chile after the coup against Allende. Think a quarter century in Italy under Mussolini, four decades under Franco in Spain. Even without consideration of the obliteration of civil liberties, looming climate destruction tells us we don’t have that kind of time. 

In short, to people who say “Let’s not hear about the lesser of two evils; I’m so done with the lesser of two evils”: what, you want the worser of two evils? This would not be just considerably worse; it would be qualitatively, disastrously worse. I don’t want to live out the remainder of my days in a fascist country. But I’m old. What I really don’t want is for my children and grandchildren—or anyone else—to experience fascism first-hand. 

We have less than a year to keep our crumbling democracy on life support for another four years. I plan to keep going to ceasefire demonstrations for as long as it takes to bring it about. I also plan to work to keep the Democrats in power because of abortion rights, relatively progressive labor policies, their acknowledgment of the climate crisis, a stated commitment to civil rights and racial equality and much more. 

I have no illusions about how far the Democrats will go to make these policies everything they should be. It’s a party divided between neoliberalism and progressive forces, and the neoliberals generally have the upper hand. But I also have no illusions that a fascist Republican Party in power will do anything but put us in the fast lane to destruction—of worker rights, women’s rights, civil rights and the planet itself.