Running candidates who are Democratic Socialists allows us to talk about these broadly popular ideas. Then electing those candidates to positions of leadership, and power, can fundamentally change the lives of the working people in the communities they serve.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s New York is proof that it is possible, and those wins on the east coast have reverberated across the country.
When voters saw “DEMOCRATIC SOCIALIST”at the top of Oliver’s literature they often asked us, “Like Zohran?”. This easily opened the door for us to have a conversation about DSA and socialism that might have been more challenging or less explicit otherwise. If voters didn’t know Zohran, or even if they were not sure about the whole DSA thing, we were still able to have those important conversations with them about their struggles and our common enemies.
We might not have ever had these conversations with our community members if we did not show up in their neighborhood to knock on their door and talk about this election and this candidate.
The time to prepare for the next election cycle is now
Building and refining chapter infrastructure and process takes time, but time is always of the essence during an election year. Start having conversations now about your chapter’s endorsement timeline, process, and electoral program. Consider what it would take not only to endorse a candidate, but also to win. Does your chapter have tools you need? Do your members have the skills they need? If not, what can you do now to be prepared for the next electoral cycle?
Socialism continues to gain momentum. We have the opportunity to build power for working people at the local and federal level; but it will take an organized mass movement to win.