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Midterms: Declare independence from DSA Dems—Elect Independent Socialists! · Gimme a Break!

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Get these Democrats out of here.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: The socialists, we're staking our clay.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: The yard signs are in.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Request one on a website.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: We'll send an organizer to your house.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: Hello and welcome to a special episode of Give Me a Break, the official podcast of the Just Break Already Caucus in the DSA.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: I'm your host, Lee Tal, and I'm here with my co-host Edward.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: Hello.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_02: And the audio you heard at the beginning of the episode was Greg Levy's campaign ad for Senator.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: He's running as an independent socialist with the Party for Socialism and Liberation against the establishment Democrat Sherrod Brown in Ohio.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: And we agree with Greg Levy that we need to get the Dems out of here and that socialists need to stake our claim.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_02: So today we're making one last push for the independent socialist candidates on the ballot in next week's midterm elections.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: And we will be making the case for why DSAers, socialists, and working people should cast their ballots for candidates running against capitalism and against both the Democrats and Republicans.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_02: These elections are being pitched as a referendum on Trump's second term.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: And while Trump is plenty hated over the fallout around the rising cost of living, the Iran war, the AI data centers, the Epstein files, the Dems are too.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_02: They're banking on doing nothing and winning these elections simply by not being Trump.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_02: At the same time, a number of DSA Democrats have won Democratic primaries and are seeking to revitalize the party of Palestinian genocide and economic ruin.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: The DSA right sees the electoral successes of these Democrats as proof of their program for taking over the Dems.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_02: And the left is burnishing these successes to show that socialism is on the rise.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: So maybe to start, what's wrong with this picture?
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_02: Obviously, we in the JBA do not support these Dems that the DSA calls socialists, whether it's Angie Nixon in Florida or quote, proud capitalist Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan or Troy Jackson in Maine.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_02: So maybe, Edward, if you want to put these elections in context and why DSA Dems winning these elections are not actually a step forward for socialism.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_03: Right now, what we're seeing is there is a lot of discontent with Trump's inability to bring down prices.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: He ran last time around saying we're going to end these forever wars, just like he did in 2016, about his continued and expanded U.S.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_03: imperialism's military operations abroad.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_03: There was the Maduro kidnapping at the beginning of the year.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_03: The big elephant in the room, of course, is the Iran War, which keeps dragging on with no end in sight.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_03: I think the Democrats are really banking on just Trump's overall unpopularity with both of these to catapult them back into office, like you were saying.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_03: The DSA left likes to portray all of these candidates, these DSA candidates winning in these Democratic primaries as like socialism on the march, right?
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_03: But let's do a reality check real quick.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_03: Where have these candidates actually won?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_03: For the most part, it's in these deep blue democratic-run cities, and they've been winning basically by mobilizing the petty bourgeoisie, which is being squeezed right now.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_03: This is not a mass mobilization of the working class to elect socialist office.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_03: It's part of this intra-democratic party civil war over who's going to be the face of the Democratic Party in the post-Trump era.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: The other thing about it is attaching yourself to the Democrats inevitably comes with a cost.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_03: That cost is that you're going to drag socialism totally through the mud.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_03: Working people are going to see what these Democrats do once they actually get in office, which is necessarily going to be a series of betrayals.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_03: We've already seen this happen with Mom Dani as mayor of New York City and AOC, right?
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_03: The electeds who came before and the last big sellouts.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_03: Right, right.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_03: You know, they've been in it's not like this is the first time this has happened.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_03: 2018, AOC comes to Congress.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_03: She's crying at the border.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_03: She's saying, Oh, we've got to abolish ICE, which she doesn't talk about much anymore.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_03: She's talking, oh, we're going to get Medicare for all, and then she won't even try to force a vote on that while in Congress.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_03: We've seen this movie before.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_03: They're trying to revive it now, and they feel like they have an opportunity to do so because the Democratic leadership is so hated that they can bank on that as a way to move up within the Democratic Party.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_03: But at the end of the day, this isn't going to advance the fortunes of socialism.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_03: It's going to deepen the divide between working people and self-proclaimed socialists who just look at these people who call themselves socialists get elected and then act like any other liberal Democrat.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_02: And there's this thing on the DSA left where they'll say, we don't think the DSA should officially endorse Angie Nixon or El Sayed because they say they're capitalist.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_02: But they say that everyone should vote for these people and that they're going to vote for these people.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_02: Just sounds very cynical.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: Why if you think that they're worth voting for and that working people should vote for them, then why not endorse them?
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_02: Because there's such a contradiction there.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_02: For us, there are candidates actually that are worth supporting.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: We think the DSA should have endorsed them, but they mostly didn't.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: But working class people should actually give their vote to and not waste it on these sellout Democrats.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_03: There are plenty of independent socialist candidates running this year.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_03: We have featured a number of episodes of this podcast since we launched on some of those campaigns.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_03: If you go back to our third episode, we actually had an interview with Brittany Kubachek, who is the one DSA independent candidate running this election in Rhode Island for the State House there.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_03: We also had a few episodes on Shama Sawant's campaign for Congress, which ultimately failed, thanks in part due to the DSA's strategy of only supporting Democrats.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_03: We will start on the East Coast, where there are actually quite a few independent socialist campaigns in New England this year.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if maybe you want to introduce those.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, sure.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so you had mentioned Britney for Rhode Island.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_02: She's running as an independent socialist for State District 5 representative.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_02: And she has been running her campaign very forthrightly as a independent socialist for Workers' Party and against uh the two-party system and the Democrats.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_02: Some of our listeners might be aware, might not, but Rhode Island DSA has broken from the Democratic Party.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_02: They do not support Democrats, and I think they're the only DSA chapter, to my knowledge, that has divested from the Democratic Party.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_02: We did an episode on her campaign and interviewed her and comrades from Labor Militant and Just Break Already have canvassed for her and phone banked.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: And again, this is a very left-wing campaign.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: And she was also very strong against US imperialism and for free Palestine.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_02: Brittany's campaign was being used to show how that you can actually do this, that it's possible to run independent candidates that stand for the working class running things.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: At the same time, there were these, quote, progressive Democratic Party campaigns in Rhode Island, like David Morales for mayor in Providence.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_02: And there was really just a lot of pressure to make these two campaigns compatible.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_02: This came very strong from New York City DSA that was supporting Morales.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_02: I think they held two fundraisers for him in New York City.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_02: And they did this knowing full well that Rhode Island DSA was not endorsing him.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: And actually, Rhode Island DSA had unendorsed him in 2023 because he was a he was a state rep rep then.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_02: And he voted for this conservative Democrat for House speaker, who was like the right-hand man to the previous right-wing speaker.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_02: They unendorsed him for cause, basically.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_02: In September, there was an article in the Liberal Nation magazine, and it was called The Left Can Win in Small Cities.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_02: David Morales is showing how.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_02: And they said that the Morales campaign is providing a model for how a progressive candidate can oust an incumbent.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_02: And the article noted that the Rhode Island DSA chapter didn't support Morales during his mayoral run.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_02: And the article said, quote, and Rhode Island DSA was only one of multiple groups that for several years steered Rhode Island's political left toward anti-majoritarian purity tests infighting and petty grievances.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_02: In an environment dominated by these kinds of voices, a movement campaign like the one Morales has built would not have been possible.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: Fortunately, in recent years, groups like Rhode Island DSA have been eclipsed by organizations actually working to build real power.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_02: And the most important example here is Reclaim Rhode Island, a group that emerged from local Bernie 2020 organizing, but came into its own with staff capacity and a significant base in the last couple of years.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_02: End quote.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: So it's very clear from the Liberal Nation magazine and the DSA right that running independent socialist campaigns and supporting Democrats, these are incompatible.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: And the DSA left should understand that too.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: There's a class line here.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_02: So you have a situation where the national DSA did endorse Britney, which was, I think, the only independent candidate they endorsed, but they really haven't built the campaign at all.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: And meanwhile, all the main New York City DSA or DSA electeds, Baskar Sankara, who's the president of the Nation magazine, he was part of these fundraisers for Morales that they did in New York City.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_02: You really see that there was really this counter pressure, really working against Britney's independent campaign and pushing support to these Democrats running in Providence and in Rhode Island.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's why we supported Britney's campaign because it was against the Democrats.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_02: I think what we encountered too in Rhode Island was this kind of idea that, well, this independence from the Democrats is kind of a local experiment for Rhode Island, and that doesn't really have to apply elsewhere.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: But I think what you've really seen, especially with this pressure that was exerted from New York City, is that the clean break can't be a local exception.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: It really has to be fought for on a national level.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so another example, we went to Britney's campaign town hall on Monday night, and it was the last event of the campaign.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the main speakers was Siraj Sinthu, who's the executive director of Reclaim Rhode Island.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like, okay, you can be on a panel with Reclaim Rhode Island, but it really should have been a debate.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_02: And it wasn't.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: So instead, it really just blurred the lines between her principled campaign and Reclaim Rhode Island's Democratic Party campaigns.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: And this really undermines the message of independence from the Dems, honestly.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_02: And I think this hurts her campaign.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_02: So I think it's really important to support, vote for her and support her and try to really show that working people do need an alternative and to not succumb to this kind of pressure.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_02: One example just that was discussed at the panel housing, which is a huge deal in Providence.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_02: We talked about it on our podcast and interview with Brittany and Morales and the other Dems, they're for private investment schemes or nonprofit takeovers.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: They're not for defending public housing.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: Working people are not going to get what they need for housing, for education, for any of these things by supporting the same Democratic Party that has really ruined housing, ruined education, ruined healthcare, ruined all these things in the service of private interests and against working class people.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_02: So we think this is really an important question here and how it's posed in Rhode Island is to really be very clear that we're supporting this independent socialist campaign against the Democratic Party campaigns here.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so that's Rhode Island.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: We're just on the East Coast in New England.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: We have Joe Tashe in Massachusetts.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_02: He's a PSL candidate.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: His campaign slogan is capitalism is a national emergency.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: The solution is socialism.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_02: He says in his campaign in Massachusetts, we've been a blue state for almost a century.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_02: What do we have to show for it?
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: Healthcare deserts, police brutality, crumbling infrastructure, and one of the highest costs of living in the country.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_02: So we're not in Massachusetts, but we have some supporters there, whoever's there.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_02: We really strongly encourage people who are in Massachusetts to vote for Joe Tashe.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_02: He's running against the Democrat Ed Markey, who's like a very old establishment Democrat there.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_02: We support that campaign.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_02: Further south in New York City, we're supporting Andre Easton, who's also PSL.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_02: The DSA is not supporting him, which is honestly really criminal.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_02: He's running against Arch Zionist, APAC-funded Richie Torres.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's an independent campaign.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: We've also done some canvassing for Andre Easton, and we think this really would be very good to give uh this Zionist still black eye here and for Andre Easton to win this campaign.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: Lastly, Rosa Pepper Macias from Workers' Voice Party is running in Connecticut for state Senate District 11.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_02: And one of her key planks is to build a labor party that working and oppressed people need a mass labor party independent of the capitalist parties to achieve a workers' government.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_02: She's also running against the Dems.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_02: So there's actually a number of candidates on the East Coast that really deserve the vote of working people and anyone who considers themselves a socialist.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think that's a pretty good overview.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_03: Lots of things happening in New England and in New York.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_03: I will take us to the Midwest, which is arguably the part of the country that needs independent socialist candidates the most, given how totally hollowed out the Midwest has been over the last 30 years.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_03: And there's no lack of them here.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_03: We got some there are some independent socialist candidates running in Ohio, in Indiana, in Illinois, and Michigan.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_03: So I'll start with Ohio since Greg Levy was the audio we played at the beginning of the show.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_03: Greg Levy is a candidate for the PSL in Ohio.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_03: Um, he makes pretty clear in his campaign materials we need another reconstruction.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_03: He highlights building an Ohio that works for workers, uh, which is not obviously the way the state has been run for, you know, its entire existence.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_03: It's really been impacted negatively by the hollowing out of industry.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_03: The Democrat running in the election is Sherrod Brown.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_03: He's a progressive Democrat.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_03: He's close with the labor bureaucracy.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: I was looking at something the other day and it was saying he's one of the most liberal members of Congress.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_03: It's actually a pretty good thing on PSL's part that they're actually contesting this election and running into this so-called progressive Democrat to provide working people with an actual option.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_03: And Greg Levy's campaign stuff is great.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_03: You should watch all of his Instagram reels.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_03: That's where we pulled the first audio from.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_03: Greg Levy's campaign has been controversial within DSA because a number of DSA branches did endorse Greg Levy's campaign.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_03: You know, they saw independent socialists on the ballot and said, hey, that's what we're supposed to be about, right?
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_03: Right?
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_03: And the answer, of course, was no.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_03: If you read half a dozen tweets whenever Akron DSA came out with this endorsement, a pylon from the DSA right and the DSA right against the Greg Levy endorsement because it was threatening a so-called Progressive Democrat on the ballot, and this could mean people vote for Greg Levy instead of voting for Sherrod Brown.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_03: That this could mean that the Republicans retain control of the Senate.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_03: Recently, I've seen some stuff where they're trying to say that Levy is a spoiler candidate for the Republicans.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_03: Same kind of crap they always do to try to dissuade people from voting for independent socialist candidates.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_03: And it's really coming down hard from elements within the DSA who are very upset that Akron, Mahoning Valley, and some of the other Ohio DSA branches endorse Greg Levy.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: But if you're in Ohio, you should definitely get out and vote for Greg Levy for U.S.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_03: Senate.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_03: He's got a pretty decent poll numbers for an independent candidate.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_03: Last I saw was 3% or something like that, which is a pretty big deal.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_03: Moving a little bit north to Michigan.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_03: Michigan is the place where the working class party, which is the party that was set up by Spark, a smaller Trotskyist organization, has set up in Michigan, and they are also active in Illinois, Maryland, and California.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_03: They've got ballot access.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_03: They're running about 20 candidates in Michigan.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_03: Now, what I will say about the working class party's campaigns and candidates is they pretty much run against anybody.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_03: Like the PSL candidate in Ohio, they will run against these progressive Democratic candidates.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_03: So, for example, in Michigan's 12th district, Gary Walkowitz is running against Rashida Talib, who is the most popular DSA elected around.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_03: But of course, Taleb being part of the Democratic Party tells you everything you need to know about what her actual role is.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_03: This is a person who, when the encampments were happening in 2024, was working with her, I believe this is her sister, right?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_03: Uncommitted.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_03: To register people to vote uncommitted in the Democratic primaries.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_03: This was supposed to be a protest vote against the Democratic Party's genocide in Gaza.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_03: And then, of course, whenever the votes were all counted, the uncommitted movement said, whatever you do, don't vote for a third-party candidate.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_03: Which really just played the reality in front of everybody.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_03: This was just another route to the same thing, registering people to vote for the Democratic candidate last November.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_03: Which at that time, of course, was killer Kamala Harris herself.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_03: So, yes, if you have a working class party candidate on the ballot, you should vote for them against the Democrats, against the Republicans.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_03: There's plenty in Ohio in Michigan.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_03: There's also one on the ballot in Illinois, which we in the JBA have been supporting uh since earlier this year.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_03: So to just back up a little bit, one of the big campaigns that DSA was pushing forward earlier this year was in Illinois' fourth congressional district, where Byron Sigcho Lopez, Democratic DSA city counselor, was seeking to replace Chewy Garcia, longtime so-called progressive Democrat, in Congress.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_03: And it's a little bit of a long story, but I promise it we'll get back to the working class party point.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: Sigcho Lopez was trying to replace Chewy Garcia.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_03: Chewy Garcia decided, said he wasn't going to run for re-election like a day before the filing deadline for the election happened.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_03: So his chief of staff, Patty Garcia, filed.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_03: She's the only one who knew about it, got on the ballot right away.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_03: Sigjo Lopez, who was talking about running for Congress, was iced out of the Democratic primary.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_03: She got the nomination automatically.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_03: Chicago DSA promoted the campaign of Sigcho Lopez as an independent.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_03: And Sigio Lopez did try to qualify on the ballot as an independent.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_03: This was this was hailed as, oh, we're running an independent socialist candidate.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_03: They were trying to put it on the same plane as Brittany running in Rhode Island, of course, leaving out the very, very, very small fact that Byron Sigcho Lopez is a member of the Democratic Party Central Committee for Cook County and still is.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_03: Right?
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_03: So this was a completely fake independent campaign where Sigcho Lopez was being promoted as an independent, but had in made every indication was and is that he was not going to cause any trouble for the Democrats.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_03: Same old thing, just one step removed.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_03: Then there's there's precedent for this too.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_03: Like Bernie Sanders is on paper an independent, but in reality, he ran for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_03: He's been the budget chair for the Democratic Party whenever Biden was president.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_03: It was completely fake.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_03: Sigcho Lopez was unable to get on the ballot, mostly because of Democratic Party trickery.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_03: But since that, uh the Chicago JBA has been pushing for an actual independent socialist campaign in Chicago.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_03: And there just so happened to be one, which is the working class party.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: See?
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: I got back to it.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, yeah.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_03: So working class party candidate Ed Hershey is running for Congress in Illinois 4th Congressional District.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_03: Hershey is teacher.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_03: He's run for this seat uh for the last few election cycles.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_03: In the last one, he actually got 10,000 votes, which is pretty decent.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: We've been out campaigning and doing some canvassing with the Hershey campaign.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_03: Some of our supporters went to a debate uh between Hershey, the Democrat, and the Republican the other night.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_03: If you live in Illinois' fourth congressional district, you should vote for Ed Hershey.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_03: Last but not least, we have Indiana in the Midwest, where the Socialist Party of Indiana.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_03: Indiana is running a candidate for state house.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, that's Ben Davis.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_03: If you've never heard of it before, the Socialist Party of Indiana is a split-off of the DSA, more or less.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_03: Jesse Brown, who was a city councilor, uh DSA, was expelled from the Democratic Party caucus early last year.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_03: He's been on the Indianapolis City Council.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_03: He was basically kicked out of the Democratic Party caucus for challenging other Democrats on things like an Israeli arms embargo, charter school funding.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_03: But rather than take their ball and go home, Brown and others involved with the Socialist Party of Indiana project set up the Socialist Party of Indiana as an independent alternative to the Democrats.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_03: It's a little complicated.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_03: Jesse Brown, the founder, is himself still a registered Democrat.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_03: Uh Ben Davis, who is the candidate we have given critical support to, pushes this inside-outside approach uh for the Democratic Party.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_03: Really similar to what you were describing with the stuff uh around Rhode Island where it's like, oh, it's an experiment.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_03: We could do some stuff on the outside, we can do some stuff on the inside.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_03: Davis had initially sought the access to the Democratic Party ballot line himself, but was denied.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_03: Part of the motivation for actually giving support to the Socialist Party of Indiana is this is an opportunity to push it in the direction it needs to take, which is total independence from the Democratic Party.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_03: The campaign that Ben Davis is running has completely supportable demands, making things more affordable for working people.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_03: He's drawing a line against the billionaires, the Democrats and Republicans.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_03: People should vote for the Socialist Party of Indiana.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_03: This has also been a obviously a level of controversy within DSA as well.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_03: Jesse Brown was actually expelled from DSA, and the DSA is not supporting the Socialist Party of Indiana for whatever reason.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_03: That reason, of course, being the Democratic Party as the only vehicle they see as a possible one for socialists.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so that's that's the Midwest.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_02: So I guess I'll do the West Coast.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_02: There is a candidate to support in the West Coast.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_02: JBA and International Socialist Alternative Revolutionary is supporting and canvassing for Aaron Revellas.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_02: Before I get to him, though, I'll I just want to talk a little bit about the mayoral elections there because that's really the main election happening.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_02: We're obviously we are for no vote.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_02: We are for not voting for Nithya Rahman or Karen Bass.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: There's unfortunately no one to vote for for mayor in this election.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_02: But it's really clear with Nithya Rahman, yes, LA endorsed her.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_02: It's become very clear that they did not abide by RS-22, which is the anti-Zionism national resolution.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_02: There's just really a lot of opportunism here.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_02: We did a whole episode about LA and these elections.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm not going to repeat everything, but since our episode, Mithia Ramon has also made clear that she is a capitalist.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_02: So what are we even talking about here?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_02: There's really no socialist to vote for here.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_02: That's the truth.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_02: And DSA, by endorsing her, is really taking responsibility for all of the attacks on working class, on black and brown angelinos.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: Both Bass and Ramon support LAPD's reign of terror.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_02: They both will have their cops collude with IC.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_02: And you have this situation in LA where the DSA electeds on city council support Bass, and then the DSA proper is endorsing Nithya.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone is gonna get screwed here.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: Nithya gave an interview recently, too, where she said that Daryl Gates, the police chief, was the gold standard of policing.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_02: Anyone who knows who Daryl Gates was, I mean, this guy in the late 80s, he oversaw it was literally called Operation Hammer.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_02: And it was a huge crackdown that resulted in thousands of arrests, particularly in the black neighborhoods in LA, you know, terrorized black and brown LA.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_02: His cops were the ones that beat Rodney King, and that's what sparked the 92 upheaval.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: I think she later apologized and said she was ignorant or something, but I mean, she knew what she was doing here.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_02: This is obviously, what do they call that?
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_02: Like when you're making a play for the most reactionary voters.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_02: Dog whistle, yes.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_02: So there's really no choice here under either one.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_02: Angelinas are going to continue to suffer in every way.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: So we supported her being unendorsed and expelled.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_02: The national political committee, the leadership of DSA, they actually have been voting resolutions, raising doing this, but they've really stalled on it.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: But I think that they even had resolutions saying they would do those things if she didn't comply by X date.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, the election is in a few days now.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_02: I think just that it went so far really shows the anger at DSA LA for endorsing Nithya.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_02: There's Geese magazine, which put out an article and their ad for it on Instagram.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: It was just totally Orwellian.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: It was like DSA's vote to expel Nithya Rahman or punish the LA chapter is an existential threat to the left of Los Angeles.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_02: No, Nithya Rahman is an existential threat to the left of Los Angeles.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: Geese argues against this dangerous move to undermine the working class movement in LA.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_02: No, again, supporting Nithya Rahman undermines the working class movement in LA.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: And then they also say this internal repression must be rejected if we want mass revolutionary politics.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, this is so Arwellian.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_02: No, Nithya Rahman must be rejected if we want mass revolutionary politics.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_02: Just to give you a sense of just how twisted everything is right now.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_02: But like I said before, there is a campaign to support and to vote for, and that's Aaron Ravelis.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: He's running to become a member of Montebello's school board trustee area two.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_02: He's running as an independent socialist with the Peace and Freedom Party.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_02: JBA and ISAR comrades have put out a statement, which we'll link in the show notes.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_02: In their statement, they say despite his strength as an independent socialist candidate, Ravelis has faced bureaucratic suppression from DSA leadership who refused to even let him seek endorsement from DSA on a bureaucratic technicality.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_02: DSALA leadership tries to justify their clampdown by arguing that without the support of the Democratic Party, Revellis' campaign isn't, quote, viable enough to endorse.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_02: Unlike proven betrayers such as Nithya Rahman or AOC, this is a disgraceful point from a supposedly, quote, socialist organization and clearly exposes how much of an obstacle they are to working class power in Los Angeles.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_02: So that's from that statement, which I encourage everyone to read.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_02: Now, like Edward was talking about with these Midwest candidates too.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_02: We have criticisms of a number of these campaigns, but it is very important for the left in LA and across the country to really draw a class line and have basic criteria to help counter all this confusion that DSALA and others have really created.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like what is a socialist candidate?
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think this campaign in LA is one way to do that, as well as the other campaigns that we've been discussing.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_03: And I think it's important to build these independent socialist campaigns because the better these campaigns do, the better position socialists working people are going to be in to face down Trump's attacks.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_03: I think also there's the reality that whatever comes out of these midterms is going to be the launching pad for what's the next election, right?
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_03: You never just have any time between them, right?
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_03: 2026 goes directly into 2028, where the left, inside and outside DSA, really lacks a candidate right now.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_03: And there is an immense amount of pressure within DSA in particular coming down in the direction of AOC as the candidate.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_03: DSA should support AOC's bid in the Democratic Party primaries in 2028.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_03: The most recent development in this was that Bread and Roses decided to endorse AOC, which leads you to seeing insane takes on Twitter.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_03: Like, uh, what was the one?
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_03: I was some some guy was saying something like, well, this is just like the Bolsheviks and the taking down the provisional government.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my God.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_03: It was like, it was not, it was, I know.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, I'm going crazy reading this press.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_02: Twitter will take any words that stick to it.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_03: To paraphrase Stalin, yes.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_03: These DSA Democrats, they're in these deep blue places, so they're probably gonna they're gonna win these elections, right?
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_03: And then the right has been showing all of this ever since Mam Dani won, right, as like proof of concept for what their political program is.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_03: And the left has not had a real response, right?
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_03: You can see it in the way that it's totally disorganized around this Nitya Rahman stuff.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_03: It's totally disorganized when Mam Dani gives millions of dollars to Zionist organizations or sends the cops to to beat up anti-ICE protesters, right?
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_03: So the left is completely disorganized.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_03: We're going into the next convention period.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_03: 2027 DSA convention is going to be in Chicago in August.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_03: And the NPC basically is going to be who decides an endorsement for DSA.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_03: Now is the time, really, between now and convention, is to really push forward a real strategy to stop this AOC endorsement, or if they do move to endorse AOC, to undo it at the convention.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_03: To throw a wrench in the in the workings of this machine, which is going to completely destroy any kind of movement for socialism by hitching it to this party of genocide.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we just get an actual working class candidate.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_03: We need an actual independent socialist candidate for 2028 that people can rally, rally behind, whatever our differences are.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_03: And that's really like a real United Front campaign is really what's in the offing for that.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_02: At our last United Front for a clean break national Zoom meeting, someone new to DSA asked what what the difference is between a clean break and a dirty break.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_02: There's dirty breakers in the DSA, and they present it like you can have both.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: You can support Democrats now to lay the basis for independence later.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_02: But we know you can't be both have both in the same way that you can't be both socialist and capitalist.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_02: This is just a left-sounding way to maintain the status quo.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_02: And in reality, what it leads to is just the same thing as the right, rehabilitating the Democratic Party.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_02: And that's what Mamdani is doing.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_02: So support to independent working class candidates in these elections and opposing the Democrats now is an immediate step that clean breakers can take to show which way forward.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_02: I listened to an interview with Sarah Milner.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_02: She's with Reform and Revolution caucus, and she's also on the MPC, the national leading body of DSA.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_02: She supports AOC for president, quote, critically.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_02: And she also talks about an independent campaign for AOC.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_02: Again, Orwellian.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_02: It was an interview with Geese magazine podcast.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: And she said that she's an unrepentant, dirty breaker.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_02: And then she's like trying to explain the problem with the clean break.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_02: She said, Imagine a whole bunch of people are like marching information, right?
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: And you're like, this guy at the front is leading us in a stupid direction.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_02: They're leading us off a cliff.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_02: This is going to be a disaster.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_02: If you leave and start walking in a different direction, but nobody follows you.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: Did you achieve a break?
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_02: Did you change things?
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_02: Did you lead people?
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_02: Or did you just separate yourself from everybody else?
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, well, actually, the duty of Marxist, real socialists, is to stop people from marching over a cliff into disaster.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_02: And to do that, there has to be a poll that says, wrong direction.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_02: Go this way instead.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_02: The more people that do that, the more disaster can be averted.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's why you should really help build the forces of clean breakers and help go the other direction.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_02: Dump the Democrats and wherever you can, vote independent socialists, vote working class.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really what real socialists have to be working for right now to avoid going over that cliff.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_03: It's very funny.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_03: It's like, I don't know that joining a bunch of people going over a cliff is much of a flex.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_03: It's quite the image.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_03: Let's all uh let's all jump off.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's very when you were a kid, your parents would be like, if everyone else did, you know.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_03: Would you too?
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_03: And the answer for the DSA left is yes.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, I would.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_03: I would go down like everyone else.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_03: Well, I think that's a very good way to conclude this episode of Give Me a Break.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_03: You can find all of our statements, petitions, resolutions, everything else we've been up to lately at our Linktree, which you can find at linktree.com slash DSA underscore just break already.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_03: You can get both our podcasts and our articles sent directly to you if you subscribe to our Substack, which is also on our Linktree.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_03: And follow us on social media at clean break now on X and at DSA underscore just break already on Instagram.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_03: We love getting your hate mail, love letters, debate challenges, comments, and criticisms.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_03: Send those along.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_03: Our DMs are always open.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_03: Share the podcast with your friends in DSA, your friends who hate DSA, and everyone else in between.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_03: And make sure to leave us a rating and a review wherever you get your podcasts.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_03: It helps us in the algorithm.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_03: And of course, last but not least, make sure you get out and vote for independent socialists next week.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_03: Midterms are on Tuesday.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: All right.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: See you next time.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_02: Bye.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_02: Bye.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Look in your heart.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: What the palmark say?
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: Say we need a clean breakup in the DSA.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: Or they could spoil the lot.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: Or we could bury the fakes.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's why we need a clean break in the DSA.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_01: We can split it apart.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_01: That old lip character.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: We need a break with the bells in the DSA.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_01: If you want a revolutionary DSA.