Building Up: Mega Edition!

DSA’S NEWEST CAUCUS!

Groundwork is officially a caucus! In some ways, this is simply formalizing what we already have. In others, it is the most work we have ever done.

For background, Groundwork started as NPC slate for the 2023 DSA National Convention, backed by a base of supporters informally connected to different chapter formations (themselves a mix of formal and informal). This was as confusing as it sounds, and so after months of development we elected to become a national caucus.

We are excited to unveil tasks and perspectives, more about our ideology, and other questions in the near future — as soon as we have completed the exhaustive democratic process of polishing up the final language. This is a large enough task to undertake in normal times, let alone during the internal and external events of the last few months. (For example, this was supposed to be the January Newsletter.)

So, in lieu of our usual already pretty long edition, we are making this a Mega Edition of Building Up in order to publicly state our positions and plans on some of the major immediate issues DSA faces, and begin to lay out the path forward.

NPC RECAP

SOCIALISTS MUST LEAD. ALWAYS.

Imagine a DSA with one million members, and twenty million dollars. A DSA seen, rightly, as a body as powerful as UAW is today. A DSA rising to the challenges of history in a way will soon make “pre-2024” DSA look as far back to us “pre-2016 DSA” does today.

This is not as far off as you think. But to get there, we must take our organizing to the next level. That means a material assessment of where we are, how we got here, and where we’re going. As most left organizations faltered and dwindled through the Biden years, DSA has held strong at nearly 80,000 members. As the fight for Palestine has put more of a political target on organizers than ever, our local and national leadership has brought in new members by the thousands. And through relying almost entirely on member dues instead of billionaire benefactors, we still take in over 5 million dollars a year—a feat unheard of in the US for any democratic, dues-funded member run organization that’s not a union.

But as our co-chairs (republished with permission) put it, “DSA is at a crossroads”:

“In many ways, we’ve never been stronger — this past year we had one of our most successful election nights ever, we’ve thrown down for Palestinian liberation and solidarity with Cuba against US imperialism, we’ve showed up with workers getting strike ready all over the country, we’ve won transformative legislation nationwide to bring the working class material gains now. In many ways we’ve never been more under threat: a burgeoning new Red Scare, our Palestine organizing putting us under the most concerted external attacks ever, and of course, our budget situation. Both are true.”

This is well put. As everyone from AIPAC to the DNC pours millions into destroying the socialist project, we need to reconcile our yearly five million in income with what was, until a few weeks ago, 7 million in planned yearly spending.

This is not easy. It would be far easier not to. It would be easier to succumb to division. To fight each other instead of the greatest ruling class threats we’ve ever faced. In a democratic organization, there is no easy way to reduce seven figures worth of planned spending. In attempting to stabilize our budget in the near term and give ourselves the cushion we need to launch a massive fundraising operation worthy of the country’s largest socialist organization, we tried to balance any cuts in the most shared, least divisive way possible. We were able to get almost a million dollars ahead through a unanimous vote already. But then, as too often happens, our internal deliberations, and heated feelings about them, quickly spread far beyond the bounds of our internal discourse, and into the public eye.

Organizing is not about telling people what to do. It is about meeting people where they’re at, and bringing them the tools and power to make the choice themselves. About asking people what they want, what they care about, and then listening. Listening. Not talking, listening. It is about showing people what we could have if we fought for it together, about raising expectations, about making the hard ask… and then waiting, in silence, for the answer.

It is about building trust. The trust that the not-yet-organized need to make that leap of faith and join us.

Every Bernie voter should be organizing as a DSA member. Everyone who thinks, “I wish there was a third party,” should be organizing as a DSA member. Everyone must understand that what you are so rightfully searching for in these things, is what you will find in DSA, and the more who join and learn to organize for it, the more we will find them. And so many others too.

It is to these masses, the not-yet-organized, that we must be responsible. When leaders fail to build structures that enable true democratic debate, tensions spill onto corporate owned social media platforms designed to incentivize conflict for profit. All under the eye of a hostile mass media waiting to pounce and blast out to the millions of people with whom we must build trust: see, these socialists can’t even stick to their own pro-worker principles, manage their own organizations. See, these socialists are trashing the workers who work for them–so how will they, in power, treat you? How could you ever trust them to organize the world, let alone want to become one yourself?

Yes, every organization left of Third Way’s fundraising has either dwindled or cratered. Yes, every “movement” employer on earth uses its mission to justify subjecting workers to toxic work environments. Yes, the age of the internet and social media means the boundary between internally-aimed discussion and national media blowup is more porous than ever for any group engaged in anything activity worth doing.

But these are just excuses. In our Co-Chair election, DSA delegates said decisively: Socialists Must Lead. And that means socialists must be better. Better than Democrats. Better than non-profits. Better than anyone. How dare we aim for anything less?

So, we cannot settle.

We cannot settle for passive fundraising and reactive recruiting that takes our economic foundation for granted, and our member base as something we can only build by waiting for the latest DNC-fueled disaster to Tweet “Join DSA” next to.

We cannot accept a style of management in which DSA’s workers must watch a few leaders incite 18 news articles full of quotes denigrating their employees’ work while calling for job terminations just weeks before collective bargaining begins.

And we cannot accept a state in which our internal communications mechanisms are so exclusively targeted at our most online members that blasting something out on Twitter is genuinely the most effective way to reach people—despite the chilling effect this type of discourse has on the many more members who, put off by this as the default mode of discussion, decide daily and in droves to simply stick to their chapters and disengage further.

Because ultimately, whatever our tendency, whatever our caucus, whatever our issue, we are socialists. We have so much more in common than not. And it is our duty to use that to win. But the second we accept that there is an “us vs them” within DSA, we lose. We are not big enough, and have not done enough to succumb to the temptation of fracture. And at a time when it has never been more important—politically, economically—to come together and organize a DSA that moves forward into the future at a newer, higher level, rather than falling back into a powerless pre-2016 retreat—we must redouble our efforts to overcome the drive for division, dissolution, and destruction that the ruling class would love nothing more than to see.

For years, everyone has said “we need to get our internal matters off of Twitter,” then, seeing that the ship has already sailed, felt no choice but to do so themselves. Decried public infighting while still engaging in it. The truth is, the act of projecting DSA’s sensitive internal politics across highly public platforms does fill an otherwise unmet need: that of reaching more members than those engaging in it otherwise would.

But that does not mean this method will fill the need effectively. That does not mean it is the only, let alone best way. The fact that the easiest way to reach the most people through corporate platforms is to be as incendiary as possible–to make elaborate “bust the DSA staff union” graphics, compare staffers to white supremacists, and so on–does not justify this approach. Because the cost of litigating this way is to increase participation only among those willing to engage in its most incendiary, social media-accelerated form is great: it is of repelling anyone else from the democratic process.

We have all met members who dedicated dozens of hours a week to their DSA chapters who see internal, national organizing as something wholly alien and composed mainly of impenetrable factional fights. Whatever our strand of socialism, a status quo around decision-making that repels even already committed socialists, let alone the yet-be-organized working class masses, is not a status quo a socialist can accept.

We will bridge this gap. We will foster a true democratic culture, one that every DSA member feels invited into, not repelled by. We owe it to every member of DSA. We owe it to every worker, in DSA and out. We owe it to a world in more need of the socialist vision and organizing strategy than ever. And we must see it as a vital organizing challenge to organize past systematically and structurally.

There are no shortcuts to building the democratic, transparent, accountable party infrastructure and mass organization we seek. It is no easy task. But neither is electing nearly 200 socialists, passing transformative legislation to raise minimum wage, make the Green New Deal a reality, and more, or leading a new wave of increasingly radical labor organizing nationwide. Neither is building the largest and most powerful US socialist movement in generations.

We have no doubt that when we put that same socialist vision and unrelenting DSA organizing muscle towards this latest challenge, and every other, the ruling class won’t know what hit them.

This will be a major project, and we are excited to develop more wide-ranging proposals in key areas soon. But there are several key steps we can take right now to both resolve our most vital current tasks, and do so in a way that builds the organizing structures and practices needed to support our future.

FOR A CONSENSUS BUDGET

With liberal institutions flailing harder than ever in the face of a resurgent right wing and a chaotic presidential election approaching, it’s clear our uncompromising socialist vision, rigorous Marxist analysis, and concrete organizing muscle are more needed than ever.

To meet the moment and grow beyond it, we must swiftly work through immediate financial deliberations to arrive at whatever best equips DSA at all levels of the organization to maximize our ability to keep meeting the organizing moment, and quickly build a DSA that not only reaches the logistical and economic base needed to not both fortify ourselves today, and rocket past our limits into a new era of DSA tomorrow.

This means an organization that:

Protects member organizing momentum at both chapter and national level
Enables expansive fundraising to ensure our next budget crisis is that we have more funding than we know what to do with
Builds expansive recruitment apparatus, both as an ongoing evergreen effort, and in preparation for national political crises bringing in mass influxes of new members
Avoids unnecessary logistical and financial obstacles to the above

With these goals in mind, we can more easily assess what kind of budget will get us there, rather than debate each item in high-stakes isolation, which leaves us especially prone to false dichotomies like “members vs workers” or “democratic convention vs undemocratic NPC.”

For example, member organizing and our DSA workers are not in inherently in conflict: take the hard work by multiple departments that made it possible to defuse the most concerted press attacks we’ve ever faced, and simultaneously work with members to stand up the national No Money For Massacres campaign in just a few days—which was key in rapidly elevating “Ceasefire Now” from resolution to the number one demand in US Politics. This coordinated pressure campaign effort was something DSA was able to do faster and more effectively than any other national organization.

This doesn’t mean taking anything off the table. But to decide what should be on the table, we must see the whole table. Starting by reaching consensus on a quantifiable budget target—a number to reach.

Once that number is agreed upon, NPC members should submit their ideal combination of adjustments as a whole, rather than taking items one at a time in a way that does not allow for a bigger picture view.

At this point, the Budget and Finance committee should organize something we have sorely lacked—a Budget Town Hall, working with DSA Chapter Leaders to ensure broad participation from members, especially those who are not connected to online discourse.

Finally, the Budget and Finance Committee should assemble all NPC members' budget cut preferences into one report which summarizes the distribution of preferences, and then work with Co-Chairs to develop a Consensus Budget that synthesizes all NPC members and YDSA NPC Reps preferences for review and adoption by the NPC.

This process is designed to enable what we need: a holistic discussion of how to fortify DSA most effectively right now with the widest member participation possible. Battling over individual items in isolation, small or large, is the easiest way to wind up with scorched earth, us vs them tactics that win individual fights but ultimately drag out the process, and take up time that could be spent organizing towards more funds, recruiting, and everything else we organize for.

It’s time to get this done, so we can hit the ground running in what is shaping up to be DSA’s most pivotal year, at every level.

BETTER FRAMINGS, BETTER FAITH

This does not mean we will align perfectly on everything–nor should we. Leadership means finding ways to accept this inherent truth and move forward together anyway.

As outlined further above, the narratives we propagate through our organizing greatly affect our ability to to move forward and work together as an organization. When dealing with challenging questions, it is easier to apply simple moralizing binaries than acknowledge ambiguity and risk. In this case, that means applying simple moralizing binaries on our comrades.

This we have seen too frequently, especially as applied to the issue of DSA’s workers, in somewhat shocking ways, pitting “the will of convention” against “staff.” In this framing, decisions are simple: proposals voted on at convention were chosen by members, while staff hiring was not. So anyone opposed to prioritizing layoffs as a first resort is in violation of the will of convention.

At a basic labor level, this division is simply inaccurate—many proposals also include dedicated staff time, so this could easily hamstring resolutions on its own; some positions were created by past convention votes. But at an even deeper level, this attempted framing approaches an uncomfortable level of sleight of hand.

As a DSA member, ask yourself: if a convention proposal included a line like “this will also require laying off 2-3 workers,” would delegates have voted to approve it? We find this hard to believe. When deliberating priorities, the claim that members or leaders are in violation of the democratic will of convention is one of the most major accusations to make in DSA, and must be wielded far more carefully.

ENDING THE DSA TELEPHONE

Still, we must be serious about the fact that some members who feel disconnected from national will wonder why even engaging in this difficult process is worth their time. With so much chapter level organizing to do, why waste any time away from it on a part of DSA that to many, appears as a kind of black box?

Most members, even active ones, are far more involved in their chapters than national work, and have little idea what the national organization does beyond receiving dues, mailing the occasional issue of Democratic Left, or sending emails (as Ayo Edebiri lightly roasted us for in her intro to a DSA fundraiser in 2021).

It is incumbent on leadership to provide accurate answers where they exist, and develop better ones where they do not.

Again, take the issue of staffing. No one benefits from how currently, staff work is hidden from large portions of the members (likely unintentionally). Ultimately, staff works for the membership, but the status quo in which expectations, process, and results all happen largely out of sight of much of the membership benefits no one. Too often, assessing staff—and for that matter, national as a whole—is closer to an unwinnable game of telephone full of contradictory accounts of what happened behind the scenes than it is a strategic, material analysis. Accounts which are largely delivered in the form of caucus polemics and forum or social media battles.

Staff and membership alike deserve a clear, consensus vision of what success looks like so that we can develop the strongest staff strategy in concrete terms, that all members can easily see at work. Fortunately, agreeing on these kind of clear, objective criteria is a core piece of collective bargaining, which DSA and our staff unit are currently engaged in. But we can do much more, and are developing several structural proposals in an effort to bring a better understanding of national DSA to all members.

As just one small first step, we’re excited for the inaugural Fireside Chat hosted by our co-chairs last night. This is a perfect function of our new political leadership: acting as the face of our organization not just to the public, but to DSA, connecting a too easily disconnected organization more fully and effectively.

We will organize to ensure this is just the first of a new kind of DSA internal communication, the kind that treats having a full understanding of our national org, how it affects us, and how we can improve as a not just key part of the DSA experience for all members, but a welcoming one.

“NITHYA RAMAN IS NOT AN SIO”

Another key part of the DSA experience is reaching a shared understanding of the goal, meaning, and power of a DSA endorsement. At the city and state level, a DSA endorsement is one of the most powerful tools in politics. It means a candidate is not only supported by our movement, but of it. It means thousands of hours of labor from the most dedicated people in the country, who are not only unpaid, but actively paying DSA dues to build this movement. When it comes to taking on the ruling class and winning, it’s been estimated to be worth at least a million dollars.

When in 2020, DSA-LA helped unseat corporate billionaire- and Nancy Pelosi-backed City Councilmember David Ryu by electing Nithya Raman to District 4, the chapter wielded this to lay the foundations for its rapidly expanding Socialists in Office project in one of the country’s largest cities. Gaining a major foothold for pro-tenant and other policy fights at the city level and winning tangible improvements for the working class, like expanded protections from eviction, improved rent stabilization, and more.

But CM Raman’s actions since then, especially in recent months, have made it inarguable that, as Groundwork NPC Member and LA member Frances G described in her overview of the situation, and why she voted for the chapter to unendorse, while she may be willing to work with the movement, she is not of it.

Raman’s actions go beyond challenges and into actively attacking and flouting the DSA chapter whose endorsement she asks for, including:

At a time when the entire world took sides on a single story, the fight to stop genocide in Palestine, she equivocated in a way comparable to those who defended the police during the George Floyd uprisings.

At the moment DSA faced its greatest ever attacks, for standing with Palestine, launched in bad faith by an establishment bent on spreading hate and war, she not only failed to defend us, but fanned the flames by publicly joining in these criticisms.

As DSA members became a pillar of a new anti-apartheid movement, she not only distanced herself, but accepted an endorsement from Democrats for Israel, a Zionist group whose third largest individual donation came from David Ryu himself.

Frances also offers local context that has been somewhat overshadowed by national debate. As she puts it “rightly or wrongly, this race has become a referendum on the pro-tenant policies DSA fights for … If her opponent wins, it will be an outright victory for the worst of LA, the right-wing, reactionary, millionaire class that redistricted her as revenge for her 2020 victory.”

The stakes here are high. The modern socialist project is new and largely unprecedented in American politics, and the ruling class working to destroy it are, simply put, the strongest forces on Earth. So episodes of failure will happen. When they do, we must first attempt to organize to repair what has been broken, so that we emerge stronger. The ruling class would love nothing more than for us to retreat from state power altogether.

But repairing harm requires both parties to engage with the goal of repair. As LA members worked so tirelessly on such a repair process, including organizing her into support of a ceasefire, Raman’s acceptance of the DFI endorsement in the middle of this process marks her clear rejection of this goal. It is the culmination of a series of what Frances described as “not the first such breach of trust between the chapter and the council member,” in a pattern that has made it undeniable that Raman is “not operating as a Socialist In Office.”

Raman in office may offer opportunities to win further concrete gains for the working class, that could become more difficult in the short term should she lose. But whatever short term gain comes from retaining this endorsement will be doubly lost in the next crisis caused by her next inevitable breach of trust with the chapter, at the cost of defanging the DSA endorsement. She is the one who put DSA-LA in such an untenable position. Which means she could easily do so again.

This calculus is likely why, in a high turnout chapter vote, DSA-LA members voted to censure Nithya Raman, change campaign strategies, and launch a city-level ceasefire campaign, but ultimately retain endorsement.

But building a strong SIO program requires a high degree of political alignment, close coordination between the chapter and the elected, and a lot of trust. If Raman is willing to test DSA LA’s trust in high stakes moments like these, why should members trust what happens behind closed doors, where most politics takes place?

Our analysis is that Nithya Raman is not operating as an SIO, and should not have the DSA endorsement. We are ready to organize with DSA LA comrades to find a solution that unequivocally supports the Palestinian people and proves that we emerge from such an episode not divided or weakened, but united in power. We cannot allow politicians to hold DSA and the working class political hostage. And we cannot allow them to defang the power of a DSA endorsement, which at city and state levels are so unprecedented that the ruling class would love nothing more than to turn it into just another meaningless logo on a palm card.

BET ON DSA

The past few weeks have focused on the challenges we face. As socialists, we naturally focus on what’s wrong. But there is so much already we are doing right too. So many ways forward we already see (hint hint👈👀), which we will discuss more fully very soon.

Until then, to all who made it this far, solidarity.

Local Groundworks

Recent DSA Chapter Accomplishments Groundwork supporters are leading, or heavily involved in. This is not an exhaustive list of actions held by these chapters, which would take too long to list!

National: Over 100 people turned out to watch our GND/labor panel with the National Labor Commission (NLC) last week! If you missed it, you can watch and share it on DSA's YouTube channel.

Then, over 400 people joined the launch of DSA’s national Trans Rights & Bodily Autonomy campaign, where Rose was among several DSA leaders who brought the fire with a vision of a socialist movement that leads the way in defending trans rights today, and winning queer liberation tomorrow.

NYC-DSA: Former NYC-DSA Steering Committee member, UAW organizer, and DSA Assembly Candidate Claire Valez pulled off what may be the biggest DSA field launch of all time, with over 100 people showing up across Queens kick.

Atlanta DSA: ATL continues to be a rising star chapter in the South! The campaign for State House candidate and cadre Atlanta chapter member Gabriel Sanchez continues to heat up, with increasingly large canvasses to elect Atlanta’s first socialist in office.

The chapter also continues the vital fight to Stop Cop City, standing with unions against right wing attacks on union rights, and fighting against bills that would repress the fight for Palestine.

And somehow, they even had time to fit in their chapter convention! Looks like it was a lot of fun.

You know who else thought it was fun? National DSA Co-Chair Ashik Siddique who spoke at their Convention about the importance of Solidarity Income-Based Dues! And he was impressed to hear that the chapter finished the year strong with an $11,000 surplus - we have a lot to learn from Atlanta DSA about fundraising!

Mid-Hudson Valley DSA: Fresh off winning rent rent stabilization in the city of Newburgh, NY, MHV-DSA just passed a ceasefire resolution there too. Go Newburgh!

Groundwork in the Media

If you’ve read this far and are thinking, if only I can hear even more from Groundwork… check out this great piece in Jacobin featuring Rose and Comrades With Kids founder Danny V.